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.

Three poorly preserved Hellenistic towers from NW Andros investigated during the course of a survey are discussed. The two small round towers of Tsouka and Ayia Marina, characterized by their humble masonry, are related to agricultural activities with a very restricted defensive role. The tower of Ayia Marina had probably also served as a road station. The third tower of Choreza is square, a public work in advanced military architecture which appears to be part of the defensive system of Andros. Reference is made to masonry types encountered on the island in relation to the architecture of the three towers. Recently the ruins of a fourth square tower were located at Tokeli near the N coast, obviously related with the trafficked naval channel between Andros and Euboea.

This article examines how religion contributed to the interconnectivity of the large geographical region of Laconia which was under Spartan control for most of the Archaic and Classical periods. With a particular focus on two Laconian sanctuaries, that of Apollo Maleatas and that of Apollo Tyritas, located in the area of the Thyreatis/Kynouria, which had traditionally been a disputed region between Sparta and Argos, it considers how sanctuaries played a part in Spartan–perioikic relations. The votives from the two sanctuaries vary: the sanctuary of Apollo Maleatas is rich in weapon dedications, while that of Apollo Tyritas has a diverse array of offerings, including bronzes, pottery and weapons. I argue that the sanctuary of Apollo Maleatas served as a central gathering place that united the Lakedaimonians, both Spartans and perioikoi, and where they celebrated the military qualities of Apollo. The sanctuary of Apollo Tyritas may reflect Spartan interests in the disputed region from the late seventh/early sixth century, and it too presents evidence for the military preoccupations affecting the area. The warrior-god Apollo, prominently worshipped in Sparta and Laconia, was appropriately offered offensive weapons of spears and arrowheads, both real size and miniature. The Spartans and perioikoi celebrated the Maleateia festival, at the sanctuary of Apollo Maleatas, which presented an opportunity for Spartans and perioikoi to gather together. A Laconian sacred landscape was formed through the celebration of common cults and festivals, thus uniting the centre (Sparta) with the Laconian (and Messenian) countryside.

In 1869, the historian George Finlay published a small pamphlet in Greek, entitled Παρατηρήσεις ἐπἰ τῆς ἐν Ἑλβετίᾳ και Ἑλλάδι Προϊστορικῆς Ἀρχαιολογίας (Observations on Prehistoric Archaeology in Switzerland and Greece), describing the discovery of Neolithic artefacts from Greece. This pamphlet is largely forgotten today, and the discovery of the Greek Stone Age is usually accorded to twentieth-century prehistorians (see e.g. Tsountas's excavations at Sesklo and Dimini). This article discusses Finlay's publication, and presents for the first time the transcription of the original English manuscript, upon which Παρατηρήσεις (Observations) was based. This material sheds light on the early stages of Aegean prehistory, and especially of Finlay's pioneering role.

To 1869, ο ιστορικός George Finlay δημοσίευσε στην ελληνική γλώσσα ένα ευσύνοπτο φυλλάδιο, με τον τίτλο «Παρατηρήσεις ἐπἰ τῆς ἐν Ἑλβετίᾳ καί Ἑλλάδι Προϊστορικῆς Ἀρχαιολογίας», όπου περιέγραφε την ανακάλυψη στον ελλαδικό χώρο ευρημάτων του Νεολιθικού πολιτισμού. Το φυλλάδιο αυτό έχει γενικώς σήμερα ξεχαστεί, ενώ η ανακάλυψη της εποχής του λίθου στον ελλαδικό χώρο, κατά κανόνα ταυτίζεται με του μελετητές της ελληνικής προϊστορίας, οι οποίοι έδρασαν τον 20ο αιώνα (βλέπε ανασκαφές Τσούντα στο Σέσκλο και το Διμήνι). Το εν λόγω άρθρο πραγματεύεται τη δημοσίευση του Finlay και παρουσιάζεται για πρώτη φορά η μεταγραφή του πρωτοτύπου αγγλικού κειμένου, επάνω στο οποίο βασίστηκαν οι παρατηρήσεις. Το υλικό αυτό διαφωτίζει τα πρώιμα στάδια της Αιγιακής προϊστορίας, αναδεικνύοντας συγχρόνως τον πρωτοποριακό ρόλο, που διαδραμάτισε ο Finlay.

