Principi, pelasgi e pescatori. L'Attica nella tarda età del bronzo

Despite being explored as early as 1877, just one year after Schliemann’s discovery of Circle A at Mycenae, Mycenaean Attica has never been the subject of a general overview. Attention has only been devoted to single outstanding discoveries, such as the monumental tombs and cemeteries of Spata, Menidi, and Perati, or the citadels and settlements of the Acropolis at Athens, Eleusis, and Kiapha Thiti. An undoubted constraint affecting the archaeological research of this region is the illicit character of several excavations carried out between the late 19th c. and early 20th c., as well as a well-established scholarly bias towards cemeteries, rather than their related settlements. For a long while, Mycenaean Attica has only been the focus of ceramic studies, which go back to Stubbings (1947) and Benzi (1975). Beginning with the late 1960s, new excavations in settlements of eastern Attica such as Thorikos, Marathon, Brauron, and Kiapha Thiti have shed new light on a formerly neglected territory that still represents a terra incognita. In this context, this study aims to provide the reader with a thorough survey of Attica’s sites situated to the South of Parnes, as well as with an interpretative essay which traces the major stages in the regional settlement history throughout the Late Bronze Age. For clarity’s sake, the chronological and topographical limits of the book are outlined in the first chapter. These serve to highlight two major points concerning Late Bronze Age Attica: on the one hand, the local transition from a Middle Helladic to a ‘Mycenaean’ material culture, which encompassed the adoption of new elements of a technological, ritual, and symbolic nature; on the other, whether and when Attica, which consists of a series of interconnected plains, represented a cultural and/or political entity. In the Shaft Graves Period, less than ten sites are known in Attica, only two of which (Eleusis and Vrana - Marathon) were continuously inhabited during the Middle Helladic.West of Hymettus, Athens and Eleusis appear as large settlements, situated within seemingly ‘empty’ plains. In eastern Attica, conversely, the presence of several fortified citadels hint at a high level of competition between peer polities. In LH IIB/IIIA1, however, citadels such as Kiapha Thiti and Brauron were apparently abandoned, whereas new, long-lasting cemeteries were established in the nearby lowlands. At the end of the period, the beginning of the ‘Mycenaeanization’ of Attica is clearly hinted at by the appearance of the first chamber tomb (at Athens) and tholos tombs (Thorikos) in LH IIA.The fact that another tholos tomb was later built (LH IIB) at Marathon leads one to wonder whether the local introduction of corbelled tombs of monumental size could have been considered more ‘fashionable’ by groups who were already used to the Middle Helladic custom of embedding built chamber tombs within earth mounds (tumuli). In LH IIB, new cemeteries were established on the West coast (Halyki, Varkiza) and in Mesogeia (Vourvatsi, Kopreza, Merenta, Spata, GlykaNera), which lasted until LH IIIC early. Meanwhile, the settlements at Athens and Eleusis kept thriving. In the latter, it is worth stressing the presence of several monumental buildings, as well as the expansion of the Western Cemetery. The cemeteries consisting of more than forty tombs (Athens, Eleusis, Halyki, GlykaNera and Chamolia-Lapoutsi) attest to the largest settlements in Attica. With the exception of Eleusis, they all mainly consist of chamber tombs. At Eleusis, four such tombs were built later, in LH IIIA2 or LH IIIB. Prestige burials are characterized by the deposition of tinned vessels (at Athens and Brauron only), golden objects, and above all by bronze arms (daggers, swords, spearheads, etc.), the latter of which attests to the spread of hunting, rather than warfare, as a widespread elite activity. During LH IIIB, unlike the majority of settlements in Attica, Athens seemingly underwent a progressive decline, evident in the very low number of burials so far known. Not far from it, at any rate, at Acharnes (ca. 10 km Northward) a monumental tholos tomb was built and used within this very phase, the context of which is still ill-defi ned. One can wonder whether Acharnes temporarily took over Athens’ function as a central site within the plain of Lekanopedio; at any rate, the latter’s importance seems to have been fully restored at the very end of the LH IIIB2, when the so-called ‘Pelasgian’ fortifi cations on the Acropolis were built. A chamber ‘warrior’s tomb’, dug on the South slope of the Acropolis in LH IIIC early can be easily referred to the very elite, who was in charge of it by this time. In spite of other proposals (Iakovidis, Mountjoy), it seems plausible to date the terraces which were laid out across the eastern sector of the Acropolis plateau to the beginning of LH IIIC early. Indeed, it is the author’s contention that all of the Acropolis terrace system belongs to this phase. Unlike Athens, all over Attica several settlements were abandoned, both on the west coast (Halyki), and inland (Glyka Nera, Vourvatsi). In eastern Attica, conversely, the cemeteries of Chamolia-Lapoutsi attest to the presence of a thriving settlement in the Brauron area; a few kilometers to the South, the impressive cemetery of Perati seems to confirm the key-role played throughout LH IIIC by the harbors of the eastern coast in the context of long term trade routes originating in Cyprus and the Near East.To sum up, no conclusive evidence exists that attests to the palatial character of Athens during LH IIIA-B; in fact, the Acropolis was fortified at a very late stage of LH IIIB2, that is, already on the eve of the mainland’s postpalatial period. If an elite residence actually existed on its top, which could have inspired Homer’s reference to the ‘well-built house of Erechtheus’, it could have possibly been lived in from LH IIIB2 onwards, during which period, at any rate, no political unity of the region is supported by the available evidence.