Questions of Context: A Greek Cup from the River Thames

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Bradley ◽  
Amy. C. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Large Area ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
The North ◽  
Bronze Vessels ◽  
Traditional Societies ◽  
The Alps ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Area North

The anthropologist Mary Helms has argued that in traditional societies access to exotic items is often a source of prestige (1988: chs. 3 and 4). So is knowledge of the appropriate ways in which to use them. This idea plays a central role in a new study of the European Bronze Age which postulates long-distance links between Scandinavia and the East Mediterranean and suggests that they were a source of political power (Kristiansen and Larsson 2005: ch. 5). Similar attitudes can also be found in studies of the Iron Age. In the graves and hillforts of Hallstatt C and D there are Mediterranean amphorae, Greek and Etruscan bronze vessels and Attic (Athenian) pottery, some of which were most probably acquired through the port of Massalia. Their distribution extends over a large area north of the Alps and has been discussed by Barry Cunliffe on several occasions. As he says ‘It is difficult to resist the conclusion that the presence of the Greek trading port created a demand for commodities from the north and that this led to the emergence of powerful chiefdoms in the core of the barbarian area, able to command the flow of luxury objects from the south’ (1988: 24–5). Such interpretations emphasize the significance for Iron Age people of access to imported goods. Individual artefacts travelled even greater distances, with a major concentration of Etruscan beaked flagons in the Middle Rhine (Kimmig 1982: Abb. 32), but much further to the north and west the distribution of imports virtually runs out. That raises a serious problem. What are archaeologists to make of the few examples which have been found beyond the areas that were in regular contact with the Mediterranean? Here it is important to consider questions of context. There have been a number of reviews of the evidence for Mediterranean imports in Iron Age Britain, but they have all had one feature in common. They have catalogued a series of artefacts which were made in the Mediterranean.

Middle Bronze Age Long Distance Exchange through Europe and Beyond

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 266-274
Author(s):  
Flemming Kaul
Keyword(s):  
Chemical Composition ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Glass Beads ◽  
The South ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Blue Glass ◽  
The North ◽  
Southern Scandinavia ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
The Mediterranean

Abstract The introduction of the folding stool and the single-edged razor into Southern Scandinavia, as well as the testimony of chariot use during the Nordic Bronze Age Period II (1500-1300 BC), give evidence of the transfer of ideas from the Mediterranean to the North. Recent analyses of the chemical composition of blue glass beads from well-dated Danish Bronze Age burials have revealed evidence for the opening of long distance exchange routes around 1400 BC between Egypt, Mesopotamia and South Scandinavia. When including comparative material from glass workshops in Egypt and finds of glass from Mesopotamia, it becomes clear that glass from those distant lands reached Scandinavia. The routes of exchange can be traced through Europe based on finds of amber from the North and glass from the South.

Centers of Power, Weapons of Iron

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Douglas Price
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Mediterranean Area ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
The Alps ◽  
Iron Artifacts ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
City States

The introduction of iron after 1000 BC brought new tools and weapons to Europe. Smelting technology and higher furnace temperatures were likely the key to iron production, which is generally thought to have originated in Anatolia around 1400 BC among the Hittites, but there are a few earlier examples of iron artifacts as old as 2300 BC in Turkey. Iron produced sharper, more readily available implements and was in great demand. In contrast to copper and tin, whose sources were limited, iron was found in a variety of forms in many places across the continent. Veins of iron ore were exploited in Iberia, Britain, the Alps, the Carpathian Mountains, and elsewhere. Bog iron was exploited in northern Europe. Carbonate sources of iron in other areas enabled local groups to obtain the raw materials necessary for producing this important material. At the same time, the collapse of the dominant Bronze Age civilizations of the Aegean changed the flow of raw materials and finished products across Europe. Greece fell into a Dark Age following the demise of the Mycenaean city-states. The Etruscans were on the rise in Italy. Rome was a small town at the border of the Etruscan region. Soon, however, new centers of power in classic Greece and Rome emerged, bringing writing and, with it, history to Europe. Again, we can observe important and dramatic differences between the “classic” areas of the Mediterranean and the northern parts of “barbarian” Europe. The chronology for the Iron Age in much of Europe is portrayed in Figure 6.2. The Iron Age begins earlier in the Mediterranean area, ca. 900 BC, where the Classical civilizations of Greece, the Etruscans, and eventually Rome emerge in the first millennium BC. Rome and its empire expanded rapidly, conquering much of western Europe in a few decades before the beginning of the Common Era and Britain around ad 43, effectively ending the prehistoric Iron Age in these parts of the continent. The Iron Age begins somewhat later in Scandinavia, around 500 BC.

