The Jomon culture is a tradition of complex hunter-gatherers which rose in the Japanese archipelago at the end of the Pleistocene (ca. 13,000 cal BP) and lasted until the 3rd millennium cal BP. Recent studies increasingly suggest how this long cultural persistence was characterised by repeated episodes of change in settlement pattern, primarily manifested as cyclical transitions between nucleated and dispersed distributions. Although it has been suggested that these events correlate with population dynamics, shifts in subsistence strategies, and environmental change, to date there have been very few attempts to provide a quantitative analysis of spatio-temporal change in Jomon settlement and its possible causes. This thesis is an attempt to fill that lacuna by adopting a twin-track approach to the problem. First, two case studies from central Japan have been examined using a novel set of methods, which have been specifically designed to handle the intrinsic chronological uncertainty which characterises most prehistoric data. This facilitated the application of a probabilistic framework for quantitatively assessing the available information, making it possible to identify alternating phases of nucleated and dispersed pattern during a chronological interval between 7000 and 3300 cal BP. Second, computer simulation (by means of an agent-based model) has been used to carry out a formal inquiry into the possible underlying processes that might have triggered the observed changes in the settlement pattern. The aim of this simulation exercise was two-fold. First, it has been used as a theory-building tool, combining several models from behavioural ecology and cultural transmission theory in order to provide explicit expectations in relation to the presence and absence of environmental disturbances. Second, the outcome of the simulation has been used as a template for linking the observed patterns to possible underlying socio-ecological processes suggested by the agent-based model. This endeavour has shown how some of the largest changes in the empirically observed settlement patterns can be simulated as emerging from the internal dynamics of the system rather than necessarily being induced by external changes in the environment.

The distribution of ceramic wares in the eastern Mediterranean of the Middle to Late Bronze Age has been the subject of intensive study for many decades. In particular, the movement of Cypriot and Mycenaean wares to Egypt and the Levant has been used to elucidate trading mechanisms and/or synchronise the chronology of the region. During the course of these studies, passing comment has been made about the circulation of small narrow-necked ceramic vessels and the commodities they might have contained. Such vessels included Cypriot Base Ring juglets and Mycenaean stirrup jars that probably contained a valued commodity such as perfumed oil. The widespread distribution of these products has become linked to the production of low-cost, value-added goods to sub- and lower elite portions of society. Most observations on juglets to date have come from studies of single wares and/or high profile imports. This PhD research represents the first systematic investigation of the circulation of juglets as a functionally-distinct form rather than as a ware. Juglets offer a fine-grained dataset for examining wider issues related to commodity production, distribution and consumption. The circulation of juglet commodities can thereby be viewed against a background of local consumption practices. The chronological depth and spatial breadth of this study offer an opportunity to trace developments in the social and economic significance in the intra- and inter-regional distribution of this form, contributing also to an understanding of changing inter-regional contacts throughout the eastern Mediterranean. This analysis presented here addresses patterns of production (including evidence for regionalism and specialist manufacture), consumption strategies within and between societies and over time, as well as producer-consumer dynamics such as bilateral trade links, selective marketing and branding.

The iconography of Bronze Age Crete has long been noted for the abundance of animal imagery. The excavator of Knossos, Sir Arthur Evans, explained these depictions in terms of ‘nature-loving Minoans’: as part of the reassessment of long-held concepts in ‘Minoan’ archaeology this thesis offers a different framework for considering animals in Bronze Age Cretan material culture. Drawing on the interdisciplinary field of ‘animal studies’ it provides a perspective which foregrounds human-animal relationships, rather than the prevailing onesided view in which humans impose meanings on animals. The affordance concept, in which meanings arise from interaction, offers a balanced way to consider the relations between humans, animals and material culture. Sealstones, frescoes, zoomorphic figures, ceramic decoration, animal bones and written documents are all regarded as material traces of human-animal relations, each medium potentially implicated in different types of human-animal relationships or ‘animal practices’. Iconographic and statistical analysis are used to establish the potential significance of these traces: different types of animals are depicted in different ways and occur in varying frequencies in each medium. This demonstrates that they were used actively to convey information about animals rather than reflecting a passive interest in the natural world. The implications of this approach for an understanding of Bronze Age Cretan society are considered.

The mid second millennium BC material record of the southern Aegean shows evidence of strong Cretan influence. This phenomenon has traditionally been seen in terms of ‘Minoanisation’, but the nature and degree of Cretan influence, and the process/processes by which it was spread and adopted, have been widely debated. This thesis addresses the question of ‘Minoanisation’ through a study of the adoption of Cretan technologies in the wider southern Aegean: principally, weaving technology. By the early Late Bronze Age, Cretan-style discoid loom weights had appeared at a number of settlements across the southern Aegean. In most cases, this represents not only the adoption of a particular type of loom weight, but also the introduction of a new weaving technology: the use of the warp-weighted loom. The evidence for, and the implications of, the adoption of this new technology is examined. Drawing upon recent advances in textile experimental archaeology, the types of textiles that are likely to have been produced at a range of sites both on Crete itself and in the wider southern Aegean are discussed, and the likely nature and scale of textile production at the various settlements is assessed. A consideration of the evidence for the timing and extent of the adoption of Cretan weaving technology in the light of additional evidence for the adoption of other Cretan technologies is used to gain insight into the potential social and economic strategies engaged in by various groups across the southern Aegean, as well as the motivations that may have driven the adoption and adaptation of Cretan cultural traits and accompanying behaviours. By examining how technological skills and techniques are learned and considering possible mechanisms for the transmission of such technical knowledge and know-how, new perspectives can be proposed concerning the processes through which Cretan techniques were taken up and imitated abroad.

