Routes of Communication in Roman to British Colonial Cyprus
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Negotiating Space: Routes of Communication in Roman to British Colonial Cyprus Erin Shawnine Leigh Gibson Submitted for the degree of PhD in the Department of Archaeology, University of Glasgow, March 2005 © Erin Shawnine Leigh Gibson 2005 Abstract Offering a social approach to landscape through the systematic study of communication routes, this study redresses the balance between previous social, historical and data driven archaeological studies of roads, paths and communication routes, while providing landscape survey projects with the techniques through which to address social interaction on a regional scale. Research on roads, paths and communication routes completed over the past 50 years focuses on the technology of road building, descriptive historical accounts of roads, and anthropological investigations that focus mainly on the role of communication routes in movement, memory and landscape. Unlike these previous studies, this research addresses communication routes as socially embedded material culture. Since the 1970s many archaeologists working in the Mediterranean have employed regional survey techniques in order to investigate broader patterns of human activity in the landscape. Communication routes are notoriously absent from these survey projects. Interaction is instead extrapolated from topographical information and sherd densities. In the current climate of landscape archaeology where interdisciplinary regional survey projects employ ever more complex and insightful GIS systems in the attempt to understand social landscapes, the absence of communication data appears glaringly obvious. Within this thesis I argue that the importance of roads and paths goes beyond the places they may or may not connect or intersect. Instead, roads and paths are products of daily practices that reaffirm, redefine and reproduce social and cultural relations. Through the intensive survey of communication routes in three distinct regions in Cyprus, (North Palekhori, Mandres and the Akamas Peninsula Survey Zones), I gained a greater understanding of the interplay between human activity, expressions of identity, land use and settlement from the Roman to the British Colonial period. ii Although the morphology and structural features of roads, paths and communication routes vary between these survey zones the underlying themes involved in the construction, maintenance and use of communication routes cut across geography and time. This thesis pushes the boundaries of landscape archaeology and survey methodologies to address: human-land relations, traditions of road and path building, the role of roads and paths in the negotiation of power and the entwined nature of communication routes and perceptions of landscape. iii Acknowledgements I am grateful to many individuals within the Department of Archaeology in Glasgow for their support and interest in my work over the past four years. I am most indebted to Dr. Michael Given whose role as a supervisor and mentor not only provided a wide range of thesis support (from lending equipment to supportive beverages) but also for his insight into the discipline and practice of archaeology itself. Prof. Bernard Knapp’s experience in archaeology made him an important member of my supervisory team, providing insightful, yet challenging perspectives. Fieldwork in Cyprus was made possible in 2002 and 2003 through the support and permission of the Department of Antiquities under the direction of Dr S. Hadjisavvas. The Department of Lands and Forest in Cyprus contributed their enthusiasm and kind logistical support to my fieldwork for which I am grateful. The Cyprus American Archaeological Research Institute (CAARI) was always a place I received a friendly welcome no matter how tired, hot and grumpy I arrived. The kind support, guidance and interest of the people of Askas, Palekhori, Nikitari, Neochorio and Nicosia reminded me to look beyond my green forms to the people living in that landscape. Financial support for fieldwork, fieldwork preparation and supplies during 2002 and 2003 were provided by grants from the Council for British Research in the Levant, the Anita Cecil O’Donovan Grant, the Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, and the Graduate School at the University of Glasgow, Scotland. My first three years of my study benefited from support from an Overseas Research Studentship award in combination with the University of Glasgow Year 2000 scholarship. Without this financial support, in addition to later support from family, studying towards a PhD would not have been possible. There are far too many people who formed part of this work to trivialise their participation with a simple mention. A picture does sometimes say a thousand words. Those photos that follow present a smattering of the people who helped me into, and through this journey. iv v Table of Content Abstract ii Acknowledgements iv Table of Content vi List of Figures x List of Tables xvi 1 Paving the way 1 1.1 Research aims 2 1.2 Research foundations 4 1.3 What are communication routes? 