In January 1959, when a trench was being dug in order to lay a water pipe in connection with the building of an orphanage (Κέντρον βρεφῶν “Ἤ Μητέρα”) on the south edge of Ayios Ioannis between Knossos and Herakleion a sinking of the ground suggested the presence of a collapsed tomb chamber. As the site lay within the Knossos area, Dr. St. Alexiou, Ephor of Antiquities for Crete, kindly invited the School to make trials there during the course of their excavations at Knossos in the summer of 1959.

The tomb which these trials revealed proved to be Minoan, and assignable to the L.M. II period, to judge from the remains of a couple of clay vases, a stemmed goblet (A.1) and an alabastron (A.2), which had evidently belonged with the original burial or burials. The deep-cut dromos, narrow with distinctly inward leaning sides, was of a type which it is often suggested may be of Mycenaean origin. But this is disputable, and the tomb at Ayios Ioannis appears to be as early as, if not earlier than, any of the tombs with this type of dromos on the Greek mainland. At Mycenae itself tombs with dromoi like this are not attested before L.H. III. On the other hand both at Mycenae and at Knossos there are tombs with shorter dromoi whose sides lean inwards, and some of these tombs may be earlier in date. Tomb 529 at Mycenae, with a short dromos whose sides lean markedly inwards, is assignable to L.H. I–II.

Since the 1960s, when the existence of tinned ceramic vessels in the Late Bronze Age Aegean was first recognised, our knowledge of this phenomenon and the catalogue of known examples have expanded significantly. Even before the nature of these objects was fully understood, scholars had suggested that their primary purpose was to imitate metal, particularly silver, vessels. Several silver vessel assemblages, including one from the tholos at Kokla, have been singled out for their perceived special relationship with tinned ceramics. However, closer analysis of tinned vessels has suggested that they were less similar to silver vessels than previously thought, especially in terms of their range of forms, details of shape and even colour. Recent scholarship has also emphasised that the concept of imitation is very complex and its investigation requires a more nuanced approach. Yet references to tinned vessels as straightforward imitations of, or even substitutes for, silver vessels remain common. In 2014, an opportunity arose to examine the Kokla silver vessels in greater detail. A strong connection between the Kokla group and tinned vessels is evident, although this does not mean that the latter depended upon assemblages such as the former for inspiration. The unique features of the Kokla group suggest it may have been a local innovation to emulate the usage of tinned vessels while simultaneously stressing the higher social status of its users. This paper concludes that situating tinned vessels within the ceramic tradition and thus regarding them as an enhanced form of ceramic, rather than an inferior form of metal vessel, better explains the nature of this phenomenon.

This article presents three new Early Helladic sites in Laconia, identified as such on the basis of sherd material collected between 1990–94. Two of the sites, Agios Georgios and Vouno Panagias, lie on the east side of the Eurotas river in the Sparta plain and offer a good opportunity to study the settlement hierarchy and density at that time. Moreover, the two probable EH III sherds from these sites are the first to be recognised in Laconia. The third new site of Boza lies on the east coast of the Laconian gulf near ancient Asopos. The richness and variety of sherd material collected there point to the sea as a possible route via which ceramic innovations reached Laconia. Finally, important known sites like Agios Vassileios in the Sparta plain, Vardies south of Gytheio and Daimonia on the east coast of the Laconian gulf, greatly contribute to the picture of EH Laconia as a densely populated area maintaining contacts with other regions of the EH culture throughout the third millennium.

