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Aegeus Society For Aegean Prehistory

ARTICLES | 2024

Articulate bodies: Forms and figures at Çatalhöyük

Carolyn Nakamura & Lynn Meskell In S. Nanoglou & L. Meskell (eds), The Materiality of Representation, Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 16.3 (September 2009): 205-230.

This paper examines the materializing practices of bodies at the Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük. We focus on the clay and stone figurine corpus (over 1,800 total, with over 1,000 of those being diagnostic), but also consider other media such as wall paintings and sculptured features, as well as the skeletal evidence.

The materiality of representation: A preface

Stratos Nanoglou In S. Nanoglou & L. Meskell (eds), The Materiality of Representation, Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 16.3 (September 2009): 157-161.

Issues of materiality are gaining ground in archaeology, although there are still conflicting views over the usefulness of the concept. Despite the controversy over the concept itself, all interlocutors converge in the need to focus on the material aspect of the world, on the material part of material culture. Historically, this could be seen as a counteraction to an overt emphasis upon the cultural as an intellectual construct that has dominated many recent attempts to reconstruct the past, but the move does not restrict itself to that. Accordingly, in this issue our understanding and use of the term is on the broadest level. It pertains to the “thingness” of things, to that aspect of things that gives them a material presence in the world.

New evidence on the religious use of Room 67 at Hala Sultan Tekke. A tribute to Paul Åström

Karin Nys, Melissa Samaes & Jan Coenaerts Journal of Prehistoric Religion XXII (2010): 57-61.

In 1988, the archaeological team under the direction of Paul Åström unearthed in Area 8 at Hala Sultan Tekke a building complex consisting of five rooms. Room 67 is the main room of this complex. The complex was interpreted as a sanctuary as its plan is considerable to that of sanctuaries at Kition and Enkomi.

Maternity, children, and ‘Mother Goddesses’ in Minoan iconography

Stephanie Lynn Budin Journal of Prehistoric Religion XXII (2010): 7-38.

This article reconsiders both the presence and role of maternal, kourotrophic, and child-oriented iconography in the Minoan repertoire. Contrary to the received wisdom, the only kourotrophic iconography in Minoan Crete is not a Mycenaean-influenced figural group from Mavrospelio cemetery, but a strongly Egyptianizing plaque from Monastiraki.

A rare Neolithic find from the Aegean: A fibre from Drakaina Cave, Kephalonia Island, W. Greece

Marie-Louise Nosch, Bridget Murphy, Bodil Holst, Irene Skals, Georgia Stratouli & Anaya Sarpaki Online article (http://www.drakainacave.gr)

The article publishes a neolithic fibre from Drakaina Cave (Kephalonia, Greece). This uncommon material was found in a rich archaeological unit of the eastern roofed part of the cave, particularly in the southern part of trench Δ5 , excavated in July 2004 and dated most probably to the late 6th millennium BC (radiocarbon dating is pending). Considering the nature of the deposit of this unit, it consisted mainly of ash and charcoal fragments alongside with burnt food remains, i.e. bones, seeds, as well other plant substance. There is little doubt that the unit represents, largely, the in situ remnants of a hearth. From the aforementioned unit/deposit, a soil sample (6 litres in sum) was collected for water flotation, in which the microscopic fibre was discovered.

Radiocarbon dating archaeological samples in the eastern Mediterranean, 1730 to 1480 BC: Further exploring the atmospheric radiocarbon calibration record and the archaeological implications

S.W. Manning & B. Kromer Archaeometry 53.2 (April 2011): 413–439.

The East Mediterranean Radiocarbon (Inter-)Comparison Project (EMRCP) has measured time series of radiocarbon ages for known age samples of German oak (GeO) and for samples from the near-absolutely placed Gordion juniper dendrochronology from central Anatolia. In this paper, we review the data for the calendar years from 1730 to 1480 bc, relevant in particular to controversy and debate concerning the absolute date of the Minoan eruption of the Santorini (Thera) volcano.

Seriphos surfaces: A study of copper slag heaps and copper sources in the context of Early Bronze Age metal production

M. Georgakopoulou, Y. Bassiakos & O. Philaniotou Archaeometry 53.1 (February 2011): 123-145.

Kephala and Phournoi, on the island of Seriphos, add to a growing number of EBA metal production sites identified in the south-central Aegean. Analytical examination of samples from the two sites addressed the technological parameters of the copper smelting process, indicating the use of mixed oxidic and sulphidic copper–iron ores to produce unalloyed copper with minute copper sulphide inclusions.

