In a rescue operation of 1965 on the Monte di Vico acropolis of Pithekoussai, Dr G. Buchner excavated a vast deposit of unstratified pottery and other finds, ranging in date from the Middle Bronze Age to early Roman times. At his invitation, the Euboean imports of the 8th cent. BC are presented here. Though fragmentary, they are of considerable importance not only in dating the foundation of the Greek colony, but also in providing the prototypes for the much more numerous colonial imitations in the same deposit, and in the recently published portion of the cemetery.

The Transitional LH III B2/C early pottery from Thorikos mine No. 3 is of particular importance for the definition of this as yet little-known phase. It is also of interest for its context. The assemblage is unusual; its nature implies a specific function rather than the debris of normal settlement. It is suggested that it may have resulted from mining activity.

Excavation of the late bronze age destruction of building complex H in the ‘agora’ at Gla revealed widespread traces of charred grain and grape pips. Samples from room H1 contained seeds identified as einkorn (Triticum monococcum L.). This material appears to be unique in Greece in consisting predominantly of grains from two-seeded spikelets of einkorn. It is uncertain whether the lack of chaff and weed seeds in these samples reflects partial preservation and recovery of grain in long-term storage, or represents fully threshed and sieved grain ready to be prepared for consumption

Professor Wace's many distinguished contributions to archaeology have been in a variety of fields. In all, however, he has kept an eye on the technical side of the problem, which so often illuminates our research. I, therefore, offer this investigation in his honour.

After Mr. Charles F. Binns had in 1929 published his theory of the firing of Athenian vases successively under oxidising, reducing, and re-oxidising conditions it became clear that the glaze on Greek vases turned red or black according to the conditions of the firing. This theory has recently been endorsed and amplified by Mr. Theodor Schumann, a ceramic chemist, who, at the instigation of the well-known archaeologist Mr. Carl Weickert, conducted during the war a series of experiments in the chemical laboratory of the Schütte Akt. Ges. für Tonindustrie in Heisterholz, Westphalia, and at long last successfully imitated the Attic black glaze. Like Binns, he used as the only ingredients for the glaze a clay that contained iron—i.e. red-burning—and a small quantity of alkali (potash or soda). His important new contribution was the peptising of the clay, whereby he eliminated the heavier particles. By using only the fluid made of the smaller and therefore lighter particles of the clay, he obtained a glaze of remarkable thinness, equal in quality and appearance to the Attic one.

This research project of Roger Moseley, a fourth-year undergraduate student in Princeton University arose out of conversations between Sir Hugh Taylor, Dean of the Graduate College, Princeton, and Dr. A. J. B. Wace of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton at a meeting of the American Philosophical Society in April 1954 in Philadelphia. The questions were directed to the properties of ivory when subjected to the conditions obtaining in houses destroyed by fire as, for example, in the houses excavated by Wace in Mycenae, where, in one case, many fragments of ivory which had obviously been in the fire were discovered.

Samples of old ivories were subsequently provided by Wace and others for examination. These included:

(1) Ivory fragments from Mycenae from houses destroyed by fire. Date: thirteenth century B.C.

(2) Ivory fragments from Syria in the Metropolitan Museum, New York. Pratt Gift. Date: twelfth century B.C.

(3) Ivory fragments from Nimrud, Mesopotamia. Date: ninth and eighth centuries B.C.

An experimental programme on ‘modern’ ivory was put into effect to provide data against which the properties of the ancient ivories could be examined.

In the summer of 1952 I visited Cibyra and the other cities of the tetrapolis, Bubon, Balbura, and Oenoanda, crossing from the last by the high pass of Girdev Gölü into Lycia; in the following year I walked from Cibyra eastwards to Lake Caralitis, Lagbe, and the interesting site at Kozaǧaci. The combined results of these journeys are presented here.

The following catalogue is divided into groups according to stratification. Brief descriptions of each piece and reference to similar vases from other sites are given in the catalogue. The chronological significance of the vases from the destruction level is discussed at the end of Section H.

