Water may separate islands and the mainland, but the sea also offers a vital link. This volume is one of three major outputs of the research and public engagement project ‘Being an Islander’: Art and Identity of the Large Mediterranean Islands, implemented between 2019 and 2024 at the University of Cambridge. This project aimed to elucidate what defines island identity in the Mediterranean. It explored how insularity affects and shapes cultural identity by integrating transdisciplinary research methodologies, for example, by producing an awarded documentary on insularity and island identity, drawing on the principles of visual anthropology, social anthropology and environment studies. This volume is the culmination of the project’s research strands, undertaken by our key research teams in Cambridge, Cyprus, Greece and Italy. It disseminates our research across our main project themes: insularity, connectivity, mobility, migration, island art and material culture production, hybridity and diachronicity, and provides cross-disciplinary arguments and suggestions on the future of island archaeology and associated disciplines. Contributions included suggest that the relationship between people, place and material culture is what reveals important aspects of island identity and reframe the concept of the islands as a dynamic interplay shaped by social and historical episodes, connectivity and mobility, rather than geography or political boundaries. The volume advocates that the complex histories of the Mediterranean islands can also be a story of connections.

The weights from Thonis-Heracleion offer a new perspective on trading activities and mechanisms in the emporium of Egypt (Diodorus Siculus, Hist., I, 19, 4). The extensive harbour facilities and temple of Amun-Gereb, rediscovered by the Institut Européen d’Archéologie Sous-Marine (IEASM), provided the necessary infrastructure for the city’s role in the economic regulation of maritime trade. Located on Egypt’s coastal border, the port was a natural stop for merchant ships before or after a long sea voyage, a space where they could rest and give thanks to the gods.

This volume follows on from papers presented at the 13th International Cretan Congress in 2022 and covers the period from the 1st century BC to 4th–5th centuries AD, with the articles in the volume set around the topic of upheavals and disruptions, and in particular those evidenced with the arrival of Rome, the creation of the Roman Province, along with those resulting from the dividing of the Roman Empire and the emergence of the Byzantine world. The volume is set against the background of the Roman conquest of Crete in 67 BC, which heralded the end of the power and control of the Greek city-states, which were themselves steeped in age-old traditions and governed by a variety of legal frameworks, some of which had their roots in Archaic times. The ensuing changes, when they arrived, took centuries to develop but resulted in the establishment of a Greco-Roman culture and society that was far removed from its Hellenistic predecessor. Roman Crete witnessed several significant periods of disruption and interventions that had a direct impact on daily life and society. These included the military invasion of the island by Rome, at one end of the period, and the AD 365 destructive earthquake at the other, but other interruptions also occurred: changes to religion and religious practices, including the introduction of Christianity; fluctuations in natural resources that affected agricultural production and thus local economies and trade; monetary devaluations in Rome; movements of populations; external shifts in trading networks; and multiple instances of tectonic activity in the Imperial period that caused damage and instability.

The volume in hand throws light on historical encounters with troubled pasts in contemporary Dutch and Greek historiography. Contributors, experts in their respective research fields with a wide range of scholarly publications, eschew dominant national accounts, deconstruct top-down narratives, and situate the historical subject(s) at the centre of the analysis. Troubled pasts are the outcome of local, national and international conflicts, of the continuous quest for growth and dominance, of Colonialism and Great Power rivalry, of ideologically-motivated purges, of Genocide, of National Liberation Struggles, and of Civil Wars. They go hand-in-hand with a great deal of human suffering and horrendous atrocities against civilians on ethnic, religious, racial and political grounds. The examination of troubled pasts and their accompanying imagery raise enduring questions: Whose past is remembered? How is the past appropriated and memorialised? Which pasts are at best neglected, at worst silenced - and why? Encounters with Troubled Pasts addresses such issues by reference to Dutch colonialism in the New World and South East Asia, the Greek campaign in Asia Minor, the Shoah and its aftermath in Greece and the Netherlands, the Greek Civil War of the 1940s, Transitional Justice in Post-Soviet Russia and the Massacre of Srebrenica. It will be of interest to postgraduate students and academics working on Colonialism, the Shoah, modern Dutch and Greek History, Memory and on Oral History.