This cist tomb was uncovered in 1959 during the excavation of the House of Sphinxes,2 and it lay at a distance of only 2 m. from tomb PG 606 (see fig. I and BSA li. 114 fig. 5).

It was built on the rock where there was a natural angle and a fairly sharp slope from west to east. The floor of the tomb was in fact for the most part the rock itself, but at the east end a number of small stones, overlying Mycenaean debris, were used. It was of rectangular shape, and orientated W.-E. The west and south walls of the tomb were provided by the rock; two large worked slabs, set upright, formed the north-east corner, and for the rest natural stones were used to line the tomb. There was no evidence of any roofing slabs, nor can one see how such could have been fixed. The inner dimensions were 1·78 × 0·68 m., and the two walling slabs had a height of 0·60 m.

The area over which the Tsakonian dialect is spoken lies on the east coast of the Peloponnese between the Parnon range and the sea. Its northern boundary is roughly the torrent which, rising on Parnon above Kastánitsa, flows into the sea near Ayios Andréas, its southern the torrent which, also rising on Parnon, passes through Lenídhi to the sea. A mountain range stretches along the coast from end to end of the district, reaching its highest point (1114 metres) in Mt. Sevetíla above the village of Korakovúni. Between Tyrós and Pramateftí, the seaward slopes of this range are gentle and well covered with soil. Behind these coast hills there stretches a long highland plain, known as the Palaiókhora, which, in the north, is fairly well covered with soil, but gradually rises towards the south into a region of stony grazing land, and terminates abruptly in the heights above Lenídhi. The high hill of Oríonda rises out of the Palaiókhora to the west and forms a natural centre-point of the whole district. Behind it stretching up to the bare rock of Parnon, is rough hilly country, cut here and there by ravines and offering but rare patches of cultivable land.

In Turkish geographical nomenclature certain ‘round’ numbers are regularly employed in an arbitrary sense. Most important of these are ‘a thousand and one’ (bin bir), used to express the idea of ‘countless,’ and ‘forty’ (kirk), which is similarly used for ‘numerous.’ As examples of the first may be cited the well-known ‘thousand-and-one-column’ (Bin Bir Direk) cistern at Constantinople and the ‘Thousand and one Churches’ (Bin Bir Kilisse) in Lycaonia. For the second we may instance several rivers called Kirk Getchid (‘Forty Fords’, in Greek Sarandáporos), the town Kirk Agatch (‘Forty Trees’), springs called Kirk Gueuz (‘Forty Eyes’), districts called Kirk In, Kirk Er (‘Forty Caves’) and numerous others.

Side by side with names like the foregoing, which explain themselves if we read ‘numerous’ for ‘forty,’ we find certain localities denominated simply ‘the Forty’ (Tk. Kirklar, Gr. Saránda). They are especially common in Pontus but occur also elsewhere, as e.g. in Mysia, where there are at least two villages called Kirklar, and in Caria, where the name is applied to a site with ruins of a church near the ancient Loryma and to an ancient tomb east of Knidos. Similarly mysterious are names like Kirklar Dagh (‘Mountain of the Forty,’ not ‘Forty Mountains’) which like the foregoing, imply an association with forty persons. These ‘forties’ call for explanation.

The provenance of vessels of the Marine Style of LMIB from Crete and LHIIA from the Mainland remains an important unsolved problem. This article describes an attempt to discriminate between selected Mainland and Cretan specimens by multivariate analysis of the compositions of their fabrics determined by optical emission spectroscopy with the aim of determining whether the Mainland Marine Style pieces were indeed made on the Mainland, perhaps locally at their find spots, or were imported from Crete or the islands. Accordingly Marine Style sherds have been sampled from seven Mainland, two island, and two Cretan sites, together with a large number of definitively local sherds from each site to serve as a control over the characteristics of the local clays. A distribution map, Fig. 1, and a corpus, as complete as possible, defining and describing the motifs and shapes used in the Marine Style from the Mainland, Crete, and the islands as a whole is included below in order to provide an overview of the available information.

