Figurines of Neolithic Thessaly. A Presentation. Volume III: The A. Bastis Collection (Online Publication)
Laia Orphanidis & Zoi Malakasioti
City: Athens
Year: 2011
Publisher: Academy of Athens
Series: Academy of Athens Research Centre for Antiquity, Online Publications 2
Description: 234 p., numerous colour figures
From the introduction
Figurine material included in this Corpus follows the typological presentation of the first two volumes entitled respectively Figurines of Neolithic Thessaly I and II: it is distinguished in two main categories, heads and bodies (male, female or parts of them) each one of them comprising naturalistic and schematic figurines (according to their prevailing features) with easily discernible subcategories.
Figurines of the A. Bastis collection are surface finds, hence unstratified. They present additional problems in dating, since they formed part of a private collection for a long time before they were filed as acquisitions of the Volos museum. Thus there has been great loss of information data or no information at all even about their finding spot. On the other hand administrative obstacles or restrictions resulted to avoidance or even rejection of archaeometrical methods such as thermoluminescence, in order to prevent harmful impact on the objects. Consequently, in all cases the most reliable aids to dating have been typological comparisons with similar stratified material (in what concerns the general structure and decoration) and- in some cases- comparison of raw materials.