Proceedings of the Kommos Symposium, Scripta Mediterranean Vol. VI

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEAN VOLUME VI 1985

Special Issue

Proceedings of the Kommos Symposium

held at the

Royal York Hotel, Toronto, Canada

on December 29, 1984

Pits dia me t‘‘mpelia sou k‘i t‘ M‘tala sou

E s ton Kommo t‘‘rcaia sou e nai h omorfi‘ sou.

Local Cretan song

Dedicated to James Walter Graham and Nikolaos Platon

whose writings and research have added substantially

to our understanding of Minoan Culture.

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) PREFACE This small volume contains the edited texts of oral presentations and subsequent discussions at a three hour symposium held at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto on December 29th, 1984, during the annual meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America and the American Philological Association. The aim was to investigate possible foreign contacts of the Minoan site of Kommos and its relationships with the two other major Minoan sites in the Western Messara Plain in southcentral Crete, during the Middle and Late Minoan periods (circa 2000-1200 B.C.). The two sites, Hagia Triadha and Phaistos, among the finest in Crete, have been extensively excavated over the last 85 years by Italian archaeologists, starting with the memorable spring of 1900. It was then that Arthur Evans and Federico Halbherr initiated excavation, one at Knossos, the other at Phaistos, suddenly revealing to the world the Minoan culture which, with its elegance in living style and artistic sensitivity, was to excite the curiosity of scholars and laymen alike. Investigation at Kommos, the third major site in the area of Phaistos and Hagia Triadha, was not begun until 1976, even though it was known earlier but long after the first major Italian initiatives were complete. Together, these three neighbouring but independent sites present archaeologists and historians with a unique opportunity to examine the dynamics of interrelationships in a single geographical area, in this case that of the Western Messara. Similar studies may some day be possible in the case of Amnisos and Katsamba, where excavation has been selective and incomplete. In terms of their relationships to Knossos the two latter sites also form a great Minoan "Triangle" comparable, perhaps, to the one under consideration. The timing of such a symposium seemed particularly appropriate. Our colleague, Professor Vincenzo La Rosa, of the Italian School of Archaeology at Athens, was well along in a series of reinvestigations of major structures at Hagia Triadha, especially those of LM III date. At Kommos, in the meantime, nine campaigns of excavation had exposed Minoan houses as well as civic buildings ranging in date from Middle Minoan I to Late Minoan III. At this stage it seemed an appropriate time to pause and to take stock. There was also the realization that the vicissitudes of the Kommos site, although readable in part through study of the unusually clear stratigraphy preserved there, could best be understood along with a consideration of its role as a harbourtown and in the context of its relations with neighbouiring Minoan sites. This could be introduced, we thought, by means of an open discussion of specific formal presentations focusing on some of the major issues and would, we hoped, serve to inform our own future efforts to interpret the remains at Kommos. The Kommos site, first pointed out by Arthur Evans in 1924 (Evans III [1928] 88-92; M. C. Shaw 1981) lay untouched until 1976 when our own work, sponsored by the University of Toronto and the Royal Ontario Museum under the auspices of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, began to reveal parts of the Minoan town and, later, the Greek Sanctuary. Excavation could not have taken place without the generous granting of a permit by the Greek Archaeological

1

Service and especially the enthusiasm and support of Dr. Stylianos Alexiou, then Ephor of Antiquities and Director of the Archaeological Museum of Herakleion, as well as the generosity of Dr. Doro Levi, then Director of the Italian School of Archaeology and discoverer of the great southwestern section of the Middle Minoan palace at Phaistos. Our own efforts have been documented so far in a number of preliminary reports in Hesperia, the most recent one (J. W. Shaw 1984) referring to earlier articles. While the discussions published here are largely unedited, the four texts themselves have gone through varied amounts of editing or revision. Professor L. V. Watrous's work on imported pottery is a summary of his paper, itself an early version of the chapter he is preparing on the subject for Volume II of the Kommos series. Professor M. C. Shaw's work on the monumental Minoan buildings is also a precis, whereas Professor P. Betancourt's contribution on the Minoan "Triangle" is largely as presented then. Professor La Rosa's article, the longest, is as it was submitted. Unfortunately, due to a delay in the mail, it did not arrive in time to be presented at the conference itself. The limited time allotted to each speaker made discussion possible, and certainly the occasion would hardly have been a success without the generous participation of the large audience which overflowed the Royal York Hotel's library that day. Among those who participated actively were people knowledgeable about surveying (D. Hope Simpson, J. Moody), metals and metalworking (H. Blitzer, J. Muhly), textiles (E. Barber), ships and shipbuilding (M. Katzev), interconnections and pottery (E. Fisher, G. Kopcke, J. Weinstein), religion (G. Gessell), storerooms (I. Begg), and seals (P. Yule), to whom we are indebted. A number of other acknowledgements is due, not the least of which is to Martha Richardson, Assistant Director of the Archaeological Institute of America, who made various arrangements and chose the comfortable Library at the hotel for the symposium; also to the Royal York itself for its responsible recording of the proceedings, as well as to Jeanny Vorys Canby of the AIA Program Committee. We would also like to thank Giuliana Bianco and Philip Betancourt for translating the La Rosa text from the Italian, and Erin Campbell for transcribing the discussions. The advisory committee of Scripta Mediterranea, especially Anthony Percival, has been most co operative in the make-up of the volume, a project partially subsidized by the Kommos Excavation Publication Fund. Joseph W. Shaw Maria C. Shaw Department of Fine Art

University of Toronto

Toronto, Ontario, M5S lAl

May 16, 1985

2

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) A GREAT MINOAN TRIANGLE IN SOUTHCENTRAL CRETE: KOMMOS, HAGIA TRIADHA, PHAISTOS

INTRODUCTION Joseph Shaw Welcome to an afternoon of talk and discussion about Crete, and more specifically southcentral Crete where, at Kommos, we have been excavating for almost ten years. With the encouragement of local Greek archaeologists and our Italian colleagues, and under the auspices of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, we could begin our work in 1976. Graced by financial support from Ottawa (first the Canada Council, then the Social Science and Humanities Council of Canada [SSHRC]), the Royal Ontario Museum, the SCM Corporation, and thanks to material gifts from a number of other corporations, we succeeded, during those exciting years of discovery, in exposing representative examples of houses of the Middle and Late Minoan town as well as large ashlar buildings to which we will return next summer for a final season of exploration. Above those buildings was an important Greek sanctuary, with multiple building phases and, during the Geometric and Archaic phases, international connections. With almost a decade of work behind us, and with publication via the Princeton University Press planned not long from now, we have reached a point where synthesis is called for, and when exploration of artistic, technical, and historical nuances continues. For this reason we have scheduled the workshop, and will allow time for discussion and active participation on your part. Our motivations for this vary. On the one hand, we wish to share with you some of our thoughts; on the other, we want and need the benefit of your own insights that may lead us to a clearer understanding of what we, blinded as it were by close acquaintance, have before us. A variety of themes could have been chosen for this afternoon's fare. The Greek sanctuary, with its informative architectural development, its evidence for ritual, its international connections, would have been a splendid repast, one where our colleague Peter Callaghan, who is responsible for the Iron Age pottery, would have participated. Or we could have explored evidence for "domestic economy" - the "stuff of life" as indicated by the Minoan houses from which artifacts, bones, and household furniture are being studied by Harriet Blitzer, Mary Dabney, David Reese, Lucia Nixon, John McEnroe, Kathy Schwab, Maria Shaw, James Wright, and others. Rather, we have chosen broader themes - international relations during the Bronze Age, and the use and 1

significance of the great ashlar buildings before us. Also, we find, as if in retrospect, that Kommos is only one of the three Minoan sites flourishing in the western Messara Plain. What can we determine about such obviously closely linked communities during certain Minoan periods? The challenge has its risks, for speculation must of necessity be a means for exploration of the issues. Speculation of this type remains an obligation. Our first speaker, Professor L. Vance Watrous, is what one might call a "founding father" at Kommos, beginning in 1976 when the promise of the site remained an open question. Vance's specific focus has been the Late Minoan pottery which he will be publishing as part of Volume II in our series, and he will speak to us about the international role or roles that Kommos may have played during the Late Minoan Period.

2

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) LATE BRONZE AGE KOMMOS: IMPORTED POTTERY AS EVIDENCE FOR FOREIGN CONTACT L. Vance Watrous After nine years of excavation (1), it has become apparent that the site of Kommos on the south coast of Crete was not another Minoan palace centre. Rather, it is a major port site which fed the nearby urban centre at Phaistos. Consequently, the sequence of imports at the site assumes considerable historical interest. The geographical range and number of imported trade items at Kommos is, to my knowledge, unmatched at any Aegean site excavated since World War I. The purpose of this paper is to describe the imported Bronze Age vessels at Kommos, and to suggest some of the broader implications of these finds. For the present my remarks should be regarded as provisional. Kommos is located at a natural harbour site, about an hour's walk from the palatial settlement at Phaistos. Excavation at the site since 1976 has concentrated on three sectors: the settlement on the hilltop and on the hillside, and the monumental complex below to the south. The total number of foreign vessels found in Middle Minoan (MM) contexts at Kommos is, according to Professor P. Betancourt, no more than a dozen. There are two jug fragments, probably from Cyprus, from an MM IB context, a Cypriote White Painted IV juglet from an MM III level, and a Nippled Ewer from Thera or Melos, also from an MM III deposit. The number of imported vases from LM I contexts at Kommos is relatively small. An important exception to this situation is a Late Minoan (LM) IB deposit of vases which fell down into the southern staircase area of Building J in the lower complex. This deposit contained a Red Lustrous Spindle Bottle which was probably from Cyprus. The site also produced five fragments of medium-sized vessels (circa 40 to 70 centimeters in height) whose clay appears to be Near Eastern. The next phase of the settlement is, in ceramic terms, LM II - LM IIIA1. Late Minoan II as a period is represented at the site by one large deposit, and several other small ones. I know of no actual foreign imports which can be dated to LM II, but the Ephyraean goblet -- which appears at Kommos at this time -- may be Mainland in origin. Beginning in LM IIIA1, relatively large numbers of foreign ceramic imports arrive at Kommos. From the Mainland comes an LH II goblet. From Cyprus, there are seven fragments of

White-Slip II milkbowls in secure LM IIIA1 contexts. Near Eastern imports include a pilgrim flask rim and five fragments of the biconical type of Canaanite jar made of coarse red to buff clay as well as a white-slipped rim from a medium-sized jar. Our first imports from Italy apparently date to LM IIIA1. There are at least eight in all, and they belong to two separate wares: the first is a wheelmade grey ware whose fabric is usually quite fine, light grey in colour and burnished. The second is brown impasto ware which is always coarse and usually black or dark grey, although it can be various shades of brown or even red. It is normally handmade and usually burnished with heavy vertical or horizontal marks. The grey ware cup in the slide is an imitation of the Minoan flat-based LM IIIA1 cup. In Italy, wheelmade grey ware vases are regarded as having their ultimate origin in Greece. Italian archaeologists do, however, acknowledge that some grey ware vessels were made locally in Italy. Grey ware vases also occur in Crete in Aegean shapes (e.g., askos, jug, kylix). For the moment, I would prefer to regard our grey ware vases at Kommos as Italian imports, although this is not certain. Four examples of open impasto ware vessels, perhaps dishes, with relief discs on their exteriors come from LM IIIA1 contexts. This kind of plastic decoration can be paralleled in Apennine pottery. The final Bronze Age phase of the site is LM IIIA2 - IIIB. The settlement, according to the pottery, is abandoned in the third quarter of the thirteenth century B.C., at a time when LM IIIB2 style pottery has appeared. Beginning in LM IIIA2, the number of foreign imports at the site doubles. From the Mainland, the commonest import is the stirrup jar. There are also examples of deep bowls and a stemmed bowl. We have been able to identify two pithoi of characteristic central Cycladic clay, probably from Naxos. Ethnographic research by Blitzer has shown that pithoi were traded widely in the 19th century eastern Mediterranean, so their finds should not come as a surprise. Cypriote White Slip II milk bowls continue as a popular import item at Kommos. We also have found one White Shaved Jug, and the neck of a large Plain White Pithos. In LM IIIA2, Canaanite jars of a different type of clay first appear at the site. This clay is finer than that of the earlier jars and tends to have a greenish or buff surface. There are two Canaanite jar shapes represented in Kommos: the biconical and the angular. Finally, the single largest group of foreign vases at Kommos in the LM IIIA2 - IIIB period is Italian. Most are of the coarse impasto ware. Large impasto vessels such as the collared jar, and dolio appear in this period. Parallels for these vessels exist in Southern Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia. The bulk of the vases imported into Kommos before ca. 1370 B.C. is from Cyprus and the Levant. Taken together, these vessels suggest a trade route with goods moving from Syria to Cyprus and then on to Crete. One of the most heavily travelled trade routes in the Bronze Age Mediterranean was between copper-producing Cyprus and the Syrian coast, where eastern tin could be obtained. The recently discovered early fourteenth century B.C. shipwreck near Kaİ, on the southern coast of Turkey, was part of this trade. Loaded with copper and tin ingots, pithoi

