Recently there has been a revival of interest in both the historical and archaeological dimensions of the destruction of cities. The destruction of the principal settlement of a polis is one thing, the effective eradication of the political community quite another. What did it take to destroy a political community? The historical record is full of references to destructions of one polis by another in late Classical to Hellenistic times in Crete. And though not all of these destructions led to the end of the political community in question, some did, and between the Classical period (where we know of 49 poleis) and the Roman conquest of Metellus (where we know of only 24) the numbers of Cretan poleis were drastically reduced. The destruction of Praisos by Hierapytna between 145 and 140 BC (Strabo 10.4.12) was one such case. This seems to form part of a horizon of destructions (of Dreros, Apollonia and Phaistos) that took place between 200 and 140 BC. Florence Gaignerot-Driessen has demonstrated that there is a clear ritual dimension to this in the case of Dreros, a dimension indicated elsewhere by the use of the verb κατέσκαψαν. Excavations at Praisos have shed light on this question. This paper argues that, while there is no evidence for a widespread destruction by fire, there is clear evidence for the ending of Praisian sanctuaries and the forced abandonment of houses and (most intriguingly) the abandonment of large storage vessels. A particular archaeological ‘signature’ of these abandonments, evident at Dreros, Phaistos and Praisos, is the abandonment of the ‘household pithos’, which in many cases seem to be older than the houses in which they have been found. The paper also argues that these archaeological signatures of what had to be destroyed in order to eradicate a political community in turn shed light on what made this particular form of ‘citizen state’ so resilient.

This paper investigates the transformative effects on technology of state collapse and related major cultural transitions in the period 1200–1000 BC (Late Bronze to Iron Age). It documents and assesses a notably large, preserved metal artefact assemblage (mainly bronze) from one of the best-known Mediterranean sites of the period. This is the large mountaintop town of Karphi, recently confirmed through excavation as occupied solely at the Bronze–Iron transition. Few other contemporary Aegean settlements sharing these characteristics of size, complexity and single-period occupation have been excavated, producing a lack of comparably informative metals assemblages. This contextual interpretative study considers in-depth knowledge of the archaeology of the site and its landscape alongside the results (published and discussed in Archaeometry in 2021) of surface HH-XRF testing on the whole assemblage. The latter is preserved in similar condition throughout, offering opportunities for broad internal alloy composition profiling by the latter method, as well as limited general compositional comparison with other assemblages from the contemporary Mediterranean. Comparisons of an interregional nature are attempted through typological, technological and contextual study of the Karphi material. In considering using this range of evidence, and considering how procurement, manufacturing technology and consumption processes around bulk metals and metal artefacts changed following state collapse, the analysis dwells on and highlights signs of locally centred, agent-driven shifts in contact, cultural and economic networks. On the basis of the full range of evidence addressed, it argues that Lasithian groups made specific, informed choices about manufacture and consumption without relying on specialised manufacture and supply from other points within Crete.

This article focuses on some central supporting walls one can see in certain buildings at Early Minoan Hagia Triadha, Fournou Korifi (Myrtos) and Vasiliki. The walls, which have Π-, C-, and L- shapes, have been viewed as central ceiling/roof supports. But that interpretation is only a partial one, for it does not explain the walls' ‘enclosing’ shapes. The solution I argue for here is that a ladder was set in each, providing access to the roof in single-storeyed buildings, as at Hagia Triadha, or to a second floor, as at Vasiliki. My investigation attempts to clarify one of the unique characteristics of Early Minoan architecture as well as how that form may have been adapted to provide access in buildings with more than a single storey.

The distinction between L.H. IIA and L.H. IIB as stylistic and historical phases was set out by Furumark over twenty years ago, but the terms have still not come into general use. Instead, L.H. II is treated as a unit, roughly equivalent to the fifteenth century B.C. Yet it is now generally agreed that there was an important historical ‘break’ in the middle of the century, marked by the destruction of many sites in Crete, which roughly coincides with the suggested division between L.H. IIA and L.H. IIB. The distinction between material preceding and following this ‘break’ on the mainland is likely to be of importance for the general history of the period.

In his discussion of these phases, Furumark was forced to rely very largely on tomb-groups, and his total material was not very great. He was conscious that additional evidence was needed for L.H. I and L.H. IIA, and commented on the general dearth of stratified material, accepting only one site, Korakou, as showing a L.H. I–II stratification.

