Hesperos and Phosphoros:
How Research on Aegean-Eastern Interactions Can Inform Studies of the West
The extent of Aegean influence on its neighbors and of neighboring regions on it remains a contentious area of investigation that continues to generate enthusiastic scholarly interest and lively debate. This poster elaborates on the importance of current theoretical perspectives on Aegean interaction with the east because they may be conceptually useful to those studying similar interactions with central and western Europe.
Aegean seafarers, traders, and crafters were engaged and entangled in cultural exchanges with the east and west on many scales, and artistic and cultural influence among these regions was multi-directional. Although the authors’ expertise lies in interactions and interconnections between the Aegean and the East (particularly Philistia and Cyprus) it is suggested that their theoretical and anthropological approaches to gift exchange, entanglement, transculturalism, transnationalism, and piracy may offer useful insights to those viewing the Aegean from a western perspective.
The Aegean was drawn within the eastern sphere of influence in the late Early Bronze Age (ca. 2200 BCE) with the importation of raw materials from the Near East including copper, tin, gold, and ivory. Gold and ivory were used in the Aegean to manufacture items of elite regalia such as diadems and mace-heads, and other luxury items, particularly ivories (e.g. Maeir et al. 2015), that went on to assume transnational significance in the repertoire of the international style (e.g. Crowley 1989). Once the Minoans acquired the technology for deep-hulled ships with masts as noted by Broodbank (2002), Crete became a key player in Mediterranean trade interactions, which involved gift exchange and trade with the east, the dissemination of ceramic styles and motifs, and the transmittal of Aegean style consumption and feasting practices (Hitchcock et al. 2015). The results of such activities lay in cultural entanglements in the liminal zones of coastal and island regions of the Mediterranean.
Our understanding of destruction and collapse that took place in the Aegean (ca. 1177 BCE, e.g. Cline 2014) has gone from simplistic models of migration v. mercantilism, to more sophisticated models of entanglement, transculturalism, transnational identity, limited migration, and piratical activity following the break down secure maritime routes (Hitchcock and Maeir 2014). As Aegean peoples and others from throughout the Mediterranean became entangled in the piratical cultures that resulted in the Sea Peoples phenomenon, a phenomenon that perhaps over emphasizes the biblically well-known Philistines, similar implications may exist for understanding cultural entanglements in the West. Likewise, as we prefer non-simplistic explanatory frameworks for the transformation processes which occurred in the eastern Mediterranean during the Late Bronze/Iron Age transition and beyond (with Aegean originating cultural influences playing a definite role in these mechanisms), so we believe similarly complex scenarios should be seen in the western Mediterranean as well.
Finally, the comparison with Iron Age east-to-west (Phoenicians and Greeks going west) - and west to east (Greeks going eastward) - connections, may also provide interesting insights for understanding the Bronze Age westward connections of the Aegean cultures. The mixed character of these Iron Age connections – mercantile ventures, colonies, mercenaries and other aspects – led to very complex cultural connections and interactions (Maeir and Hitchcock in press). While there are substantial socio-cultural differences between the Bronze and Iron Age Aegean (and Mediterranean in general), the many aspects of continuity and the longue durée seen throughout Mediterranean history (e.g. Broodbank 2013), indicates that similarities and parallels – and for sure insights – can be gleaned from this.
Louise A. HITCHCOCK
Aren M. MAEIR
Works Cited
BROODBANK, C. (2002) An Island Archaeology of the Early Cyclades. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
-------. (2013). The Making of the Middle Sea: A History of the Mediterranean from the Beginning to the Emergence of the Classical World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
CLINE, E.H. (2014) 1177 BC: The Year Civilization Collapsed. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
CROWLEY, J.L. (1989) The Aegean and the East: An Investigation into the Transference of Artistic Motifs between the Aegean, Egypt, and the Near East In the Bronze Age. (SIMA Pocket-book 51) Jonsered, Sweden: Paul Åströms Förlag.
HITCHCOCK, L.A.; HORWITZ, L.K.; BOARETTO, E.; and MAEIR, A.M (2015). “One Philistine’s Trash is an Archaeologists Treasure,” Near Eastern Archaeology 78.1: 12-25.
HITCHCOCK, L.A. and MAEIR, A.M. (2014) “Yo Ho, Yo Ho, A Seren’s Life for Me,” World Archaeology 46.4: 624-640.
MAEIR, A.M. and HITCHCOCK, L.A. (In Press) “The Appearance, Formation and Transformation of Philistine Culture: New Perspective and New Finds,” in P.M. Fischer (ed) “The Sea-Peoples Up-To-Date. New Research on the Migration of Peoples in the 12th Century BCE.” Proceedings of the European Science Foundation Workshop, Vienna (Austria). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Science and Institute for Oriental and European Archaeology.
MAEIR, A.M.; DAVIS, B.E.; HORWITZ, L.K.; and ASSCHER, Y.; and HITCHCOCK, L.A. (2015), “An Ivory Bowl from Early Iron Age Tell es-Safi/Gath (Israel) - Manufacture, Meaning and Memory,” World Archaeology 47: 1-28
