The close relationship between photography and archaeology is widely acknowledged. Since its invention, photography has been an indispensable documentation tool for archaeology, while the development of digital technology has facilitated the growing needs of an archaeological excavation in recording and archiving. Still, both photography and archaeology are much more than documentation practices. On the one hand, photography is the most appropriate medium for creating visual art; on the other, the excavation is a locus where material and immaterial knowledges are constantly being produced, reproduced and represented; as such, it constitutes an ideal "topos" for experimentation in creating images. This entangled relationship between photography and archaeology, and art and documentation, has only recently attracted attention, emerging as a separate field of study. Archaeographies: Excavating Neolithic Dispilio consists one of the very first experimentations in printed format, dealing with this visual interplay between archaeology and photography. The case study is the excavation of the Greek Neolithic settlement of Dispilio. The book tackles archaeological practice on site, the microcosms of excavation, and the interaction between people and "things". Archaeographies derives from an on-going, blog-based project, launched in 2006 (visualizingneolithic.com). The black-and-white photos of the book were selected from a large archive, and are loosely assembled as an itinerary. They are accompanied by a laconic commentary, in order to retain the sense of ambiguity and allow multiple interpretation of the images.

How can we find alternative, sensorially rich and affective ways of engaging with the material past in the present? How can photography play a central role in archaeological narratives, beyond representation and documentation? This photo-book engages with these questions, not through conventional academic discourse but through evocative creative practice. The book is, at the same time, a site guide of sorts: a photographic guide to the archaeological site of the Sanctuary of Poseidon in Kalaureia, on the island of Poros, in Greece. Ancient and not-so-ancient stones, pine trees that were “wounded” for their resin, people who lived amongst the classical ruins, and the tensions and the clashes with the archaeological apparatus and its regulations, all become palpable, affectively close and immediate. Furthermore, the book constitutes an indirect but concrete proposal for the adoption of archaeological photo-ethnography as a research as well as public communication tool for critical heritage studies, today.

Spondylus shells were prized as seafood but also invested with social and symbolic significance in many prehistoric cultures. This volume offers a broad and up-to-date discussion of the Spondylus phenomenon in prehistory, in diverse archaeological contexts from Europe and two areas of the New World. It brings together new archaeological data, methodological advances, and current interpretations for the study of this important material. Further understanding comes from consideration of other shell technologies, ancient and traditional.

The objective of this book is the reconsideration of the practices of personal adornment during the Neolithic period in Greece, through the assemblage, extensive bibliographic documentation, and critical evaluation of all the available data deriving from more than a hundred sites in the mainland and the Aegean islands -an archaeological archive of wide geographical and chronological scope. In addition, a thorough study of the personal ornament corpus from the Middle-Late Neolithic Dispilio in Kastoria, an important lakeside settlement in north-western Greece, was conducted. The book begins with an overview of the anthropological and archaeological literature on theoretical and methodological issues concerning practices of personal adornment. Then follows an examination of the problems and key points of study regarding personal adornment in Neolithic Greece, as well as a critical evaluation of the methodological approaches and classification schemes that have been applied in previous archaeological works. Subsequently, the technologies and processes of production, consumption, recycling, deposition, and distribution of personal ornaments in Neolithic Greece are discussed. Finally, the social correlates of personal adornment are explored, as they are reflected in the choice of different raw materials (shell, clay, bone, stone, and metal) and ornament types (beads, pendants, annulets, and so forth).