Aegean Prehistory

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Aegean Prehistory The David Brown Book Company Presents Aegean Prehistory Great Deals on New Titles from INSTAP Academic Press, British School in Athens, Aarhus University Press, and others, plus an assortment of sale bargains The Emergence The Bronze Age Begins of Civilisation The Ceramics Revolution of Early The Cyclades and the Aegean Minoan I and the New Forms of Wealth in the Third Millennium BC that Transformed Prehistoric Society by Colin Renfrew by Philip P Betancourt with a foreword by John Cherry This volume focuses on economic and Unavailable for too long, this social changes, particularly during the new edition reprints the original opening phase of the Minoan civilization text of Renfrew’s groundbreak- on the island of Crete. New develop- ing study, supplemented with ments in ceramics that reached Crete at a new introduction by the au- the end of the Neolithic period greatly thor and a foreword by John contributed to the creation of the eco- Cherry, in order to make this landmark publication nomic, technological, social, and religious advancements we call available once again to the scholarly community. the Early Bronze Age. The arguments are two-fold: a detailed explanation of the ceramics we call Early Minoan I and the differ- Contents: Foreword by John Cherry; Introduction to the 2009 Edition; ences that set it apart from its predecessors, and an explanation Civilisation; The Explanation of Culture Change; The Multiplier Effect; the Minoan- of how these new and highly superior containers changed the Mycenean Civilisation and its Origins. Part I - Culture Sequence: The Neolithic storage, transport, and accumulation of a new form of wealth Background; Crete in the Third Millennium BC; Mainland Greece in the Third consisting primarily of processed agricultural and animal prod- Millennium BC; The Eastern Aegean in the Third Millennium BC; The Early Cycladic ucts like wine, olive oil, and various foods preserved in wine, Culture Sequence; The Grotta-Pelos Culture; The Keros-Syros Culture; The Phylakopi vinegar, honey, and other liquids. The increased stability and I Culture; Aegean Interrelations and Chronology in the Third Millennium BC. Part security provided by an improved ability to store food from one II - Culture Process: Patterns of Settlement and Population in the Prehistoric year to the next would have a profound effect on the society. Aegean; Natural Environment and the Subsistence Subsystem; The Development Contents: Part I: 1. Introduction, 2. The Change in Ceramic Technology of Aegean Metallurgy; Craft Specialisation and the Transformation of the in EM I, 3. The Clays and the Fired Fabrics, 4. The Pottery Shapes, 5. EM I Physical Environment; Social Systems; Symbolic and Projective Systems; Trade, Surface Treatments and Decoration and their Relation to Fabrics, Shapes, Communication and Innovation; The Multiplier Effect in Action. Appendices. and Methods of Manufacture, 6. Comments and Conclusions on the Pottery; 688p, 152 b/w illus & 32 b/w pls (Oxbow Books, March 2010) Part II: 7. The Transformation of Cretan Society; References; Index. paperback, 9780977409464, $60.00. Special Offer $48.00 156p, 69 b/w illus (INSTAP Academic Press 2009) paperback, hardback, 9780977409471, $100.00. Special Offer $80.00 9781931534529, $36.00. Special Offer $29.00 Special Offers are valid through April 30th, 2010, and for Sale Books while stocks last. When ordering, please quote the reference number 379–10. Aegaeum New Titles instap academic press FYLO Engendering Prehistoric ‘Stratigraphies’ in the Aegean and the Mediterranean edited by Katerina Kopaka This volume contains 29 articles by leading scholars of Aegean and Mediterranean archaeology. They are grouped into five sections: Past and Present Gender Issues – A State of Art; Worlds of Women, Men and Beyond – Gender Identities, Roles, Interactions, Symbolisms; Formation of Past Gender – Coming Pseira X of Age, Childhood, Womanhood, Motherhood; Reading Aegean Block AF Gender – Through Women’s and Men’s Eyes; Engendering Aegean Fieldwork – The Contribution of Women Archaeologists. by Philip P Betancourt 283p, 43p of pls (University of Liège, Belgium 2009, Aegaeum 30) hardback, 9781935488248, $145.00. This volume, the tenth in the Special Offer $116.00 series of excavation reports about the harbor town of Pseira, Thin-Section Petrography which is located on the island of the same name, just off of Ceramic Materials the northeast coast of Crete, focuses on the excavation by Sarah E Peterson and interpretation of the architecture and material culture with contributions by Philip P Betancourt in Block AF. This southern group of buildings is one of the This booklet provides a concise overview most important areas in the settlement because of its long of the history