Tracing Networks: Craft Traditions in the Ancient Mediterranean and Beyond

A new innovative interdisciplinary project with a specific contribution based on the material culture from the Mycenaean site of Tiryns, Greece.

As part of a programme recently funded by the Leverhulme Trust with £1,729,180, Dr. Ann Brysbaert, Department of Museum Studies, University of Leicester, will conduct, in cooperation with Professor Joseph Maran, Heidelberg University, Germany, and Dr. Alkestis Papadimitriou, Fourth Ephorate at Nauplio, Argolid, Greece, a five year research project focusing on Late Mycenaean Tiryns. The strongly interdisciplinary nature of the project will approach ancient crafts from a combined perspective of chaîne opératoire and Cross-Craft Interaction (CCI), a methodology that has not previously been combined, while Dr. A. Brysbaert has worked with both concepts since 2002. The project will involve the intensive study of a range of finds from the archaeological site of Tiryns in the Argolid covering the period of the (Late) Bronze Age into the sub-Mycenaean period. Together with a research associate (to be appointed in 2009), Ann Brysbaert will investigate all possible craft links that can be uncovered by studying and analysing the pyrotechnologically produced objects found on the site, on the one hand, and potential equipment/facilities that were involved in any of these industries, on the other. The purpose is not only to understand the intricacies of technological links between crafts but also to look into the social factors that played a role in achieving such technological links or causing such links. 

Further Contact Partners

Prof. Dr. Joseph Maran
(Leiter der Ausgrabungen in Tiryns)
Institut für Ur- und Frühgeschichte der Universität Heidelberg
Marstallhof 4
D-69117 Heidelberg
E-Mail: m17@ix.urz.uni-heidelberg.de

Bibliography

For more information, please click: www.le.ac.uk/museumstudies/news/leverhulme.html

Institut für Ur- und Frühgeschichte der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg