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Coarse-ware Stirrup-jars at Mycenae

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2013

Halford W. Haskell
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Extract

The coarse-ware stirrup-jars presented here come from two buildings at Mycenae excavated by Alan Wace from 1950 to 1952: the House of the Wine Merchant (HWM), and the House of the Oil Merchant (HOM). Over fifty examples were found in the HWM, and twenty-seven (plus three semi-fine ones) in the HOM, and as such they comprise the largest surviving deposits of the type apart from that of the Kadmeion at Thebes (where Keramopoullos found at least 120).

Although coarse stirrup-jars have received an increasing amount of attention in the last quarter-century, nearly all of the work has focused on those bearing painted Linear B inscriptions; results of philological studies, and of scientific analyses of the clay fabric, have provided fresh evidence for the debate concerning the political and economic relations between Post-Palatial Crete and the Greek mainland. With one possible exception, none of the jars from the two Mycenae deposits is inscribed, but the evidence indicates that, as is the case with inscribed jars, many were manufactured on Crete. Many of the jars fall into distinct typological groups, with parallels from other findspots at Mycenae, and other Aegean sites. The deposits are fairly well dated, and illustrate the diversity of coarse-ware stirrup-jars in use at Mycenae in the late fourteenth to the middle of the thirteenth century B.C.

Type
Research Article
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 76 , November 1981 , pp. 225 - 238
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1981

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References

Acknowledgements. I am most grateful to Dr. Elizabeth French for giving me permission to publish the jars in this study. Dr. H. Catling very kindly allowed me to read the manuscript of the article on analysis of inscribed stirrup-jars before its appearance in print (BSA 75 (1980)). I have benefited greatly from discussions with Dr. Catling, Dr. J. Cherry, Dr. S. A. Immerwahr, and Dr. R. Jones.

The following abbreviations are employed in addition to those in standard use:

CIV Sacconi, A., Corpus delle iscrizioni vascolari in lineaire B (Rome, 1974)Google Scholar

CMS I Sakellariou, A., Corpus der minoischen und mykenischen Siegel I. Die minoischen und mykenischen Siegel des Nationalmuseums in Athen (Berlin, 1964)Google Scholar

DPK Popham, M., The Destruction of the Palace at Knossos (Göteborg, 1970)Google Scholar

HOM The House of the Oil Merchant

HWM The House of the Wine Merchant

MT I Bennett, E., ‘The Mycenae Tablets’, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 97 (1953), 422–70Google Scholar

MT II Bennett, E., ed., ‘The Mycenae Tablets II’, TAPA 48 Part 1 (1958)Google Scholar

MT III Chadwick, J., ed., ‘The Mycenae Tablets III’, TAPA 52, Part 7 (1962)Google Scholar

OES optical emission spectroscopy

PKU Bosanquet, R., Dawkins, R., ‘The Unpublished Objects from the Palaikastro Excavations’, BSA Suppl. I (1923)Google Scholar

TT II Spyropoulos, T., Chadwick, J., ‘The Thebes Tablets II’, Minos Suppl. 4 (1975)Google Scholar

VIP Raison, J., Les vases à inscriptions peintes de l'âge mycénien et leur contexte archéologique (Rome, 1968)Google Scholar

1 VIP, 15.

2 These are collected in VIP (up to 1968) and CIV (up to 1974). To CIV can be added the following fragments: Mycenae (Georgiev, V., Kadmos 15 (1976) 95–6Google Scholar); Tiryns (Gercke, P. and Gercke, W., Hiesel, G., Tiryns VIII (Mainz, 1975) 21 no. 34 pl. 23.2a)Google Scholar; Tiryns (Godart, L., Killen, J., Olivier, J.-P., AA 94 (1979) 457–8, 457 fig. 3Google Scholar); Thebes (Symeonoglou, S., Kadmeia I (Göteborg, 1973) fig. 33:9Google Scholar). VIP includes stylistic analyses of the jars as well.

3 e.g. Palmer, L., Gnomon 31 (1959) 433Google Scholar; The Interpretation of Mycenaean Greek Texts (Oxford, 1963) 275–7; Kadmos II (1972) 27–46. Hart, G., Mnemosyne 18 (1965) 1–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Catling, H., Millett, A., Archaeometry 8 (1965) 3–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Catling, H., Jones, R., Archaeometry 19 (1977) 137–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Now, Catling, H., Cherry, J., Jones, R., Killen, J., ‘The Inscribed Stirrup Jars and West Crete’, BSA 75 (1980) 49.Google Scholar

5 Not all agree that stirrup-jars were traded. See VIP 193–209.

6 For the HWM, see BSA 48 (1953) 4, 15–17 (general plan of area, 2 fig. 1); BSA 56 (1961) 82 fig. 1; Archaeology 6 (1953) 80–1.

7 Athens 7386: BSA 48 (1953), pl. 11b.

8 Nauplion 10936–8: Ibid. 17 pl. 11d.

9 French, E., BSA 66 (1971) 112, 114, 117, 152.Google Scholar

10 The museum numbers quoted refer to Nauplion Museum numbers, unless otherwise noted. All jars, except for 3 from the HOM, correspond to FS 164. The fabric of coarse stirrup-jars can be described as ‘Oatmeal’, and does not vary much visually from one pot to another. Fabric colour is seldom uniform, varying from light brown/reddish brown to dark brown/reddish brown near the surface; it is often grey near the core. Many of the jars are covered with a slip, which on dark-on-light examples tends to be somewhat lighter in colour than the fabric. Museum numbers prefixed by * have been analysed by OES; the results are reported in BSA 75 (1980) 49–113.