A.Occupation Phase before the Curved Buildings

1. Plate 21. Fragment of rim of large krater.

Diameter about 0·30.

Very pale clay; dark-brown glaze; on the rim groups of short vertical lines; on the shoulder, panel containing hatched maeander; inside, rather streaky glaze varying from dark to light brown.

Weinberg holds that this type of krater developed during the Late Geometric period, but the term ‘Late Geometric’, as applied to Corinthian pottery, wants further definition. This piece must belong to the first half of the eighth century.

Both high- and low-footed examples are found.

Context: Trench H (Plate 74, Squares E-Gxi-xiii), Room XLI between floors at 8·90–8·40.

What seems to be the case is that Durrës during the late Roman period was incorporated in the network of Byzantine state-controlled supply which operated throughout the east and west Mediterranean, suggesting that the city was more open to the east than to the west in late Antiquity. By contrast, the supply of Tunisian fine ware and amphorae is smaller then the imports from the eastern Mediterranean. However, the persistence presence of Tunisian wares throughout late Vandal and Byzantine period argues for sustained interaction between east and west within the Byzantine world. The presence of local production in the 6th century contexts merits further analysis.

In his article in BSA 93 (1998) 199–219, Eric Cline comments on the recent discoveries at the site of Tell el-Dabca, where palatial quarters of the late Hyksos Period and the early 18th Dynasty have been discovered. For Aegean scholars the most spectacular finds from these excavations were numerous fragments of wall paintings which were identified as Minoan by experts working at the excavations and visiting colleagues. Cline particularly criticises the change of dating given to the paintings which were attributed by the excavators originally to the Hyksos period (1992) and afterwards to the Early 18th Dynasty (1995). Doubts have also been expressed about the validity of the new date and the identification of the paintings as Minoan or Aegean. This response tries to show: (1) the context of the paintings in the 18th Dynasty palace quarters in the light of recent research, (2) why a dating to the Hyksos period was originally considered, (3) why the paintings should be identified as Minoan and (4) that Cline failed to make himself knowledgeable enough about the archaeology of the site of Tell el-Dabca to give a serious opinion on the excavations and material.

The bronzes described below were found about 0·20 m. below the surface in the central part of the Prehistoric Cemetery area excavated at Mycenae in 1952. (Cf. BSA XLVIII 6f., with pl. 2—hereinafter referred to without the volume reference.) They lay together in a small heap as though they had been buried in a bag of some material which had entirely perished. The numbers attached to the objects here are those of the 1952 excavation inventory.

The combination of cruciform hilt, flanged throughout, with a blade narrow but without midrib, is not very common, though there is a good L.M. III parallel from Palaikastro. Cruciform swords are rather more familiar; one from Prosymna is virtually a longer version of our dagger (44 cm. against 29) except that the flange does not continue round the butt end oil the hilt—perhaps because the larger weapon had a pommel of another material, in one piece, while for a dagger the pommel was made as part of the hilt. Other L.H. III daggers from Prosymna have the flanged hilt (not cruciform) with a broad thin blade.

By ‘Clazomenian’ is usually meant what seems to be the main group of East Greek pottery decorated in a mature b.f. style. It is most obviously distinguished from Attic, on which it is partly dependent, by its greater tendency to decorative forms and details, as for example in the more extensive use of rows of white dots, and by such favourite motives as sirens and scales containing white drops. The home of Clazomenian is in northern Ionia: from Samos southwards, where its counterpart is the reserving and more traditional pottery known as Fikellura, no important b.f. school developed.

The first and still the only big find of Clazomenian pottery was made by W. M. Flinders Petrie in 1886 at Tell Defenneh in Egypt: most of this find went to the British Museum and a selection of the pieces was promptly and fairly published in 1888. In this publication Petrie, though not expert in Greek archaeology, noted the unity of the group, but—mainly (I suspect) on grounds of frequency—considered it to be a local Greek product of Tell Defenneh.