Textile imagery is pervasive in classical literature. An awareness of the craft and technology of weaving and spinning, of the production and consumption of clothing items, and of the social and religious significance of garments is key to the appreciation of how textile and cloth metaphors work as literary devices, their suitability to conceptualize human activities and represent cosmic realities, and their potential to evoke symbolic associations and generic expectations. Spanning mainly Greek and Latin poetic genres, yet encompassing comparative evidence from other Indo-European languages and literature, these 18 chapters draw a various yet consistent picture of the literary exploitation of the imagery, concepts and symbolism of ancient textiles and clothing. Topics include refreshing readings of tragic instances of deadly peploi and fatal fabrics situate them within a Near Eastern tradition of curse as garment, explore female agency in the narrative of their production, and argue for broader symbolic implications of textile-making within the sphere of natural wealth The concepts and technological principles of ancient weaving emerge as cognitive patterns that, by means of analogy rather than metaphor, are reflected in early Greek mathematic and logical thinking, and in archaic poetics. The significance of weaving technology in early philosophical conceptions of cosmic order is revived by Lucretius’ account of atomic compound structure, where he makes extensive use of textile imagery, whilst clothing imagery is at the center of the sustained intertextual strategy built by Statius in his epic poem, where recurrent cloaks activate a multilayered poetic memory.

The Kyrenia Ship, a Greek merchantman built around 315 BC, which sank off the north coast of Cyprus was excavated between 1968 and 1972 under the direction of Michael L. Katzev of the University of Pennsylvania and Oberlin College. The importance of this ship lies in the exceptionally well-preserved hull that provided new insights into ancient shipbuilding, as well as the cargo it carried. The hold was stacked with transport amphoras of various types made on Rhodes, with a few examples from Samos, Kos, Knidos and Cyprus (?), supplemented by a consignment of millstones, iron billets and almonds. The cabin pottery from Rhodes also suggests this was the vessel’s home port, a conclusion supported by most of the scientific ceramic analyses. Its trade route included Rhodes, Cyprus and the Levant with perhaps Egypt as a final destination. This volume provides a detailed history of the excavation followed by definitive studies of the amphora cargo and the pottery associated with shipboard life. Some of the amphora stamps suggest that the ship sank between 294 and 291 BC, dates corroborated by the cabin wares. The repetition of four drinking cups (kantharoi), oil containers (gutti), wine measures (olpai), as well as bowls and saucers, suggests that the ship was sailed by a crew of four. Seven bronze coins were recovered, five minted in the name of Alexander the Great and one well-known type of Ptolemy I produced only on Cyprus.

Landscape-archaeology projects have had a significant impact on our understanding of the deep history of the Greek countryside, but have overwhelmingly been limited to the plains and have rarely placed the Ottoman period at their core. This investigation of Zagori in Northwest Greece explores the archaeology and cultural history of a mountainous area that famously thrived in the Ottoman period. This engagement with an upland region in the early modern period sheds light on previously neglected aspects of Greek landscape history. The inclusive methodology combines critical historiography, archival research, oral history and landscape-archaeological survey to achieve novel insights into this montane landscape and its distinctive history and cultural heritage.Contrary to the dominant nationalist historiography, it demonstrates the continuity of regional elites from the Byzantine to Ottoman period in Epirus and reveals how this shaped settlement patterns and elite/non-elite sedentary adaptations in this montane region. It also gives voice from within to the labour-intensive, engendered, cultural landscape of the Zagori peasantry and challenges the view of external scholarly observers that mountains support a predominantly pastoral way of life.

The Late Bronze Age from about 1600 to 1150 BCE was a time of unprecedented economic activity in human history based on the supply and production of the eponymous alloy bronze on an almost industrial scale. The supply networks for copper and tin during this period stretched over large parts of western Eurasia and included long distance maritime transport.The palatial centres of Mycenaean Greece were positioned at a unique geographical interface between the cultural hotspots of the eastern Mediterranean as well as the metal supply sources in the western Mediterranean, northern Europe and the Black Sea area. There are archaeological and historical indications that Mycenaeans somehow contributed either directly or indirectly via intermediaries to the exchange of goods in the second half of the 2nd millennium BCE. However, and partially due to limitations of archaeological and historical evidence, the degree to which the Mycenaean Greeks conducted long distance commercial journeys themselves to participate in the metal trade of the period is still disputed.Mull analyses the large corpus of the Greek myths, some of which are likely to go back to Bronze Age roots and which contain evidence of long distance journeys of Mycenaean pioneering adventurers. Mull, after an education in classical languages, became a trained economist with almost 30 years of experience in international business. From this unusual vantage point he provides a fresh perspective on what is known about travel and trade during the Late Bronze Age, a discipline so far dominated by archaeologists and historians.

