This volume explores the part played by different metals in use from the fourth millennium BC to the Early Iron Age, not only in the Aegean but also in the wider Old World. It addresses the divergent uses and roles of different metals, the interrelationships of these roles and the changing values that may have been accorded to them at different times and in different places by producers and consumers. Individually, the papers in the volume contemplate the particular properties of different metals and the various issues concerning their frequent under-representation in the archaeological (but not necessarily textual) record, and also point out comparative and diachronic perspectives that may have the ability to offer insights into their important roles in wider cultural and historical changes over a period of several millennia. After the Introduction and Chapter 1, which reflects on some of the parameters involved in the term ‘precious’ as applied to metals, the remaining six chapters cover the Aegean and the networks that link the Aegean with Italy, Cyprus and the Near East more generally, and south-east Anatolia and the Caucasus. Between them they discuss the beginnings of regular iron metallurgy, the uses of and attitudes to gold, silver and bronze and other copper-based alloys at various times between the fourth millennium BC and the Early Iron Age.

The post-palatial period - Late Helladic IIIC - is often seen as the twilight years of Mycenean civilisation, a period of economic decline with few achievements in terms of architecture, materials or technology. Excavation in the Citadel House area at Mycenae afforded unique opportunities to explore stratified remains of this period and to define and describe its character. In this fascicule, Dr. Elizabeth French presents her full report on the remains of this period, which, sheltered within the massive 13th century BC walls, allow us to chart something of Mycenae's history in the final years of the Bronze Age. This fascicule also contains a unique account of LH IIIC pottery, stratum by stratum, incorporating a major study by Dr. Susan Sherratt, together with a wealth of illustration of pottery vessels. The account of the other objects of terracotta, metal, ivory, stone and bone helps us to better understand the cultural materials of the post-palatial period, while Gordon Hillman's account of the plant remains from the "Granary" is a significant addition to the palaeo-botanical record for the Mycenean period as a whole and one of very few for the LH IIIC period. This book, which includes a DVD containing all the data from previous fascicules and an interactive index, will be an essential reference tool for the study of the period.

In commemoration of the work of Mervyn Popham this festschrift contains 22 essays concerned with the archaeology of Crete and Euboea. Studies include an examination of the role of Crete in Homeric epic, a consideration of the role of the little palace' and some ofthe Middle Minoan pottery found by Evans at Knossos is reexamined. Essays on Euboea include Knossos and Lefkandi: the Attic connections' and Euobean Phylla and greek barracks'. Contributors are: Sinclair Hood, Colin F Macdonald, Elizabeth Schofield, Eleni Hatzaki, Peter Warren, Hugh Sackett, Doniert Evely, H W Catling, Judith Weingarten, Susan Sherratt, Dyfri Williams, E Sapouna-Sakellaraki, Angelika Andreiomenou, Irene S Lemods, R W V Catling, J N Coldstream, Angeliki Lebessi, John Boardman, J J Coulton, Evi Touloupa.

The relationship between the Homeric epics and archaeology has long suffered mixed fortunes, swinging between 'fundamentalist' attempts to use archaeology in order to demonstrate the essential historicity of the epics and their background, and outright rejection of the idea that archaeology is capable of contributing anything at all to our understanding and appreciation of the epics. Archaeology and the Homeric Epic concentrates less on historicity in favour of exploring a variety of other, perhaps sometimes more oblique, ways in which we can use a multi-disciplinary approach - archaeology, philology, anthropology and social history - to help offer insights into the epics, the contexts of their possibly prolonged creation, aspects of their 'prehistory', and what they may have stood for at various times in their long oral and written history. The effects of the Homeric epics on the history and popular reception of archaeology, especially in the particular context of modern Germany, is also a theme that is explored here. Contributors explore a variety of issues including the relationships between visual and verbal imagery, the social contexts of epic (or sub-epic) creation or re-creation, the roles of bards and their relationships to different types of patrons and audiences, the construction and uses of 'history' as traceable through both epic and archaeology and the relationship between 'prehistoric' (oral) and 'historical' (recorded in writing) periods. Throughout, the emphasis is on context and its relevance to the creation, transmission, re-creation and manipulation of epic in the present (or near-present) as well as in the ancient Greek past.