During the joint excavations carried on from 1929 to 1934 by the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem and the American School of Prehistoric Research in the caves of the Wady el-Mughara in Mount Carmel, many burials were found in the Natufian (Mesolithic) deposit of the big cave known as the Mugharet el-Wad. In addition to scattered human fragments, there were forty-four skeletons in varying stages of preservation, of which thirteen were found inside the cave, and the rest in the terracedeposit in front of the cave-mouth. Of these burials thirty-four belong to the Lower Natufian stage, three to the Upper Natufian, and the rest, although undoubtedly Natufian, cannot, owing to the condition of the deposit, be assigned with certainty to one stage or the other.

Whether it was caused by enemy action or by earthquake, the destruction of the houses outside the walls at Mycenae, particularly the group beside the modern road, south of the Tomb of Clytemnestra, has left a unique collection of pottery. For the Clytemnestra group at least it is a reasonable hypothesis, which the pottery and tablets do much to support, that the houses were destroyed in a single disaster. Though relatively complete publications of the several buildings in this area have already appeared, the pottery has not been published in detail nor considered as a whole. In this article it is intended to consider solely the evidence which this material gives for the definition of a period in the development of the pottery of Mycenae. This material consists entirely of whole or restorable vases and in this and other respects it is complementary to the group of fragments from the Prehistoric Cemetery (Central), published in the preceding article in this series, which illustrates the same or perhaps a slightly earlier phase.

Four major buildings were excavated in the area: the House of Shields, the House of the Oil Merchant, the West House, and the House of Sphinxes Fig. 1. Very little pottery was found in the House of Shields but in each of the others there was a considerable number of vases both painted and unpainted.

The appearance of loom weights at a number of southern Aegean sites in the Middle and early Late Bronze Age is indicative of the adoption of a new weaving technology: the use of the warp-weighted loom. The specific type of loom weight (discoid) recovered is a Cretan form, and this evidence of Cretan influence is also seen in a wider range of material culture features at these settlements during this period. Weaving is a complex skill and learning requires contact between novice and expert practitioner over an extended period of time; the introduction of a new weaving technology therefore raises the question of how the necessary technical knowledge and know-how was transferred from one individual or community to another. The archaeological indicators of this new technological practice, the loom weights themselves, are objects that very rarely travel, except with their owners; the presence of loom weights manufactured from non-local ceramic fabrics at some of the southern Aegean sites can therefore provide a window into the patterns of mobility through which the new technology is likely to have spread. Both in the Bronze Age and subsequent Archaic and Classical periods, weaving was closely associated with women. Loom weights thus constitute archaeological markers for the craftswomen who used them. This paper explores the insight they can offer into female networks of teaching, learning and craft practice in the second millennium bc.

Greece is on the whole a poorly watered country. Its rainfall is comparatively small, and confined to one or two months in the year; its rivers dwindle and its streams disappear altogether except immediately after rain. Consequently the provision of an adequate water supply is always important. In some districts wells must be sunk; but often in more hilly regions a more obvious source of supply is the natural springs which gush out from the rocks.

The earliest fine Attic pottery (excluding scraps of Geometric ware) found at the site of Old Smyrna was made in the first quarter of the sixth century (see no. 2 in the Catalogue below), although it is not until the second quarter that it appears on the site in any appreciable volume. One of the earliest, and incidentally most complete vases among otherwise very fragmentary material, is a lebes gamikos (no. 1) from the workshop of Sophilos, and it is accompanied by near-contempory lekanai by known painters. From this time on into the first decade of the fifth century fragments of almost every known variety of Attic cup are found, some of the highest quality, and at the end of this period skyphoi and lekythoi also appear while larger vases are conspicuously few. In the first quarter of the fifth century there is a marked falling off in the import of Attic pottery and it is noteworthy that no vases later than the first decade of that century were found in the main excavated area of the sixth-century houses at the north end of the site, and only isolated fragments from Trench C to the West. The possible historical significance of this is pointed out elsewhere by Mr. Cook. By the middle of the fifth century import is resumed on a small scale, but it is of high quality, including as it does a volute crater by the Niobid Painter (no. 118). The volume increases to the beginning of the fourth century, dying away again by the middle of it, and in this period fine black pottery, some of it with impressed decoration, appears beside the figured vases. The Attic black pottery of the fourth century is intimately associated with its numerous Ionic imitations and the presence of some of the commoner shapes is noted in the publication of the Ionic ware in a later volume of this Annual, to which the reader is referred.