(one of which was filled with WSII milkbowls, Base Ring and White Shaved vases), and Canaanite jars, this ship was apparently wrecked on its way to the Aegean after having been in Levantine and Cypriote ports. It is tempting to see a substantial portion of our foreign vessels in LMI - IIIA1 Kommos as evidence for the Aegean leg of this east-west route. One would therefore connect them with the ingot and pot-bellow fragments, crucibles, charcoal and metal prills from the southern complex at Kommos which indicate that metals were being melted there at that time. Analysis of the metal remains would help to clarify our understanding of this trade. If we interpret literally the number of vases imported during LM IIIA2, it is during the second half of the fourteenth century that trade contacts with Cyprus and the Levant reach their peak. The presence of large vessels, like the pithoi and the Canaanite jars, also suggests an increased bulk in the trade. Again, I would see these vessels as evidence of trade with Cyprus, probably at sites such as Kition, Enkomi and Hala Sultan Tekke, which become large copperproducing centres in the fourteenth century. In many ways, Kommos is an Aegean version of these Cypriote commercial settlements. Given this build-up of eastern contacts at Kommos in IM IIIA1 and IIIA2 it is surprising to find that by the thirteenth century foreign trade contacts at the site seem to have changed substantially. The number of Cypriote imports trails off almost entirely in LM IIIB. Levantine vessels are still found in LM IIIB levels at Kommos, but they are less in number than before. The foreign imported pottery from this period suggests that Kommos's eastern trade contacts were replaced or at least supplemented by commercial connections with the west. The pottery from Kommos suggests that: 1) Italian pottery was already arriving in the Aegean in some quantity before Late Helladic IIIB, and 2) that this trade with Italy, at least in the case of Kommos, probably involved, in part, the exchange of Cretan oil for bronze. Finally, I would like to point out that the foreign pottery is only an inconsistent subset of the actual trade carried out there. To reconstruct the foreign trade at Kommos as fully as possible, we need to draw upon and integrate many different kinds of information from the site.

Department of Art History

State University of New York

605 Clemens Hall

Buffalo, New York 14260

U.S.A.

NOTES 1. This paper is based not only on my own work, but on the work of others. In this connection I would like to acknowledge my indebtedness to Clarissa Bellardeli, Vincenzo La Rosa, Sandy MacGillivray, Hector Catling and Robert Koehl, all of whom helped to identify the various wares.

DISCUSSION

Paul Yule:

How certain is it that the tuyère [a device used in connection with heating metal: Ed.] from

Kommos is from the Near East and why should it be imported? Something like that is very easy to

produce.

Watrous:

The answer to that, Paul, is that it is not certain it is a tuyère.The shape is similar to the shape of

tuyère published by Schaeffer at Ugarit. Its provenience is suggested by the fabric. Of that I am

fairly certain. Maybe I was being a little too coy, but it seemed to me that one might make a case

for this kind of an import coming in MM IB as being part of an inherited technology coming in at

that time.

Jennifer Moody:

I was wondering: last summer Birgitta [Hallagher] and I were discussing the Adriatic ware at Chania

and it looks like a lot, well not a lot, but some of the fabric, anyway, that has this Italian treatment

to it, is local, that it is being made in Chania in this way, and I was wondering if you find anything

like that in the Messara.

Watrous:

That's a good question. What I showed you today was our impasto ware pottery, which is different

from the kind of corded ware, which is being called "Barbarian" ware in the Mainland. Now, the

reason for this, I suspect, is because our Italian pottery is earlier -- it is at least one hundred years

earlier, at least when it begins -- than anything that has been found so far in the Aegean. We do

know that later on, both at Chania, Tiryns and some other mainland sites, the kind of Italian

pottery which I showed you from Kommos occurs with the later handmade "Barbarian" ware. We

apparently do not get it, because, I assume, our material is earlier.

The ware that you were referring to is the wheel-made grey ware. This is a problem. The problem

is that Italian archaeologists think it is one thing, Aegean archaeologists another thing. Birgitta put

out the suggestion in the symposium at Cambridge that these vases were made locally. The

evidence for that is the fact that a number of these vases occur in local shapes. I alluded to that.

I have to say I do not believe it. I would rather see this pottery being made in Italy or somewhere

outside of Kommos for foreign consumption. The reason why I suggest this is that grey ware begins

at a time when the wheel is introduced into Italy from the Aegean and that most grey ware comes

from the Gulf of Taranto area.

Ian Begg:

Your last map made me wonder, how does the evidence from Pylos fit into this? Pylos is on the

same route that you're talking about between Kommos, Chania, and Italy.

Watrous:

Well, in what respect?

Ian Begg:

The pottery - any evidence for trade? How does it fit in with trading patterns in LM IIIA and LM

IIIB?

Watrous:

Well, I will tell you a small story. I took some of the sherds from one of the stirrup jars that I

showed you, which is Mycenaean. I also took sherds from the stemmed bowl up to Athens and I

showed them both to Hector Catling and George Korres, who were digging in Lakonia and

Messenia, respectively. They both said those sherds are -- well, they did not say -- "are" probably

mine; but they did say "they would not cause any surprise on my site." So I suspect that in the late

period we have a lot of Mycenaean pottery; but you know, it is funny, it all seems to be in this very

yellowish soft clay which is definitely not from the Argolid. In terms of a trade route which goes

through Chania the next step obviously is the southern Peloponnese. So it looks as if one or more

sites in the southern Peloponnese are involved in this, what I would take to be a trade route which

then goes further west to Italy.

James Weinstein:

I have two questions actually: first, since you have brought up the subject of metals trade, I am

wondering what you have been doing about any metals you have found at the site.

Watrous:

We hope to have an analysis made of some of the ingots and some of the metal fragments. This, I

think, is tremendously important because with these analyses we can at least eliminate some of the

possibilities. In other words, are these things coming in from Cyprus, are they coming from the

mainland, are they coming from the west? I think it seems to me vitally important to have that kind

of knowledge.

James Weinstein:

Second, I am curious. There was no mention of Egypt, of Keftiu or Egyptian pottery. Is that to

come in a future talk or would you like to say anything about that in terms of trade patterns and the

question of a direct route from Crete to Egypt?

Watrous:

For a while last year we thought we had a few sherds that might be Egyptian. Alas, people who have

looked at them and who know Egyptian pottery have dashed our hopes. They are not Egyptian. So

we have no pottery from Egypt that we can recognize. I think we would recognize it; Nile clay

apparently is very distinctive. We do have a few bits of faience. Beyond that I do not think that I

can say very much. Given the evidence that we have, we don't seem to have anything which

indicates a direct route.

James Weinstein: Thank-you. Elizabeth Fisher: I hate to anticipate my paper for tomorrow ["The Trade Pattern of the Mycenaeans in Southern Italy" (see AJA 89 [1985] 330): Ed.] but to go to the question of the trade route between western Greece and Italy, it does seem that certain sites in Greece, in the western area of Greece, in Achaia, in the Ionian Islands, in Messenia, and in western Crete, were linked to southern Italy; but, they tended to be linked, I think, on a one-to-one basis. So that at Termitito, for instance, which is in Basilicata, we have a lot of pottery that seems to be Messenian, or could have Messenian parallels. And at Tarento, I disagree that it is fourteen per cent Minoan. I've looked at it for the past two years. I think it is mostly Minoan or western Cretan from the Chania region. So I think that it is much more complex than simply coast hopping from, say, Cyprus, Rhodes, Crete, Pylos, Achaia, Kephallenia, Italy. I think that there were business contacts set up and that trade went back and forth one-to-one. Watrous: This is just the kind of evidence that we need more of. But let me interrupt. Has not anybody seen those poor transport amphorae? Surely in this group here there must be somebody who has seen one of these vessels on one of their sites, or run across them. I would very much like to find a home for these things. We have a lot of them. They are not apparently being made on the site. We even have, I think, a large type of clay stopper, a large clay stopper which may have been made for them. So that they are coming in presumably with something in them or going out with something in them. Guenter Kopcke: Vance, do you suggest that there is a change in the emphasis on the prominence of copper supply? You said something - that there is a decline in Cypriote or Eastern imports at the same time when your western wares come in or western connections come in. And that sounded somewhat as if you suggested that, you know, one source dries up, and the other one opens up. Can we say this at this point? Because you continue to have Eastern material and I think that with Mycenaean pottery, no, really pottery from the Argolid ... [inaudible section] ... imported, although to a lesser degree and at the same time, I do not know whether we have an emphasis of the western connection, but the western connection continues strongly at the same time. So that is somewhat of a parallel here. Watrous: Let me try and answer this. Two points on that: one is a point of methodology. It seems to me, given a site like Kommos, as Professor Shaw says, we are obligated to speculate about its role. That is what it is, it is speculation. On the other hand, look at the site; it is not a major centre in itself, it is part of a larger regional complex, part of a larger trade pattern if you will. So that you could regard it almost as a barometer of Aegean trade which is the spirit I have taken it in. And so I have begun by describing the various types and amounts of imported pottery at the site and then I have tried to infer what I can from the evidence. Now the second point: the reason why I believe that the

trade from the east was replaced to some extent by the trade from the west is that I tend to see it as

part of a much larger picture in Crete involving Knossos, and the fact that beginning in LM IIIA2

and IM IIIB you get a sudden flood of Chania pottery all over the island, and I tend to see this

change that we get from east to west as perhaps being involved in some sort of conflict between

two centres. And the point of the conflict might be bronze. So that it does not surprise me when

you say that the eastern imports, for instance, continue in Mycenae, say, or up in the mainland.

That is what I would expect; but I think that in LM IIIB we have got a period when we may have

two centres which in a sense are competing with two commercial outlets so to speak.

Jim Muh1y:

You know that Hector Catling has argued that with the fall of Knossos there is a great decline both

in the Minoan and also in the Mycenaean metal industry. How would you react to Catling's thesis in

the light of your evidence from Kommos?

Watrous:

The problem is of course that the lights go out at our site roughly around the third quarter of the

thirteenth century, somewhere between 1250 and 1225. And, if I am not mistaken, that is the time

that I would assume the final destruction takes places at Knossos. The two in fact may be

synchronous.

Jim Muhly:

I am talking around 1375. There is a real collapse of the metals industry in the fourteenth and

thirteenth century following the rich [period] that you have just prior to the fall of Knossos around

1400.

Watrous:

I think we have to be careful with that. Obviously he is arriving at that kind of characterization

based on numbers.

