The mainland Bronze Age: the search for patterns

Pharos 20(1), 00-00. doi: 10.2143/pha.19.2.3015345© 2014 by pharos. all rights reserved.

The Mainland Bronze Age: the search for patterns1

Oliver DickinsOn

Abstract

This paper focuses on the Helladic region of Bronze Age Greece, taking in the southern Greek mainland and the nearest islands, but also pays some attention to Mycenaean connections and exchange activity outside this region, particularly beyond the Aegean, since these have a consid-erable bearing on our understanding of Mycenaean civilisation. New discoveries have tended to make a bigger contribution to our knowledge in recent years than new theories of interpretation. Such discoveries always tend to make the picture more complex, but they serve as a reminder that the state of our knowledge is rarely satisfactory, and that general explanations of the past are always vulnerable to falsification in the light of new discoveries, as some striking mainland examples have shown.

The individual nature of developments on the mainland is stressed. At its simplest the sequence may be defined as a pattern of alternation between ‘boom’, in the Early Helladic II and Mycenaean periods, and ‘bust’; but, while there are analogies between the Early Helladic II and Mycenaean ‘booms’, there is no clear sequential link between them. Instead, after the ‘bust’ at the end of Early Helladic II, mainland development clearly diverges from the wider Aegean sequence. The beginnings of the Mycenaean ‘boom’ reflect a quite individual develop-ment, and the mainland continues to show distinctive features until the final collapse of the ‘palace societies’ late in the Bronze Age. But it remains easier to see what happens over the long term than to explain it.

Keywords

Bronze age – Mycenaean – palatial.

1 This text is close to the spoken version, but some revision has proved necessary, and a revised abstract has been provided. Most illustrations that were used in the powerpoint that accompanied the paper have been replaced by short comments in the text, or by references in footnotes to the particu-lar images shown. I have provided footnote references mainly to very recent discussions and to mate-rial that is not likely to be well known; much of what I refer to should be familiar, and is covered in the sections on the different periods of mainland prehistory in Cullen 2001, Shelmerdine 2008 and Cline 2010.

97583_Pharos_20_1_05_Dickinson.indd 143 6/10/14 15:10

144 oliver dickinson

Introduction

I must confess that, having finally got this paper down to a reasonable size, I realise that it does not really fit the approach that I suggested in my original abstract. I have not pursued patterns as much as I originally intended, and I have spent more space on the pre-Mycenaean and early Mycenaean phases than on the Mycenaean palace period. But perhaps this is how it should be, since we know so much less about the earlier periods. What I now present will not be a full appraisal of recent advances in our understanding, but a somewhat disjointed alternation between comments on general trends and references to some remarkable discover-ies, some so new that their impact has hardly been registered, but so striking that any new account of the mainland Bronze age should take account of them.

By ‘mainland’ I understand the helladic region, that is, the mainland of Greece from Thessaly southwards and the nearest islands as shown in the map in Dickinson 1977. I will also be wanting to say something about Mycenaean activity outside this core area. My cut-off point will be the collapse of Mycenaean civilisa-tion around the end of Late helladic IIIB, c. 1200 BC, leaving the final Myce-naean phases to Irene Lemos.

When John Bintliff first sounded me out about participating in this collo-quium, he wrote: ‘I was hoping you might do the Bronze age of Mainland Greece: what’s new and interesting in recent years (as far as you are concerned).’ But the theme of the colloquium is the most significant advances in our knowl-edge, which is not quite the same thing. For instance, I found the recent discovery of the grave of a man who has been called the πολεμιστής της Aμφιλοχίας at Κouvaras phyteion (near amphilochia on the ambracian Gulf, in north-west Greece), extraordinarily interesting. The grave is a simple cist, but its occupant was provided with bronze greaves, many weapons, notably a very long Naue Type II sword with a gold-bound hilt, and most impressive of all, a gold kylix, the first of this advanced form ever found, surely the product of a palace period crafts-man.2 But is this more than just a spectacular find? I think it could be, and will return to it later.

2 I based this account on that published online by the newspaper Eleftherotypia on 1/10/2008, from which my illustration was taken, supplemented by valuable information from Dr Y. Galanakis, for which I am much indebted to him. The kylix does not resemble the Lh IIIa2–IIIB long-stemmed pottery shapes as closely as I had imagined from the illustration, but these provide the nearest analogies.


the mainland bronze age 145

The Early Bronze Age

an enormous amount of new data has appeared in the last ten to fifteen years, and a mass of publications of various kinds has accompanied it, and I certainly have not assimilated it all; I may be especially out of date on Early helladic. But these new discoveries, although they often fill out or clarify the picture, can produce as many questions as they solve. What are we to make, for instance, of the recognition that the strange incised pottery excavated at Olympia long ago by Dörpfeld belongs to the Cetina culture of the Dalmatian coast, which had wide maritime connections in the central Mediterranean?3 This connection dates to Early helladic III and early Middle helladic times, and may be a continuation of previous links between the aegean and adriatic; but what it signifies, why this pottery is only abundant and locally influential in the north-west peloponnese, and, most of all, why the connection stopped remain mysteries. Such mysteries are frustrating, when it seems likely that mainland and aegean prosperity derived largely from involvement in trade, but they are only too common in this field: we see the evidence for long-range contacts, but cannot easily decide how important they really were, economically or culturally. It is certainly premature to use them all as evidence for a World Systems Theory, core-periphery model.

