Approaching Levantine shores. Aspects of Cretan contacts with Western Asia during the MM-LM I periods

Annette Højen Sørensen Proceedings of the Danish Institute at Athens VI (2009): 9-55.

Abstract

This article presents an interdisciplinary approach to the study of the foreign relations of Crete towards the Levant and beyond, from their first en­counter to the end of the New Palace Period, with the main focus on the MM-LM I periods. The ar­chaeological material indicates contacts during the EM II and from the MM I period onwards, whilst the textual evidence strongly indicates direct royal connections perhaps from the Old Palace Period or early New Palace Period, and furthermore offers a mythological remembrance of these contacts dur­ing the Late Bronze Age. This article does not review the Western Asian imports in Crete as these have been extensively discussed by Cline, Lambrou-Phillipson and re­cently by Colburn. Neither does it lend the place for substantial theoretical discussions of trade and its mechanisms.