Jim Muhly:

Based on the numbers of metal objects found in excavation.

Watrous:

The numbers go way down. Based on what we find at Kommos in the LM IIIB period, that site is a

beehive of metal working.

Harriet Blitzer:

Since I am the one who is working on the metal finds [at Kommos] perhaps I can add some light on

this question. Professor Muhly has asked a very important question since we have concentrated on

the ceramic remains here we have to consider we are dealing with a site that has produced not only

ceramic remains but other things as well. Kommos in LM I has a substantial metal-melting industry

down in the southern complex area with massive crucibles of the size of about ten inches across massive crucibles. We are talking about a really substantial industry. This is going on down in the

southern complex and we have all kinds and bits of remains from it. In the IM IIIA2 - LM IIIB period, however, we have evidence for metal-melting at two establishments, up on the hilltop and hillside. These are carried out in a much more scrappy way. They are carried out in and around establishments which are both living and working establishments, and what the people are producing is shafthold axes - double axes. They are producing them in clay molds, the evidence for which we have. We also have a very different kind of crucible being used in LM IIIA2 - LM IIIB, much smaller, of a type which begins in Crete in LM II and does not occur before that time. The people who are producing the double axes are themselves using in their homes handflaked axes. They are using stone axes. They themselves are not using the metal axes. They are clearly being produced for some other reason. Part of the furniture, part of the tools contained in all of the houses where people live in LM IIIA2 - LM IIIB at Komtnos, almost every one of those houses, has one of these hand-flaked axes made of a very hard stone. So you have a cultural change going on at Kommos in LM IIIA2 - LM IIIB which matches whatever is going on with the pottery. So we have very distinctive kinds of metal industries in each of those two separate periods. Watrous:

Just on this same question I wonder if our Near Eastern colleagues here could throw any light on

the situation. Is there any evidence in the Near East that could suggest that the sources [for metal]

might be drying up?

Jim Muhly:

This is the great age of the Levantine bronze industry, in the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries.

We have a wealth of metal from sites like Ugarit in this period. There is no evidence that there is a

shortage of metal, that things are drying up. And there certainly is no such evidence from Cyprus

itself. I think the more we learn of the Late Bronze Age in Cyprus the more we come to appreciate

the existence of a local metal industry in Cyprus during the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries.

Again, the idea of Catling that the Cypriote bronze industry was something brought to the island by

Aegean colonists at the end of the Late Bronze Age is now becoming increasingly difficult to

defend. So I see no evidence for shortage of copper in the eastern Mediterranean during this period.

Watrous:

Yes, I agree with you. And I think also that we might search for this apparent lack of bronzes in the

political and social changes that are taking place, at least in Crete. I think that things are happening

which are skewing our sample so to speak, and I think conflict is one of them.

Joseph Shaw:

I think we should perhaps stop there, although come back to these central themes, I am sure we

will, as time goes on.

INTERMISSION

Joseph Shaw: Our second speaker, Professor Maria Shaw, might be called a "founding mother," having lived with the idea of excavation at Kommos since 1965 when I first visited the site, and having been an active participant in the logistical planning of all aspects of excavation since then, year after year, whether is was selection of personnel or complex negotiations concerning aspects of expropriation. She has, as trenchmaster, exposed the remains and set the style of excavation and standard of recording more than anyone else. She will now speak about our ashlar buildings, their definition, use and significance.

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) LATE MINOAN I BUILDING J/T, AND LATE MINOAN III BUILDINGS N AND P AT KOMMOS: THEIR NATURE AND POSSIBLE USES AS RESIDENCES, PALACES, AND/OR EMPORIA Maria C. Shaw This paper focuses on two monumental, ashlar buildings of Late Minoan date located in the southern area of the site of Kommos and at the foot of the hill where a contemporaneous town once sprawled, going back in time initially to the Middle Minoan I period. T and P, as these two buildings are now labelled, are obscured by extensive superposed later remains, ranging in date from the Protogeometric period to the first century A.D., and especially by a series of temples with auxiliary edifices. (Figure 4) The earlier of the two buildings, J/T, had first been spotted in 1979 and has since been discussed extensively in preliminary excavation reports (J. W. Shaw 1980:234-243) and in public lectures by the director of the excavation. As exposed, it is some 62 meters long east-west, starting at the west some 40 meters from the sea at its present level, although it is clear that a substantial section of it on that side has been washed away and ravaged by the waves and the high, seaborne winds. In its prime (Figure 6), its floors rose up gently towards the east, following the natural slope, one also reflected in a wide, slab-paved road skirting it along its north, monumental facade, built of huge orthostate and ashlar blocks (Figure 5; Plate 2a). That part of its plan so far known (for the building could have extended further south where excavation is incomplete) consists of three distinct units: a series of adjacent spaces, probably storerooms, entered from an exceptionally wide and long southern corridor; a shallow stoa with five columns and two flanking end piers fronting a large court paved with pebbles; and a series of rooms on the west, what we have more specifically labelled Building J, which was provided with a second storey and which may have combined living quarters and administrative units. That T was endowed with architectural elegance is clear not only from the quality of the construction, but also from the remnants of the fine mural decoration of the stoa, which simulated veined and other variegated stonework. Building J/T was constructed in LM IA, part of a major project which included also the laying out and paving of the northern road leading inland from the sea and branching off north and south where Building T ends on the east, as we just discovered last summer [1984]. While the

1

building went out of use by late LM I, probably in LM IB, the road continued in use into the end of Minoan occupation at the site, in LM IIIB. Already in LM I there are indications of change in Building T. There was remodelling and reorganization of spaces of a kind that suggests decline, rather than healthy renovation. It is a phenomenon which may be more widespread at the rest of the site than has become apparent so far. In this second phase first the large corridor was subdivided, and some floors were raised; then, in phase 3, Building J went out of use along with the rooms east of the stoa. The stoa itself was partly turned into a room by having a wall built over where the columns used to be and right on top of the still existing stone column bases, which we were able to discover underneath it. Life continued in an impoverished fashion, during which a new type of Minoan hearth, two parallel slabs with their ends set against a wall, was introduced and proliferated. LM II pottery dates this phase, when use, or what might more appropriately be described as a "squatters' occupation," continues. Perhaps then, or soon after, a new monumental building rose directly south of the east part of T (Figure 7; Plate 3a). Pottery under its floors indicates a date of LM IIIA1 during or soon after which it was built. Though different in its masonry, using extensive half-timber framing, P relied in plan upon that of neighbouring Building T, the walls of which were conveniently dismantled and quarried. The walls of P end exactly where the south wall of the corridor ended on the west before; and we can assume an analogous situation on the east end, as well, given the delimiting presence of the north-south road there. P's dimensions then should be 32 meters east-west, with a minimum of 21 meters north-south, as exposed -- a substantial building. The plan is simple: at least two long galleries, ranging from 5.50 to 5.60 meters in width, which open to the west onto a large court which extends further west.(1) During this period, or soon after, Building J was reused. Its north door was blocked and its floor considerably raised. A new door was created at its south side to connect it with spaces now newly built, to which we have given the name "N". It is conceivable that though Buildings J/N and P are physically separated, they belong together functionally, thus, to some extent reflecting in a modified form the earlier use of J and T. A landmark in the history of P is that the end of its first phase is marked by a severe fire seen so far in the heavy burning and charcoal on its floors, which were subsequently raised. Both P and J/N came to an end in LM IIIB. The floors of P at this last stage were left empty, which suggests abandonment rather than sudden destruction, a condition paralleled in other areas of the site. Although there are endless questions one can raise in regard to the history of these fascinating buildings, it is the uniqueness of their plans and what these mean in terms of function on which I would like to focus. Of Building J/T it is its proximity to the sea and what appear to be storerooms on the east that suggest that it is a commercial establishment and one possibly connected with sea trade, as has already been suggested in the excavation reports in Hesperia. Unfortunately, we have to rely almost exclusively on architecture, for useful artifacts from the first use are almost non-existent. 2

The formal stoa, the limited number of other rooms, also speak for a public/civic building, and one intended to impress, to judge from its otherwise unnecessarily heavy construction. It is, in fact, these three architectural elements which suggest to me that perhaps other comparable complexes in other sites might provide a clue to T's more specific use. Though more than one such complex could be found in other Minoan sites, as further research could demonstrate, the one that presently comes to my mind is also of LM I date in construction and continues after remodellings into LM III in the neighbouring Minoan town of Hagia Triadha. It is the complex which consists of the heavy structure nicknamed "Bastione" by the Italian excavators and divided internally into several rooms, then a series of rooms to its east, which could be compared to J and, finally, a shallow stoa placed at right angles to it and fronting a large court, from which most of these spaces were entered (Figure 9) (Halbherr et al. 1977:203ff and Figure 131). It is interesting, moreover, that the complex is perhaps meaningfully located between the humble town to the north and the rich villas to the south. Perhaps, if the villas played a role in the direction of local industries and artifacts, as has been suggested recently (Watrous 1984:123-134), the complex may have acted as a depot and redistribution centre. At Kommos there are no villas comparable to those at Hagia Triadha, but such could exist to the south of Building T and, at any rate, T could have functioned as a storage and distribution centre for the Messara area and, especially, for objects to be transferred overseas. As to later Building P, its recent excavation and still incompletely recovered plan make any suggestions to be offered here tentative and provisional. From what we have of it, however, I believe that the clue to its use lies in the plan, dimensions and proportions of its galleries. Elongated, consecutive rooms have been encountered in several Minoan and other Bronze Age edifices in Egypt, Asia Minor and the Greek mainland, and their function as magazines there is clear (Figure 11). Though on paper the plans of such look very similar to the galleries at Kommos their proportions are, generally, quite different. The extreme length of the galleries of P in relation to their width (circa 32 meters by 5.60 meters) and the fact that they are doorless, at least at their west ends, makes them clumsy and unsafe spaces for storage; or else, what was stored in them could not be taken away easily. Not perhaps a coincidence is the fact that the dimensions correspond closely to those of a number of shipsheds. Pre-classical shipsheds, if any (J. Shaw in Bass 1972:90) are difficult to identify and date, partly because of changes in sea level since ancient times, and our parallels here are mostly those of the Classical period, of which the closest one is the example at Apollonia, the port of Cyrenaica (Du Plat Taylor 1965: 168 ff., Figure 69). Only one suggestion for such a Minoan structure has been made with any plausibility: the so-called shipsheds reported at Nirou Khani on the north coast of Crete (Marinatos 1925-26, and Marinatos 1933: 193 ff.). On the other hand, the average dimensions of the galleries at Kommos at least do not conflict with what we can estimate as those of large Aegean ships. Already a long time ago Marinatos calculated those to have had an average length of about 20 to 30 meters, and then on evidence much more meagre than what would be made available later through his own discovery of the now famous Fleet Fresco from the island of Thera, a most valuable source for information on nautical engineering (Marinatos 3

