Minyans

In Greek mythology, the Minyans or Minyae (Greek: Μινύες, Minyes) were a group of legendary people who were the inhabitants of the city Orchomenus in Boeotia, and who were also associated with Thessaly. They were named after their eponymous ancestor, Minyas. In archaeology, the term "Minyans" has been applied to the Minyan ware excavated from Orchomenus, and is used to refer to an autochthonous group of Proto-Greek speakers inhabiting the Aegean region, though the degree to which the material culture in the prehistory of the area can be securely linked to the legendary people or language-based ethnicity has been subjected to debate and repeated revision. John L. Caskey's interpretation of his archaeological excavations conducted in the 1950s linked the ethno-linguistic "Proto-Greeks" to the bearers of the Minyan (or Middle Helladic) culture. More recent scholars have questioned or amended his dating and doubted the linking of material culture to linguistic ethnicity.