Societies in Transition in Early Greece: An Archaeological History

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Situated at the disciplinary boundary between prehistory and history, this book presents a new synthesis of Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Greece, from the rise and fall of Mycenaean civilization, through the "Dark Age," and up to the emergence of city-states in the Archaic period. This period saw the growth and decline of varied political systems and the development of networks that would eventually expand to nearly all shores of the Middle Sea. Alex R. Knodell argues that in order to understand how ancient Greece changed over time, one must analyze how Greek societies constituted and reconstituted themselves across multiple scales, from the local to the regional to the Mediterranean. Knodell employs innovative network and spatial analyses to understand the regional diversity and connectivity that drove the growth of early Greek polities. As a groundbreaking study of landscape, interaction, and sociopolitical change, Societies in Transition in Early Greece systematically bridges the divide between the Mycenaean period and the Archaic Greek world to shed new light on an often-overlooked period of world history.

Author information

KnodellAlex R.:

Alex R. Knodell is Associate Professor of Classics and Director of the Archaeology Program at Carleton College. In Greece, he co-directs the Small Cycladic Islands Project and the Mazi Archaeological Project. He is the author of numerous academic articles and co-editor of Regional Approaches to Society and Complexity.

Frontmatter
Open Access

i

Contents Open Access

vii

List of Illustrations Open Access

ix

Preface and Acknowledgements Open Access

xiii

Introduction: An Archaeology of Early Greece Open Access

1

1. Landscape, Interaction, Complexity Open Access

17

2. Articulating Landscapes in Central Greece Open Access

33

3. Confronting Hegemony in Mycenaean Central Greece Open Access

63

4. Reconstituting Polity in the Postpalatial Bronze Age Open Access

116

5. Transforming Village Societies in the Prehistoric Iron Age Open Access

151

6. Expanding Horizons in the Protohistoric Iron Age Open Access

192

Conclusions: Early Greece and the Bigger Picture(s) Open Access

237

Appendix Open Access

263

Bibliography Open Access

281

Index Open Access

347