another source of frustration that I want to mention, because it limits our picture of the early societies very significantly, is that we know virtually nothing about religious practice in the helladic region before the Mycenaean period, and not very much then. at least attention is now being given to ceremonial behaviour in the form of communal feasting, which might well have included a ritual element, but I feel this is a great gap in our knowledge.

If I had to choose one simple general phrase to describe how I see the pattern of development of the mainland Bronze age as a whole, it would be ‘boom and bust’. You might say, there’s nothing very remarkable in that; take a broad enough view and all Greek history can be seen in terms of periods of expansion and con-traction, as I suspect we will be told. But the mainland Bronze age has a distinc-tive feature, that between the first and second periods of ‘boom’, that is, mature Early helladic II and the bulk of the Mycenaean period, there is a period of recession so pronounced that the form which the Mycenaean development took was quite different from what we can suggest for Early helladic II.

at one time the explanation for this would have seemed simple – the ‘coming of the Greeks’. But ‘invasion hypotheses’ as a way of explaining cultural change have largely been abandoned, for their supposed explanations only raise further questions. In my opinion, it is not actually a very important question when the

3 Maran 2007, 14-16.



speakers of an Indo-European language that was to develop into Greek first arrived in the aegean, for, as the archaeological and historical record surely shows, the ancient Greeks became ‘Greek’ as a result of a long period of development in Greece, and in my opinion the most important part of that development took place after the Bronze age.

It seems possible to say very little that is not concerned with pottery, even now, about the Final Neolithic period that immediately preceded the Bronze age and about the Early helladic I phase, although together they covered as much time as the rest of the Bronze age put together. But there is one notable exception, the remarkable cemetery of Tsepi near Marathon, which seems to have begun at the end of Final Neolithic and continued in use for much of Early helladic. This has many interesting features, including evidence of far-flung contacts both in the aegean and overland to north Greece and beyond,4 but the most valuable is the mass of information on patterns of use. For these quite substantial tombs were very frequently used for multiple burials, up to 20 or more, and there is evidence for rituals concerning the remains of the older dead; they can, then, be loosely classified as ‘family tombs’. Comparable cemeteries of Early helladic I or II date in which tombs of various types were used on several occasions have now been identified at a number of sites, mostly in attica and central Greece.5 here, then, a pattern may be detectable, suggesting that Early helladic society, at least at sizeable settlements, consisted of extended families or kin groups. The variations in the quality of grave-goods found in different tombs suggest that these families might differ in status, but the material cannot easily be interpreted as forming a definable hierarchy, with a ‘chief’ at the top, although the major settlements of Early helladic II have been described as the likely centres of ‘chiefdoms’.

In fact, we remain ignorant of how these major settlements evolved, but a hier-archy of sites had clearly developed by mature Early helladic II. Lerna is of course the premier example of a leading centre, and the house of the Tiles of its final phase was the first of the class known as ‘corridor houses’ to be discovered; several other certain examples have now been identified, but the type is not found at all major sites (Tiryns, for example, has the famous ‘Rundbau’).6 The house of the Tiles, incautiously called a palace by Caskey, was later suggested by Martha heath Wiencke to be the possible residence of a chief, who collected taxes and stored them for redistribution. But more recently, following detailed analysis of the pot-tery and large group of sealings found, she has argued that, among other activities,

4 pantelidou-Gofa 2005 publishes 30 tombs; see AR 43 (2007-2008), 9 for very early material, and 10, fig. 10 for a recent plan; for northern contacts see Forsén 2010, 56, 58 (a ‘Bratislava lid’).5 See Cavanagh & Mee 1998, 16-19 on stone-built graves and rock-cut chamber tombs. More exam-ples have been found since this publication, e.g. chamber tombs at Thebes.6 On ‘corridor houses’, especially the house of the Tiles, see most recently pullen 2008, 32-35.



communal feasting involving some 70 persons could have taken place in a major room, with more feasters in a courtyard outside, and the sealings may come from containers of materials that each person contributed to the feast.7 however, such groups of sealings have not been found in association with the other ‘corridor houses’. But they have been found in quantity at two new sites, at petri near Nemea and Geraki in Laconia; the latter, despite its relative remoteness, was clearly an important site with a substantial fortification.8 as at Lerna, these sites have produced evidence for a number of different seal-users, which suggests that authority was spread among a group of leading persons, maybe heads of the extended families or kin groups, in a form of oligarchy, rather than concentrated in the hands of a ‘chief’.9 The possibility that dominant personalities might arise sometimes cannot be ruled out – was the gold sauceboat bought by the Louvre as early as 1887, so surely genuine, from the grave of a ‘chief’? – but these are likely to have been exceptions, like the ‘tyrants’ of archaic times.