The scope and a summary of the results of the 1962–3 excavations at Palaikastro and their relation to the earlier work of 1902–6 were set out in Part I (BSA lx (1965) 249–52). There is no call to repeat those findings here, nor has further study made it necessary to make any significant revisions.

In this article we publish the Late Minoan IB and reoccupation pottery from Block N (excavation report in PK VI. 252) and from other tests, along with an account of work undertaken in the main area of the town at Palaikastro (Roussolakkos).

As before, the excavation report was written by L. H. Sackett, while M. R. Popham contributed the sections on the L.M. pottery. We are grateful to P. M. Warren for notes on the stone objects and to V. E. G. Kenna for a note on one sealstone.

The material still awaiting final study and publication consists principally of Early and Middle Minoan pottery from Kastri, tests in Block Χ, Block Γ, and Square H3.

Among the Mahommedan religious antiquities of Asia Minor the tomb-sanctuaries held to represent the resting-places of Arabs killed during the forays of the viii–ix centuries form a well-marked and extremely interesting group. Their authenticity is on general grounds more than doubtful. The campaigns of the Arabs led to no permanent occupation: the lands they had conquered for the moment were restored to Christendom or fell to alien races. Only in the borderlands, where in times of peace Christian and Moslem might meet on equal terms, can we expect a true tradition regarding Arab graves or a continuous veneration of them to have persisted.

Of these borderland Moslem cults supposed to date back to the Arab period we can point to two examples, the tomb of the ‘sister of Mahommed’ at Tarsus and the tomb of Umm Haram in Cyprus.

The former is mentioned by Willibrand von Oldenburg (1210) as still a place of Moslem pilgrimage under the Christian kings of Armenia. It was situated outside the church of S. (Beatus) Peter and S. Sophia in the middle of the town.

In my study on the chronology of Middle-Byzantine churches after considering the contrary evidence I accepted the dated inscription in the west front of H. Theodoroi at Athens as a record of the erection of the present building. In an additional note reference was made to an article by Xyngopoulos, published after my own had gone to press. To support his dating of the church in the twelfth century he introduces new arguments which I suggested demanded a re-examination of the evidence. More recently Laurent has dealt conclusively with some of the points in connection with the inscriptions raised by the Greek scholar. But, while his verdict on their content may be accepted with confidence, for the archaeologist the question is not yet closed. Laurent's main theses are that in the first place the date on the smaller stone should be reckoned by the Byzantine era and interpreted as 1049, and, secondly, that the metrical inscription should be attributed to the eleventh century, if not earlier, in preference to the twelfth. However, of the relation of the two stones to one another and to the church into which they are built he speaks with less conviction. He favours the prima facie view that the present building was erected by Kalomalos in 1049, but, if the church is shewn on stylistic grounds to be of later date, he is prepared to dissociate both the dated and the metrical inscription from the foundation and to place the latter in the tenth century or even earlier (p. 82).

In 1956 the Greek Archaeological Council decided that there should be no excavations at Mycenae. The Anastelosis Department was still busy with the rebuilding of the Cyclopean walls of the Citadel along the western side and along the stretch of ashlar work in conglomerate from the Lion Gate to the north-western angle. At the actual north-western angle the Cyclopean work of the northern wall of the acropolis had originally met the conglomerate work in ashlar with a straight vertical joint. This has now been obscured in the rebuilding. The Archaeological Service was also planning and preparing to put into effect various measures to protect the site from damage by the large numbers of tourists who visit it every year.

Since we were thus not able to excavate, we devoted ourselves to studying and preparing for publication the finds from the excavations of previous years in the museums at Athens and Nauplia. In Athens the Director of the National Museum, Dr. Karouzos, and his wife, Mrs. Semne Karouzou, made us very welcome and afforded us every possible facility. Mrs. Sakellariou and Mr. Papathanasopoulos, assistant curators in the museum, also gave us much friendly help. At Nauplia Mr. N. Verdeles, the Inspector of Antiquities, and Miss Protonotariou, the Epimeletes, made special arrangements for our work and gave us every support.