1933:191 ff. and Marinatos 1974:38 ff. and Colour Plate 9). Moreover, in a preliminary report, George Bass notes that the fourteenth century B.C. ship he is presently excavating off the shore of Turkey may be about 20 meters long (Bass 1984). The distance of P from the sea is still a real problem in my interpretation, but perhaps storage of ships in the wintertime, when they would not be used, was safest at a location considerably inland where they would be protected from the waves and the wind (2). Another possibility is that the area to the west of the galleries, one which seems to be a large, open space, may have been used for shipbuilding and that the galleries east of there would serve for longer term storage, before the ships were ready to be launched. Two parallel east-west walls lining up with the two walls of the northern gallery of P (Figure 4) may indicate further galleries on the west, but the date of these remains to be determined.(3) Figure 8 gives a tentative idea of how the galleries of Building P may have looked from the west, and it was upon completion of this sketch that I was suddenly struck by the similarity that exists between this facade and that of one of the buildings depicted in the Theran fresco referred to above, but on a different section of the frieze (Plate 3b). Unlike other buildings shown elsewhere in the fresco, this is unusual in not having a second storey, in being without windows or doors, and in consisting of consecutive, rather narrow, rather exceptionally high-ceilinged spaces opening right onto the sea. Three spaces and the beginning of a fourth one are visible. A group of armed warriors has just walked by it, possibly come from a mustering place or arsenal to its left, and there is a deployment of ships right to its front and by the coast. Perhaps we have here our first known pictorial evidence for Aegean shipsheds. As at Pylos, where Linear B tablets inform us of a local shipbuilding industry (Ventris and Chadwick 1956:183 ff.), so at other coastal sites, like the one in the fresco at Thera, or our site at Kommos, there may have been such production. At Kommos there is a question of who might have commissioned these ships, and whether some local 'superpower,' such as might have had its residential and executive quarters in a place like Hagia Triadha in LM III, might have been the one. This might answer the legitimate concern of Joe Shaw, who incisively noted in the past the contrast in quality between the buildings of the humble settlement at Kommos on the hilltop and those of the southern area, suggesting a commission and use of the latter by an outside boss. Long ago Evans made the suggestion that Kommos may have been the location of Menelaus' shipwreck in Crete on his way back from Troy and before he went on to Egypt (Evans Vol. II 1928:87-88). In fact, the Mycenaean king met with many other adventures and made many a, presumably, forced stop before returning home - one at Sounion, another at Kydonia, apparently at the northwestern tip of Crete. Perhaps, as in other picaresque stories involving other folk heroes, such as the Egyptian "Shipwrecked Sailor" and Wenamun of the Middle and New Kingdoms, re spectively, (Lichtheim 1975:211-215 and Pritchard 1969:25), or Sinbad the Sailor in the Arab World, so in Menelaus' case there was also a fictionalization of what originally may have been an account of a pilot's standard route. If there is any validity to the above explanation of the role of

4

Kommos in the LM III period, then this would certainly have been a good spot for seafarers to stop at, not only to replenish food and water supplies, but to refurbish their long-travelling ships.

Humanities Division

Scarborough College

University of Toronto

Toronto, Ontario, M1C lA4

5

NOTES

1.

Recent study of a series of consecutive pavements in the road east of Buildings T and P suggests that P could have been entered on that side, although whether there doors or, as on the west side, the galleries were open, it is not known. In the 1985 excavation season one more gallery was found giving us a measurement of circa 28 meters by circa 32 meters as the minimum dimensions of the building. More galleries could exist to the south, beyond the excavation's property line. A staircase was added to the west of the northernmost gallery. The date of the staircase has not yet been determined, but it is definitely not of the primary phase.

2.

References in the Iliad (I, 485-6) suggest that sometimes ships were hauled high up on land. Rough winter seas and even strong summer meltemia, common in this area, probably necessitated long waiting periods before propitious sailing weather appeared.

3.

Excavation in 1985, after the main text here was written, has shown these two walls to be of seventh century B.C. date. There were, therefore, no galleries on the west. No other LM III or even LM I walls were found west of the galleries in the extensive areas exposed in this last season.

6

DISCUSSION

Maria Shaw:

I should say that I welcome Joe’s participation in the discussion, since this was to be a joint

contribution.

Joseph Shaw:

I would point out perhaps that Joseph Shaw has written some time in the past that there were no

Bronze Age shipsheds in the Aegean. But he would change his mind!

Michael Katsev:

In the LM III complex, your Building P, which seems to consist of two buildings, of at least two

aisles; I am somewhat speculative about your reconstruction of the southern-most aisle, but that is

neither here nor there regarding my question.Between the two buildings you referred to a

"pebbled court". And I am wondering how you would fit that into your suggested function of

shipsheds.

Maria Shaw:

Well, the main suggestion I made is shipbuilding within and the way I envision this is that you

would a more permanent storage in the galleries on the These are extremely long, even for ships,

and I was told that the proportions of ships are such that if a ship is about 5.50 to 6.00 meters wide,

it should not be more than 20 meters long; is that not right Michael? [Information was provided by

M. Katsev before the talk: Ed.] In that case we may assume storage of more than one ship in each of the long eastern galleries. I visualize the shipwrights working in the central area, with a more permanent storage on the east and with boats ready to be launched being placed closer to the water on the west. As to your objection to a pebbled court: I do not really know. I am not an expert in nautical engineering and this is why I brought all this up here: to test out experts' opinions. Michael Katsev: Well, I am not [such an expert], but it is just that the nature of a pebbled court, seems to me [odd] from at least my knowledge of shipsheds from the Classical or Hellenistic periods as well as more contemporary shipyards in Greece today, which is perhaps not a very useful parallel. But a pebbled court is a rather elaborate way of dealing with a working area in a shipyard, or seems to me not to make any real contribution in terms of attempting to interpret the function of this building as a shipsherd; it is rather more elaborate than what I know of and what I would in fact envisage even for the late Minoan period of a shipshed. Maria Shaw: I have a thought on that. First let me say that the floor within the galleries themselves is not of pebbles, but of hard-packed earth: very hard-packed earth and clay. And the pebbles are limited to the court. Now you may remember that earlier on I remarked that Building P may have connected functionally with what replaced the early Building J along with those other rooms we have labelled 7

"N" [Figure 7]. The making of a pebbled court may have been dictated by what was considered

more necessary for the appearance, for the function of this complex, rather than for the galleries.

So it may be incidental that it is next to the galleries and was not a pavement specially made for

shipbuilding. [The pebble court was shown in 1985 to be of LM I date. The area west of the

galleries seems to have been paved with hard-packed, clayey earth in LM III: Ed,] I should also add

that we have [found] the edge of that court, but we do not have the entire area between my two

sets of galleries. That is still unexcavated. I assume the pebble floor would have continued here but

I do not know exactly how far, whether it will go across to the other set of "galleries" because we

[still] have to determine the date of the walls on the west. It is a suspicion at the moment; you can

see that they line up pretty well, and you see that their distances are such that they match with

those of the eastern galleries, but they may prove to be of a different date. It is something that has

to be tested next summer. We plan to dig there. So that is how I would explain the pebble floor,

as being intended more for the formal function of the other part of the building, maybe the

commercial, the business part of the complex.

Gerry Sheppard:

If it were a shipbuilding location would it be with imported materials, and would the storing of

these timbers, or whatever, would that have something to do with the floor?

Maria Shaw:

If it is -a commercial building …?

Gerry Sheppard:

If it is a commercial place, would they be importing materials to build the ships, or would they be

coming from inland, do you think?

Maria Shaw:

There was much more wood in Crete in those days than there is today; I think they would usually

use the local wood. Incidentally, I should mention on the matter of commerce, that it looks as if the

date of construction of this building is LM IIIA1, with its main use in LM IIIA2, which matches with

Professor Watrous's period of heightened commerce at Kommos.

Jennifer Moody:

I was wondering exactly what type of finds you found associated with those galleries. It is not clear;

is it pottery or what?

Maria Shaw: The galleries are heavily overbuilt by seventh century Greek buildings and a large area of them is under several meters of sand, and it will involve removing that sand to get down to their floors. We have exposed very tiny areas of their floors. And since there were two floors, as I mentioned before, there are two phases of use. I think the raising of the floor occurred some time in LM IIIA2, and there are correspondences on the hilltop for raising of the floors there too, a similar architectural phase. So we are beginning to see some patterns of matching in the life history of the 8

site between the hilltop and bottom area. Since you have two floors, the first one was swept clean before the other was built. It was, though, very heavily burned. So the first phase of P ended by fire, and because we found this burning in several separated areas I don't think it was just a localized phenomenon, because a lamp turned upside down or something burned the wood in the chases or something. I believe that this fire is connected with the end of that phase, and the floors were later cleaned. Then in the LM IIIB period, which is the one in which the building was used in the second phase, we have again this unfortunate situation that there seems to be abandonment at the site and you don't always find enough pottery to tell you about function, especially if you are dealing with a tiny area. So we have to rely rather heavily on architecture, I am afraid, for this kind of speculation. I am interested in reactions to the first building and connections with Hagia Triadha, if anybody has any ideas, perhaps more conservative parallels than what I have drawn - something with a more definite type of evidence. Guenter Kopcke: The parallel with Hagia Triadha I found convincing. What really emerges here, and you know that much better than most of us do in this audience, is a new type of planning, and quite a new consideration of which had hardly emerged before, and in that respect already Vance's paper was an eye-opener. And I think that Mrs. Blitzer's suggestion also helped really in the understanding and interpretation of a new building type. Now, as far as these shipsheds are concerned, it does seem to be the best, and, indeed, rather obvious once it is articulated, really a rather obvious idea, because it seems to fall into place with a number of sort of monumental features that seem to be characterizing precisely this LM IIIA1 period. And that's not just in this very area in terms of building, but just when one thinks of the enormous spread all of a sudden that this outbreak of reaching out that happens at this time which apparently involved, possibly, really official effort. And this would look like an official effort. Now the question really that lingers in my mind is the purely technical one, and that is the proportion. I do think that we do have boats from Egypt that exceed 40 meters, and I wonder, have you taken, or do you recall measurements? Is not the width rather narrow, in relation to the length? Because we would have to assume here that the length was really tailored to the actual size, [and that we are considering] a major special vessel, warship or something like this. But is this realistic proportion in terms of shipbuilding? Maria Shaw: If you place one ship there making use of the full length capacity, it would have to be a very narrow ship. It does not make sense. You would have to assume that there was a shorter ship than the gallery length available, or two quite small ships. The technical problems of proportions are something we shall have to work on, but, unfortunately, we have no parallels for this sort of building. We could bring back the slide of the magazines, the chart. Would people be interested in that to compare the plans? We have nothing like the galleries at Kommos. Nothing of that size. So if they are not storerooms, what are they?

9

Joseph Shaw:

I think that's a good question. Let's pause there for a bit. We have come up with Hagia Triadha,

we are talking about trade and interrelationships. Let's take that five-minute break, no more, then

come back, if you like, for "Chapter Three".

INTERMISSION

Joseph Shaw: Professor Philip Betancourt, also a founding father, whose advice and energy continue to inform our various efforts, especially our understanding of Middle Minoan pottery and relative chronology, will now take on a large, complex issue, that of the relations between Kommos, Hagia Triadha, and Phaistos.

