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SPARTA: MENELAION I – THE BRONZE AGEPublished by: British School at Athens Supplementary Volumes No. 45 This is the account of an excavation by the British School at Athens at the major Mycenaean settlement in the central Eurotas valley of Laconia, close to the site of ancient and modern Sparta, in the south-central Peloponnese. The site was first identified and partly explored by the British School (under its sixth Director, R. M. Dawkins) in 1909–10. This volume presents the results of fieldwork undertaken by the School in 1973–77, 1980 and 1985, led by the then Director, H. W. Catling. Excavation of the Mycenaean settlement concentrated on the upper part of the Menelaion ridge — comprising the North Hill, the Menelaion and Prophitis Elias Hills, and Aetos — covering an area of not less than 10 hectares. The ridge may have been first occupied during the Final Neolithic; there had certainly been a small Early Helladic settlement. All three hilltops had traces of Middle Helladic use, including several burials. Reinvestigation of the 1910 complex on the Menelaion Hill revealed superimposed ‘Mansions’, the earlier built in the 15th c. BC (LH IIB), the later in the earlier 14th c.(LH IIIA1). Their plans suggest prototypes for the much larger 13th c. palaces at Mycenae, Tiryns and Epano Englianos (Pylos). On the North Hill remains were damaged by severe erosion, but on Aetos a 15th–13/12th c. building sequence was associated with a ruined, once massive terrace wall. The present volume presents an exhaustive account of the Bronze Age structures (ca 50 in all) spread across the Menelaion Ridge. Detailed considerations of the stratigraphy and architecture are supported by approximately 175 plans and sections; a further 25 in-text illustrations elucidate specific features. The pottery from each deposit is presented in catalogue format, supported by statistical analyses, drawings and photographs. In addition, there is an overall appraisal of the ceramic finds, in relation to those attested elsewhere in mainland Greece and beyond. Also catalogued and discussed are ‘small finds’, including objects of metal, terracotta figurines, spinning and weaving equipment, and objects of stone. The few seals and sealings are described by H. Hughes-Brock. Painted wall plasters and architectural stone are also fully treated. A final chapter considers topographical and environmental issues, and places the Menelaion within the context of both Laconian and wider Aegean developments Much further information is gathered in CD-Rom form, including the 1910 excavation records and commentary; and full qualitative and quantitative tabulations of uncatalogued pottery. Appendices by R. E. Jones present technical analyses of plasters and pigments; XRF analysis of bronzes; the proton magnetometer survey; and chemical analyses of pottery (with J. Tomlinson). Further appendices concern human skeletal material (N. Brodie); and animal bone (G. Jones). Two volume set. Vol. 1. Text: xxxvi + 488. CD-Rom. Vol. 2. Figures & Plates: xviii + 348 plans / figures + 138 half-tones. ISBN: 9780904887594 Price: £205 + post/packing
(£143.5+ post/packing to individual Subscribers and Friends of the British School at Athens). |
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AYIOS STEPHANOSExcavations at a Bronze Age and Medieval Settlement in Southern LaconiaPublished by: British School at Athens Supplementary Volumes No. 44 Lord William Taylour’s excavations at Ayios Stephanos in 1959-77 investigated a port that relied on trade, fishing and metallurgy. It lay just north of the main Minoan east-west trade route via Kythera and exported the rare stone lapis lacedaemonius to Cretan workshops. As a Linear A inscription shows, the site illuminates the diffusion of Minoan culture to the mainland. Ayios Stephanos yielded a stratified pottery sequence from EH I to LH IIIC, with a break at the end of the Early Bronze Age. Study of this sequence has vastly improved our knowledge of the chronology, clarifying Cretan relations with the mainland. There were three phases of EH. After disastrous fires, rectangular buildings replaced the MH I apsidal dwellings, and the street plan came to resemble Minoan prototypes. The pottery illuminates the invention of Mycenaen ceramics. In line with the fortunes of Crete, the site declined in LH IIA, traded with Knossos in LH IIIA1, and declined again. It briefly revived in LH IIIC Early, probably following an influx of refugees. Then it was abandoned, perhaps after a massacre. Ayios Stephanos was reoccupied in c. 1270 AD, when a building with a walled yard and stables was erected to guard the approach to Skala along the River Vasilopotamos. This phase fills a gap in our knowledge, since no site of this period has been excavated south of Corinth. After 1321 a hostile raid plunged the site into oblivion. This publication studies the architecture and stratigraphy, the burials, the Medieval period, the pottery and small finds, the human and other organic remains, the settlement pattern and the regional and historical context. Numerous figures and plates document the results. Appendices containing techinical analyses, stratigraphic tables and concordances are on an accompanying CD ISBN: 9780904887587 Price: £150 + post/packing
(£105+ post/packing to individual Subscribers and Friends of the British School at Athens). |
