Connected peripheries - North Danube Thrace in the 4th-3rd centuries BC. Exploring settlement patterns in the environs of the ostentatious grave of Peretu (original) (raw)
The following analysis emerged as an attempt to explain and contextualize a very rich grave, already historiographical notorious, with analogies equally famous, traditionally dated around the middle of the 4th c. BC, discovered in 1970, at Peretu, Romania, 40 km north of the Danube. The main objective of the study was to explore how (and if) this ostentatious display of authority, consumed in the symbolic domain, was linked with other processes of rising collective identities in North Danube Thrace, as suggested to had taken place by a series of neighbouring fortified sites dated approximately in the same period with the grave. These sites stand out through their particular technique of building defences based on using burnt clays in the construction of their enclosure walls. The interpretations will be partially based on recent interdisciplinary investigations (geophysical & aerial) undertaken in several fortified sites of the Teleorman region. In the two-three decades before the Macedonian rule, these fortified sites were already focusing the attention of regional communities around a cultic component. In a broader framework the study examines the processes of social growth, authority centralization and emergence of collective identities occurred during the early Hellenistic period in peripheral territories of the Macedonian rule. North Danube Thrace exhibited after the wars of Philip II and especially during those of Alexander’s Successors a particular vivid demographic development. It is stated that this development, including the wealth visible in several graves, was triggered by the Macedonian coin and political interests of the Diadochi that used North-Eastern Thrace as a secondary stage in their power competition through proxy.
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Archaeological thought has traditionally perceived river valleys as places of intense human contact and mobility, exchange of ideas and commodities and thus loci of cultural innovation. This perception emerged in modernity after the major hydraulic works that dramatically changed river valleys from places of natural disasters and degradation to economically and demographically flourishing landscapes. In regions such as those of southern Thrace, which was regarded as a buffer zone between major cultures, rivers were always imagined as routes of migration, trade and communication of ideas that facilitated the circulation and exchange of technologically more advanced artefacts and ideas from the Aegean. From this more or less colonialist point of view, rivers were viewed as a contact network that gradually transformed the cultural landscape. Geomorphological analyses in some parts of the world have, however, shown a totally different picture of river valleys. This paper presents some glimpses of the material culture of southern Thrace and suggests that the most important innovations in this region did not take place within river valleys. By tracing the earliest contacts of the Balkan hinterland with the Aegean that took place during the early Archaic period following a long break after the Late Bronze Age, I argue that major rivers such as the Hebros, Nestos and Strymon did not define the cultural landscape as major water routes of contact as is usually thought.
Giamakis, C. 2024. Identity, Power and Group Formation in Archaic Macedonia (600-400 BC)
2024
The first ever large-scale synthesis on identity and social dynamics across archaic Macedonia (600-400 BC), Christos Giamakis’s book provides a detailed narrative exploring the role of power as displayed through material culture in the formation of group identities across the region. Giamakis focuses on data from nine cemeteries in the region combining multiple datasets including grave goods, osteological evidence, burial rites, tomb types and the organisation of the cemetery space in order to explore both inter- and intra-site competition that led to the emergence of different group identities across the region. By doing so, he proposes a new theoretical framework for the study of the region as an alternative to past, ethnicity-based, approaches. Identity, Power and Group Formation in Archaic Macedonia (600-400 BC) encourages the reader to explore the ways in which social inequalities, power dynamics and social interactions all affect the potency of specific identities at the expense of others. The present monograph will be of great interest to researchers working on ancient Macedonia and the wider ancient Greek world but also to scholars interested in power dynamics and identity formation in other parts of the ancient Mediterranean.