10

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) A GREAT MINOAN TRIANGLE: THE CHANGING CHARACTER OF PHAISTOS, HAGIA TRIADHA, AND KOMMOS DURING THE MIDDLE MINOAN IB-LATE MINOAN III PERIODS Philip Betancourt Kommos, Hagia Triadha, and Phaistos hold many of the clues to the historical interpretation of the Messara in the second millennium B.C. I have benefited from discussions with numerous persons in the formation of these observations, especially my Italian colleague Vincenzo La Rosa. Phaistos, at the western end of the fertile Messara Plain, is strategically situated to administer the plain's rich agricultural production. Hagia Triadha is on the last hill between Phaistos and the Libyan Sea. Kommos, located to the south, lies at an excellent harbour near a good fresh water spring, with a productive hinterland of small plots and hills. The preeminent position of these three sites in the second millennium may be contrasted with the situation in earlier times. The first known settlement of this part of Crete dates to the Final Neolithic.(1) Phaistos and Kommos were already settled by this period, along with many other small raised hills used as open village sites. The earliest habitation of Hagia Triadha is less well known, but certainly by the Early Bronze Age it was settled as well because its residents were buried in two nearby tholos tombs (Banti 1930-31). Before Middle Minoan IB, we have little archaeological evidence to single out these three sites as among the most important sites of southern Crete. It is possible we are misguided by the clearing and levelling operations of MM I-II that may have destroyed much of the earlier remains, but it is clear that wealth was shared more generally within the Messara in EM and MM than it was in later times. Abundant evidence for this situation exists in the richness of the EM to MM I locations like Koumasa, Platanos, and other tholos tomb sites.(2) By the end of MM I, however, several changes have occurred. These changes are part of a general pattern that can be traced at many points in Crete. Within the period EM III/MM I, coastal settlements are expanded, palaces are built or enlarged, and many new villages are built. In the Messara, there is evidence for either an increase or a redistribution of population. Some old sites are expanded, and many new ones are founded. At about the same time, some very fundamental changes occur in the production of manufactured goods like bronzes and pottery. These changes can be traced most easily in the ceramics industry where an increase in quality and quantity is accompanied by basic technological improvements including the introduction of the potter's wheel and a new type of clay preparation.(3) In addition, we have a gradual increase in the number of

1

foreign products found in Crete. Finally, one can trace the emergence of architectural focal points, with the largest centre located at Phaistos. Within these changes, it is difficult to distinguish cause from effect. Did a more efficient resource management centred at Phaistos lead to a general increase in population, or did the pressure from more population create a need for a more centralized authority? Did a desire for trade require technological improvements and a larger production, or are they the result of new ideas brought in by overseas contacts? The truth may lie in a complex interrelationship of many factors, what Colin Renfrew has called the "multiplier effect" (Renfrew 1972: Chapter 3). There is no doubt that Phaistos was the largest and most influential site in southern Crete from MM IB until the end of LM IB.(4) Its monumental architecture, brilliant arts, and fine manufactured products were imported or imitated throughout the Messara. Its palace was surrounded by a substantial town, and it was surely politically and economically preeminent. Although it suffered partial or complete architectural damage after MM IIA, MM IIB, and MM III, it was always rebuilt until the destruction of IM IB. Other sites with important histories at this time surely owed their prosperity to decisions made at Phaistos, decisions that distinguished one site from another for Phaistian-centred reasons. Hagia Triadha was already important by this period, and by MM III to LM IB it had fine ashlar buildings and turned out art objects like the well-known series of carved stone vases of the highest quality.(5) Farther down the coast, Kommos was very greatly enlarged in MM IB, and its prosperity continued to increase during the period (Shaw 1984, with earlier bibliography). By LM I it boasted a large building of ashlar masonry with a central(?) courtyard, a sizeable town, and a general aura of industry and prosperity. Finds of crucibles from metalworking and of wasters from ceramic kilns suggest manufacturing at the local level. The picture changes radically in LM II to LM III. Phaistos and Hagia Triadha were destroyed at the end of LM IB, and Kommos was damaged.(6) Substantial architectural changes occurred in the next period. While only houses have been found at Phaistos from this time, both Hagia Triadha and Kommos have revealed a sequence of large and well-built structures, clearly too large and too specialized to be private dwellings. At Hagia Triadha these buildings are joined by an axial construction of the "megaron" type, by a shrine, and by a number of well-built houses, constructed more splendidly than at Kommos. Although architectural phases at Kommos may be recognized for LM II, LM IIIA1, LM IIIA2, and LM IIIB, the most fundamental change is the one that occurs after the middle of IM IIIB. By the end of IIZB Kommos is abandoned, Phaistos is nearly deserted, and Hagia Triadha has only a remnant of its earlier population. LM IIIC is rare in this part of Crete, attested mainly by a few scraps of wall, some shrines, and a few tombs. Apparently most of the population has abandoned the coast.

2

Perhaps the most important part of a workshop like the present one is the generation of a series of questions for general discussion, both in this forum and elsewhere. Several of these questions emerge from this briefest of historical sketches: 1.

Where did the increase in population in MM IB come from? Where did the population go in LM IIIB?

2.

If Kommos was a port by MM I, what does this imply about the specialization of the Cretan economy by this period? Could a town exist without being an agricultural centre?

3.

If Kommos was the harbour-town for the Messara during much of the second millennium B.C., should it be regarded as a dependency of Phaistos until the end of LM IB and a dependency of Hagia Triadha during LM IIIII?

4.

How can Kommos have been raised to importance as a port if the quantity of imports only becomes large in the Late Bronze Age, well after it was already a significant town? Can it have been a palace in its own right during LM I, perhaps subservient to Phaistos, but drawing its wealth from the rich grazing lands to the south and from the many small fertile plots in the hills south of the Messara? Tyler School of Art Temple University Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19122 U.S.A. NOTES

l.

For the relation to the Late Neolithic and to other Final Neolithic sites see Vagnetti 1972 1973; Vagnetti and Belli 1978.

2.

Xanthoudides 1924; Branigan 1970; for a recently excavated example see Blackman and Branigan 1982.

3.

For evidence of a fundamental change see Myer 1984:62-63.

4.

For the excavations of Levi, and for earlier bibliography for the entire region centred around Phaistos, see Levi 1976.

5.

For the early bibliography see Pernier and Banti 1947; for LM see Halbherr et al. 1977.

6.

The damage at Kommos may be documented from Building J/T, for which see Shaw 1984:272. 3

DISCUSSION

Joseph Shaw: Let me just make a few comments here. One thing is, when we are talking about port I think we should have a sense of what we mean. We are not talking about a great emporium, a Pozzuoli or a Portus, let us say, like what you would find along the coast of Roman Italy. We are talking about a town which would serve ships: fishing ships; ships which would go beyond the islands; and to the East and to the West; serving a number of purposes, I think. So we are thinking of "harbour", which is not going to become a major port in our own sense. Is that fair, Phil? Betancourt:

Exactly right.

Geraldine Gesell:

I was wondering what your definition of "palace" was? When you talk about pinpointing Kommos

as a palace in its own right, what really do you have in mind?

Betancourt:

Well, of course this is at the heart of the "palace" has been probably defined more often ways than

any other building in antiquity. I how one defines the word "palace". In the Near East often means

the seat of a king. I raise it as an issue. I think there is a move among many people in the Aegean to

define palace as something almost synonymous with a complex redistribution centre, whatever

that, in its turn, may mean. I think that we are generally thinking of a seat of power, something

which is administering a substantial area geographically, or politically, or population-wise, or all

three, and which may or may not be subservient to another seat of power. I hesitate to use the

word "palace", but I am posing it as a question, and I think, if one is considering the relationships

between sites, one has to at least raise the issue for discussion. And that is my intent.

Guenter Kopcke:

Could you restate the last question because I wish to answer to it, but I am not sure that I

completely understood?

Betancourt: Fine. How can Kommos have been raised to importance as a seaport or port if the quantity of imports only becomes large in the Late Bronze Age well after it was already a significant town? Can it have been a palace in its own right during IM I, perhaps subservient to Phaistos but drawing its wealth from the rich grazing lands to the south and from the many small fertile plots in the hills south of the Messara? Basically, I am posing the question of can it have had an economic base aside from its function as an outlet for another site to the sea?

4

Elizabeth Barber: I am concerned about a certain matter as well. My own interest has been in textiles, and I find all the time that we tend to forget about the things that do not leave much evidence behind them and yet which, for what little evidence we have, had to have been economically very important. What strikes me here is that in order to develop shipping one presumably develops it on the local level first or develops ships. And I am thinking about fishing as possibly, a very major industry. Could this have been originally a fishing port supplying very large quantities of protein to the interior? And it has then gradually shifted over to an import - export kind of port? One might think about the vanishing evidence as well. Thank you. Betancourt: Let me address that. Yes, I think there is no doubt that there is a shift either in the quantity or the type of goods that are brought in, or in the way, or in the basic reason for bringing the goods in. I think Vance Watrous has clearly demonstrated that there is a distinct shift in the type of foreign object that we get at the site through time. Fishing is something that must have been important in the Bronze Age. This requires ships, and, of course, this requires an outlet to the sea. I am struck more by the suddenness of the expansion of the site in MM IB. We have virtually no evidence at all for EM II, EM III, or MM IA. It is very scanty. We have abundant evidence for MM IB, as if a conscious decision was made: "this site shall be expanded". I think this prompts us then to ask why and, to get at this, we have to address what the economic reasons were for expanding sites at the beginning of the Second Millennium. And certainly trade and fishing are things to be considered, but I think an administration of an economic base of agricultural or animal husbandry has to be considered also, if not as the main focus, at least as one possibility. Joseph Shaw: I would address a question to Professor Betancourt. Hagia Triadha has been said by many people, including Sinclair Hood, to be a port in its own right, in which ships sailing up the Geropotamos River, which goes right next to it, would have docked; or, according to another scenario, that there is a broad, deep alluvial deposit which, according to Bintliff, was not there during the Late Bronze Age, which is, of course, the period that we are considering. Therefore, does he think it is a possibility? Then to bounce the question that he himself asked back at him, to what extent does he think Hagia Triadha, seeing what we have learned there through the excavation, could serve as an administration centre for what we have found at Kommos? Betancourt: On the question of Hagia Triadha as a sea port, I think it is not impossible. I think it is quite likely that, at least at some period in its history, Hagia Triadha functioned in this way. I do not see any real evidence that would prohibit this.We are then, I suppose, to question the existence or possibility for two sea ports for the southern Messara, and this makes us wonder, of course, precisely what the situation might be. But it is not unparalleled in Crete. For example, from Knossos one can go north and find Katsamba and Amnisos, which have already been mentioned today as two outlets on the sea. On the other hand, certainly Hagia Triadha is more conveniently situated in relation to Phaistos to function as a sea port, because it is closer than Kommos, if for no 5

other reason. As to the question, you know ... we just wonder. Vance Watrous: I wonder if I could not supplement what Phil has said. We, this summer, myself and some Greek students with a Greek co-director, began what we hope to be a three-year survey project to the north of Kommos, roughly in the area between Hagia Triadha, Phaistos, and Kommos. I want to second what Phil said about the beginnings of Kommos in MM I. We found, somewhat to my great surprise anyway, thirty-three sites that had MM I occupation in the area that we worked which is roughly nine to ten square kilometres. It is an incredible explosion of population in MM IB. Well, I think that is enough. Guenter Kopcke: I wonder whether it is true. I have the impression that the megaron, or so-called megaron at Hagia Triadha, is the one architectural undertaking in the fourteenth century that can be called a substitute for the earlier palaces on Crete. I know of no other architectural enterprise of a comparable order. And I find, if this were true, then this alone should make one think that Hagia Triadha had an organizing priority in the area.The other question that I just wanted to briefly address is the validity of pottery in terms of arguing export and foreign connections and so on. It is of course our most obvious tool. But, I will not comment on the Middle Bronze Age, but on the fact, for instance, that in Egypt, and this is well known to most of you here in the audience, we have the emissaries from Crete, and I think they are emissaries from Crete, while we have hardly any Cretan pottery. And this has been observed in the latest publication on this whole question as being a paradox. It is a paradox. But it shows us that pottery is not necessarily a reliable indicator. On the other hand, the other side of the medal, when you have expansive Mycenaean export to the Middle East at a later date it must not necessarily mean that the Aegean trade was more intensive. I know this sounds rather heretical and really could lead into another extensive discussion. I just want to say here with particular regard to Kommos, I think that Vance Watrous has mentioned that the later foreign pottery, that means fourteenth/ thirteenth century, is found in the private houses. I hope I understood this correctly. It is the majority. Now what this means is really very little in terms of trade. What this means is that the people who live there, and these houses we heard about today too, compare not too well with the large establishment in the harbour area itself. What this may mean is that the mariners, the seamen, or whoever it was, who lived in these houses, which were not that splendid anymore at that time, that these in some way brought with them or had access to this kind of foreign material. But this may be a very limited level in society. It really, when you analyze it, may not give you very much on the foreign evidence. I also will mention here the fact that you have the spread of Mitanni seals which is really our most valid evidence for Aegeans being involved in trade at this time. Over all of Greece I think twenty-two is the number now. These are cheap things and everyone had access to them. You have these in just common contexts. So, what you have here is ... evidence that really points to a low level where the pottery does not really tell you very much of what goes on in the, you might call it, "palatial" or "organizing level". It is just that quantity does not weigh very heavily in the balance when you want to know about the intensity and the quality of the exchanges.

