This thesis argues that in Archaic and Classical Greece (700-336 B.C.E.), the construction of social and civic identities relied on the redeposition and repurposing of older artifacts, including architecture, dating from the Mycenaean period (1600-1100 B.C.E.). By considering the distribution of Mycenaean artifacts in later contexts, this work aims to demonstrate that discernible patterns emerge. From 1000 to 700 B.C.E., the deposition is primarily limited to private burials, but from 700 to 336 B.C.E. deposition switches to sanctuaries, as there is a shift from constructing familial identities to communal identities. This process is intimately linked with the emergence of the political institution known as the polis. Interacting with the prehistoric ruins dotting their landscape, both by building on them, as well as imitating them, the ancient Greeks engaged in the process of memory modification. Because these ruins served as the loci of memory, their survival or loss had a profound effect on historical narratives. Nowhere is this more apparent than in ancient Athens. By tracing the development of Athenian interaction with Mycenaean artifacts and architecture, this thesis demonstrates the profound role Athens’ prehistoric past had on the construction of a singular Athenian identity. / Graduate

This thesis compiles and assesses orientalising artefacts from EIA Crete, which by definition are those that emulate Near Eastern models in design, style or technique. While oriental imports discovered on Crete have been the subject of several recent publications, there are currently no studies that deal with orientalising finds from the island in a similarly comprehensive manner. The aim of the present work is to fill this gap in scholarship and to provide a solid basis for interpretation. Following a multifaceted approach, the thesis offers an in-depth investigation of relevant pottery, terracottas, sculpture and metal finds. These classes of objects are investigated in terms of types, contexts and iconographies; they are then compared to potential Near Eastern models, which are examined in equal detail where appropriate. Based on this evidence, presumed connections to the Near East are challenged or substantiated while novel links are added, offering fresh insights into the meaning of the Cretan material. A critical revaluation of Cretan contacts with the Near East puts gained findings into a larger perspective of socio-political relations. The final part of the thesis suggests a new interpretation of the material, stressing the importance of Cretan agency, cultural self-definition and the multivalent nature of the orientalising phenomenon on the island.

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This study provides an abstract look at the movement of Greek religion into Magna Graecia with the arrival of Achaean settlers in Southern Italy. Through an investigation into the proliferation of sanctuary construction in the nonurban territory of the colonies, it is evident that the sanctuaries were not only used for religious purposes, and served as symbols of the authority of the city. Metaponto, Croton, Sybaris, and Poseidonia are the colonies in question, whose systematic development relied on the construction of these sacred compounds. This study takes a twofold approach; by investigating the physical placement of sanctuaries in various areas around the chora, their functions will be extrapolated. In the Achaean colonies in Southern Italy, sanctuaries in the nonurban territory did have a sacred significance, but more importantly they demonstrated ownership over the areas they presided over, and thus aided in the delineation of the chora. Nonurban sanctuaries also held the responsibility of sustaining order amongst the outlying populations, bringing together Greeks and indigenous and serving as a mediator amongst them. Furthermore, the sanctuaries positioned at the frontiers of the territory strongly demonstrated the identity of the Greeks, reinforcing their claim to the land. Thus, dissimilar to their counterparts on mainland Greece, the sanctuaries constructed in the nonurban territory of the Achaean colonies were part of a clearly defined development plan, and serviced the political necessities of the Greeks above all. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