The intense bonds among the king and his family, friends, lovers, and entourage are the most enticing and intriguing aspects of Alexander the Great’s life. The affective ties of the protagonists of Alexander’s Empire nurtured the interest of the ancient authors, as well as the audience, in the personal life of the most famous men and women of the time. These relations echoed through time in art and literature, to become paradigm of positive or negative, human behavior. By rejecting the perception of the Macedonian monarchy as a positivist king-army based system, and by looking for other political and social structures Elizabeth Carney has played a crucial role in prompting the current re-appraisal of the Macedonian monarchy. Her volumes on Women and Monarchy in Ancient Macedonia (University of Oklahoma Press, 2000), Olympias: Mother of Alexander the Great (Routledge, 2006), Arsinoë of Egypt and Macedon: A Royal Life. (Oxford University Press, 2013) have been game-changers in the field and has offered the academic world a completely new perspective on the network of relationships surrounding the exercise of power. By examining Macedonian and Hellenistic dynastic behavior and relations, she has shown the political yet tragic, heroic thus human side, thus connecting Hellenistic political and social history. Building on the methodological approach and theoretical framework engendered by Elizabeth Carney’s research, this book explores the complex web of personal relations, inside and outside the oikos (family), governing Alexander’s world, which sits at the core of the inquiry into the human side of the events shedding light light on the personal dimension of history. Inspired by Carney’s seminal work on Ancient Macedonia, the volume moves beyond the traditionally rationalist and positivist approaches towards Hellenistic antiquity, into a new area of humanistic scholarship, by considering the dynastic bloodlines as well as the affective relations. The volume offers a discussion of the intra and extra familial network ruling the Mediterranean world at the time of Philip and Alexander. Building on present scholarship on relations and values in Hellenistic Monarchies, the book contributes to a deeper historical understanding of the mutual dialogue between the socio-cultural and political approaches to Hellenistic history.

A study of archaeology and the early Church in Greece is long overdue. So far, no book has been published in English that examines the growth of Christianity in southern Greece from New Testament times until the medieval period, taking into account both contemporary theological expertise and a detailed knowledge of the numerous and exciting current archaeological excavations. Situated between Israel and Italy, Greece is now yielding vital evidence of the development of early Christianity. Mainland Greece and its surrounding islands is a vast region, and I have chosen to focus on an area rich in early Christian remains, namely the region stretching from Athens southwards.The book examines evidence relating to Christianity in New Testament times, particularly through the writings of St Paul and early theologians, and juxtaposes these texts with recent and current excavations at Corinth, with its twin ports of Kenchreai and Lechaion, and its chief sanctuary beyond the city at Isthmia, where St Paul worked during the celebration of the pan-Hellenic Games. Much of the excavation at Lechaion has been carried out underwater by divers pioneering new methods of preserving submerged material, since most of the harbour is entirely submerged.Later, particularly from the sixth century onwards, Christian basilicas were built throughout Greece. A number of these are examined, including those at Nemea and Epidaurus. Nemea provides unique evidence of an agricultural community guided by a bishop; numerous Christian artefacts have been excavated at the site. Epidaurus was honoured as the birthplace of the healing god Asclepius, and early Christians inherited and developed these healing skills in unexpected ways. At other locations, monks developed a wide variety of lifestyles that were little known in the Western Church. The archaeology of Christian sites in Greece is a new and unfolding discipline; this book will hopefully encourage scholars and students to take these studies further.

This book examines the mutual influence of architecture and human action during a key period of history: the Hellenistic age. During this era, the profound transformations in the Mediterranean’s archaeological and historical record are detectable, pointing to a conscious intertwining of the physical (landscape, architecture, bodies) and social (practice) components of built space. Compiling the outcomes of a conference held in Kiel in 2018, the volume assembles contributions focusing on Hellenistic architecture as an action context, perceived in movement through built space. Sanctuaries, as a particularly coherent kind of built space featuring well-defined sets of architecture combined with ritual action, were chosen as the general frame for the analyses. The reciprocity between this sacred architecture and (religious) human action is traced through several layers starting from three specific case studies (Messene, Samothrace, Pella), extending to architectural modules, and finally encompassing overarching principles of design and use. As two additional case studies on caves and agorai show, the far-reaching entanglement of architecture and human action was neither restricted to highly architecturalised nor sacred spaces, but is characteristic of Hellenistic built space in general.

This volume investigates the interaction between the natural environment, market forces and political entities in an ancient Sicilian town and its surrounding micro-region over the time-span of a thousand years. Focusing on the ancient polis of Kale Akte (Caronia) and the surrounding Nebrodi area on the north coast of Sicily, the book examines the city’s archaeology and history from a broad geographical and cultural viewpoint, suggesting that Kale Akte may have had a greater economic importance for Sicily and the wider Mediterranean world than its size and lowly political status would suggest. Also discussed is the gradual population shift away from the hill-top down to a growing harbour settlement at Caronia Marina, at the foot of the rock. The book is particularly important for the comprehensive analysis of the 1999–2004 excavations at the latter, with fresh interpretations of the function of the buildings excavated and their chronology, as well for reviewing the present state of our knowledge about Kale Acte/Calacte, and defining research questions for the future. The archaeological material at the heart of this study comes from excavations at the site conducted by the author. It is one of the few detailed publications from Sicily of Hellenistic and Roman amphora material. The conclusions about changing trends of commercial production and exchange will be of interest to those working on ceramic material elsewhere in Sicily and indeed further afield. The study also offers a fresh perspective of the economic history of ancient Sicily. The origins of Kale Akte and its alleged foundation by the exiled Sikel leader, Ducetius, in the fifth century BC, are also discussed in the light of the latest archaeological discoveries. An Italian summary of each chapter is also included.