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Studies of Byzantine regional history, including Macedonia's, have not normally engaged with overarching problems of economic history, yet regional case studies are essential to their exploration. Five avenues of enquiry are explored to create a framework for the discussion of the economic history of Late Antique Macedonia: (1) the pre-modern configuration of Aegean Macedonia's landscapes, the range of exploitations practised within them, and the fluctuating levels of their intensity; (2) the organization of the imperial and civic administration, and army, and the appearance and demise of their institutions; (3) stability, instability, and the response to invasion, migration and barbarian settlement; (4) the typology and distribution of four categories of Late Antique successors to the Greco-Roman towns and cities of the region; (5) five case-studies of distributions of categories of "successor settlement" relative to distributions of rural settlements or rural churches, to landscape-types, to landscape-archaeology, and to politico-administrative history. It is argued that only this interdisciplinary approach unlocks the economic, but also social and cultural, history of even a "core" province and region such as Macedonia. Trends and patterns observable under most headings are then corroborated or further elucidated within the framework of developments throughout Illyricum and Thrace. The implications of all these studies for Macedonia's economic history during Late Antiquity are then discussed within the framework of studies of other regions of Late Antique Greece.

A Greek or Roman school was a group of students gathering around one teacher. There were no complex educational institutions such as schools and universities as we know them. The prosopographical study undertaken here aims at collecting all the teachers known by name who taught in Greek in the Eastern Mediterranean within the first three centuries of the Byzantine Empire. The resulting three hundred and six teachers in almost as many years form a poor statistical sample, but it is all that we have. An analysis of their floruit, geographical distribution, teaching subjects and the religion of these teachers is compiled here for the first time, confirming many of the conclusions drawn previously. The statistical analysis highlights the sharp drop in the number of teachers in the Greek world from as early as the late fifth century A. D. and the decreasing proportion of those teaching at an advanced level. The changing ratio of Christians to pagans in the profession is substantiated and the different rates of progress in this process of Christianizing are analysed in relation to the particular type of subject taught, whether grammar, rhetoric or philosophy. There is sufficient homogeneity in the period and area documented here to make the changes occurring within it material for a study of the decline of education within a culturally developed civilization.

This thesis is an investigation into the safe passage of the deceased over water as exemplified in the Lake of Knives and the Lake of Fire. The journey of the deceased from death to resurrection is envisaged as taking place in a boat crossing dangerous places and ordeals. This journey was parallel to the sun god Re's passage over the waters of the sky, and in which he is threatened by the powers of chaos. he rites of passage ocus on the safe pasage of through chaos,and assert resurrection, ebirth and life after death for the deceased the passageis re-enactedin mythical imagesa nd in ritual actions,a nd focuseso n the safej ourney of the deceasedth rought he ordealso f the Netherworld. This thesis is divided into seven chapters. Chapter One deals with the symbolism of water, knives and fire. Water is dealt with as the discharge which comes from the body of Osiris and offered to him in ritual. The second section deals with the symbolism of knives and fire. It is concluded that water mediates the passageo f the deceasedw hen it is offered to him in ritual. Water can also cause vlent death.Fire and knivesa reused as destructive tools in rituals. Chapter Two explores the cartographical descriptions and cosmographical locations of the two lakes, using textual and pictorial evidence. It is concluded that the lake of Knives is envisaged as extending from the east to the west of the sky. The description of the Lake of Fire varies from one context to another. The two lakes have no specific locations, but they wind through the sky. Chapter Three is a discussion on the theme of passage over water in Ancient Egypt. The ferryman spells and the Island of Fire are taken as two examples for the passage of the deceased over water, It is concluded that the ritual aspects of the ferryman spells and the Island of Fire are not very different from the ritual aspects of the Lake of Knives and the Lake of Fire, Chapter Four is an extension of the discussion of the theme of passage over water, and deals with crossing the lake as a ritual enacted for the deceased at the day of funeral. It is tentatively concluded that the aim of the deceased's crossing over the lake is to mediate his passage to become an ?# . The crossing was accompanied by recitation of ritual texts. Crossing over the Lake of Knives and the Lake of Fire was also accompanied by recitations of ritual texts, Chapter Five deals with the Lake of Fire in the Book of the Two Ways. The journey of the deceased constructed until he reaches the Lake of Fire, It is concluded that the Lake of Fire is a place, which the deceased visits to be