This thesis addresses the lacuna in the study of Greek terracotta figures and figurines corresponding to the transitional period between the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages (1200-700BC). It provides a comprehensive synthesis of all available data, with particular reference to material from recently excavated sites in mainland Greece and its islands (Euboea, the Northern Aegean islands, the Dodecanese and the Cyclades). The study is framed according to the relationship between terracotta <b>figures</b> (those made on the potter's wheel) and <b>figurines</b> (those made by hand). The observation that the technological distinction between these two types is reflected in their different and separate functions has been sustained in scholarship for the past three decades, but only for the Mycenaean period. Handmade figurines and wheelmade figures occurred in different and restricted contexts in the Mycenaean world: the former in settlements, cemeteries and religious locations, and the latter exclusively in religious contexts. It is therefore inferred that they had different socially embedded values or 'meanings'. However, the extent to which such a distinction applies to figures and figurines in the Early Iron Age has hitherto not been explored. Initial evidence indicates that by the 8th century, handmade figurines and wheelmade figures were deposited together at selected sites, suggesting that their inherent socially embedded meanings were the same, and that they represented "different levels of [financial] investment in what is essentially the same category of votive". This thesis therefore determines the levels of co-occurrence of wheelmade figures and figurines, thus identifying how distribution relates to usage. Changes are observed over time and space and between different types of functional contexts, and the meanings of these patterns are investigated. The results of this study provide a chronological and geographical overview of the distribution of figures and figurines, and also indicate that figures and figurines had consistently multivariate relevance in multiple types of contexts. The functional dichotomy of figures and figurines observed for the Mycenaean period cannot be sustained beyond 1200 BC. Moreover, study of the contexts from which the material originates indicates that the significance of secondary deposits of religious nature has been consistently overlooked, and that figures and figurines were used in an active and meaningful sense even during the act of their discard. This type of activity is a distinctive one that can be characterised and defined functionally, geographically, temporally and quantitatively. The socially embedded meaning of figures and figurines was fluid and related to an action being performed; their meaning was not linked exclusively to an aspect of the object itself, and was therefore not static.

Urbanization in the Sikeliot apoikiai was the catalyst to the creation and reinforcement of polis identity from soon after the point of initial settlement onwards. A main priority of the Greek settlers was to first layout the foundations for an urban grid, and within this grid to designate space for ritual practice, later monumentalized during the Archaic and Classical periods following the growth of the polis. A diachronic and geographical survey of urbanization and of the religious architecture, art, and votives dating to the Archaic and Classical periods illustrates this; this survey centers around seven major Greek settlements in Sicily: Naxos, Megara Hyblaea, Syracuse, Himera, Gela, Akragas, and Selinus. While the process of urbanization also occurred on the Greek mainland, it was not prior to the phenomenon taking place in Sicily, rendering the Sikeliot poleis simply as imitations of mainland poleis as once argued; rather urbanization in Sicily occurred over a timeline parallel to that of the mainland. The development of Sikeliot trends and even prototypes in temple architecture and urban planning confirm this in the material evidence. There is also no evidence of the apoikiai in Sicily ever adopting poliadic deities, a traditional quality of polis identity within mainland poleis. Their polis identities were not rooted in the cult practice of poliadic deities, but in cult practice itself, which fostered a collective consciousness among polis inhabitants by virtue of shared ritual practice, reinforced by the monumentalization of religious space; cult practice is what affirmed and reaffirmed their polis identity. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

The research project concerned cultural and economic transfers between the Etruscan world and Attica during the Archaic period and focused on the copy and the adaptation of Etruscan vase shapes by some potters of the Athenian Kerameikos. This being a vast and known subject, it was decided to concentrate on the case study of one shape, the kyathos, for which a large range of aspects were studied: the origins and typology of the shape in Etruria and its variants according to regional tastes. Etruscan black-figure productions are also included. The research then moved on the Attic shores and proposed a study of Attic kyathos shapes (compared to the Etruscan models) and tried to identify workshops and potters’ shaping habits. This approach is close to H. Bloesch and E. A. Mackay studies, but also to C. Orton’s system of “envelopes”. In another chapter of the work, several aspects such as the contexts, distribution, uses, functions and manipulation of the kyathoi (both Etruscan and Attic) have been studied. In another part of the thesis, I drew a synthesis about other Etruscan shapes copied in Athens. Their situation has been compared with the kyathos. In this way, I tried to demonstrate the different aspects and phenomena which lead to these copies of foreign shapes in Athens (and the Etruscan demand for them). The work shows how complex is the system of reception of foreign objects/images/practices by both the Etruscans and the Greeks. / Doctorat en Histoire, art et archéologie / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished