Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-r6qrq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T22:03:43.418Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

KNOSSIAN GIFTS? TWO LATE MINOAN IIIA1 CUPS FROM TEL BETH-SHEMESH, ISRAEL

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2014

Shlomo Bunimovitz ,
Zvi Lederman  and
Eleni Hatzaki
Shlomo Bunimovitz*
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University
Zvi Lederman
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University
Eleni Hatzaki
Affiliation:
Department of Classics, University of Cincinnati
*
zvi.lederman@gmail.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Two Late Minoan IIIA1 cups were recently found in the excavations at Tel Beth-Shemesh, Israel. They were part of a larger assemblage of local Late Bronze IIA (first half of the fourteenth century bc) drinking and eating vessels sealed under a destruction layer in one room of a large edifice, presumably a ‘palace’. A commemorative scarab bearing the name of Amenhotep III and related to the first Jubilee (Sed festival) in his thirtieth regnal year was found alongside the cups, providing further chronological evidence. This article examines the Late Minoan IIIA1 cups from Beth-Shemesh within their Aegean context and emphasises their close affinity with comparable cups from the palace of Knossos, catalogued and republished here. The Tel Beth-Shemesh cups are the second occurrence – after Sellopoulo Tomb 4 – of Knossian Late Minoan IIIA1 pottery found together with Amenhotep III's scarab. This new evidence strengthens the likelihood of some chronological overlap between Late Minoan IIIA1 and the reign of this Pharaoh. The article also considers the biography of the two Minoan cups, as social agents within the intricate network of the Late Bronze Age palatial gift exchange in the eastern Mediterranean. While it is possible that the cups came to Beth-Shemesh directly from Knossos, another viable option is that they arrived as a gift from the Egyptian court. The two rare Late Minoan IIIA1 Knossian cups could have reached Egypt on the occasion of Amenhotep III's much-discussed official embassy to the Aegean – including Knossos – and then been sent as royal gifts to the ruler of Beth-Shemesh.

Κνωσσιακά δώρα; Δυο ϒστερομινωικά ΙΙΙΑ1 κύπελλα απο την θέση Tel Beth-Shemesh, Ισραήλ

Δυο ϒστερομινωικά ΙΙΙΑ1 κύπελλα ανακαλύφθηκαν πρόσφατα κατα την διάρκεια των ανασκαφών στην θέση Tel Beth-Shemesh στο Ισραήλ. Αποτελούσαν μέρος ενός μεγαλύτερου κεραμικού συνόλου της τοπικής Ύστερης Εποχής του Χαλκού ΙΙΑ (πρώτο μισό του 14ου αιώνα π.Χ) που απαρτιζόταν από σκεύη πόσεως και κατανάλωσης τροφής. Το σύνολο βρέθηκε «σφραγισμένο» κάτω από ένα στρώμα καταστροφής σε ένα από τα δωμάτια μεγάλου κτιριακού συγκροτήματος, πιθανότατα «Ανακτόρου». Μαζί με τα κύπελλα ανασκάφηκε και ένας αναμνηστικός σκαραβαίος που φέρει το όνομα του Amenhotep του III, ο οποίος, καθώς συνδέεται με το πρώτο ιωβηλαίο (εορτασμός του Sed) επ’ ευκαιρία του τριακοστού έτους της ηγεμονίας του, μας προσφέρει περαιτέρω στοιχεία χρονολόγησης του συνόλου. Το συγκεκριμένο άρθρο εξετάζει τα δυο ϒστερομινωικά ΙΙΙΑ1 κύπελλα από την θέση Beth-Shemesh εντός των Αιγαιακών τους συμφραζομένων και παράλληλα δίνει έμφαση στο γεγονός οτι παρουσιάζουν σημαντικές ομοιότητες με αντίστοιχα κύπελλα, που παρατίθενται και επαναδημοσιεύονται εδώ, από το ανάκτορο της Κνωσσού.

Τα κύπελλα από την θέση Tel Beth-Shemesh αποτελούν, μετά από τον Τάφο 4 στο Σελλόπουλο, την δεύτερη περίπτωση όπου ϒστερομινωική ΙΙΙΑ1 κεραμική ανασκάπτεται μαζί με σκαραβαίο του Amenhotep του III. Η δεύτερη αυτή περίπτωση ενισχύει την πιθανότητα η ϒστερομινωική ΙΙΙΑ1 περίοδος να συμπίπτει χρονολογικά με την βασιλεία του συγκεκριμένου Φαραώ. Το άρθρο συζητά επίσης την «βιογραφία» των δυο Μινωικών κυπέλλων ως κοινωνικά ενεργών φορέων μέσα στο δαιδαλώδες δίκτυο ανταλλαγής «ανακτορικών» δώρων στην Ανατολική Μεσόγειο κατα την Ύστερη Εποχή του Χαλκού. Ενώ είναι πιθανόν τα δυο κύπελλα να έφτασαν στην θέση Tel Beth-Shemesh απευθείας από την Κνωσσό, δεν αποκλείεται η εκδοχή να κατέληξαν εκεί ως δώρο προερχόμενο από την Αιγυπτιακή αυλή. Τα δυο σπάνια ϒστερομινωικά ΙΙΙΑ1 κνωσσιακά κύπελλα θα μπορούσαν να έχουν φτάσει στην Αίγυπτο κατα την περίσταση της πολυσυζητημένης «διπλωματικής αποστολής» του Amenhotep του III στο Αιγαίο – συμπεριλαμβανομένης της Κνωσσού – και έπειτα να στάλθηκαν ως βασιλικά δώρα στον ηγεμόνα της Tel Beth-Shemesh.