The source of the wealth that finds like the sauceboat represent was probably closely linked with exchange, as in the contemporary Cyclades. Evidence is accu-mulating for extremely wide-ranging webs of interconnections in the aegean and central Mediterranean, but these have to be traced through the distribution of some very distinctive but rare types of artefact, and all they can do is remind us that Early helladic Greece was part of a wider world.10 More substantial in quantity is the evidence for considerable anatolian influences in pottery and metal-working in the late stages of Early helladic II and contemporary phases in the Cyclades and north aegean, associated especially with Lefkandi on Euboea and Kastri on Syros. On the mainland, typical pottery is often found alongside typical Early helladic II forms, as at Thebes.11 This variety of contexts makes its appearances difficult to interpret, to put it mildly, and a further complication is that the connections of the pottery appear not to be with one area of western anatolia only.12

The Early helladic II ‘bust’ or collapse seems to have involved some kind of social breakdown that may have resulted in violence at some sites and certainly led to the abandonment of many others, especially small sites that may have held only a few families or have been isolated farms. These are interesting parallels with

7 Wiencke 1989, 504, and 2011. On Geraki see most recently AR 57 (2010-2011), 21.8 Krzyszkowska 2005, 37.9 I am grateful to John Bintliff for drawing my attention to the suggestion that the society repre-sented by the R graves on Lefkas had such a structure, in Kilian-Dirlmeier 2005, a book to which I should have paid more attention.10 See Maran 2007, especially 9 and 16-17. 11 See pullen 2008, 35 on the pottery.12 I base this comment on Dr David French’s discussion of the pottery of Lefkandi I, now close to publication.



what happened much later in the Mycenaean collapse, but if ‘invaders’ are ruled out we remain in the dark about the causes, though it is now being suggested that this was connected with a general worsening of the climate, thought to have occurred in the late third millennium.13 But the course of events on the mainland must have been complicated, for the destructions and abandonments that are likely signs of trouble are spread over a long period of time, into Early helladic III, in fact.14 But one thing is clear: with one striking exception, the previous lead-ing centres survived, if at all, as no more than substantial villages, without any remarkable features such as central buildings. The exception is Kolonna on aigina, which seems to have suffered destruction but remained a fortified settlement, close in character to the aegean towns, with a central building, the Large Building Complex, founded early in Middle helladic and extended later.15

Why aigina should have survived the disturbances that afflicted the rest of the helladic region is another mystery, but it became very important in the Middle helladic period, to judge from the quantities of different forms of aiginetan pottery distributed widely in the eastern mainland; I suspect its traders may have acted as middlemen, gathering mainland products for feeding in bulk into the aegean networks. a very noteworthy find from a pit close to the Large Building Complex is a pair of cylinder seals of apparently local clay.16 Their form is origi-nally Near Eastern, and their unique decoration may well have Near Eastern links, enhancing the evidence for aigina’s important foreign contacts. But as I have said, aigina is exceptional.

Middle Helladic Greece

a great deal of new information about Middle helladic Greece was presented at the MESOhELLaDIKa conference, but to my mind the best attempts to under-stand Middle helladic society as a whole are those of Sofia Voutsaki and Jim Wright, presented most recently in Shelmerdine 2008 and Cline 2010 respective-ly.17 Sofia Voutsaki argues for a stable, conservative society based on the kin group, whose whole ethos was opposed to excessive display of differences of wealth or status; this might help to explain why for several centuries Middle helladic society seems effectively static. Jim Wright accepts that society was essentially stable, but

13 pullen 2008, 36; Broodbank 2008, 69.14 See Forsén 1992 for much detail, also 2010, 61 for relevant comments.15 Gauss et al. 2011, 9, fig. 2 – a notably less impressive plan than the house of the Tiles. 16 Shown in philippa-Touchais et al. 2010, 174, figs. 7-8. 17 These were first presented at the Mycenaean Seminar in 2001, cf. BICS 45 (2001), 82-84; further comments are made in Wright 2004 (especially 70-73 on factions), 2008 (especially 239, 244. on Big Men) and 2010 (especially 814-815), and in Voutsaki 2010, 107-108.



lays stress on a potentially disruptive element, the ‘men of renown’ who might gain prominence through their actions as individuals, for example as hunters, warriors, or sea-farers. These would be likely leaders of factions, engaged in a constant struggle to maintain and increase their prominence, maybe extending their activities to a whole district – a new but perhaps less stable form of the oligarchy that might be suggested for Early helladic society, in fact, but more readily recognisable because they displayed their prominence in bigger houses, richer or more elaborate graves, or unusual possessions like boar’s tusks.