Trade and exchange

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Gosden
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
For Profit ◽  
New Directions ◽  
The Alps ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Trade And Exchange

This chapter challenges prevailing paradigms which have structured discussion of trade and exchange in Iron Age Europe around the dichotomies of gifts vs commodities, or socially generated exchanges in the earlier Iron Age vs production for profit in the later Iron Age. It begins by reviewing the debate on markets and gifts, and what is still useful, and goes on to suggest new directions for research, focusing more on what brought people together as much as the items exchanged. Early Iron Age links between the Mediterranean and Europe north of the Alps are reconsidered in the light of recent work, with a focus on the Heuneburg and Massalia. For the later period, the role of oppida is considered; evidence of production for profit is absent from many areas, and the long-distance exchanges evident at oppida were part of broader European links connected to changes in power and identity.

From Bronze Age to Iron Age: Middle Europe, Italy, and the North and West

1948 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 196-218 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. F. C. Hawkes
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Near East ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
The North ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Middle Europe ◽  
Temperate Europe ◽  
The Alps

This paper is intended as a sequel, reaching into the Early Iron Age, to the preceding one by Professor Childe on ‘The Final Bronze Age in the Near East and in Temperate Europe.’ When he and I were invited to prepare these papers first, as addresses to the Prehistoric Society's Conference in London in April 1948, we purposely agreed to do most of our work on them separately, he approaching the problem of the European Bronze—Iron Age transition from its Bronze Age end, and I from its Iron Age end. But now, through his kindness, I am writing with his paper in its final form before me; and I want therefore to begin by considering what he has written, in order to fit my contribution squarely into his. I shall then turn to Italy, and to its relations with Europe beyond the Alps and with Greece and the Orient, and so approach the Hallstatt question and the Final Bronze Ages of the North and West, upon which the Iron Age, in due time, supervened. I am most grateful to Childe for his approval to this course; and his paper is truly so important, that I cannot but make it the starting-point for mine.

Cyprus, Sardinia and Sicily: A Maritime Perspective on Interaction, Connectivity and Imagination in Mediterranean Prehistory

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
A. Bernard Knapp ◽  
Anthony Russell ◽  
Peter van Dommelen
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Culturally Diverse ◽  
Social Activity ◽  
Social Dimensions ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Mediterranean Regions ◽  
Trade Route ◽  
Direct Trade

In this study, we outline a maritime perspective on interaction in the Late Bronze/early Iron Age Mediterranean. In response to what has elsewhere been termed the ‘maximalist’ approach, which foregrounds direct, long-distance trading connections between distant Mediterranean regions as a key feature of Late Bronze Age exchange systems, we propose a more nuanced, ‘minimalist’ and argue that notions of contact, connectivity and mobility need to be carefully distinguished if we wish to discuss both the material and social dimensions of maritime mobility. In particular, we critique the prominently proposed, allegedly direct trade route between Sardinia and Cyprus. The network we suggest hinges on multiply connected nodes, where a variety of social actors take part in the creation and maintenance of maritime connections. By unpacking several such nodes between Sardinia and Cyprus, we demonstrate that simply asserting the dominance of Sardinian, Cypriot or Aegean mariners falls short of the complex archaeological evidence and eschews possible social interpretations. In conclusion, we submit that maritime connectivity is an inherently social activity, and that a culturally diverse prehistoric Mediterranean was connected by multiple interlocking and overlapping networks.