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PALAIKASTRO: TWO LATE MINOAN WELLSPublished by: British School at Athens Supplementary Volumes No. 43 Editors: Hugh Sackett, Alexander Macgillivray, Jan Driessen When Sir Arthur Evans was establishing the chronology of the Minoan period at Knossos in the early twentieth century, Robert Carr Bosanquet and his team from the British School at Athens began to define the contemporary sequence at Palaikastro in eastern Crete. One of the aims of the recent British School excavations at Palaikastro is to refine the early excavator’s results and to explore social, political and environmental change within the Cretan Bronze Age. The discovery of two wells with undisturbed layers of the LM IB to LM IIIA2 periods (the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries BC) provided a rare opportunity to study the pottery chronology and development in detail, but also to look at diet, foreign connections, and religious practices at that time. One surprise was the discovery of the remains of several dogs related to the modern Cretan Tracer Hound. Another was part of an exquisite stone vase with dolphins carved in relief. This volume gives the first detailed template of LM IB to LM IIIA2 pottery at Palaikastro along with final reports on the wells’ excavation and complete contents by members of the international team of specialists who excavate at Palaikastro. Volume contents: 1. Introduction (L. H. Sackett, J. A. MacGillivray and J. M. Driessen); 2. Well 576: excavation and stratigraphy (S. M. Thorne); 3. Well 576: the pottery deposits and ceramic sequence (E. M. Hatzaki); 4. Well 605: Stratigraphy and Catalogue (J. A. MacGillivray); 5. The Late Minoan pottery (J. A. MacGillivray); 6. The ceramic petrography of LM III A2 conical cup fabrics (C. Doherty); The stone and terracotta finds (D. Evely); 8. The stamped seal impression on pot 251 (J. Weingarten); 9. The stone ‘horns of consecration’ or ‘twin peaks’ (J. A. MacGillivray); 10. The animal bones (S. Wall-Crowther); 11. Archaeobotanical observations (A. Sarpaki); 12. The fish remains (D. Mylonas); 13. Shells and snails (D. Reese); 14. Synthesis (L. H. Sackett and J. A. MacGillivray) pp xv + ca 245: figs. 113, tables 20, half-tone plates 47 ISBN: 9780904887570 ISBN: 9780904887570 Price: £79 + post/packing
(£55+ post/packing to individual Subscribers and Friends of the British School at Athens). |
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EXCAVATIONS AT PHYLAKOPI IN MELOS 1974-77Published by: British School at Athens Supplementary Volumes No. 42 Editors: Neil Brodie, Christine Morris, Chris Scarre Authors: Robin Barber, John Cherry, Jack Davis, Alec Daykin, Rachel E Evans, Lyvia Morgan, Penelope Mountjoy, Sarah Vaughan, David Williams, Nick Winder The excavations undertaken by the British School at Athens at the Bronze Age site of Phylakopi in the Cycladic island of Melos from 1896 to 1899, under the immediate supervision of Duncan Mackenzie, have been described (by no less an authority than Carl Blegen) as: ‘the first really serious effort to understand stratification, the first really good excavation in Greece’. Since that time Phylakopi has been a key site both for the study of the Cycladic Bronze Age and of prehistoric Aegean interconnections. This volume completes the authoritative account of the excavations undertaken for the British School of Archaeology from 1974 to 1977 under the direction of Colin Renfrew. Leading specialists contribute full descriptions of the stratigraphy, of the pottery of successive phases and of the other finds, now making Phylakopi one of the most comprehensively documented and published sites of the Aegean Bronze Age. Phylakopi was a settlement in close touch with other areas, notably Minoan Crete and Helladic Greece, from the Early Bronze Age onwards, with a marked increase in Minoan imports during the Middle Bronze Age. The chronology of the fortifications is here re-assessed in the light of stratigraphic associations. The painted plasters, now assigned to the Late Bronze I period, are also re-evaluated, as is the important central building of the time (with the find of a tablet fragment in the Minoan Linear A script). Significant material of the Mycenaean period is described in detail and supplements finds from the 1974–77 excavations published in The Archaeology of Cult: The Sanctuary at Phylakopi. BSA Suppl. 18 (London 1985). The growth of settlement in Melos has been outlined in C. Renfrew and J.M. Wagstaff (eds.), An Island Polity: the Archaeology of Exploitation in Melos (Cambridge 1982). With this new volume publication of the project now reaches completion, offering the documentation upon which earlier and more recent conclusions must rest. This work should stand for many years as the definitive account of this important Bronze Age site, one of the first proto-urban centres of the prehistoric Aegean. It offers much of the evidential basis needed for assessing the role of the Cyclades in the developing field of Aegean Bronze Age studies. Approx 540pp., 202 figs, 47 tables, 1 colour plate; 3 fold-outs; 61 half tones ISBN: 9780904887549 Price: £123 + post/packing
(£86+ post/packing to individual Subscribers and Friends of the British School at Athens). |
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KNOSSOS PROTOPALATIAL DEPOSITS IN EARLY MAGAZINE A AND THE SOUTH-WEST HOUSESPublished by: British School at Athens Supplementary Volumes No. 41 The crucial earliest phases of palatial Knossos are not well known, in part due to over-building by neopalatial structures and floors. This volume represents the first complete publication of substantial deposits dating to this period, specifically the Middle Minoan IB and IIA phases. This is a first not only for Knossos but for Crete as a whole, and will act as a crucial point of reference for future work on these key phases in the island’s prehistory. The five Protopalatial deposits in question, excavated in 1973, 1987 and 1992–93, are fully published with their contexts, the stratified pottery and ‘small finds’ — including the earliest inscribed clay document from Crete, clay sealings, horn-cores and chipped stone; radiocarbon dates are also presented. The deposits come from the south-west of the palace area, and provide evidence for a range of activities such as ceremonial feasting, workshop production and administration, as well as showing the early development of individual town dwellings on terraces just a few metres from the palace. The volume concludes with a full discussion of the form and function of the Old Palace, stressing that the plans laid down in the first 150 years were far more closely followed over the next 400 years than has hitherto been suspected. xiv+204pp., 49 plates ISBN: 9780904887532 Price: £68 + post/packing
(£48+ post/packing to individual Subscribers and Friends of the British School at Athens). |