I find this an attractive theory because it provides a plausible background for the major social changes that began in late Middle helladic times. But I feel bound to comment that neither Jim’s nor Sofia’s theory can easily accommodate strange burials like those in the two Kastroulia tumuli, close to the major site Ellinika, some ten km north of Kalamata.18 These are remarkable for their early date – many pots have parallels in the ‘Middle helladic I’ phase of Nichoria – and for their rich grave-goods, particularly those of the two female burials found, one in each tumulus. Both were provided with pottery and ornaments, including unique bronze plate items resembling miniature double axes; but the goods with the female burial in Tumulus 2 are most striking, for they included over 30 pots – an extraordinary quantity when many Middle helladic burials held none at all, and those provided with pottery normally held only one or two examples. This burial, identified as a 16-19 year old girl, was further singled out by a rectangular platform of stone pebbles, laid out about 1 m above it. an adult male was buried in the same tumulus with pottery, a dagger and a knife, but further from the centre and without any platform over him.

Something strange, surely ritual, is going on here. The girl seems too young to be some kind of priestess, but did she have some other kind of high ritual status? Does the pottery, which has been described by Jörg Rambach as a ‘full set of tableware’,19 suggest that she was to provide a feast for the ancestors? This can only be speculation, but the find does suggest that ritual status could make a person look as prominent archaeologically as any ‘man of renown’, and it illustrates the problems of interpreting the Middle helladic tumuli. although they must surely have been intended for persons of special status, since it would take the labour of more than one family to construct them, it would be dangerous to make assump-tions about the basis for that status.

It seems reasonable that some further stimulus would be needed to make low-level faction struggles of the kind imagined by Wright so competitive that they led to the development of a much more obviously hierarchical form of society.

18 Rambach 2007.19 Rambach 2007, 147.



here I should mention Sofia Voutsaki’s idea, that increasing contact with the vastly more complex Minoan civilisation gave impetus to social upheaval. While the evidence for such contact is clearest in the argolid, as she notes, knowledge of what was going on there could have led to emulation by ambitious individuals in other regions, for although they used differing kinds of tomb these developing elites were clearly in contact. They can be seen to favour many of the same sym-bols of status, such as Type a swords and ornamental daggers, vessels of precious metal, especially gold drinking vessels, massive copper vessels of shapes suitable for major feasts, and gold plate dress ornaments. aigina may well have set an example here, since its ‘warrior burial’, which has several of these features, seems earlier than any comparable mainland graves.20 What sticks out from the mainland exam-ples as well as aigina is how each burial was treated as an individual; this surely continues the ‘men of renown’ pattern, though women were certainly included. This concentration on the individual may fairly be seen as a characteristic feature of the new society, traceable in various ways through the Mycenaean period.

This feature is, of course, typical of the Shaft Graves, and while speaking of them I would like to mention a very recent development, in which I have played a part. Following the rediscovery by Lena papazoglou of the Grave VI skeletons, misplaced for many years in the National Museum, all the bones retained as from Circle a graves were re-studied by Jonathan Musgrave and argyro Nafplioti and the results have been published in joint articles in BSA 104–5 (2009–10). In these Lena papazoglou quoted sections from the reports of panayiotis Stamatakis, appointed by the archaeological Society to supervise Schliemann. I was asked to provide some assessment of the new data for a final article. The results of the re-study are dramatic enough, but a comparison of Schliemann’s account of the graves’ excavation with Stamatakis’s notes has produced even more startling con-clusions. Stamatakis was clearly present throughout, unlike Schliemann, and his notes are a goldmine of primary data, including schematic plans of the graves, that specialists studying the Shaft Graves thought they would never have. I will say now, these notes make clear that Schliemann’s account is not always trustworthy, as you can see from comparing his account with what is cited in BSA 105 (2010).21

Mycenaean Greece

In considering the Shaft Graves we slip almost without noticing it into the early Mycenaean period, which is appropriate, for the dividing line between Middle and Late helladic is particularly artificial: many features that might be considered

20 Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997; for the goods see pl. 3, for some of the best pottery 58, fig. 27.21 For more, see now BSA 107 (2012).



‘Mycenaean’ appeared before the Mycenaean decorated pottery style, which pro-vides the technical beginning of Late helladic. I would emphasise that there is no evidence to suggest that the new leaders made any attempt to turn their capitals into something like aegean towns, let alone to emulate the advanced administra-tive practices of Minoan Crete, and the sources of their evident wealth remain unclear, although long-distance trade probably played a role. It is highly relevant that Late helladic I–II pottery has been found in the north aegean at Torone, like imported Middle helladic wares before it,22 and that a range of mainland wares, decorated and plain, has been identified at widely separated sites in the central Mediterranean, especially in the Lipari or aeolian islands, on Vivara, and in southeast Sicily.23 The importance of this westward connection, in particular, is suggested by the quantities of amber found at Mycenae and other mainland centres.

