scholarly journals Identifying Wheel-Thrown Vases in Middle Minoan Crete? Preliminary Analysis of Experimental Replicas of Plain Handleless Conical Cups from Protopalatial Phaistos

2021 ◽  
Vol XII (2) ◽  
pp. 201-216
Author(s):  
Ilaria Caloi ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Ceramic Material ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Experimental Work ◽  
Preliminary Analysis ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Minoan Crete ◽  
Technological Study ◽  
Wheel Throwing

Recent work in Middle Bronze Age Crete has revealed that most Protopalatial or First Palace period pottery is produced through the use of a combination of coil-building and the wheel, i.e., wheelcoiling. Experimental work conducted on pottery from Minoan sites of Northern and Eastern Crete (e.g., Knossos, Myrtos Pyrgos, Palaikastro) has indeed determined that Minoan potters did not develop the skills required to adopt the wheel-throwing technique. However, my recent technological study of Protopalatial ceramic material from Middle Minoan IIA (19th century BC) deposits from the First Palace at Phaistos, in Southern Crete, has revealed that though pottery was produced by the wheelcoiling techniques, yet other forming techniques were practised too. In this paper I present a preliminary analysis of experimental replicas of MM IIA Phaistian plain handleless conical cups, manufactured on the potter’s wheel using three different forming techniques: wheel-pinching, wheel-coiling, and throwing-off-the-hump. This analysis will proffer answers to several questions on the use of the potter’s wheel in Middle Bronze Age Crete and opens the possibility that at MM IIA Phaistos there co-existed potters who had developed skills to employ different forming techniques on the wheel, including possibly that of throwing-off-the-hump.

A MIDDLE HELLADIC TOMB IN THE ATHENIAN KERAMEIKOS AND SOME THOUGHTS ON THE EARLY CONNECTIONS OF ATTICA

2019 ◽  
Vol 114 ◽  
pp. 119-143
Author(s):  
Anthi Balitsari ◽  
John K. Papadopoulos
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Aegean Islands ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Minoan Crete ◽  
Middle Helladic

This paper focuses on a presentation and discussion of the solitary Middle Helladic tomb found in the Athenian Kerameikos. Our purpose is twofold: first of all, to present in detail the tomb offerings that we were able to relocate, and to suggest a MH I date for the burial. Secondly, given the significant presence of ceramic imports from various Aegean islands, we outline the connectedness that Attica enjoyed at the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age. This is a story that involves not just Athens, but Aigina, the Argolid, and Minoan Crete, as well as the much sought-after metal ores of Laurion.

scholarly journals MIDDLE BRONZE AGE JERUSALEM: RECALCULATING ITS CHARACTER AND CHRONOLOGY

Radiocarbon ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-31
Author(s):  
Johanna Regev ◽  
Yuval Gadot ◽  
Helena Roth ◽  
Joe Uziel ◽  
Ortal Chalaf ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
17Th Century ◽  
16Th Century ◽  
Southern Levant ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
In The Beginning ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
Early Phases

ABSTRACT The following paper presents the results of radiocarbon (14C) dating of Middle Bronze Age (MB) contexts in Jerusalem. The dates, sampled with microarchaeology methods from three different locations along the eastern slopes of the city’s ancient core, reveal that Jerusalem was initially settled in the early phases of the period, with public architecture first appearing in the beginning of the 19th century BC and continued to develop until the 17th century BC. At that time, a curious gap in settlement is noted until the 16th century BC, when the site is resettled. The construction of this phase continued into the early 15th century BC. The dates presented are discussed in both the site-level, as well as their far-reaching implications regarding MB regional chronology. It is suggested here that the high chronology, dating the Middle Bronze Age between 2000 and 1600 BC is difficult to reconcile with dates from many sites. In contrast, a more localized chronology should be adopted, with the Middle Bronze Age continuing into the early 15th century BC in certain parts of the southern Levant, such as the region of Jerusalem.