This paper, based on Schliemann's correspondence and on his travel diary of 1868, fills in an important gap regarding Schliemann's beginnings in archaeology. Schliemann's awakening interest in archaeological excavation is traced throughout his sojourn in Rome and Southern Italy, where Pompeii provided perhaps the decisive impetus for Schliemann's own first archaeological endeavours in Ithaca. Interesting differences between the diary and the published account of Schliemann's itinerary in Itaque, le Péloponnèse et Troie are analysed in the context of his subsequent studies in Paris that obliged him to revise many assumptions he had held uncritically during what was originally planned as a ‘pleasure trip’. The section dealing with the Troad (where the diary is summarised and excerpted at length) considers the allegations made by David Traill on Schliemann's having removed a page from the diary to hide what would have been embarrassing comments rejecting Hissarlik as the site of Troy. It will be shown that this section of the diary is complete and that Traill's account of Schliemann's movements must subsequently be rectified. Furthermore, the sources of Schliemann's information on the Troad at this specific juncture will be examined, together with his eventual adoption of the Hissarlik theory after meeting Frank Calvert at the Dardanelles. The charge of intellectual robbery leveled against Schliemann by Traill will be reconsidered.

Continuing the lines laid down in 1906, the campaign of 1907 was confined entirely to the site of Sparta itself. Our thanks must again be expressed to the Hellenic Government and the Ephor-General of Antiquities for their continuous support. This year we have especially to mention the enlargement of the Sparta Museum. The number of our finds had made this necessary, as the two rooms and entrance-hall of the old Museum were quite full when our work began. Two rooms have now been added to the right and left of the old building, doubling its original capacity. These rooms we have found most useful for purposes of study, and for arranging and repairing the finds, and we are especially grateful for the speed with which this improvement has been carried out.

The village of Angelona lies amongst the hills surrounding the plain of Molai, midway between the latter and Monemvasia. About half an hour east of the village is a small plateau known as Kollýri; this plateau is bounded on its south-eastern side by a revma, tributary to the greater ravine which runs down to the sea south of the ruins of Epidaurus Limera. At the head of the revma is a perpetual spring of good water, and in its neighbourhood are many traces of former human occupation; roof tiles of slightly concave section with a rough red-to-black glaze, and sherds of black-glazed and coarse red pottery are common. A few hundred yards above (west of) the spring an anta capital of poros (Fig. 1) lies on the surface; the block measures 0·82 m. in length, 0·80 in breadth and 0·23 in thickness, and is remarkable because the profile is continuous on the long side but only extends for 0·33 m. on the other. On one end there are traces of an attempt to work the profile, and on the top a series of rough toolings (dowel holes?) parallel to the breadth.

On March 31st, 1903, and the three following days I conducted a trial excavation at a site situated at about an hour's distance from Roussolakkos, and known as Hagios Nikolaos from a small church of that name. During the first three days I employed ten men, on the fourth only two.

The most prominent feature of the landscape is the height called Módhi (1776 ft.). From the foot of this there runs almost due east a deep valley with a river-bed, which, although quite dry at the time when I saw it, must sometimes carry off a considerable volume of water from the surrounding hills. The valley is at first narrow and its sides very steep, but a little way above the chapel it broadens out considerably: although the left bank is steep and in places almost precipitous, the right side rises in a gentle slope, forming a series of terraces which are under cultivation and afford a good harvest in spite of the stony character of the soil. It is on this southern slope that the chapel stands, situated on a small outcrop of rock and surrounded by cornfields.

These notes are for the most part devoted to questions of phonetics, dealing more with Lautlehre than with Formenlehre, and do not pretend to give a complete account of the dialect. I have thought this side of the subject most worth developing, because it is that which native collectors, excellent from the sides of lexicography and literature, are apt to neglect.

