Archaeological sites & excavations

From the Chalcolithic onwards the culture and society of Sumer flourished along the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers with communities living close to the ancient shoreline in an environment that was closely linked to the exploitation of fluvial systems the sea and the unique marshlands of the area. This volume gathers together research first presented as part of a workshop entitled Sumer and the Sea: Deltas Shoreline and Urban Water Management in 3rd Millennium Mesopotamia to explore the interaction between Sumerians and their water-dominated environment. The chapters gathered here offer updates on methodologies and the most recent research from the field to provide new understanding and fresh insights into how the Sumerians adapted to the world in which they lived.

Gerasa/Jerash and the Decapolis are located along the seismically active area of the Dead Sea Rift a point where four tectonic plates meet to create the 110 km-long fault known as the Dead Sea Transform. It was activity along this fault that led in ad 749 to a famously devastating earthquake in the region. Measuring at least 7.0 on the Richter scale this quake not only had a profound physical impact on the Decapolis Galilee Caesarea and Jerusalem causing widespread destruction and reshaping urban landscapes but also led to a clear shift in socio-economic dynamics through a combination of economic decline and population displacement. It thus stands as a clear watershed moment in Late Antiquity. In its aftermath some cities struggled to regain prominence while others declined and were abandoned. Taking the ad 749 earthquake as its starting point this volume aims to provide a nuanced understanding of the quake’s effects questioning its role as a sole watershed moment and exploring the various other factors at play that influenced urban change. The contributions gathered here which clearly recognize earthquakes as non-human actors in this process clearly highlight the diverse impacts that this seismic event had on the city life in the southern Levant and the fallout in the decades that followed.

The ancient city of Neapolis (modern Kavala Greece) was founded by Thasos in the seventh century bce at a strategic location where the Thracian hinterlands meet the Aegean Sea. The patron deity of this North Aegean polis was Parthenos (the Maiden) known to us through epigraphic and archaeological evidence. Her sanctuary came to light in the twentieth century during rescue excavations and yielded numerous finds most of which date from the Archaic period.

This monograph provides a discussion of the history of excavations at this sanctuary as well as a contextual examination of the material leading to a new interpretation of Parthenos’ identity. Among the wealth of finds from the site the corpus of incised and painted ceramic inscriptions stands out as it offers a unique glimpse into the history of the cosmopolitan temenos and the dedicatory practices and rituals that took place there. The inscribed vessels carry dedications numerical and other graffiti and dipinti as well as the initials of the goddess which designate them as sacred equipment. When considered in the context of the ceramic inscriptions from sanctuaries across Aegean Thrace they further underscore the important role of Neapolis and the Sanctuary of Parthenos in the commercial networks and cultural dynamics of the Aegean both in the early stages of Greek colonization and in the centuries that followed.

People have been living in Uist’s island landscapes for millennia; shaping and shaped by the unique environments of machair and moorland we see today. Uist Unearthed tells the story of 5000 years of the islands’ prehistory and history through five key archaeological sites.

Based on the award-winning Uist Virtual Archaeology Project this interactive book brings Uist’s past to life. Readers are invited to dig deeper and discover Uist’s unique archaeology through colourful and creative mixed media including illustrations infographics and photography enhanced with state-of-the-art augmented reality.

This book provides an excellent introduction to Uist’s archaeology for novices and professionals alike. It discusses the importance of Gaelic language and culture in our interpretation and understanding of archaeological landscapes. It is for all those interested in exploring alternative ways of reimagining interpreting and presenting the past through digital storytelling.

This paper approaches the question of the identity of Parthenos patron deity of Neapolis through a new perspective based on Pausanias’s description of Polygnotos’s Nekyia the painted composition that decorated the Lesche of the Knidians at Delphi. This painting depicted among other heroes and heroines of the ancient Greek pantheon the Parian priestess Κleoboia carrying the cult objects of Demeter to Thasos. It is argued here that this Kleoboia a maiden (parthenos) according to the traveller could be the deified heroine that lies behind the name of Parthenos the elusive deity worshipped at the Thasian colony of Neapolis.

This paper presents some observations from the study of Corinthian pottery from the Sanctuary of Parthenos at ancient Neapolis (Kavala). Despite our limited knowledge regarding the stratigraphy and context of the finds the article discusses the Corinthian imports in relation to the total pottery finds and addresses each shape based on its use e.g. symposium-related vases oil and cosmetic containers vases with a votive and ritual function. Moreover it examines questions of iconography dating and frequency in an attempt to trace preferences of shapes recurrence of types and variations popularity of painters and workshops and how this assemblage compares to Corinthian pottery from other sanctuaries in the north Aegean southern Greece and southern Italy.

Already before World War II the Greek government or its delegates presented antiquities as diplomatic gifts encoding explicit or implicit messages from givers to receivers and vice versa. This practice witnessed a new impetus after World War II. This essay focuses on the inaugural presentation of a set of symbolically charged antiquities presented to President Truman by a formal delegation from Greece on 28 March 1949. The analysis comments on the nature of archival resources in Greece and the United States while problematizing the qualitative and quantitative nature of the existing archival records of Greece and the United States. The comparison between these records illuminates an interesting phenomenon that has largely to do with the power differential between the global superpower of the USA and the ‘crypto-colonial’ state of Greece in a liminal geostrategic location of Europe. One could expect that as a source country Greece would have a firmly simple but clear archival record of this formal exportation of antiquities. This record however is very scarce and this has to do at least in part with the intentional elimination of the archival habit in the troubled political life of Greece after World War II. On the other hand archives in the US are rich in information mainly because the archival habit has to do with construction maintenance and imposition of power both internally and externally.