It is more than twenty years since John Boardman with his ‘Pottery from Eretria’, published in Volume xlvii of this Annual, aroused a fresh interest in the study of Euboean pottery. A certain amount of work has been done on the subject since then, but there has been no controlled digging of cemeteries from which the main lines of the development of Euboean vase-painting in the sixth and fifth centuries can be established. So owing to the lack of external evidence, research on the subject continues to advance in a haphazard fashion and consists to a great extent in guesswork based on scanty material, as has recently been pointed out by Dietrich von Bothmer in his ‘Euboean Black-figure in New York’, the latest contribution to the subject. I wish here to add some more to the small corpus of vases already attributed, observing their relationship to the three great Eretrian amphorae in Athens and to one another.

Professor Wace's brilliant services to archaeology have been diffused over so wide a field that it is not difficult to cite some notable work of his in connexion with almost anything that one may oneself offer to his Festschrift. As I wish to write of a famous fifth-century bronze statue, I may gratefully remember his illuminating article on the Chatsworth head, printed in JHS LVIII (1938), 90–95.

The Corinthian Helmet Catalogue No. B2, of a popular seventh-century design, is described and classified. It is dated to the first half of the seventh century, and placed in Snodgrass's second group.

From several passages in Herodotus it is possible to piece together a general description of the Caspian Sea which, apart from its claims to accuracy, is at least comprehensive when judged by the standards of Herodotean geography. The Caspian, says the historian, is a sea by itself without connexion with other seas. Its length is fifteen days' journey in a rowing boat, and its breadth at the broadest part is eight days' journey. Its western shores are bounded by the Caucasus and its eastern shores by vast deserts. Its southern shores form the boundary of Asia in the North.

In a joint Greek-British excavation in 1993–4 on the E slope of the hill of Xeropolis, an interesting tomb complex of MH date was revealed, consisting of two chambers covered by slabs. Above the slabs was a stone-mound. The tomb complex, which had been robbed, recalls the tombs in the tumuli that are either built or in cist form. The pottery collected dates it to the MH period, but the tomb had been built on top of an EH layer. EH or LH pottery was also found in the fill of the tomb, apparently fallen from the settlement on the hill.

The sequence of construction of the Propylaia to the Acropolis of Athens is reassessed in the light of Pontus Hellstrom's suggestion that the two unbuilt east halls, and the original plan for the S.W. hall were intended to be dining halls like the Pinakotheke. It is argued that the objections of the various priests are unlikely to account for changes in plan; that the east halls were abandoned before work started on the S.W. wing; and that the cause of the change was financial, the need to economize in the face of the growing certainty of war with Sparta.

In the past the inaccessability of the Lasithi district of Crete has made a thorough botanical survey difficult. Its flora is still imperfectly known, but as far as can be ascertained at present, it is definitely not as rich in rare plants as several other Cretan districts. Even so, it contains well over a dozen of the island's most spectacular endemics.

The Lasithi plain itself is too well cultivated to allow many plants to grow, but the annual Crepis rubra, with flowers like clear pink Dandelions, is a weed on many of the banks. During late summer the grey spiny hummocks of Cichorium spinosum are none too lavishly dotted with their soft sky-blue flowers of typical Chicory shape, and in the walls at the western end of the plain Aristolochia sempervirens is firmly established. The leaves are shaped like arrow-heads, of a dark and glossy green, and among the long twining stems hang down the flowers. Their bent tubular shape is weirdly fantastic and their colour equally so, being dark brownish maroon with a startling golden blotch on the lip.

The paper presents the results of an intensive survey of two upland basins in eastern Crete. Following a description of the geology and topography of the area, the methods of survey, data manipulation, and pottery analysis are described. There follow catalogues of ceramic type fabrics and other finds. The results of the survey are then presented in three chronological phases (Neolithic, Bronze Age, Graeco-Roman), interpretations are suggested, and a final section provides an overview of the development of human settlement in the region. It is suggested that initial colonisation took place in the Final Neolithic but was short-lived. The basins were only reoccupied during the Protopalatial period, when both nucleated and dispersed settlements were occupied. There is no certain evidence for continued occupation after LM IIIA and the third phase of occupation did not begin until the fourth century BC. Hellenistic and Roman occupation in both nucleated settlements and farmsteads seems to have prospered over a period of eight or nine centuries.