6

Betancourt: Yes, let me come to the first part of that first. On the relationship between Kommos and Hagia Triadha which was raised earlier by Professor Shaw, I see a real correspondence in some architectural techniques used in LM IIIA at the two sites. It is a shame that Professor La Rosa was not able to be here because I am sure that he would have shared with you some of the slides of his current excavations which have clarified greatly the chronology and sequence of these buildings, and have added new buildings to our knowledge of the site, and have shown really that, besides the megaron, there are substantial modular buildings at the site, contemporary or nearly so with those at Kommos, and with many similarities of architectural design, such as the use of timber within stone walls. As to the question of pottery as an indicator of trade, I think of course you are right. The pottery, however, shows that we do have a change that occurs. The entire western connection is new in the Late Bronze Age and the intensity of connections with the East I do not think can be denied.We have pithos-sized large jars, for example, and even though they may show up in a domestic context, this still says something for contact, I think, between the two regions of a type which was not present before. Jennifer Moody: I would just like to go back to the point that you made about Kommos perhaps having the agricultural hinterland in the mountains or the hills around the area there and towards Matala, in that general region. And I think that this is something that is neglected often when talking about the Messara in that people focus on the valley itself and forget that those hills are perfectly usable as an economic base, and that it could have formed a subsistence base to this town, and that nothing more than a political tie need really be established for the connection between the major centres and the Messara, of Hagia Triadha and Phaistos. Betancourt: Yes, I would agree. And I really do feel that for a site of substantial size to exist, in certainly the Middle Bronze Age, it must have had an economic base. We see the growth of focal points like Knossos and Malia centred near the sea coast with a substantial agricultural region beyond them and behind them, and often an area which can be defined on the basis of, for example, pottery style which is related to the major site. If one then duplicates this in miniature with the villas, one can find again an architectural centre of population at places like Pyrgos Myrtou, again surrounded by a smaller, but no less arable, section of land which will have contributed the living substance of food and raw materials for the villa. Perhaps I see Kommos as a mid-point between villa and palace, as a regional manifestation that still required an architectural focal point, which was something less than Phaistos or Hagia Triadha, and something more than a villa like Pyrgos Myrtou. But I certainly feel that during the course of the Second Millennium, if its function did not change, at least it underwent some metamorphoses, and we see a gradual increase, for example, in the quantity of foreign goods that occur at the site. We see a gradual expansion in the size of the site. We see a culmination really in the fine ashlar buildings that we have looked at today.

7

Vance Watrous:

Just one small point. This summer we also had the services of a Greek geologist who worked with

us, who spent some time following the watercourse of the Geropotamos river from Phaistos down

to the coast. And he claims (I have not actually seen this, but there is no reason to disbelieve him)

that he actually found bedrock not too far from the sea, in the actual river bed of the Geropotamos.

If this is true, this would cast real doubts on those people, myself included, who argue that the

coastline must have been tremendously closer to Hagia Triadha.

Betancourt:

That is a very interesting point and one I had not heard before. It is certainly something that will

have to be taken into consideration. I think what we really need for the region is a series of coring

operations that could nail this situation down once and for all.

Dick Hope Simpson:

In the survey of the Kommos region it is also noted that the expansion was not actually as sudden as

MM IB, though we had one or two very good MM IB sites, but steadily throughout MM, there are

far more sites than during EM, and in fact a lot more sites than the Late Minoan. So, in fact, you

have perhaps a peak in MM II and MM III. You can not really tell from the survey evidence, because

there may be more NM IB than one thought, but certainly an expansion in MM II parallel to what

Vance Warrens had further north.

Betancourt: Yes, I think that I perhaps simplified the case a bit for want of time today. Kommos, as you know, is also expanded in MM III substantially, and there are smaller and perhaps less dramatic shifts and changes that occur as well during the periods in question. There is certainly a shift between LM II and LM IIIAI at the site. There is certainly a shift between IN IIIAI - beginning of LM IIIA2 and the end of LM IIIA2 and IN IIIB, coinciding with the destruction level at Knossos that Vance Warrens has brought out, and these are indeed probably mirrors of important, perhaps dramatic, political events or population shifts that may have occurred. Roger McCleary: This has to do with Professor Watrous's point about the apparent major shift to the west of the trade in metals and I am wondering if the agency that was causing disruption in the eastern Mediterranean may in fact be these otherwise unknown folk referred to in the Amarna tablets from the period of Tutankhamun Year IV approximately, that refer to people who are vagabonds of the sea, who are disrupting the area of Captor and Alasia and points in the eastern Mediterranean, whether this may in fact be the agency that is disrupting a11 of the established trade patterns of the Middle Bronze Age to the Late Bronze Age period which had been established at that time. Vance Watrous:

That is a very large question; it is beyond my competence to tackle this question. I will point out

though that Nancy Sanders has suggested pretty much the same thing for them, certainly in the Late

IIIB and IIIC, but earlier than that I don't think I would like to hazard a guess.

8

Guenter Kopcke: What intrigues me in this picture that Dr. Betancourt just painted for us is that there seems to be a shift from Phaistos to Hagia Triadha or maybe a shift from Phaistos to Hagia Triadha and Kommos, but, in any case, Phaistos seems to some extent to be sidelined, and one would say unexpectedly; because, after all, here you have a major centre of operations and all of a sudden one should abandon it in favour of another place, and one has to ask oneself why this other place. I wonder whether it might not have been economic consideration, but it indicates the importance of Hagia Triadha, pace Watrous, too. I wonder if whoever came in as a new ruler found it simply expedient to move the mansion or what it was, to that very spot. Betancourt: Although we shall surely never know the precise reasons for a shift away from Phaistos, I think we can discern some of the ingredients within the decision, in that they also involve Knossos, because Knossos also is not abandoned. It flourishes. It has a very dynamic pottery style, and in fact both at Hagia Triadha and at Kommos the pottery of LM II to a certain extent, but especially the pottery of LM IIIA and LM IIIA1 - LM IIIA2, is heavily dependent on Knossian style. Whatever decisions were made, and wherever they were made, Knossos is a crucial part of the decision making. Joseph Shaw: Well, I have learned something today.That mention by Vance of the bedrock that apparently appeared in the Geropotamos is quite new and quite interesting. My asking Professor Betancourt that question was slightly provocative, because I think Hagia Triadha is too high to have been close to the water at the time, especially when one has to work in a sea level change, a relative sea level change of at least 2.50 meters between now and then. So, I personally believe it was some distance from the sea, which, however, does not mean that it was not approachable from the sea, but you would need a road in order to do so. Notes on a few things pointed out: the charting of the variables through the periods I think is most interesting and then the shifting away from Phaistos of, apparently, the population; the loss of palatial form after LM I when Phaistos is destroyed. We do not have at Hagia Triadha a nice, little Minoan palace; its really quite different from the architectural point of view and certainly reflects different habits and, I think, different aims. The shifting of centre and relationship therefore is something we certainly must spend more time on. As far as Kommos is concerned, these buildings on the south, these great ashlar buildings still need a great deal of thought, and we must publish what we have found out about them. Certainly we are not going to have the solution right away. On the other hand, during the coming summer when we are excavating down into those areas that Maria was talking about, the question of shipsheds, of commerce, of space for the keels, sizes of ships and whether they fit, are certainly going to be raised again and again. A very productive seminar, therefore, at least from my own point of view, and I would like to thank you very very much for your attention and participation, and if you are in the area, please come and visit us next summer. Thank you very much.

9

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS ON THE PROBLEM OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PHAISTOS AND HAGIA TRIADHA Vincenzo La Rosa The problem of the relationship between Phaistos and Hagia Triadha was foreseen, as everyone knows, by the first excavators in southern Crete who were concerned with the possible subordinate role of Hagia Triadha to Phaistos. The hypothesis proposed at the beginning by Halbherr (1903:7) that the villa of Hagia Triadha was to be considered a 'rural residence' of the princes of Phaistos, codified this condition of dependence even though, later, the idea was to be abandoned. Already Halbherr himself, in a letter to L. Pernier dated 5 October, 1912 (Creta Antica:42) could not avoid noting a different situation in LM III: "It seems almost", he wrote, "as if in LM III the inner city of Phaistos lost its importance and that at least the centre of commercial activities was brought closer to the sea, in the suburb of Hagia Triadha, from the terraces of which one could see the arrival of the ships from the Libyan Sea to the landing of Dibaki" [= Tymbaki: Ed.]. Essentially ignored by the earlier and later excavators of Phaistos (Pernier, Levi), the problem was again addressed by L. Banti (Halbherr et al. 1977:233) in the publication of the excavations of Hagia Triadha; Banti obstinately rejected the hypothesis proposed by S. Marinatos that in Neopalatial times the ruler of Phaistos had moved to Hagia Triadha. This refutation, which defended the 'Palatial' role of Phaistos, re-proposed, indirectly, the subordinate role of Hagia Triadha. The subjectivity and ambivalence of some arguments expressed by Banti together with the lack of data led us to consider this problem as one of the major aims of our research related to the resumption of the work at Hagia Triadha. In our efforts to obtain a more rigorous chronological sequence of the structures already excavated, we have tried to reconstruct the architectural and urbanistic events in order to outline the history of the centre.The work started in 1977 (Halbherr et al. 1977:297), made difficult by the earlier excavations and later disturbances, is still in progress. At the same time we thought it necessary to begin the re-examination of the data available from the excavation of Phaistos concerning the LM I - IM III period (we had to rely, for the most recent excavations, only on the few elements known from the preliminary reports). In addition, we plan to re-examine the furnishings of the LM III cemeteries of Kalivia and Liliana (Savignoni 1904:501). The considerations that our friend Shaw is 'forcing' us now to make thus represent nothing more than hypotheses of directions for research: and we are particularly sorry not to be able to

1

participate directly at the Convention because it would have certainly offered us suggestions and stimuli for the continuation of our research. There are more than a few basic difficulties: not only do the centres of Hagia Triadha and Kommos remain anonymous but also we lack comparative data concerning relationships between settlements and cemeteries and a systematic study of the territory, items which are indispensable in undertaking a problem like ours. Therefore we wait with impatience for the results of the investigation started by V. Watrous and D. Vallianou, as we do for information on changes of the physical characteristics of the district, the delineation of the coastline, and the navigability of the Hieropotamos. The vicinity of the sites, their proven contemporaneity, the existence of structures of palatial type, and the geographical homogeneity of the territory are elements that must have made a close and reciprocal relationship unavoidable; they make us believe that the knot to untie is mainly of a political nature, one connected, that is, with the identification of a centre of power and with the determination of the influence of such power on the architectural, urbanistic features and artistic production of the other settlements. In our brief re-consideration of the available data regarding the centres of Phaistos and Hagia Triadha, we omit the Prepalatial period (i.e. H. Onouphrios style) in which the events seem substantially identical, without specific problems of territorial organization. The remains of houses and structures of that period testify to the existence at Phaistos of various small nuclei, spread over the whole area that would later be occupied by successive settlements. Particularly interesting for the investigation of the relationship between these nuclei is the fact that the remains of the two small sites at Hagia Triadha (Creta Antica:182), (below the northern boundary of the villa and near the track that flanks the river) appear almost equidistant from the two great circular tombs. Regarding the end of the Prepalatial period, excavation at Patrikies (Boncasa 1967 1968:7ff.; Levi 1976:749 ff.) located half-way between Phaistos and Hagia Triadha, has supplied a comparatively anomalous feature: it has yielded a homogeneous ceramic material datable to MM IA. Uncontaminated strata with material of this type have not yet been discovered at Hagia Triadha or at Phaistos. For the period of the First Palaces, the preeminent position of Phaistos is well documented: the monumentality of the palatial structures, the existence of archives, the density of private houses in the quarters around the hills covering a vast area, and the quality and quantity of ceramic production do not find any correspondence at Hagia Triadha. In addition, we cannot say that during MM times a building of the dimensions and functions of the villa existed at Hagia Triadha; below the villa only thick strata of Kamares ware sherds or remains of stucco floors existed. The Protopalatial rooms that we found below the Sacello (La Rosa 1979; Creta Antica: Figure 280), which differ in orientation from the villa, would demonstrate that the new construction represented a major change rather than simple continuity in settlement life.