and application of this type succession of building phases. In addition to domestic of petrographic analysis. When thin-section pottery, the houses furnish examples of stone tools, stone analysis is employed as part of a thorough, vessels, loom weights, inscriptions in Linear A, cult objects, multi-disciplinary study of ceramic ma- animal bones, marine shells, and a wide range of material terials, it provides a wealth of additional recovered from water sieving. This latter category, with interpretative data to archaeologists, al- burned grain, fish bones, shells, and other categories of lowing for more accurate interpretations materials, fills many gaps in our knowledge of Pseiran life. of the past, especially regarding pottery production, provenance, 330p, 64 b/w illus, 42 tbls, 21 b/w pls (INSTAP Academic Press variations in technology over time and space, exchange networks on 2009, Prehistory Monographs 28) hardback, 9781931534567, local and non-local scales, and even social issues such as choices of $80.00. Special Offer $64.00 both manufacturers and consumers and traditions of manufacture. 27p (INSTAP Academic Press 2009, INSTAP Archaeological Excavation Manual 2) paperback, 9781931534550, $9.95. Special Offer $8.00 Mochlos IIB: Period IV The Mycenaean Settlement and Cemetery: Retrieval of Materials with The Pottery Water Separation Machines by R Angus K Smith by Sarah E Peterson Excavations carried out at two Late Minoan III sites at with contributions by Philip P Betancourt Mochlos in eastern Crete yielded a pottery assemblage from 31 tombs and 11 houses, which are cataloged, A water separation, or flotation, ma- discussed, and illustrated together with petrographic chine is an instrument that divides soil analyses. The cemetery remains mirror the settlement into three components: the material that remains, and the conclusions discuss how the two floats, the stones and other heavy por- sites reflect each other. Rarely in Crete are a settlement tions that do not float, and the particles and its cemetery both preserved, and it is extremely that either dissolve in water or become fortunate to be able to document both in a series suspended in it and are washed away. The of scientific excavation reports (Mochlos IIA-IIC). primary purpose for utilizing such a device 320p, 40 tbls, 93 b/w figs, 35 b/w pls (INSTAP Academic Press is the recovery of organic remains, such as charred seeds, charcoal, 2009, Prehistory Monographs 26) hardback, 9781931534543, or small bones, which would otherwise be permanently lost. $80.00. Special Offer $64.00 27p (INSTAP Academic Press 2009, INSTAP Archaeological Excavation Manual 1) paperback, 9781931534536, $9.95. Special Offer $8.00 The David Brown Book Co. www.oxbowbooks.com — toll-free 1-800-791-9354 aarhus university press british school at athens New Titles Time’s Up! Dating the Minoan Eruption of Santorini Acts of the Minoan Eruption Chronology Workshop, Sandbjerg, November 2007 edited by David A Warburton Papers by natural scientists, archaeologists, egyptologists and clas- sicists discussing the newest evidence of the Santorini eruption. The papers fall into two sections. I: Evidence, geology, archaeology & chronology; II: Debate: typology, chronology, methodology. 298p, illus (Aarhus University Press 2009, Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens 10) hardback, 9788779340244, $60.00. Special Offer $48.00 Sparta and Laconia Santorini From Prehistory to Pre-Modern Volcano, Natural History, edited by W G Cavanagh, C Gallou Mythology and M Georgiadis by Walter L Friedrich, This volume contains papers from a confer- ence that celebrated the 100 years since translation by the beginning of work in Laconia by the Alexander R McBirney British School at Athens. The conference When the Greek island of aimed to carry forward from that original Santorini, classically known work a broad spirit of inquiry – the research as Thera, erupted dra- of those early scholars ranged over every matically in 1613 BC (+/- 13 aspect of the archaeology, epigraphy, his- years), it produced one of tory, architecture and art history of the region. The papers published the largest explosions ever witnessed, thereby pos- here have been arranged chronologically and they cover an immense sibly giving rise to the legend of Atlantis. This so-called span from the Palaeolithic to recent times. There are, however, other ‘Minoan’ eruption triggered tsunamis that devastated disciplinary and thematic connections, which form junctures across the coastal settlements in the region, and on Santorini it chronological order: material culture, religion and belief, cultural iden- left behind a Bronze Age Pompeii, which is currently tity, epigraphy, topography, architectural studies, iconography, histori- being excavated. The author
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