Australian Archaeological Fieldwork Abroad III, 2015
The Tundzha Regional Archaeological Project (TRAP) was initiated in 2008 and is still ongoing. It is a collaborative, multidisciplinary project involving researchers, students, and volunteers from Australia, Bulgaria, the United States, and the Czech Republic. TRAP combines regional landscape archaeology with paleoecological studies to reconstruct and interpret habitation in the Tundzha River watershed in its environmental context. The project is diachronic in nature, investigating the long-term environmental change and social evolution from before the introduction of agriculture to the recent past. 2 An Australian Research Council Linkage Project Award funded extensive fieldwork (archaeological survey, test excavations, and palaeoecology) from 2009 through 2011. 3 This paper will examine the emergence and evolution of larger-scale social and political organisation in Thrace over the course of the first millennium BC (until the arrival of the Romans in the first century BC), a research priority during the ARC-funded phase of research (readers interested in the results related to earlier or later periods are directed to detailed presentations elsewhere). 4 Contrary to expectations based on mortuary and urban archaeology (outlined below), and despite the claims made by Greek historians of the Classical era (also elaborated below), TRAP found little evidence for social complexity or state emergence in pre-Roman Thrace.
Perspectives on Balkan Archaeology 2, 2024
Abstract The Iron Age, in the case of central Macedonia, spans five centuries, divided into Early (1050–600 BCE) and Late (until 500 BCE). The present paper will attempt a presentation of the hitherto published data concerning the 9th–7th century BCE from the Thermaic Gulf region and the Chalkidiki Peninsula, trying to clarify the existence or not of a hierarchical structure between the boundaries of diverse settlements on mounds dated from the Late Bronze Age, trapezai and hilltops. The emergence of power, based on the archaeological data, is thought to be reflected basically on two factors: (a) the presence of buildings standing out not only typologically (rooms, facilities, etc.) but also due to their spatial organisation and location either inside or outside the boundaries of the settlement and (b) the implementation of major infrastructure projects probably under the guidance of leadership, e.g., enclosures/fortifications, monumental terraces and ditches. Tracing various activities, e.g., metalworking, transport amphorae production, rituals, and feasting indoors/outdoors of each prominent building, enable the disclosure of a hierarchical social order and elite group.
Spheres of Interaction Contacts and Relationships between the Balkans and Adjacent Regions in the Late Bronze / Iron Age (13th–5th Centuries BCE) Proceedings of the Conference held at the Institute of Archaeology, Belgrade 15–17 September, 2017, 2020
The Late Bronze Age and the so-called Transitional period in Macedonia are characterised by turbulent turmoil, which was one of the main causes leading to the establishment of settlements at new locations in Macedonian regions. All the elements of material culture typical of these two periods are directly connected with this formation, with varied motivations for their creation, the length of existence, and the mode of their development. The presence of this turbulent time can be confirmed by one horizon in all excavated settlements. In the Early Iron Age, people lived in small family or clan communities with diverse habitats, and they moved often. This way of life contributed to forming of settlements with light above-ground architecture or semi-dug out dwellings, such as in the 5th and 6th BCE settlement at Kastanas or of the 14th layer of the third settlement at Vardarski Rid. In all these settlements larger family complexes formed at the end of the 10th century BCE. They had steadier architecture with walls made of stone socle and mudbrick superstructure, including the settlement at Gradishte Pelince or the 13th layer of the settlement at Vardarski Rid, and the 7th settlement at Kastanas, layers 8–5. The economic and social life in these communities in the Early Iron Age was characterised by the appearance and widespread use of a new metal – iron. These new aspects of life during the Developed Iron Age created ideal conditions for very strong and powerful communities, historically well attested. In Macedonia, a new type of settlement emerged as a result of the developed economic power of these communities and the rise of metallurgy, especially marked through the use of iron during the Iron Age. These settlements also offered increased opportunities for the development of crafts, trade and cultural and spiritual beliefs as well. All phenomena from the beginning of the Early Iron Age and during the developed Iron Age thus created excellent conditions for strong communities and the first proto-urban centres. These centres presents a new page of prehistory, enabling further developments that followed in the historical periods.
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in M. Gavranović, D. Heilmann, M. Verčík & P. Ardjanliev (eds.), The Mechanism of Power. The Bronze and Iron Ages in Southeastern Europe. Proceedings of the 3rd PeBA Conference Held in Ohrid, 25-28 May 2022 (Perspectives on Balkan Archaeology 2), Rahden 2024, 81-104