2

Phaistos, in the period of the First Palaces, appears then the only possible centre of power in the South-West Messara. The situation is without doubt more complex in Neopalatial times. Regarding Phaistos the most significant and well known data seem to be the following ones: —

—

—

The partial contraction of the Palace, rebuilt on the ruins of the earlier one, with the obliteration of the paved Court, of about half of the ‘Theatral' staircase and of a large area west of the Court. These elements, however, did not diminish the monumentality of the new complex. The absence of a continuous settlement in the area previously occupied by the Protopalatial quarters. One cannot consider this absence casual. The houses at Chalara (Levi 1976: Plate LL) and H. Fotini (Levi 1976: Plate HH), more or less isolated rooms located west of the Palace, and the remains of structures visible in the saddle of St. George in Falandra, perhaps do not document an effective contraction of the settled area, but they make us suspect a different articulation of these areas. To date we have not yet found Neopalatial walls in the soundings made along the sides of the central hill (1969 and 1971) (Levi 1976: Plate FF). In addition true Neopalatial strata had not been found at the top of the hill (in soundings by Pernier and during excavation for the construction of the buildings for the Italian Mission). The absence, in the destruction level of the Palace, of finds of special value (metals, steatite vases, frescoes, etc.). This was connected by Banti and Levi (Halbherr et al. 1977:233-234) with lootings or salvage operations related to the continuous occupation of the building.

For Hagia Triadha we should instead remember that: —

The atypical complex of the so-called Royal Villa is constructed ex-novo; its unitary plan, building phases and use cannot be considered definitely clarified even after the interesting observations by V. Watrous (Watrous 1984:123 f.). We should underline that the periods of use of the building coincide with the ones of the Palace of Phaistos, and that the nature of the finds allows us to document, for the villa of Hagia Triadha, the same functions as for the other Cretan Palaces. And it is perhaps not by chance that the curious L-shaped plan practically represents half of a palatial architectural complex. In addition, clay tablets and seal impressions seem to testify to the same administrative use as the earlier ones from the First Palace of Phaistos.

—

A continuous urban network contemporaneous with the villa is documented within the excavated area. This urban network, with some monumental construction ('Bastion', 'Cyclopaean Building', 'East House'), extends up to the boundary of the settlement as our soundings below the so-called 'Esavani' (1981) and below Room Q (1983-1984) have confirmed (Creta Antica:192, Figure 300). The thick wall, with projections, which cuts through the whole settled area and which was also used during the succeeding period, most likely testifies to the inner articulation of the settlement. In the 'Casa del Lebete', just south

3

of this wall, as everyone knows, a considerable number of clay tablets in Linear A came to light (Halbherr et al. 1977:258). —

The so-called Royal Villa was not looted. It is therefore particularly significant that a new building, also monumental, was constructed ex-novo above the destroyed one. The find of the copper ingots, more than the frescoes or the broken steatite vases, shows that the reoccupation of the area was probably immediate. This, at first glance, seems difficult to understand, whether one considers the destruction due to natural or artificial causes.

—

The proximity of Phaistos to Hagia Triadha makes us believe that the events could not have been different at the two sites; we must therefore ask ourselves whether copper ingots were kept, before the hypothetical sack, within the Palace of Phaistos. We feel, in fact, that we should exclude the only cause of diversity between the two centres; diversity that could only be possible in case of internal or reciprocal conflicts. For the problem of the sack, the difference between the situation at Hagia Triadha (Creta Antica:184, Figure 276) and Zakro lies in the lack of re-occupation of the latter. Pottery kilns, on the other hand, occur at both sites, at Phaistos, associated most likely with the palatial buildings.

The differences noted above not only concern the situation of the two settlements in Neopalatial times, but also in the period included between the First and Second Palaces; these differences are such that new researches may not be able to explain them away. Therefore, it seems probable that a significant change in the relationship between Phaistos and Hagia Triadha happened sometime during the LM period. The importance of Hagia Triadha increased, even though its level of power is not easily definable. In addition, one should note that Building J at Kommos with its annexes and superb, paved road, date from Late Minoan times: an increased interest in the sea must have existed at both centres; its reason is still not understood. We cannot exclude the possibility that the rulers of Phaistos promoted the growing importance of Hagia Triadha during Neopalatial times because of particular reasons (dynastic events or new political, economic or commercial conditions). It seems unlikely that the ascendancy of Hagia Triadha occurred at the expense of, or without the consent of, the managers of the Palace. The different situations make us suppose some kind of interdependence for the two centres, related perhaps to a more complex articulation of power within one 'reign' rather than a simple decentralization. It is premature, even if stimulating, to consider the nature of any complementary relationship between the two centres or the possible distinction of functions or areas of power (political, religious, juridical, or economic). This new system of equilibrium, not determined by conflict, could have been the base of the renewed splendour of the settlement of Kommos, connected with an increase in sea traffic. The expansion of Zakros and Kydonia at this time seems to widen the dimensions of this phenomenon. For Phaistos, one suspects a progressive reorganization of the hegemony during Neopalatial times; such a process may have continued in LM III.

4

After the destruction of the Second Palaces, the differences between Phaistos and Hagia Triadha appear to be more radical. They can be summarized as follows: At Phaistos: —

The Palace was partially re-occupied, with simple private dwellings (as would be the case also in Geometric and Hellenistic times). "A clay Larnax decorated with an octopus of late Mycenaean style lies above a stratum of earth that seems to cover the floor of Room 54 of the Second Palace," L. Pernier to G. Beloch in a letter dated 20 January 1910 (Creta Antica:41). A pithos of LM IIIB type was at the north-west corner of the Central Court. (Levi:1969:164 Plate IG 3). One access to the houses located within the Palace at this time was through an east-west ramp, a portion of which is preserved just west-southwest of Room LII (Levi 1976: Plate B).

—

The traditional quarters of the city were occupied by groups of houses; rich finds were also made on the top of the median hill (area of the Stratigraphic Museum) (ASAtene 47-48 (1969-1970):9, Figure 1). No monumental building has yet come to light, although the settlement kept the location and configuration of the earlier periods.

—

From a chronological viewpoint most of the pottery belongs to LM IIIB and C. Some rooms of the Quarter of Chalara seem, instead, to date from LM IIIA (Levi, 19671968, Figures 92 95), a beautiful LM IIIA1 cup was discovered near the foundations of a retaining wall located half-way up the slope west of the Theatre Court (Levi 1965-1966:381, Figure 78), just where the rubble of the First Palace was thrown when the Second Palace was constructed.

The oldest tomb furnishings from Kalivia ('Tombs of the Nobles' as L. Savignoni called them) date from LM IIIA2; the poorer furnishings of Liliana ('Tombs of the Populace') belong, instead, to the following period (Savignoni 1904:501 ff.). No evidence supports any interruption of the occupation of the site after the destruction of the Second Palace. Life seems, instead, to have continued until Geometric times (Rocchetti, 1974 1975:169-173, Figure 1; Levi 1976: Plate B and LL). The centre is mentioned on the Linear B tablets of Knossos, the chronology of which is still unfortunately under discussion. —

A LM III "Re-occupation" of the territory is documented not only in the far away villa of "Khania" near Gortyn (Creta Antica:116 with bibl.), but also in the settlement of Patrikies (Creta Antica:195) and in the tomb of Kamilari (Creta Antica:197 ff.). On the other hand, it does not exist at the site of Seli (Creta Antica:196).

5

At Hagia Triadha: —

The Royal Villa was abandoned; above it the monumental structures of the 'Megaron' and of the L-shaped Stoa were built; the upper Court was re-structured and the drain between the two buildings was constructed.

—

A renovation is documented only in the so-called 'Bastion' (Halbherr et al. 1977:211 f.), modifying its original plan only slightly. A series of monumental buildings, in addition to the ones already mentioned, were built ex novo; these gave the settlement a physiognomy and shape unique to the island at that period. The Sacello, the Stoa of the 'Agora', the socalled Esavani, and the new Megaron P (1984) situated north of the Court of the 'Agora' certainly prove an official and public arrangement; the new situation also required the creation of courts and of their drainage system (Creta Antica: 192, Figure 300).

—

A continuous succession of structures and rooms grew over the earlier houses, occupying all the area already excavated. The large LM I wall with projections (Halbherr et al. 1977:239) formed a key element of the organization of the centre at this time because it separated buildings with different orientations. The structures to its north, independent of their level, somehow align with the Magazines of the Market and present more regular plans. A construction with symmetrical structures located at the sides of an angular corridor, is particularly interesting and can hardly be interpreted as a simple private house. Such a typology, documented already in LM IIIA1, is resumed in the following phase with almost double dimension: proof of a particular function indispensable to the particular activities characteristic of that area of the settlement (Creta Antica: Figure 300).

—

Concerning the chronology, the new stratigraphic soundings affirm that the group of monumental buildings was built almost simultaneously, and certainly during LM IIIA2. In this period, in the sector of the private dwellings, a truly urban plan has been documented; we have tried to reconstruct the building phases of this plan, with the various arrangements of the great Court and the construction of a road just north of it, a road that perhaps led towards the area of the Necropolis.

—

The fourteenth century represents, then, the moment of greatest splendour in the life of the centre; we do not hesitate to call its structures public.

—

LM IIIB at Hagia Triadha already represents a period of contraction; this is documented in the architecture by a continued occupation of the Court of the Agora and in the pottery by material which is, in great part, plain. Some data drawn from the earlier excavations (Creta Antica:172, Figure 248), together with stratigraphic results from our recent excavations (Halbherr et al. 1977:328-329, Figures 26-27; Creta Antica:190, Figure 294), allow us to date the final destruction of the settlement in the thirteenth century. The scantiness of sherds datable with certainty to LM ZIIB2 would suggest an exclusion of the later phase of this period: therefore this dating would not coincide with the final4 destruction of the most 6

prominent settlements of the island, as suggested by Popham and Desborough (Creta Antica:172). —

The LM IIIC and Protogeometric periods seem to continue only in the votive material found in the Court of the Sacelli (Stipe nel Piazzale dei Sacelli), a public structure which now related to a larger territory and not to a single settlement. The suggestion by A. L. D'Agata (Creta Antica:181) that the end of the 'Stipe dei Sacelli' coincides with the construction of the Sanctuary of Kommos seems to us worthy of consideration.