There have been many remarkable finds of the full Mycenaean period. It is no real surprise that such finds occur at known leading centres, such as the evidence from Mycenae that Linear B was already in use in Late helladic IIIa2. Tiryns shows much evidence of Near Eastern and probably Italian contacts; Thebes has produced a whole Linear B archive and many other finds; a new study of the pylos frescoes has identified new themes, a ship scene and a female archer;24 and most recently evidence has been identified for many buildings within the circuit at Gla, in areas long believed to be empty (Figure 1).25 But the most striking new development is surely the discovery of ayios Vasileios south of Sparta, which has a strong claim to be considered the major palatial site of central Laconia.26 Its importance may have begun during the Middle to Late helladic transition, but the major finds so far date well within the Mycenaean period, including five widely scattered fragments of Linear B tablets, covering familiar topics, evidence of large building complexes, and associated with them many fresco fragments. The frescoes evidently showed many familiar subjects; some may come from miniature battle scenes (Figure 2).27

22 Morris 2009-2010, 43 (Middle helladic), 53. 23 On this material see most recently Merkouri 2010, which reports material from many sites apart from those on Vivara, including Monte Grande, a most productive site near agrigento in Sicily (the relevant material is published in detail in Castellana 2000). 24 On the archer see Brecoulaki et al. 2008; a publication on the ship scene is forthcoming.25 I thank prof. Christofilis Maggidis for providing this illustration and permission to use it. Up-to-date information on Gla will be found at http://glas-excavations.org, and reports were submitted to AJA and ArchEph in 2012.26 Reports in AR 56 (2009-2010), 43 and AR 57 (2010-2011), 23 give some details.27 I thank Dr adamantia Vasilogamvrou for providing this illustration and permission to use it. another piece showing a helmeted head, which I also showed as illustration for my paper, was found 350 m from Figure 2 and is clearly from a different composition.



Figu

re 1.

View

of G

la, in

corp

orati

ng fe

atures

unc

overe

d by

geo

phys

ical s

urve

y in

201

1; by

perm

issio

n of

pro

fesso

r C. M

aggid

is



This discovery of Linear B in a new part of Mycenaean Greece is not unique, for two tablet fragments are now reported from Volos, to go with two inscribed items from the Dhimini building.28 There is also a tablet fragment from Iklaina in Messenia, close to pylos. This last find seems particularly significant, for, together with the inscribed sealings found at Midea in the argolid, it offers strong mainland evidence that Linear B could be written at secondary centres. Iklaina too has produced evidence of substantial buildings and frescoes, while at Dhimini we are now familiar with what looks like an administrative complex, with evidence for large-scale storage and likely ceremonial or ritual rooms, but no frescoes or special architectural features.29

But of equal potential significance has been the concentration of important new finds in the Saronic Gulf region, which emphasises what an important role it may

28 I here alter my spoken text significantly, since it has been rightly pointed out to me by Dr Vassilis petrakis, whom I thank for his comment, that the ‘inscription’ on the lintel of the Kazanaki tholos near Volos, which I had cited, is a jumble containing no words. For Linear B from Dhimini, see pantou 2010, 386-387, with a comprehensive plan on 388 fig. 5. 29 For recent reports on Iklaina see AR 55 (2008-2009), 35-37 and AR 56 (2009-2010), 51.

Figure 2. Fresco fragment from Building B at ayios Vasileios; by permission of Dr a. Vasilogamvrou



have continued to play, even after aigina was displaced as a leading centre. Earli-est is a strange little fortified acropolis on Megali Magoula near Galatas, and near it two Mycenaean tholos tombs and a proto-tholos.30 The proto-tholos, a circular chamber built wholly above ground which may not have been fully domed in stone, contained pottery that appears to date in the transitional Middle to Late helladic or early Late helladic I period. Together with a reported Late hel-ladic I tholos near Corinth, this threatens to overturn the theory, which I have previously supported, that the Mycenaean tholos tomb type was developed in Messenia.

Then we have large portions of the plans of two whole Mycenaean townships, which have been discovered by the Saronic harbours project in the eastern Corin-thia (most notably Korfos-Kalamianos, a fortified site),31 while at Kanakia on Salamis there is a series of major structures, datable mainly to Late helladic IIIB, which have produced notable finds, including a copper ingot fragment.32 another find with a different kind of significance is the shrine complex at ayios Konstan-tinos on Methana, a welcome addition to the few definite Mycenaean cult sites. This has many remarkable features – the types of dedicated figurine suggest that it was for a specialised cult – but perhaps the most significant element, because it is something new, is the evidence for burnt animal sacrifice (mostly of young pigs), a rite which many, including myself, have believed not to be a Mycenaean practice.33

