The goldwork in the Treasures of Mycenae and Tiryns: Evidence on the network of European hoarding during the Late Bronze Age (original) (raw)
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The phenomenon of hoarding is a special aspect of economic, social or political life throughout the European continent, generally divided into utilitarian assemblages and votive deposits. To a lesser extent, it is located at the Helladic area in the third phase of the Late Bronze Age, almost parallel to the establishment of the Mycenaean palatial civilization. To date, only twenty-three hoards of metal objects have been identified from the core or the periphery of the Mycenaean world. Although in most cases there is a lack of data from the context or the conditions of unearthing Helladic hoards, few deposits are recognized as possible collective offerings to the aquatic or supernatural element. Mainly though, they are located in a domestic or public space, which is usually controlled by the administrating bodies of the Mycenaean authority. The brief examination of the Helladic hoards leads to few interesting conclusions, regarding their contents and their possible character or their chronological order, before and after the gradual decline of the Mycenaean civilization in 1200 BC.
Gold and gold working in Late Bronze Age Northern Greece
Naturwissenschaften 95 (4) 361-66., 2008
Numerous objects of gold displaying an impressive variety of types and manufacturing techniques are known from the Late Bronze Age (LBA) contexts of Mycenaean Greece, but very little is known about the origin and processing of gold during the second millennium B.C. Ancient literature and recent research indicate that northern Greece is probably the richest gold-bearing region in Greece, and yet, very little evidence exists regarding the exploitation of its deposits and the production as well as use of gold in the area during prehistory. The unusual find of a group of small stone crucibles at the prehistoric settlement of Thessaloniki Toumba, one with visible traces of gold melting, proves local production and offers a rare opportunity to examine the process of on-site gold working. Furthermore, the comparison of the chemical composition of prehistoric artefacts from two settlements with those of gold deposits in their immediate areas supports the local extraction of gold and opens up the prospect for some of the Mycenaean gold to have originated in northern Greece. The scarcity of gold items in northern Greek LBA contexts may not represent the actual amount of gold produced and consumed, but could be a result of the local social attitudes towards the circulation and deposition of artefacts from precious metals.
Chasing Bronze Age rainbows Studies on hoards and related phenomena in prehistoric Europe in honour of Wojciech Blajer , 2020
Thousands of Bronze Age hoards have been discovered all around Europe, showing a high variability in space and time. A visible differentiation in the content of the hoards expresses probably different depositaries and may provide some clues about the distribution of wealth – in this case bronze objects – within the society. Statistics, spatial analysis and ethnological examples provide facts that allow us to interpret this phenomenon in social and eventually economic terms.
Journal of Archaeological Research, 2018
Bronze is the defining metal of the European Bronze Age and has been at the center of archaeological and science-based research for well over a century. Archaeo-metallurgical studies have largely focused on determining the geological origin of the constituent metals, copper and tin, and their movement from producer to consumer sites. More recently, the effects of recycling, both temporal and spatial, on the composition of the circulating metal stock have received much attention. Also, discussions of the value and perception of bronze, both as individual objects and as hoarded material, continue to be the focus of scholarly debate. Here, we bring together the sometimes-diverging views of several research groups on these topics in an attempt to find common ground and set out the major directions of the debate, for the benefit of future research. The paper discusses how to determine and interpret the geological provenance of new metal entering the system; the circulation of extant metal across time and space, and how this is seen in changing compositional signatures; and some economic aspects of metal production. These include the role of metal-producing communities within larger economic settings, quantifying the amount of metal present at any one time within a society, and aspects of hoarding, a distinctive European phenomenon that is less prevalent in the Middle Eastern and Asian Bronze Age societies.
Mycenaean Gold: Provenance, Technology and Trade (Open Access)
Reinhard Jung – Hristo Popov (Eds.) Searching for Gold Resources and Networks in the Bronze Age of the Eastern Balkans (Open Access) , 2024
The provenance of Mycenaean gold, although extensively discussed over the last decades, still remains a puzzle for the scholars of the period; the lack of a sufficient number of archaeometric analyses on samples from Mycenaean sites has inevitably led to the suggestion of several ‘candidates’ as sources of their gold, among them, Egypt, northwestern Anatolia (Troad), the Caucasus region and Transylvania. A comparison of stylistic and technological features between certain types of Mycenaean gold artifacts and their counterparts from the above areas points more to the east than the north, although a trade route over land would be the most sensible choice. The ongoing research and publication of the preliminary results from the earliest European goldmine so far at Ada Tepe in the southern Balkans, is expected to enrich our knowledge and provide a basis for a reassessment of the evidence. The present paper aims to briefly present the existing evidence on the connecting links – and consequently the commercial routes – between the Mycenaean centers of the Peloponnese and their potential suppliers of gold.