11 Where two or more jars are very similar typologically, they are placed in a Group and presented within a single catalogue entry. Jars which are unique within the deposit are presented singly. Fragmentary jars which lack diagnostic features but which are generally similar (e.g. d-o-l banded) are presented together. Many of the Groups were established in a preliminary way by the excavator, E. French.

12 The name Biegen was first assigned to the HOM because Blegen first suggested digging the trench which led to the discovery of the HOM. The later name, House of Stirrup-Jars, was abandoned when it became clear that Mycenaean basements were normally filled with coarse-ware stirrup-jars. For the excavation of the HOM (by Dow, J. M.), JHS 71 (1951) 255–7Google Scholar; BSA 48 (1953) 4, 9–15; BSA 50 (1955) 184–5; MT I, 422–4; MT II 3–5, 6–9; MT III 30–2: Praktika tis Akadimias Athinon 33 (1958) 161–73; Archaeology 6 (1953), 78–80.

13 West House, House of Shields, House of Sphinxes. See MT II 3–13; MT III 13–29.

14 BSA 62 (1967) 151–3.

15 Palmer, L., Gnomon 31 (1959) 433 n. 3Google Scholar, and Marinatos, S., Praktika tis Akadimias Athinon 33 (1958) 161–73Google Scholar, proposed that the HOM was a perfume factory, citing the heating arrangements under one of the pithoi in Room 1.

16 E. Bennett, MT II 96–9.

17 French, E., BSA 62 (1967) 151–3, 168–77, 182–4.Google Scholar

18 BSA 48 (1953), pl. 9d; MT II 31 fig. 37. For similar stoppers, see MT II 31 fig. 37 lower right (Exc. No. 39–570; Mycenae, House of the Columns); Kilian, K., AA 94 (1979), 384, 384 fig. 4 (Tiryns).Google Scholar Verdelis found in the West House at Mycenae two unpainted kraters filled with yellowish earth (Plesia), which he conjectures was for floor plaster or for stirrup-jar stoppers: MT III 20–2.

19 Od. 3. 392. Wace, A., BSA 48 (1953), 13Google Scholar, 13 n. 17; MT II 7–8.

20 CMS I 181–3.

21 See Marinatos, S., Thera IV (Athens, 1971) 44.Google Scholar For horns and loops, see e.g. Pernier, L., Banti, L., Festos II (Rome, 1951), 396 fig. 259 ii (also 397 fig. 260) (Haghia Triada)Google Scholar; BCH 96 (1972), 28 nos. 54–5.

22 See n. 10 above.

23 For the deposit, see MT I 468 fig. 9 = MT II 30 fig. 34.

24 As with the HWM deposit, the jars which are very similar typologically are presented within their respective Groups. The various Groups into which the 30 jars fall were recognized by the excavator, M. Dow.

25 For specific parallels, see the Catalogue entries. For large Post-Palatial stirrup-jars, Popham, M., The Last Days of the Palace at Knossos (Lund, 1964), pls. 3d, e, f, g, 4e.Google Scholar

26 The date of the Kadmeion at Thebes varies from LH IIIA1 (Keramopoullos and Furumark) to LH IIIB (Raison). See Catling, H., BSA 75 (1980) 94–7.Google Scholar

27 Raison, in VIP n. 108i, groups all of the jars from HOM Groups 1–3 together.

28 BSA (1980) 49–113.

29 West Cretan a: BSA 75 (1980), table 6 nos. 100–1.

30 West Cretan a: ibid. nos. 102–3, 105.

31 BSA 75 (1980) 83.

32 For light-on-dark, see nn. 29–30 above; no. 10967, the exception, is an unusual piece—see BSA 75 (1980), no. 99. For HWM Group 3, ibid., no. 98, West Cretan β (Group 4 probably comes from the same workshop). It is interesting that most inscribed jars from mainland contexts generally seem to have been manufactured in West Crete, but an exception to this pattern occurs at Mycenae, where 5 of the 6 inscribed jars tested seem to be of local manufacture; see ibid. 93.

33 Tzedakis, Y., Kanta, A., Kastelli khanion 1966 (Rome 1978), 26, 28Google Scholar; Tzedakis, Y., BCH 93 (1969), 412–14CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kanta, A., The Late Miman III Period in Crete (Göteborg, 1980), 257, 288–9Google Scholar; Mavriyannaki, C., Ann. 29–30 (1967–1968), 169 fig. 4.Google Scholar

34 See Catling, H., BSA 75 (1980), 101.Google Scholar

35 Such possibilities are suggested by HOM Group 4. The sealing on the stopper of 5359 is the same as that of the semi-fine jar Athens 7626 (bovid). If 5359 is a Knossian jar, as is possible, and if Athens 7626 is of mainland manufacture, as is probable (see Popham, M., The Last Days of the Palace at Knossos (Lund, 1964), 16 no. 20Google Scholar), then reuse would be a certainty for one of the jars. This leads to various possibilities in connection with the jar from Thebes belonging with HOM Group 4; the jar from Thebes may have been exported to Thebes from central Crete directly, or via Mycenae, or the Mycenae specimens via Thebes.