But finds from pylos and Mycenae have now been adduced as evidence of this practice, and most recently we have the amazingly rich material from the sanctu-ary of Zeus on Mt. Lykaion in arcadia.34 This was clearly a cult site, where a major rite was the burning of animals’ thigh-bones, mainly sheep and goats, on an ash altar made up of the bones, although figurines and much pottery were evidently dedicated also. The stratification suggests that this rite was practised continuously in much the same way from at least Late helladic IIB down to hellenistic times. accepting this will surely require reconsidering the whole his-tory of a rite central to later Greek religion.

as is well known, in the 14th and 13th centuries BC the Mycenaean world expanded enormously: many aegean islands and part of southwest anatolia became effectively Mycenaean, and Mycenaean trading activity can be traced all over the eastern Mediterranean, and increasingly widely in the central Mediter-

30 Konsolaki-Yiannopoulou 2010, especially 72-73 on the tombs.31 On these sites see now Tartaron et al. 2011. My illustration combined AR 55 (2008-2009), 9 figs. 8-9. 32 AR 50 (2003-2004), 9-11, fig. 12.33 hamilakis & Konsolaki 2004.34 I am grateful to prof. Mary Voyatzis, co-director of the project, for permission to mention details. See also AR 57 (2010-2011), 25 for brief comments.



ranean. In apulia, Roca Vecchia, an important fortified site, has produced extraor-dinary quantities of Mycenaean and Mycenaean-related material, down to Late helladic IIIC: 5000 pieces was the figure cited in a publication of 2008.35 But the distribution of evidence only extends a certain way up the adriatic; it is still lacking for the upper eastern coast of Italy and from the whole eastern adriatic beyond albania. Similarly, in the Balkans, there is nothing certain beyond Bulgaria, and this material could easily have spread through local contacts between the coast and inland.36 The distribution of copper ingot fragments in and near the Black Sea coast could easily be the work of east Mediterranean traders, since there is east Mediterranean material at Troy, but double axes and other bronzes may well reflect some direct Mycenaean connection; anthony harding notes a Type Eii blade in the Sarköy hoard in the Dardanelles.37 But claims of strong Myce-naean influence in central and even northern Europe remain, in my view, totally dubious, often based on extremely suspicious material, like a supposed Linear B inscription written on a piece of amber!

But in many ways the most significant development relevant to Mycenaean involvement with the outside world is the demonstration by hawkins38 that there is no realistic alternative to placing the anatolian part of the kingdom of ahhiyawā, with which hittite kings of the 13th century BC had a frequently strained relation-ship, in precisely the region that was most heavily Mycenaeanised in western ana-tolia, where the major centre Millawanda can be identified with Miletus. I have therefore accepted that ahhiyawā must represent one of the leading states of Mycenaean Greece, wielding significant power in the aegean; I think that its capital was probably Mycenae, though Thebes cannot be ruled out. That the hit-tite king could write to the king of ahhiyawā in the diplomatic style normal between the great kings of the Near East says a lot about the level of sophistication of the greatest Mycenaean centres, and incidentally confirms that the king of ahhiyawā, presumably a wanax, was like a Near Eastern monarch, not something which can be assumed unhesitatingly, despite all the kings in homer and Greek legend generally.

This hardly supports Susan Sherratt’s view that Mycenaean civilisation was no more than a superficial, half-understood imitation of its Minoan predecessor; rather, it had its own very distinctive character.39 But I am not sure that we fully understand the nature of the ‘palace societies’, even now, and fear that we

35 Referred to in Guglielmino et al. 2011, 174.36 I thank Mrs Diana Doncheva for providing copies of the maps in Doncheva 2011, that were used as illustrations.37 For this material see harding 2007, especially 51 on Sarköy.38 hawkins 1998.39 as argued in Sherratt 2001, especially 229-230.



continue to make unwarranted assumptions, given the very patchy nature of the Linear B sources on which our understanding is based. Were the palace societies, in fact, all as similar in organisation as the standard account suggests? against this one could cite the continued failure to find a palace ‘megaron’ at Thebes, which, like most of Boeotia, lacks tholos tombs, and also the lack of evidence for a ‘central archive’ anywhere except pylos.

how common were ‘palace societies’ on the mainland, in fact, and how far did their power extend? The presence of Linear B material strongly suggests that cen-tral Laconia and eastern Thessaly should be added to the short list of territories – the argolid, Messenia, Boeotia – where there is good evidence for such societies; but I find maps such as that shown in Galaty & parkinson 2007, fig. 1.1, admit-tedly intended to be schematic, quite misleading. On the analogy of what we know about the contemporary Near East, each of the ‘palace societies’ could have been surrounded by a halo of less organised political units, which might range in nature from principalities with an established ruler to loose tribal groupings, and might be dependents, allies, or potential enemies of the ‘palace societies’. Birgitta Eder has produced an interesting argument that sealstones of this period found in the more northern parts of the mainland, up to Spathes beyond Mt Olympus, indicate some kind of controlling relationship between the palace societies and northern communities.40 This seems to me a much more plausible way to envisage the Mycenaean world.

