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This book presents an archaeological study of Crete in transition
from the Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age (c. 4000 to 3000 BC)
within the broader South Aegean context. The study, based on the
author's own fieldwork, contains a gazetteer of over 170 sites. The
material from these sites will prompt archaeologists in Greece,
Turkey, and the Middle East to reconsider their understanding of
the foundation of Bronze Age civilization in the Aegean.
The natural terraces hanging high on the northern cliff of the Cha
Gorge at the site of Monastiraki Katalimata in eastern Crete were
discovered as an excellent refuge site for the first time about
5,500 years ago. At first sight, Katalimata looks like an extreme
refuge place where one might expect small groups of people hiding
for a brief time during the most serious period of threat.
Excavation of the largest of the terraces, however, has shown that
use of the place was often long-lasting and more complex. The most
interesting result of the project was the identification at
Katalimata of almost all the same phases known from elsewhere in
Crete (and, in some cases, the broader Aegean region) as periods of
disturbances, relocations, and destructions. The pottery, when
compared with the material from Chalasmenos and neighbouring sites
near Kavousi, allows the site to be placed in a well-established
historical context in relation to the general breakdown of LM IIIB
settlement pattern around 1200 B.C. This monograph provides a
detailed discussion of the six occupational phases recorded on the
largest of Monastiraki Katalimata's terraces (Final Neolithic, MM
II, LM IB-IIIA1, LM IIIC, Early Byzantine, and Late Venetian to the
17th century A.D.) and offers a reconstruction of the site's role
in the context of Cretan history.
A regional survey was undertaken in the central part of the
Mirabello Bay area: along the northeastern coast of Crete in the
Gournia Valley and the northern half of the Isthmus of Ierapetra,
ending in the valley of Episkopi, to provide a regional context for
the Bronze Age palace and settlement of Gournia. As this survey was
the last and geographically most central compared to three other
surveys (Vrokastro [Hayden 2004a], Pseira [Betancourt, Davaras, and
Hope Simpson 2005], and Kavousi [Haggis 2005]) conducted in the
Mirabello region, it ties together the data from all four surveys
regarding the environment, population(s), and social organization
of an entire region. Furthermore, this volume goes beyond the
survey data to consider, at some length, the evidence from local
excavations, so as to provide an in-depth and integrated picture of
the regional socio-economic development. It is meant as a regional
archaeological study of the Mirabello Bay area.
The period after the end of the Bronze Age, the so-called Dark
Ages' has always been a highly debated subject in Aegean
archaeology. In this study, Krzysztof Nowicki collates more than 15
years of research into defensible sites in Crete, and includes
detailed descriptions of sites, sketches and plans, which make them
easier to locate, as well as details on the surface finds. The
sites are arranged chronologically and then in geographical areas,
and the evidence discussed is used to present a historical summary
of this turbulent period of population shifts, crisis, war and
destruction. Much more than a catalogue of sites, this study places
the evidence from Crete within the historical and archaeological
context of the Aegean and other areas of the Mediterranean.
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