The dialect of Karpathos belongs to the south-eastern or south-Sporadic group of modern Greek dialects, which extends over Cyprus, Rhodes, Kos, Kalymnos, and other islands as far north as Chios. Its connexion with Cretan has also been recognized.

A Survey of the Marine Style shows that we may categorize octopods and argonauts into Types A and B, according to the drawing of the suckers in their tentacles. Type A suckers enclose a dot; Type B have no dot. All the instances of Type A and Type B are displayed against a crowded Marine background.

We may further distinguish a third class (Type C) of octopods and argonauts; small compact creatures whose suckers are reduced to knobs, while the argonaut shells are no more than sketchily drawn, the striations being placed haphazardly, either vertically or horizontally. These motifs are displayed against an open background.

This little pot—two and a half inches high, something less across—is said to have been found in Athens (Pls. III, IV, and Figs. 1-2). It is an oil-pot of the shape now known as a round aryballos. Whether an Athenian would have called our vase an aryballos is doubtful: he would have called it a lekythos or lekythion, for an Attic vase of the same shape and period, found in an Athenian grave, bears the legend A sōpodōrou hē lēkythos, ‘the lekythos belongs to Asopodoros.“ But lekythos is a wide term, covering not only that slender vase (in its numerous varieties) to which we usually confine the word; but also the squat, stable version of the same; and the so-called protocorinthian aryballos of the seventh century; and perhaps, at a pinch, even the alabastron.

Certain wooden fragments from tomb V at Mycenae are identified as parts of two small tripod tables, which constitute the best-preserved furniture from the prehistoric Aegean. As the epigraphic, iconographic, and archaeological evidence demonstrates, wooden furniture was not common in the Aegean area and belonged chiefly to prosperous persons, who rarely provided it to the dead. Statistically rare, though more widely known, are the wooden structures used from the end of MM III to the LH/LM III A2 period for burials, nearly all richly endowed (with weapons, metal vessels, ornaments, even with furniture). In tombs with multiple burials the dead person, placed on a bed or a bier, is isolated and raised above the others. Burial in a coffin, of whatever material, constitutes a means of individualizing the dead: the wooden coffin has additional value. Thus these modes of burial are explained as one of the customs adopted during the New Palace and Early Mycenaean period, in order to demonstrate the social and economic status of the prominent dead.

The new Rome inherited from the old a strategic situation in the Mediterranean world that was essentially similar at the beginning of the seventh century to what it had been in the first. Persia, vetus hostis, was still a threat in the east, while in the north there was the less organized but no less persistent threat of migratory peoples pressing across the Danube. By the middle of the seventh century the Byzantine supremacy in the east Mediterranean had been destroyed, and a profound reshaping of the state had been set in train. In discussing some coins and coin hoards from the reign of Heraclius (610–41), I wish to draw attention to the place of the Aegean coastlands in the regional economy of the Byzantine Empire as it was before the Arab expansion. The revival of commerce in the provinces in the ninth century seems to have begun in the coastal cities of the Aegean: this prompts an inquiry into their importance in the sixth and seventh centuries.

The second and third decades of the seventh century were a time of disaster for the Empire, when it was attacked from both the east and the north. The Persian armies conquered Syria in 611 and thereafter were able to make incursions into western Asia Minor, on occasion reaching as far as the shores of the Bosporus. Thomas Presbyter records that they carried captives away from Rhodes, while in the same year the Slavs invaded Crete. The Miracula S. Demetrii gives a graphic account of a naval blockade of Salonica by the Slavs and mentions sea raids on the whole of Thessaly and near-by places and the Greek islands which depopulated many cities and regions. The Avars, in alliance with Slavs, Bulgars, and Gepids, besieged Constantinople itself by land and sea, while the Persians occupied Chalcedon. The records of events in the first part of the reign of Heraclius are fragmentary in the extreme, and the chronology in particular has been the subject of much debate.