Concluding remarks

Which brings us back, finally, to the πολεμιστής της Aμφιλοχίας. I do not believe this man was a ‘Mycenaean’ in the sense that inhabitants of the southern main-land were Mycenaeans. What Mycenaean of such evidently high rank would have himself buried in a small cist?41 No, I believe that he was a leader, perhaps the ruler, of what I will call a semi-Mycenaean society. There is increasingly clear evidence for such societies in a whole arc across the north mainland, from aetolia and Epirus across to Macedonia. These groups might well have spoken Greek or something very close to it; they valued luxury items and Mycenaean weapons acquired from the south,42 and imported and imitated certain types of Mycenaean pottery. But they did not have a developed Mycenaean pottery industry, they did

40 Eder 2007. 41 Its dimensions are reported as 1.50 x 0.60 m.42 The illustration combined the Type F short sword from Liatovouni (AR 1999-2000, 66, fig. 92), and a Type G sword and dagger from Spathes, Olympos (Demakopoulou 1988, 136).



not apparently share the ritual practices involving Mycenaean figurines, and they chose to bury even their most important dead in cists and pits.

This is not the place to discuss the Collapse of the palace societies in detail, but I will say that I see it as a lengthy process, which was started and pushed on by an accumulation of unfavourable factors. These could include adverse developments in the conditions of trade on which much of Mycenaean prosperity depended, tensions resulting from this that led to social unrest and wars between and within the most important states, coincidental natural disasters like droughts and earthquakes which could cause major disruptions locally – and, one could easily add, opportunistic raids from the poorer Mycenaeans on the fringes of the palace societies and the semi-Mycenaean groups of the northern mainland. perhaps the gold kylix buried with the πολεμιστής was originally a piece of loot – and perhaps such men, sometimes, led their people to occupy lands in the south, whether invited or not, like the albanians of late medieval times.

o.t.P.k. dickinsonDurham University

[email protected]

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the Netherlands archaeological Institute and John Bintliff for inviting me to speak at this colloquium, and my wife Tania for doing almost all the work creating the powerpoint.

Referencesbrecoulaki, h., zaitoun, c., davis, J. and stocker, s. 2008. an archer from the

palace of Nestor in pylos. Considerations on a wall-painting fragment in the Chora Museum, Hesperia 77, 363–397.

broodbank, c. 2008. The Early Bronze age in the Cyclades. In: C.W Shelmerdine (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Aegean Bronze Age, Cambridge, 47-76.

castellana, g. 2000. La cultura del Medio Bronzo nell’ agrigentino ed i rapporti con il mondo miceneo, agrigento.

cavanagh, W. & c. mee 1998. A Private Place: Death in Prehistoric Greece, Jonsered.cline, e.h. (ed.) 2010. The Oxford Handbook of the Bronze Age Aegean, Oxford.cullen, t. (ed.) 2001. Aegean Prehistory. A review, Boston.demakoPoulou, k. (ed.) 1988, O Μυκιναϊκός Κοσμος. Πέντε Αιώνες Προιμού

Ελληννικού Πολιτισμού 1600-1100 π.Χ., athens.dickinson, o.t.P.k. 1977. The Origins of Mycenaean Civilisation, Göteborg.doncheva, d. 2011. Ein Blick von Norden: Einflüsse der mykenischen Welt auf den

thrakischen Raum. In: F. Blakolmer, C. Reinholdt, J. Weilhartner, & G. Nightin-gale (eds), Österreichische Forschungen zur Ägäischen Bronzezeit 2009, Vienna, 81-95.



eder, b. 2007. The power of seals: palaces, peripheries and territorial control in the Myce-naean world. In: I. Galanaki, h. Tomas, Y. Galanakis & R. Laffineur (eds), Between the Aegean and Baltic Seas. Prehistory across Borders, Liège, 34-47.

Forsén, J. 1992. The Twilight of the Early Helladics. A Study of the Disturbances in East-Central and Southern Greece towards the End of the Early Bronze Age, Jonsered.

Forsén, J. 2010. Mainland Greece. In: E.h. Cline (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the Bronze Age Aegean, Oxford, 53-65.

galaty, m.l. & W.a. Parkinson (eds.) 2007. Rethinking Mycenaean Palaces II, Los ange-les.

gauss, W., m. lindblom, & r. smetana 2011. The Middle helladic Large Building Complex at Kolonna. a preliminary view. In: W. Gauss, M. Lindblom, R. angus, K. Smith, & J.C. Wright (eds) 2011, Our Cups Are Full: Pottery and Society in the Aegean Bronze Age, Oxford, 76-87.

guglielmino, r., F. iacono & m. rugge 2011. Before the stream: the social and eco-nomic role of exotica in the Central Mediterranean. The case of the ivories from Roca. In: a. Vianello (ed.), Exotica in the Prehistoric Mediterranean, Oxford & Oakville, 172-185.

hamilakis, y. & e. konsolaki 2004. pigs for the gods: burnt animal sacrifices as embod-ied rituals at a Mycenaean sanctuary, OJA 23, 135-151.