Temples are the most prestigious buildings in the urban landscape of ancient Italy, emerging within a network of centres of the then-known Mediterranean world. Notwithstanding the fragmentary condition of the buildings’ remains, these monuments – and especially their richly decorated roofs – are crucial sources of information on the constitution of political, social and craft identities, acting as agents in displaying the meaning of images. The subject of this volume is thematic and includes material from the Eastern Mediterranean (including Greece and Turkey). Contributors discuss the network between patron elites and specialized craft communities that were responsible for the sophisticated terracotta decoration of temples in Italy between 600 and 100 BC, focusing on the mobility of craft people and craft traditions and techniques, asking how images, iconographies, practices and materials can be used to explain the organization of ancient production, distribution and consumption. Special attention has been given to relations with the Eastern Mediterranean (Greece and Anatolia). Investigating craft communities, workshop organizations and networks has never been thoroughly undertaken for this period and region, nor for this exceptionally rich category of materials, or for the craftspeople producing the architectural terracottas. Papers in this volume aim to improve our understanding of roof production and construction in this period, to reveal relationships between main production centres, and to study the possible influences of immigrant craftspeople.

Pantalica is a large limestone promontory in southeast Sicily known chiefly for a series of extensive cemeteries comprising thousands of chamber tombs cut out of the rock, dating mainly between the 13th and 7th centuries BCE. A UNESCO World Heritage site and nature reserve, renowned for archaeological remains in a spectacular natural setting, the site gives its name to the Late Bronze and Iron Age “Pantalica culture”, typical of southern Sicily in the period just before Greek colonization. At the time of Greek colonization in southern Sicily (8th c BCE), however, Pantalica was still one of the main indigenous centers of the region, sometimes likened to a chiefdom, dominating a sizeable territory and subsidiary settlements. The main excavations were undertaken by Paolo Orsi between 1895 and 1910 and mainly comprise information and relatively abundant finds of pottery and bronze artefacts from about 250 chamber tombs. The material is housed in the Archaeological Museum of Syracuse and is crucial for an understanding of local cultural traditions, burial practices and international contacts between Sicily and other areas (Italy, the eastern Mediterranean) in this period. The finds are only known from a small selection published by Orsi in two articles of 1895 and 1912. More than half were never published. The main aim of this volume is to provide a comprehensive study and illustrated catalogue of all the finds from the Pantalica tombs, along with new information from Orsi’s original excavation notebooks about their original context. In addition, the authors present the results of original research on different aspects of the evidence, including topography, funerary architecture (chamber tombs), funerary practices, ceramics, metals and other finds, and chronology. This volume will be an indispensable source of hitherto unpublished information of particular interest to scholars of Mediterranean later prehistory and connections between Greek colonists and native populations in the early historical period. Some new information is also provided about remains of the classical, Hellenistic, late antique and Medieval periods.

Greek Colonization in Local Context takes a fresh look at Greek colonies around Europe and Black Sea. The emphasis is on cultural interaction, transformation and the repercussions and local reactions to colonization in social, religious and cultural terms. Papers examine the archaeological evidence for cultural interaction in a series of case studies from locations around the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions, at a variety of scales. Contributors consider the effects of colonization on urban life and developments in cities and smaller settlements as well as in the rural landscapes surrounding and supporting them. This collection of new papers by leading scholars reveals fascinating details of the native response to the imposition of Greek rule and the indigenous input into early state development in the Mediterranean and adjacent regions.

As the founder of the longest-lasting of all the Hellenistic kingdoms, not only was Ptolemy I an able soldier and ruler, he was also an historian and, in Egyptian eyes, a living god. His own inclination and experience facilitated continuous acts of self-creation in a variety of forms, whether literary, dynastic, artistic, or political. His work on Alexander and his campaigns was used by the later Alexander historians, and was one of Arrian’s major sources for his Anabasis. In the pages of his own history, Ptolemy constructed a self-portrait characterized by military courage and deep friendship with Alexander. As ruler of the Egyptian kingdom, Ptolemy experienced an elevated model of kingship very different from the Macedonian one: he consciously embraced the divinity of the Pharaoh, a construct that had little to do with the real man who wore the crowns. The chapters in this book, written by field experts in numismatics, gender, warfare, historiography, Egyptology and religion, examine the many ways in which Alexander the Great’s most successful Successor consciously made his own legacy.