6 1.4 An introduction to Cyprus and its history 7 1.4.1 Hellenistic to Roman period (312 BC-AD 650) 8 1.4.2 Early to Late Roman (31 BC-AD 650) period 9 1.4.3 Byzantine period (AD 650-AD 1191) 10 1.4.4 Medieval period (AD 1191-AD 1571) 11 1.4.5 Ottoman period (1571-1878) 14 1.4.6 Early British Colonial period 1878-1920 15 1.5 Pottery chronology 17 1.6 My approach 17 2 Theoretical Approaches to Communication Routes 21 2.1 Communication routes as ‘material culture’ 21 2.2 Power 22 2.2.1 Resistance 25 2.2.2 Postcolonial approaches 29 2.3 The theory of practice 34 2.4 Landscape theory 38 2.5 The framework for interpretation 42 3 A Guide to Field Research: Methodological Approaches to the Survey of Communication Routes 44 3.1 Survey zones 45 3.2 Method of discovery 48 3.2.1 Systematic: Transect Unit and Road Unit survey 51 3.2.2 Purposive: reconnaissance survey 53 3.2.3 Tools for locating communication routes 54 3.3 Recording methods 55 3.4 Interpretation and survey assessment 65 3.5 Conclusion 68 4 North Palekhori: Interaction in a High Elevation Landscape 70 4.1 Landscape history 72 4.2 Physical landscape 79 4.3 Land use 80 4.4 Path location 80 4.4.1 Spurs 82 4.4.2 Ridges 86 4.4.3 Saddles 87 4.4.4 Contour lines 87 4.5 Land use and interaction 91 4.6 Routes of movement 98 4.6.1 Road Unit width 99 4.6.2 Structural features 101 4.6.3 Intersections 102 4.6.4 Junctions 105 4.7 Communication and settlements 109 4.8 Stopping places? 115 4.9 Rethinking high elevation interaction 120 5 The Mandres Survey Zone 121 5.1 Landscape history 123 5.1.1 Plains 123 5.1.2 Foothills 126 5.1.3 Mountains and forest 128 5.1.4 Land use 130 5.1.5 Physical landscape 132 5.2 Plains 133 5.2.1 Unpaved Road Units 133 5.2.2 Paved Road Units 142 Structural features 147 The pride and prestige of the road 151 5.2.3 Movement 157 5.3 Foothills 159 5.3.1 Interaction in the foothills 159 5.3.2 Forest demarcation and communication 165 5.4 The mountains 167 5.5 Communication routes 171 5.5.1 Route 1 172 5.5.2 Route 2 175 5.5.3 Route 3 180 5.5.4 Where the routes intersect 181 5.5.5 Dating the routes 182 5.5.6 Route maintenance 184 5.6 Interaction and movement 184 6 The Akamas Peninsula Survey Zone 187 6.1 Landscape history 189 6.1.1 Pre-Roman period 190 6.1.2 Roman period 193 6.1.3 Medieval period 202 6.1.4 Ottoman period 210 6.1.5 British Colonial period 215 6.2 Communication routes 217 6.2.1 Communication by sea 217 6.2.2 Communication by land 227 Loops 228 Structural features 229 The ‘North-South Inland Communication Route’ 235 Eastern peninsula communication route 243 6.3 Long-term interaction within the Akamas Peninsula 247 7 Cyprus: An Island Wide Study of Communication 250 7.1 The socially embedded material form of roads and paths 251 7.2 The formation and maintenance of roads and paths 254 7.3 Landscape and movement 259 7.4 Power relationships 261 7.4.1 Redressing power: a British Colonial case study 265 7.5 Cyprus: the journey’s end 269 8 Contextualising Interaction: Moving Towards New Interpretations 272 Glossary 276 Bibliography 281 Archival Sources 281 Other Sources 281 List of Figures Chapter 1 Figure 1.1: Gum heart located on the east side of Cranworth Street, Glasgow. 1 Figure 1.2: On left double gum hearts on Queen Margaret Drive opposite the Botanical Gardens; on right position of hearts with relation to bus stop and garbage bins. 2 Figure 1.3: Schematic view of the island of Cyprus with survey zones outlined in grey. 7 Figure 1.4 TÆSP: Period Codes. 17 Chapter 3 Figure 3.1: Map of Cyprus showing position of the Akamas, North Palekhori and Mandres survey zones discussed within this thesis. 45 Figure 3.2. View of path in North Palekhori Survey Zone. 46 Figure 3.3: View west along transect of Mandres Survey Zone with cereal fields in the distance. 47 Figure 3.4: View of Cape Arnauti to the north, Akamas Peninsula Survey Zone. 48 Figure 3.5: Mandres Survey Zone showing transects and grey dots where roads and paths cross transects lines. 52 Figure 3.6: Schematic map showing total Road Unit and Transect Unit distances for the Akamas Peninsula, Mandres and North Palekhori Survey Zones. 53 Figure.3.7: Transect Unit (TU) form showing descriptions of transect T02 and its associated Transect Units TU001-TU009.