harding, a.F. 2007. Interconnections between the aegean and continental Europe in the Bronze and Early Iron ages: moving beyond scepticism. In: I. Galanaki, h. Tomas, Y. Galanakis, & R. Laffineur (eds), Between the Aegean and Baltic Seas. Prehistory across Borders, Liège, 48-56.

haWkins, J.d. 1998. Tarkasnawa king of Mira, ‘Tarkondemos’, Boğazköy sealings and Karabel, AS 48, 1–31.

kilian-dirlmeier, i. 1997. Das mittelbronzezeitliche Schachtgrab von Ägina, Mainz.kilian-dirlmeier, i. 2005. Die bronzezeitlichen Gräber bei Nidri auf Leukas, Bonn. konsolaki-yiannoPoulou, e. 2010. The Middle helladic establishment at Megali

Magoula, Galatas, Troizinia. In: a. philippa-Touchais, G. Touchais, S. Voutsaki & J. Wright (eds), MESOHELLADIKA. The Greek Mainland in the Middle Bronze Age, athens, 67-76.

krzyszkoWska, o. 2005. Aegean Seals. An Introduction, London.maran, J. 2007. Seaborne contacts between the aegean, the Balkans and the central

Mediterranean in the 3rd millennium BC: the unfolding of the Mediterranean world. In: I. Galanaki, h. Tomas, Y. Galanakis, & R. Laffineur (eds), Between the Aegean and Baltic Seas. Prehistory across Borders, Liège, 3-21.

merkouri, c. 2010. Mh III/Lh I pottery from Vivara (Gulf of Naples, Italy): a contribu-tion to the understanding of an enigmatic period. In: a. philippa-Touchais, G. Touchais, S. Voutsaki & J. Wright (eds), MESOHELLADIKA. The Greek Main-land in the Middle Bronze Age, athens, 1025-1035.

morris, s.P. 2009-2010. Prehistoric Torone: a Bronze Age emporion in the Northern Aegean. Preliminary report on the Lekythos excavations 1986 and 1988-1990, MeditArch 22/23, 1-68.

Pantelidou-goFa, m. 2005. Tσέπι Mαραθώνος. Tο πρωτοελλαδικό νεκροταφείο, athens.Pantou, P.a. 2010. Mycenaean Dimini in context: investigating regional variability and

socioeconomic complexities in Late Bronze age Greece, AJA 114, 381–401.



PhiliPPa-touchais, a., g. touchais, s. voutsaki, & J. Wright (eds) 2010. MESO-HELLADIKA. The Greek Mainland in the Middle Bronze Age, athens.

Pullen, d. 2008. The Early Bronze age in Greece. In: C.W. Shelmerdine (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Aegean Bronze Age, Cambridge, 19-46.

rambach, J. 2007. Investigations of two Mh I burial mounds at Messenian Kastroulia (near Ellinika, ancient Thouria). In: F. Felten, W. Gauss & R. Smetana (eds), Middle Helladic Pottery and Synchronisms, Vienna, 137-150.

shelmerdine, c.W. (ed.) 2008. The Cambridge Companion to the Aegean Bronze Age, Cambridge.

sherratt, s. 2001. potemkin palaces and route-based economies. In: S. Voutsaki & J. Killen (eds), Economy and Politics in the Mycenaean Palace States, Cambridge, 214-238.

tartaron, t.F., d.J. Pullen, r.k. dunn, l. tzortzoPoulou-gregory a. dill & J.l. boyce 2011. The Saronic harbors archaeological Research project (ShaRp). Investigations at Mycenaean Kalamianos, 2007-2009, Hesperia 80, 559-634.

voutsaki, s. 2010. Mainland Greece. In: E.h. Cline (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the Bronze Age Aegean, Oxford, 99-112.

Wiencke, m.h. 1989. Change in Early helladic II, AJA 93, 495-509.Wiencke, m.h. 2011. ‘Ceremonial Lerna’. In: W. Gauss, M. Lindblom, R. angus,

K. Smith, & J.C. Wright (eds), Our Cups are Full: Pottery and Society in the Aegean Bronze Age, Oxford, 345-354.

Wright, J.c. 2004. The emergence of leadership and the rise of civilization in the aegean. In: J.C. Barrett & p. halstead (eds), The Emergence of Civilisation Revisited, Sheffield, 64-89.

Wright, J.c. 2008. Early Mycenaean Greece. In: C.W. Shelmerdine (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Aegean Bronze Age, Cambridge, 230-257.

Wright, J.c. 2010. Towards a social archaeology of Middle helladic Greece. In: a. philippa-Touchais, G. Touchais, S. Voutsaki, & J. Wright, J. (eds), MESO-HELLADIKA. The Greek Mainland in the Middle Bronze Age, athens, 803-815.


The mainland Bronze Age: the search for patterns

Documents

Transcript of The mainland Bronze Age: the search for patterns