Pottery Styles in Transition in Iron Age Crete

This paper presents the preliminary results of the study carried out by the author on a precise class of materials: Protogeometric B pottery from the site of Prinias, in central Crete. The pottery comes from the excavations conducted in the necropolis of Siderospilia, used from the end of XII century BC until the VII/VI century. A large assemblage of material has been so far analyzed, mostly consisting on figured specimens. Among this, a particular class of pithoi, characterized by straight sides and mostly used as cinerary urns, stands out for its quite unique features, finding comparisons just in Knossos and in few other Cretan sites. The impressive figured repertoire adopted in decorating PGB pottery (850-800 BC) does not find comparisons in continental Greece and it seems to reflect some sort of mixed tendency between Near Eastern influences, involving Crete in Early Iron age, and Minoan background. Keywords: Prinias, Protogeometric B, Pithos, Crete, Aegean

Navigating through Resilience: Young Adults in Kuwait

Individual’s behaviors, mindset and personality is greatly affected by their social circle and shaped by their past experiences, leading the individual to develop resilience against stressful situations and adversaries. Such situations are mainly experienced during adolescence stage presenting an opportunity to understand how individuals think they will react to stressful times and what measures do they consider if and when crises hit. The inevitable goal of this research is to find out how and if individuals build resilience to negative situations and find themselves to express and feel happiness instead of succumbing to negative emotions and behaviors. For a better understanding of their self-resilience, we created a framework of Internal and External Resilience to guide us with the findings. This research was conducted during the early stage of the COVID-19 spread, which did not present to be a pandemic at the time and had not affected one’s life as gravely. In gathering our research, questions that will be kept in mind but are not limited to, include: how do two individuals who experience similar situations react in different ways, one left negatively affected while the other unaffected? Do past experiences make individuals more resilient to situations that they came into contact with? With those probing questions, we would be able to further understand the relationship between building resilience and experiencing hopelessness in times of crises. Keywords: resilience, adversaries, crises, hopelessness, psychological immune system

COVID-19: Cartography as a Witness of Change of Spanish Urban Models along History Due to Sanitary Crisis

During past centuries, pandemics were something very natural to the human race, but as result of industrialisation during the 19th century, they became a larger problem. The arrival of populations to big cities provoked the development of irregular and overpopulated quarters without any measures of safety, and facilitated the expansion of diseases. The problem resided in sanitation problems, as the example of what happened in London and Paris. As a solution, in different cities, and as a starting point, Paris with the Haussman’s proposals, issued different reforms and extension plans were made in Spain (Nadal 2017, 357-385). Humanity believed that these extension plans would give us a healthy density and an ordered expansion. We opened big boulevards to believe that we had a wide city to walk, but nothing could be further from reality. At the beginning of 20th century, history repeated itself, and now, a new pandemic crisis has shown that cities have, again, a crisis of congestion. Keywords: cartography, cities, COVID-19, urban models

Google Trends as a Method to Predict New COVID-19 Cases and Socio-Psychological Consequences of the Pandemic

Understanding how people react to the COVID-19 crisis, and what the consequences are of the COVID-19 pandemic is key to enable public health and other agencies to develop optimal intervention strategies. Because the timely identification of new cases of infection has proven to be the key to timely respond to the spread of infection within a particular region, we have developed a method that can detect and predict the emergence of new cases of COVID-19 at an early stage. Further, this method can give useful insights into a family’s life during the pandemic and give the prediction of birth rates. The basic methodological concept of our approach is to monitor the digital trace of language searches with the Google Trends analytical tool (GT). We divided the keyword frequency for selected words giving us a search frequency index and then compared searches with official statistics to prove the significations of results. 1) Google Trends tools are suitable for predicting the emergence of new COVID-19 cases in Croatia. The data collected by this method correlate with official data. In Croatia search activities using GT for terms such as “PCR +COVID”, and symptoms “cough + corona”, “pneumonia + corona”; “muscle pain + corona” correlate strongly with officially reported cases of the disease. 2) The method also shows effects on family life, increase in stress, and domestic violence. 3) Birth rate in 2021 will be just 87% of what it would be “a normal year” in Croatia. 4) This tool can give useful insights into domestic violence. Unquestionably, there are still significant open methodological issues and the questionable integrity of the data obtained using this source. The fact is also a problem that GT does not provide data on which population was sampled or how it was structured. Although these open-ended issues pose serious challenges for making clear estimates, statistics offer a range of tools available to deal with imperfect data as well as to develop controls that take data quality into account. All these insights show that GT has the potential to capture attitudes in the broad spectrum of family life themes. The benefit of this method is reliable estimates that can enable public health officials to prepare and better respond to the possible return of a pandemic in certain parts of the country and the need for responses to protect family well-being. Keywords: Google trends, COVID-19, birth rates, domestic violence, Croatia, predicting demographic trends, family

Turkey at the Dawn of the 2020s: Old Challenges and New Prospects

Turkey is a great power as this is measured by its population and economy. The question is whether she is so great that she can play a decisive and, in many cases, antagonistic if not adversary role vis-a-vis her allies of the so-called western world. Apart from the rhetoric of the current Turkish leadership, her role is restricted by her commitment to international organization such as NATO when it comes to politico-military independence and European Union when it comes to politico-economic independence. It seems that Turkey has no other political and economic choice but to align her international ambitions with the priorities of its traditional allies of the western world even if this would require some sort of compromise. This would result from either her “free choice,” or would be forced upon her by the use of soft and hard policies. The latter might include the threat of military action. Keywords: Turkey, Middle East, great power competition, population, per capita income

For Inclusive and Sustainable Education: The Profile of the Educator and Pedagogist in Italy

