Situated intentions: providing a framework for the destruction of objects in Aegean prehistory

THRAVSMA

THRAVSMA

by K. Harrell & J. Driessen

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Contents

Fragmented souvenirs 15

Introduction to the volume

Jan Driessen

Kate Harrell

Fragmentation in Aegean Bronze Age context

John Chapman

Situated intentions 49

Providing a framework for the destruction of objects in Aegean prehistory

Stratos Nanoglou

The rough and the smooth 61

Care and carelessness in the forgetting of buildings

Carl Knappett

Damaged Pottery, Damaged Skulls at the Tsepi, Marathon Cemetery 75

Maria Pantelidou Gofa

Evidence for ritual breakage in the Cycladic Early Bronze Age 81

The Special Deposit South at Kavos on Keros

Colin Renfrew

Des biens de prestige grecs intentionnellement fragmentés dans un contexte indi-

gène de la Méditerranée occidentale au VIIe siècle av. J.-C. 99

Mario Denti

Coincident biographies 117

Bent and broken blades in Bronze Age Cyprus

Jennifer M. Webb & David Frankel

Piece Out 143

Comparing the Intentional Destruction of Swords in the Early Iron Age and the Mycenae Shaft Graves

Kate Harrell

Destruction and other material acts of transformation in Mycenaean funerary practice 155

Michael J. Boyd

Breaking Up the Past 167

Patterns of Fragmentation in Early and Middle Bronze Age Tholos Tomb Contexts in Crete

Giorgos Vavouranakis & Chryssi Bourbou

List of Illustrations

Fragmented souvenirs

Jan Driessen

Kate Harrell

Bits and pieces

John Chapman

Fig. 3.11. Two views of a fragment of the spout of an amethyst Triton

THRAVSMA. Contextualising the Intentional Destruction of Objects in the Bronze Age Aegean and Cyprus

8

Situated intentions

Stratos Nanoglou

The rough and the smooth

Carl Knappett

Damaged Pottery, Damaged Skulls at the Tsepi, Marathon Cemetery

Maria Pantelidou Gofa

Evidence for ritual breakage in the Cycladic Early Bronze Age

Colin Renfrew


9

in situ

6478 in situ

6478

6478

Des biens de prestige grecs intentionnellement fragmentés dans un contexte indigène de la Méditerranée

occidentale au VIIe siècle av. J.-C.

Mario Denti

e

e e


10

e

e e

Incoronata

Dinos

perirrhanterion

oinochoe

Incoronata

krateriskos

stamnos

askos askos

Coincident biographies

Jennifer M. Webb & David Frankel


11

et alii

et alii

et alii et alii

et alii

Archaeology 131


12

et alii

Piece Out

Kate Harrell

Destruction and other material acts of transformation in Mycenaean funerary practice

Michael J. Boyd

Breaking Up the Past

Giorgos Vavouranakis & Chryssi Bourbou


13

in situ micro-excavation

in situ

Situated intentions

Providing a framework for the destruction of objects in Aegean prehistory

Stratos Nanoglou

Introduction

the individual for at least the past thirty years and it makes perfect sense to probe such issues from diverse

angles bringing new perspectives on the lives of past people. This paper is an attempt to contribute to a better

understanding of the terms employed in the relevant discussions within Aegean prehistory and beyond and to do

so I will argue that it is essential to turn to the framework necessary for these notions and associated intentions

of framework was there in place and accordingly what kind of notions and intentions were possible and even

would have had to capitalise on that background during the third millennium BC.

In/completeness

the very postulated intention that lies behind the categorisation into complete or incomplete.


50

kind of time and a different kind of framework that enabled and sustained different ontologies. To do that I

.

A fragment of what?

presence of the deep sharp incision and the regularity and smoothness of the break make it probable that

e.g.

imply that this is anything but the most widely attested trend in Aegean prehistory and beyond today.

Situated intentions: providing a framework for the destruction of objects in Aegean prehistory

51

contribute to its materialisation either way.

For the moment we are bound to explore only practices of deposition and indeed very few instances

1

straightforward claim made by their users and an articulation that is sustained by all actants involved.

regimes were formed that allowed or enforced certain lines of action.


52

Contexts and conditions

buildings were covered with the new. There was no tangible evidence that the building had undergone several

organisation of the settlement. The focus on action I have highlighted suggests that one needs to act to keep it that


53

one that we have been accustomed to since early modernity and one that coincides with the presence of a particular

contexts I have been referring to produced objects that sustained an everlasting present as parts of an assemblage

It is within such a framework that intentions should be placed. I argue that we should situate intentionality within

ad hoc decision that would have probably seemed unintelligible.

Moving forward to the past

that the people using these artefacts were not able to invoke different levels of spatial associations at will or


54

For present purposes I will focus on a couple of types found in just a few sites in northeastern and eastern Thessaly

They presuppose something past.

It is interesting that this preoccupation with the past is tied up with the use of multiple materials. I have suggested

substances

Greece and furthermore it is reproduced to appropriate the associated values. That does not mean of course that the

such an argument.

in the background. This is then a very different framework from the one in the sixth millennium BC. This is a

substances here to refer to categories of matter that include but are not limited to what we call materials. Snow or blood are certainly


55

Preserving intentions

It is within this framework that the practices deployed in the third millennium BC should be placed. Several

than being constant. It is not stone per se

extends these conditions up to a certain point.

millennium BC and relates precisely to a gamut of practices that capitalise on the past as a material resource. It is

remains of and made possible a certain utilisation of that resource as a material focal point.

e.g.

e.g.

et alii

et alii

e.g.

et alii

et alii

et alii


56

3

the other hand for their deposition on Keros. It may be worth considering that the not-intact and not-reduced-to-

framework in place allowed or even compelled people to have.

infelicitous journey. Either way this is the place where intentions should be placed. This is the framework that

someplace else.

Appendix

e.g.

et alii


57

e.g.

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Situated intentions: providing a framework for the destruction of objects in Aegean prehistory

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