The elements mentioned above seem to suggest that, after the destruction of the Second Palaces, Hagia Triadha was a true centre of power (La Rosa 1985: 379380). In addition, this is the Cretan settlement in which one finds great evidence for an architectural post-palatial development. Such a phenomenon, if not determined by external factors (a new political organization of the island?), could represent the end result of those tendencies that had already appeared in our territory in LM I. The favourable conditions of Hagia Triadha during the fourteenth century seem to find a significant counterpart in the newly discovered monumental structures of Kommos; these confirm the consolidated importance of the port installation and prove that the supposed transfer of the power centre did not cause disturbances in the territory. The absence at Hagia Triadha of imported ceramics (Cypriote, Canaanite, Western) would confirm the specific prosperous commercial function of Kommos into the thirteenth century. The analytical study of the material and the identification of imports and of local products in the interior of the island will help us greatly to understand better the relationship between Hagia Triadha and Kommos. The disappearance of the settlement at Hagia Triadha was probably due to the fall of those structures of power that had caused its splendour; when it fell, Phaistos reacquired the role of reference point and it kept it, without breaks, until Geometric times. It is not prudent, after these considerations, to draw general conclusions regarding the history of Crete; it is possible, though, to re-discuss opinions, also recent (Godart 1985:173 f.), on the existence in Crete, during LM III times, of the Mycenaean kingdoms of Knossos and Kydonia. Obviously the problem to solve remains the one of the chronology of the last Palace of Knossos and of its clay tablets. If the opinion of the English archaeologists were true, the centre of power at Hagia Triadha, with its public, religious and commercial buildings (but without clay tablets) would have been rebuilt immediately after the destruction of Knossos; this fact would have consequences that we hesitate to draw. On the other hand, a LM IIIB dating of the Knossian tablets could reflect, through the mentioning of pa-i-to, a traditional rearrangement of the equilibriums in our territory, unless the place name did not refer to one settlement, but to a whole district. In any case, it seems possible that the geographical and cultural 'province' of the Messara possessed, throughout different periods, its own centre of reference; one would have to define its autonomy or its internal hegemony for each period. This centre of reference, which we propose to locate along the Phaistos-Hagia Triadha axis, experienced periods of alternating dependence, perhaps, and independence which was caused by internal or external factors.Memory of these was 7

lost soon, for the noun "Radamanthos" was, according to the later tradition, the only memory of the 'reign' of the Messara, a reign that may have been a counterpoint to that of its more famous brother-rival to the north. Istituto di Archeologia

Via A. di Sangiuliano 256

Università di Catania

95124 Catania

Italia

NOTES

1.

As already noted, Professor La Rosa's paper, although sent from Italy in November, did not arrive in Toronto until some time after the symposium took place. We print it here, nevertheless, and with thanks to Giuliana Bianco and Philip Betancourt for the translation of the text from the Italian.

8

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985) EPILOGUE Concerning Kommos's relationships with other areas outside of Crete, Vance Watrous's paper charted a switch from chiefly eastern to western connections from LM IIIA1 to LM IIIB, a phenomenon not noted elsewhere on Crete before, but, if shown to have parallels at other sites as, for instance, perhaps at Chania (= Kydonia) could be of major historical importance. Italian wares from Chania have just been examined by B. Hallagher (1985). Watrous also brought up the question of metal working and trade in metals as a pivotal one that must be considered in depth when the Kommos metals are analyzed and the molds, crucibles, ingot fragments and prills are examined from the point of view of their original contexts. In the discussion that followed his paper, Harriet Blitzer, who has been studying the metal industry at Kommos, also pointed out that large crucibles from the southern area indicate bronzeworking on a massive scale within Building T during LM I with work continuing during LM IIIA2 - LM IIIB, but now with smaller crucibles being more usual and those being used on the hillside and hill top to the north. As a warning, however, that such a reconstruction of metalworking activity has to await a more final dating of contexts, I should mention here that, to my knowledge, crucible fragments were found in the levels of reuse of Building T and not those of its primary phases. Maria Shaw's paper explored, among other matters, the possibility that Minoan building P may have been connected with shipbuilding and ship storage. So far there is not enough tangible evidence to show that this is true, but if excavation there reveals no physical impediments to such a use (e.g. a contemporary blocking wall or colonnade on the west), and hopefully provides diagnostic small finds or floor features, then a new element may have been introduced in our knowledge of Aegean seafaring. Should this be the case we will have new, positive evidence for the continuing debate about the so-called Minoan "thalassocracy" and the possible interrelationships between the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean at the time. There seems little doubt, in any case, that Building P (and part of T) were used for storage, and their position next to the harbour can hardly have been accidental. It is even worthwhile to consider that grain may have been stored here, perhaps in sacks awaiting local distribution for export, for according to the Knossian Linear B tablets "Da-wo", a site near Phaistos, thought by some to have been Hagia Triadha, was a centre where great masses of grain were collected (Bennet 1985:247).(1) Kommos could be "Da-wo", but might also (as per La Rosa, above) simply have served as an outlet for trade promoted through Hagia Triadha. Philip Betancourt's attempt to explore the "triangle" of the three great Minoan settlements in the Messara during the period MM I - LM IIIB, reasonably suggested that their characters and relationships were quite different in MM, LM I, and LM III times. He even suspected that Building T at Kommos may have been part of a palace during LM I, an intriguing suggestion, but one far

1

from certain, although the remains involve a large court partially bordered on at least three sides by monumental construction. We are most grateful to Vincenzo La Rosa, whose broad analysis of the "triangle", made from the point of view of someone who has intimate connection with Phaistos and Hagia Triadha, was particularly timely. Not only did he refer to unpublished opinions of earlier excavators, but he proposed that after LM I there was a peaceful transfer of power from Phaistos to Hagia Triadha, with Kommos serving as the commercial harbour of Hagia Triadha, a suggestion implying that La Rosa believes that Hagia Triadha could not have served as a major harbour. La Rosa also notes the absence of large-scale, neopalatial settlement at Phaistos, an occurrence that could foreshadow a later transferal of power to Hagia Triadha. It is important for us to note, also, that by adopting the sequence of Late Minoan periods followed by the English excavators at Knossos, he is accepting a sequence previously doubted by some of his predecessors in the Messara, but shown now to exist stratigraphically at both Kommos and Hagia Triadha. The most important aspect of the conference, however, was to introduce consideration of the Messara's dynamics during some eight hundred years of its history (mm I _ LM IIIB). Our own hope is that those presentations and discussions, made available through this publication, may invite and encourage major future studies of these relationships. Joseph W. Shaw

Department of Fine Art

University of Toronto

Toronto. Canada

M5S lAl

NOTES

1.

Fortunately, the date of the Linear B tablets need not be resolved in order to posit that Building P may have been used for storage of grain. Bennet incorrectly notes that T was reused in LM III -- actually only J was reused while the interior of T was abandoned, being succeeded by P on the south. This does not affect his argument, however. After the conference, during a talk for the Aegean Seminar at New York University, I proposed that probable Minoan exports were (as per E. Barber's comment at the conference in Toronto) grain, oil, textiles and wood. During the question period that followed Robert Stieglitz kindly pointed out that, according to one of the tablets from Ugarit, Kaphtara (probably Crete) actually did export oil, grain, as well as fermented beverages (Schaeffer 1955:107-108). I note here that the king reigning then (Ammistamru II) is thought to have been active circa 1270 B.C. (CAH II(2):1040), when Building P, most likely intended for storage of material in connection with the harbour, was still in use. 2

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Banti, L. 1930-1931. "La grande tomba a tholos di Haghia Triada," ASAtene 13-14:155-251 Bass, G. F. 1972. A History of Seafaring, New York .............. 1984. "Bounty from the Oldest Shipwreck," Time, December 17, 1984:6 Bennet, John 1985. "The Structure of the Linear B Administration at Knossos," AJA 89:231-249 Blackman, D. and K. Branigan 1982. "The Excavation of an Early Minoan Tholos at Ayia Kyriaki, Ayiofarango, Southern Crete," BSA 77:1-57 Boncasa, N., 1967-1968. "Patrikiès - Una stazione mediominoica fra Haghia Triada e Festòs," ASAtene 45-46, Rome Branigan, K. 1970. The Tombs of Mesara, London Du Plat Taylor, J. 1965. Marine Archaeology, New York Creta Antica. Cento anni di archeologia italiana (1884-1984), Rome 1984 Evans, Sir Arthur 1921-1936. The Palace of Minos at Knossos, London (Four Volumes) Godart, L. 1985. "La caduta dei regni micenei a Creta e 1'invasione dorica," in Le origini dei Greci, Dori e mondo egeo, Bari p. 173 f. Halbherr, F., 1903. "Resti dell'età micenea, scoperti ad Haghia Triada presso Phaestòs, "Mon. Ant. 13:6-74 Halbherr, F., E. Stefani and L. Banti 1977. 55, Rome

Haghia Triada nel periodo tardo-palaziale, ASAtene

Hallager, Birgitta P. 1985. "Crete and Italy in the Late Bronze III Period," AJA 89:293-305 La Rosa, Vincenzo 1979. "Haghia Triada II: relazione preliminare sui saggi del 1978-79," ASAtene 57, in press ............... 1985 in Le origini dei Greci, Dori e mondo egeo, Bari, pp, 379-380 Levi D. 1965-1966. "La conclusione degli scavi a Festòs," ASAtene 43-44:313-399

3

.... 1967-1968, "L'abitato di Festòs in localita•Chalara," ASAtene 45_46:55-166 .......... 1969. "Un pithos inscritto da Festòs," Kritika Chronica 21:153-176 ............... 1976. Festòs e la civilta minoica, Rome Lichtheim, M. 1975. Ancient Egyptian Literature, Berkeley Marinatos, S. 1925-26. "Excavations at Nirou Chani, Crete," (in Greek) Praktika, 141-147 ............... 1933. "La Marine Creto-Mycenienne," BCH 57:170-235 ............... 1973. Kreta, Thera, und das mykenische Hellas, Munich ............... 1974. Excavations at Thera, VI, Athens Myer, G• H. 1984. "Ceramic Petrography," in P. P. Betancourt, ed. East Cretan White- on-Dark Ware. Philadelphia, pp. 60-66 Nongayrol, J. 1955. in Schaeffer, C. Mission de Ras Shamra Vol. VI. Le Palais royal d'Ugarit III: textes accadiens et rite des archives est, ouest, et centrales, Paris Pernier, L. 1935. Il Palazzo minoico di Festòs, I, Rome Pernier, L. and L. Banti 1947. Guida degli scavi italiani in Creta, Rome ............... 1951. Il Palazzo minoico di Festòs, II, Rome

Pritchard, J. B. (ed.) 1969. Ancient Near Eastern Texts, Princeton Renfrew, C. 1972. The Emergence of Civilisation, London Rochetti, L. 1974-1975. "La ceramica dell'abitato geometrico di Festòs a occidente del Palazzo minoico," ASAtene 52-53:169-300 Savignoni, L. 1904. "Scavi e scoperte nella necropoli di Phaest3s," Mon. Ant. 14:502-675 Shaw, J. W. 1980. "Excavations at Kommos (Crete) during 1979," Hesperia 49:207-250 ................... 1984. "Excavations at Kommos (Crete) during 1982-1983," Hesperia 53:251-287 Shaw, M. C. 1981. "Sir Arthur Evans at Kommos: A Cretan Village Remembers its Past," Expedition, Spring 1981:4-12 4

Vagnetti, L. 1972-1973. "L'insediamento neolittico di Festòs," ASAtene 50-51:7-138 ..............., and P. Belli 1978. "Characters and Problems of the Final Neolithic in Crete," SMEA 19:125-163 Ventris, M. and J. Chadwick 1956. Documents in Mycenaean Greek, Cambridge Watrous, L. V. 1984. "Ayia Triada: a New Perspective on the Minoan Villa," AJA 88:123-134 Xanthoudides, St. 1924. The Vaulted Tombs of Messara, London

5

SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol. VI (1985)

FIGURES AND PLATES

PLATE I

The Kommos site, from the south (T. Dabney)

PLATE II

a. Part of the east-west Minoan road next to Building J's northern facade, looking west (J. Shaw)

b. Restored perspective view of T's colonnade and court (G. Bianco)

PLATE III

a. Northern wall of P (right) with vertical chases for wooden supports (J. Shaw)

b. Detail of building in Theran fresco (after Marinatos 1974: Plate 7)

PLATE I V

a. Fragments of imported Cypriot wares (T. Dabney)

b. Burnished Italian jug (C847) from hilltop houses (T. DeVinney)