The changes that have characterized contemporary complex societies and the need to affirm the values of social inclusion have led the Italian educational policy makers to debate on the professional quality within the educational field, to study its changes and its social impact. This debate has gradually led to a redefinition of the professional profile of the educator and the pedagogist giving rise to a legislative provision aiming at recognizing, regulating and protecting these professionals. According to this law, in particular, the socio-pedagogical educator and the pedagogist are required to have specific competences that could promote inclusive and sustainable educational actions. The present theoretical argumentative paper aims at presenting a synthesis of the long debate that led to the approval of Law 205/17 in Italy, involving policy makers and Italian scholars and academics in the redefinition of the educational professions. Specifically, it aims at highlighting the rational and the characteristics of the context which have supported the long legislative process within a conceptual dimension that considers inclusive education as an unavoidable framework for social sustainability. Keywords: inclusive education, sustainable education, educator and pedagogist, Italy

Poetry in Action: From the Gift Economy to Corporate Philanthropists

The role of patronage has been widely examined in studies in different disciplines, from the arts to sociology. This paper adopts a novel interdisciplinary approach to investigate the relationship between patronage, corporate philanthropy, and the economic (and non-economic) returns for donors. In an ancient Latin literature perspective, the case study analyzes the literary works of Horace, master poet and noteworthy exemplum of cursus honorum and Latin patronage. Highlighting some pivotal poetic lines (from a managerial standpoint), the study proposes a patronage and gift economy framework as the building blocks for corporate philanthropy and corporate social responsibility actions. While patronage fosters the development of economic relationships, even if in a non-linear and multi-faceted way, corporate philanthropy promotes relationships aimed at achieving positive returns for the donor, be they economic or meta-economic, instantaneous or delayed. Although more difficult to capture through the usual cash inflow and outflow measurements, corporate philanthropy and corporate social responsibility express an elusive but valuable economic relationship. Therefore, this study offers some managerial insights for non-profit corporations and those industries – for example, sports – where the economic returns may not be a central element of the investment. Finally, it is noteworthy that Horace is, among other things, an author of great modernity for his tension, articulated and complex, towards the active events of his time. His rediscovery, not only in literary studies, has allowed to add to other disciplines the analysis of an intellectual, divided between art and current life. Keywords: Latin literature, patronage, corporate philanthropy, gift economy, non-financial performance

Turkey’s Game Plan in Northern Syria and its Implications for the EU

Throughout the civil war, the Syrian opposition has been politically and militarily supported by several countries. At present, with its boots on the ground, Turkey is the main backer of the armed opposition in northern Syria. In the region, Ankara envisions a long-term presence which is characterized by a continuous control along the M-4 highway from Idlib in the west to the Iraqi border in the east. This will depend, however, on Turkey’s negotiations with Russia and its relations with the US. Meanwhile, the EU has limited its engagement with Ankara, by mainly focusing on the refugee crisis. Yet, divergent views and contesting interests are hindering an effective cooperation between the two on the Syrian “dossier”. In light of this, this paper argues that the EU should broaden its perspectives, while establishing permanent contact with Turkey. This necessitates the continuation of the EU’s financial support given to Ankara to host refugees; the backing of Turkey in maintaining a frozen conflict situation in Idlib; the increasement of diplomatic engagement in the provision of humanitarian aid; the backing of any effort that aims at ending the hostilities and establishing ceasefires; and the showing of empathy towards Turkish concerns on border security and terrorism. Keywords: Syrian crisis, Turkey, European Union, Northern Syria, humanitarian aid

The “Protocols” for the Hittite “Royal Guard” during the Old Kingdom: Observations on Elite Military Units and their Possible Warfare Applications

In this article, we intend to analyse the importance and modus operandi of a military unit (generally known as “Royal Guard”) whose function was, among other things, the protection of the Hattuša-based Hittite kings. For this essay, we will be mainly using two Hittite textual sources known as “instructions” or “protocols”. We aim to find a connection between these guards and their function regarding the protection of the royal palace as well as their military enlistment in that elite unit. The period to be covered in this analysis comes directly from the choice of sources: the Hittite Old Kingdom, confined between the chronological beacons of the 17th, 16th and 15th centuries BC. With this analysis, we intend to provide some relevant data that may contribute to a better understanding of these elite military units, particularly in regards to their probable warfare functions. Were they used in battle? How were they armed? What was their tactical importance in combat? How was the recruitment done? How were the units formed? These will be some questions that we will try to answer throughout this article. Keywords: guard, palace, command, warfare, infantry

Investigating the Revival of Ancient Egyptian Artifacts as a Symbol of Power through their Occupation of European Public Spaces: A Chrono-Morphological Study

Numerous architectural styles have been explored in recent years (Pakkanen 2018). However, Egyptian revival did not obtain the consideration it deserved till lately, when there was a remarkable flow of attention coursed by various significant ancient Egyptian exhibitions all over the world, which led to the publications of books and articles tackling the Egyptian revival (Curl 2013). In this paper the researcher will try to investigate the chronological change of form and shape of ancient Egyptian architectural features that were revived in European public spaces to signify power, sovereignty, and authority. Curl (2013) charts the argument of the persistence of Egyptian motifs in design from Greco-Roman Antiquity, through the Mediaeval, Baroque, and Neo-Classical periods. Our hypothesis is that Ancient Egypt is a central source, rather than peripheral, to the development of considerable volume of European urbanistic and architectural features. We will distinguish manifestations with Egyptian connotations based on literature reviewed, field observation and the methodology of Curl (2013). Aiming only on three ancient Egyptian sources, the Sphinx, the obelisk, and the temple. Keywords: Egyptian revival, Ancient Egyptian artifacts, morphological regeneration, space occupation, public spaces