Lead isotopic analysis for the identification of Late Bronze Age pottery from Hala Sultan Tekke (Cyprus)

V. Renson, J. Coenaerts, K. Nys, N. Mattielli, F. Vanhaecke, N. Fagel & P. Claeys Archaeometry 53.1 (February 2011): 37-57.

Lead isotopic compositions were measured for 65 sherds from five pottery wares (Plain White, Coarse, Canaanite, White Slip and Base-ring) excavated from the Late Bronze Age site of Hala Sultan Tekke (Cyprus). The elemental composition and isotopic signature of the sherds were compared with those of 65 clay samples collected in south-east Cyprus, mainly in the surroundings (<20 km) of Hala Sultan Tekke.

The use of oxygen isotopes in sheep molars to investigate past herding practices at the Neolithic settlement of Çatalhöyük, central Anatolia

E. Henton, W. Meier-Augenstein & H.F. Kemp Archaeometry 52.3 (June 2010): 429–449.

This paper presents a pilot study designed to test the use of oxygen isotopes for investigating aspects of early herding practices in the Neolithic of western Asia, using the site of Çatalhöyük in central Anatolia as a case study. Time-sequenced δ18O values in dental enamel of archaeological sheep are assessed for post-depositional diagenetic effects and compared with seasonal δ18O meteoric water values in the region today. The evidence is used to indicate the environmental conditions in which individual sheep spent their first year, enabling management of breeding and birthing seasons, and movement to seasonal pastures, to be investigated.

Neolithic zoomorphic vessels from eastern Macedonia, Greece: Issues of function

C. Marangou & B. Stern Archaeometry 51.3 (June 2009): 397-412.

Five fragments of Late Neolithic clay zoomorphic vessels from northern Greece have been analysed for organic residues by gas chromatography – mass spectrometry. The results showed that the containers had been used in connection with a number of substances, in particular lower terpenoids, an oil or fat, possibly fossil fuel and in one case possibly beeswax

Representations of Knossos and Minoan Crete in the British, American and Continental Press, 1900-c. 1930

S. Sherratt Creta Antica 10/II (2009): 619-649.

The Arthur Evans archive in the Department of Antiquities of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford contains 11 volumes of newspaper and journal cuttings which cover the years from roughly 1900 to 1930. Many of them refer to Evans’ work at Knossos or to other aspects of the Minoan civilization. It seems probable that Evans himself amassed most of these cuttings, which number well over a thousand, and kept them in a largely unsystematised state. Despite the number and range of these cuttings, they cannot be regarded as comprehensive.

A Mediterranean Connection. Nuovi dati sulle relazioni tra Malta e Creta agli inizi dell’età del Ferro (A Mediterranean Connection. New data on the relations between Malta and Crete in the Early Iron Age)

Davide Tanasi Creta Antica 10/II (2009): 519-538.

The topic of the relations between the Maltese Archipelago and the Aegean in the Bronze Age and in the Early Iron Age has been neglected due to the scant evidence available. Recent research on unpublished pottery coming from several Middle and Late Bronze Age Maltese sites, held at the National Museum of Archaeology of Valletta, offered new data for the interpretation of a Mediterranean connection that linked Malta and Crete in the Early Iron Age. In this paper three classes of objects, extraneous to the local tradition and probably of Cretan derivation, coming from the excavations of the Borg in-Nadur temple and from the Borg in-Nadur culture layers of the Bahrija village, are discussed.

A Late Minoan III Propylon at Agia Triada

Nicola Cucuzza & Nils Hellnerr Creta Antica 10/II (2009): 501-518.

A survey of the area around the Stoà dell’Agorà at Agia Triada has identified an H-shaped Propylon. Built in LM III A against the northern wail of the Bastione, the structure was located at the entrance of the large Piazzale dell’Agorà. The Propylon has no good comparison in Minoan architecture; instead it has many similarities with the propylaia known in the Mycenaean palatial sites of Mainland Greece. The presence of a propylon (the only one known up to now in Crete) confirms the importance of Agia Triada in LM IIIA-B. Moreover, it enlarges our knowledge of the LM IIIA-B architecture and its relationship with the contem­porary architecture of Mainland Greece.

The Absolute Chronology of the Egyptian S.I.P.- New Kingdom transition and its implications for Late Minoan Crete

Tiziano Fantuzzi Creta Antica 10/II (2009): 477-500.

The textual/archaeological based absolute chronology for the end of the Second Intermediate Period, and the first part of the Egyptian XVIII Dynasty, has been much refined in several studies over the last two decades, and offers a good chronological datum-line which reflects significantly on the absolute chronology of LM I-II Crete, through both direct and indirect archaeological arguments.