Art and Archaeology of the Bronze Age in China

Art History ◽  
2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
English Language ◽  
Pictorial Representation ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Museum Displays ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Bronze Vessels ◽  
The Bronze Age

“China” here designates much but not all of China Proper or Inner China, terrain controlled during the Imperial era (221 bce to ce 1912) by historic dynastic states. Vast regions to the northeast, north, and west—Manchuria, Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Tibet—are excluded even though they are now integral to the modern-day nation-state. Similarly, we slight areas of the south, for example the modern-day Lingnan and Yun-Gui macroregions, that only gradually were absorbed after the Bronze Age. In Chinese scholarship, “Bronze Age” (qingtong shidai青铜时代) serves as an alternate for the “Three Dynasties” (san dai三代) of traditional historiography: Xia (Hsia), Shang, and Zhou (Chou). Bracketing dates of c. 2000–221 bce are now widely used, the first an approximation, the latter firm. Bronze alloy, however, was just one ingredient of material cultures of the Three Dynasties. Other features include the appearance of states, social stratification, urbanization, warfare, and the appearance of iron (the Iron Age), in addition to achievements in literature, music, and philosophy during the latter centuries, a kind of “Classical Age.” Today, “arts” may encompass many forms of crafting materials for a variety of purposes and audiences. This bibliography specifically addresses architecture, bronze, jade, lacquer, and silk as well as music, pictorial representation, and writing. A term from the Bronze Age—“Six Arts” (or “skills,” liu yi六艺)—defined expertise for an elite male as ritual, music, archery, chariot driving, writing, and calculation. While the overlap between the ancient and modern categories is at best partial, these concepts do intersect in terms of makers and consumers and in social and religious purposes. The elite’s luxury lifestyle was sustained by the “arts.” Ritual required bronze vessels, and the requisite music was performed on instruments of bronze, stone, lacquer, etc. Chariots were outfitted with bronze; writing and picturing employed silk. This bibliography emphasizes Chinese archaeology, both as a discipline and as a realm of knowledge that have burgeoned since the late 20th century. Archaeology creates fresh evidence, which then becomes the stuff of excavation reports, investigative scholarship, exhibitions and museum displays, and reference works. Only some of this bounty can be cited here, and readers are directed to Oxford Bibliographies for Chinese Studies (e.g., Chinese Architecture, Calligraphy, Ceramics, Paleography, Ancient Chinese Religion) for further advice. This essay is limited to publications from 1980 and, when possible, favors English-language sources.

Edges and interactions beyond Europe

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter S. Wells ◽  
Naoise Mac Sweeney
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
The North ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Temperate Europe ◽  
The North Atlantic

Iron Age Europe, once studied as a relatively closed, coherent continent, is being seen increasingly as a dynamic part of the much larger, interconnected world. Interactions, direct and indirect, with communities in Asia, Africa, and, by the end of the first millennium AD, North America, had significant effects on the peoples of Iron Age Europe. In the Near East and Egypt, and much later in the North Atlantic, the interactions can be linked directly to historically documented peoples and their rulers, while in temperate Europe the evidence is exclusively archaeological until the very end of the prehistoric Iron Age. The evidence attests to often long-distance interactions and their effects in regard to the movement of peoples, and the introduction into Europe of raw materials, crafted objects, styles, motifs, and cultural practices, as well as the ideas that accompanied them.

Bronze Age Barrows on Charmy Down and Lansdown, Somerset

1950 ◽  
Vol 30 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 34-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Audrey Williams
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
The South ◽  
Stream Flows ◽  
North East ◽  
The North

Charmy Down is a plateau three miles north-east of Bath (fig. 1, 1), east of the Bath-Tetbury road. About a square mile in extent it has a general height of well over 600 ft. To the north the scarp falls swiftly, on the east more gently, to the wooded valley of St. Catherine's Brook, a tributary of the Bristol Avon and the modern Somerset–Gloucester boundary. At the foot of the steep western scarp a second stream flows south to the Avon. On the south Chilcombe Bottom separates Charmy Down from Solsbury Hill, distinguished by its Iron Age earthwork. The underlying rock is oolite, a southward continuation of the Cotswold formation.

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