Water management in Minoan Crete, Greece: the two cisterns of one Middle Bronze Age settlement

2007 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Cadogan
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Military History ◽  
The Political ◽  
History Of ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Important Addition ◽  
Minoan Crete ◽  
The Hill ◽  
Social Management ◽  
The Bronze Age

The two earliest structures of Minoan Crete that may be considered as large cisterns were both built in the first half of the second millennium BC (the time of the first Minoan palaces) at Myrtos-Pyrgos (Ierapetra). A considerable feat of engineering and social management, they remain a most unusual attribute of a Minoan settlement, all the more so since the Myrtos river is/was available to supply water at the foot of the hill of Pyrgos. This paper presents these cisterns, briefly, in terms of geology and technology, the history of their use and re-use, and their relevance to understanding the culture and society (at local and regional levels) of Crete in the time of the Old Palaces, as well as their possible contribution to the political and military history of the period. I then review possible precursors of, and architectural parallels to, the Pyrgos cisterns at Knossos, Malia and Phaistos (none of which has been proved to be a cistern), and the later history of cisterns in Bronze Age Crete. Since only three others are known (at Archanes, Zakro and Tylissos, of Late Bronze Age date), the two cisterns of Myrtos-Pyrgos are an important addition to our still rudimentary knowledge of how the Bronze Age Cretans managed their water supplies.

scholarly journals A Return to the Wheel: Rethinking Experimental Methodologies for the Study of the Potter’s Wheel

2021 ◽  
Vol XII (2) ◽  
pp. 127-142
Author(s):  
Chase A. M. Minos ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Experimental Work ◽  
Experimental Archaeology ◽  
Chaîne Opératoire ◽  
Chaine Operatoire ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
The Way

Research into the study of wheel-making techniques has grown, but studies of the tool or the wheel and its properties have remained understudied or considered insignificant until recently. In order to develop this research, the wheel and its practicalities, such as the physics, should be incorporated more into research of making techniques. Through the application of chaîne opératoire and experimental archaeology, this research questioned whether different wheel types produce different macroscopic traces on pots produced by the same technique. There are several results presented here that can shed light on the way archaeologists should investigate and understand early wheel potting, in particular the physics of rotation, which has received minimal attention as a result of a predominance for researching techniques over the tool (the wheel). The application of this research is used to better understand pottery and potter’s wheels from their adoption and development during the Middle Bronze Age on Crete, c. 2000 to 1500 BCE. A revision of experimental work and methodologies is combined with archaeological experimentation in order to help clarify not only how tools such as the wheel were used but subsequently what roles these craftworkers played in past societies.

scholarly journals The Introduction of the Potter’s Wheel to Ancient Sudan

2021 ◽  
Vol XII (2) ◽  
pp. 299-309
Author(s):  
Sarah K. Doherty ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
River Nile ◽  
Pottery Industry ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Manufacturing Techniques ◽  
Wheel Throwing

Doherty (2015) has previously investigated the origins of the potter’s wheel in Egypt in depth. However, how the potter’s wheel came to be used in Sudan has not yet been properly analysed. This paper will present the author’s initial investigations into the pottery industry of Sudan and the manufacturing techniques employed by Sudanese potters. Evidence seems to suggest that rather than being an indigenous invention, the potter’s wheel came to Sudan as part of the colonisation of Sudan by Egypt during the Middle-Late Bronze Age. Throughout this period, various Egyptian towns were founded along the river Nile. One such town was Amara West (inhabited c. 1306–1290 BC). By the Middle Bronze Age, Sudanese potters had well-developed pottery techniques, principally coil- and slab-building. Amara West and other Egyptian colonies used the by then well-established wheel-throwing and coiling techniques (RKE) to manufacture their pottery, principally imported from Egypt. However, these colony towns contained both Sudanese and Egyptian vessels, sometimes in the same contexts, and occasionally with blended manufacture techniques and decoration. This paper will endeavour to postulate upon the effect and legacy of the imposed technology of the potter’s wheel on the Sudanese pottery industry.

scholarly journals Crisi e Rigenerazione nella valle dell'Alto Khabur (Siria)

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valentina Orsi
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Near East ◽  
Cultural Development ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Urban Crisis ◽  
The Third ◽  
Ancient City ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
The 19Th Century

In the history and archaeology of the Ancient Near East, the period between the end of the third and the beginning of the second millennium BC in northern Mesopotamia constitutes a 'Media Aetas', an obscure period between the flourishing of the urban cultures of the Ancient Bronze Age in the middle of the III millennium BC and the development of the Amorite states of the Middle Bronze Age at the end of the 19th century BC. The identification in the archaeological sequence of Tell Barri, the ancient city of Kahat, of the ceramic horizon coeval with the 'urban crisis' that preceded the diffusion of the painted ceramic of Khabur, associated with a new phenomenon of sedentarisation, makes it possible to redefine the chronology of events in the region. It aso enables a delineation of the processes of interaction between the various social realities of northern Mesopotamia in the phase of formation that underlies the subsequent cultural development of the II millennium BC.

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