At v. 94–5 Herodotus has often been accused of combining into a single war events separated in fact by half a century. At v. 81–9 and vi. 87–93 his critics take a different turn. He here presents us with three wars between Athens and Aegina, one (v. 82–8) in remote antiquity, another (v. 81 and 89) about 505 B.C., and another (vi. 87–93) between 491 and 490: and it is sometimes asserted that he has here split up a single war and scattered its parts over some twenty years, or even over several centuries.

Discovered in 1923 during excavations led by Duncan Mackenzie, the frescoes were found in a deposit in Space E on the ground floor of the building. Subsequent publication of the Monkeys and Birds Fresco suggested that the composition originally decorated a room on an upper floor of the House of the Frescoes. Shaw's close reading of the original excavation reports written by Mackenzie, however, yields no evidence for an upper storey. Shaw's review of the archaeological evidence and architectural comparanda suggests further that the House of the Frescoes may have been one-storied and that Room H-3 is the most likely candidate for frescoed decoration.

Part Two, undertaken primarily by Chapin, publishes a new reconstruction of the Crocus Panel that incorporates 14 previously unpublished fresco fragments in addition to the 14 fragments previously attributed to the composition. Stylistic and iconographic associations confirm the distribution of red-flowered crocuses, undulating bands, and an olive tree, but evidence for the attribution of two agrimia and blue-flowered crocuses remains weak. Detailed stylistic and iconographic analysis places the Crocus Panel within the Neopalatial tradition of wall painting.

In April 1971 remains of ancient buildings were brought to light and partly destroyed by a bulldozer in the south-west corner of a field below Makryteikhos village at Knossos. The field lies against the west bank of the Kairatos stream (fig. 1), immediately north of the path which runs down to the stream from the village. The owner, Mr. P. Triandhaphyllou, had put in the bulldozer to prepare the ground for planting. At the request of Dr. St. Alexiou rescue excavations were carried out on 3–4, 6–7, and 12 May by P. Warren on behalf of the School, and the site was afterwards filled in to leave the field free for planting.

The area of the Protogeometric cairns here described was first discovered in 1931, when we opened a trial pit (Fig. 3) which revealed part of a wall (Fig. 4, 6) and behind it what seemed to be a confused mass of stones mixed with black earth, and containing sherds, ranging from a few LH III to Protogeometric. These stones we took to be the remains of a collapsed house. In 1932 the pit was extended, principally to West and North, and though we encountered the same masses of stones all over the area, it became possible to discover some coherence in them. The plan (Fig. 3) and section (Fig. 4) give some idea of the complexity of the remains, but for the sake of clearness the accumulations of stones (all of which it was necessary to plot before they could be removed) between the surface and the remains actually shown are omitted. In the neighbourhood of wall 6 the stones explained themselves as remains of a succession of terrace-walls and their filling, built at various periods to terrace up the area to the North of them, each time with a slightly different alignment. It was only when we had got near virgin soil that the cairns became recognisable. They had naturally suffered in the process of terracing and had been further disturbed by a series of Byzantine cist graves (Fig. 3, 12–21; Fig. 5), the makers of which had displaced the stones and contents of the cairns and the earth above them. It is really remarkable that the cairns have survived at all and it is only owing to the skilful and patient work of Miss Lorimer that their structural character has been recognised.