Type
Articles
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 108 , November 2013 , pp. 51 - 66
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bevan, A. 2007. Stone Vessels and Values in the Bronze Age Mediterranean (Cambridge).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bisset, N.G., Bruhn, J.G. and Zenk, M.H. 1996. ‘The presence of opium in a 3,500 year-old Cypriot Base Ring juglet’, Ägypten und Levante 6, 203–4.Google Scholar
Blankenberg-Van Delden, C. 1969. The Large Commemorative Scarabs of Amenhotep III (Leiden).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blegen, C.W. 1937. Prosymna. The Helladic Settlement Preceding the Argive Heraeum (Cambridge, MA).Google Scholar
Brandl, B., Bunimovitz, S. and Lederman, Z. 2013. ‘Beth-Shemesh and Sellopoulo: Two commemorative scarabs of Amenhotep III and their contribution to Aegean chronology’, Annual of the British School at Athens 108.Google Scholar
Bunimovitz, S. 1995. ‘On the edge of empires – Late Bronze Age (1550–1200 bce)’, in Levy, T.E. (ed.), The Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land (London), 320–31.Google Scholar
Bunimovitz, S. and Lederman, Z. 1993. ‘Beth-Shemesh’, in Stern, E. (ed.), The New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land, vol. 1 (Jerusalem), 249–54.Google Scholar
Bunimovitz, S. and Lederman, Z. 2008. ‘Beth-Shemesh’, in Stern, E. (ed.), The New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land, vol. 5. Supplementary Volume (Jerusalem), 1644–8.Google Scholar
Bunimovitz, S. and Lederman, Z. 2009. ‘The archaeology of border communities. Tel Beth-Shemesh renewed excavations, Part 1: The Iron Age’, Near Eastern Archaeology 72, 116–44.Google Scholar
Catling, E.A., Catling, H.W. and Smyth, D. 1979. ‘Knossos 1975: Middle Minoan III and Late Minoan I houses by the Acropolis’, Annual of the British School at Athens 74, 1–80.Google Scholar
Chovanec, Z., Rafferty, S.M. and Swiny, S. 2012. ‘Opium for the masses: An experimental archaeological approach in determining the antiquity of the opium poppy’, Ethnoarchaeology 4, 5–36.Google Scholar
Cline, E.H. 2001. ‘Amenhotep III, the Aegean, and Anatolia’, in O'Connor, D. and Cline, E.H. (eds.), Amenhotep III: Perspectives on His Reign (Ann Arbor), 236–50.Google Scholar
Cline, E.H. and Stannish, S.M. 2011. ‘Sailing the Great Green Sea? Amenhotep III's “Aegean List” from Kom el-Hetan, once more’, Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections 3, 6–16.Google Scholar
Day, P. and Wilson, D.E. 2004. ‘Ceramic change and the practice of eating and drinking in Early Bronze Age Crete’, in Halstead, P. and Barrett, J.C. (eds.), Food, Cuisine and Society in Prehistoric Greece (Sheffield Studies in Aegean Archaeology 5; Oxford), 45–62.Google Scholar
Dietler, M. 2001. ‘Theorizing the feast: Rituals of consumption, commensal politics, and power’, in Dietler, M. and Hayden, B. (eds.), Feasts: Archaeological and Ethnographic Perspectives on Food, Politics, and Power (Tuscaloosa), 65–114.Google Scholar
Dothan, M. and Dothan, T. 1992. People of the Sea: The Search for the Philistines (New York).Google Scholar
Finkelstein, I. 1996. ‘The territorial-political system of Canaan in the Late Bronze Age’, Ugarit-Forschungen 28, 221–55.Google Scholar
Furumark, A. 1941. Mycenaean Pottery: Analysis and Classification (Stockholm).Google Scholar
Goren, Y., Finkelstein, I. and Na'aman, N. 2004. Inscribed in Clay: Provenance Study of the Amarna Tablets and Other Ancient Near Eastern Texts (Monograph Series of the Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University 23; Tel Aviv).Google Scholar
Gosden, C. and Marshall, Y. 1999. ‘The cultural biography of objects’, World Archaeology 31, 169–78.Google Scholar
Grant, E. and Wright, G.E. 1939. Ain Shems Excavations (Palestine). Part V (Text) (Haverford).Google Scholar
Haggis, D.C. 2007. ‘Stylistic diversity and diacritical feasting at Protopalatial Petras: A preliminary analysis of the Lakkos deposit’, American Journal of Archaeology 111, 715–75.Google Scholar
Hallager, E. and Hallager, B.P. (eds.) 2011. The Greek-Swedish Excavations at the Agia Aikaterini Square, Kastelli, Khania, 1970–1987 and 2001.Volume IV.1–2: The Late Minoan IIIB:1 and IIIA:2 Settlements (Stockholm).Google Scholar
Hatzaki, E. 2005. Knossos: The Little Palace (British School at Athens Supp. Vol. 38; London).Google Scholar
Hatzaki, E. 2007a. ‘Final Palatial (LM II–IIIA2) and Postpalatial (LM IIIB–LM IIIC Early): MUM South Sector, Long Corridor Cists, MUM Pits (8, 10–11), Makritikhos ‘Kitchen’, MUM North Platform Pits, and SEX Southern Half Groups’, in Momigliano, N. (ed.), Knossos Pottery Handbook: Neolithic and Bronze Age (British School at Athens Studies Vol. 14; London), 197–251.Google Scholar
Hatzaki, E. 2007b. ‘Neopalatial (MM IIIB–LM IB): KS 178, Gypsades Well (Upper Deposit), and SEX North House Groups’, in Momigliano, N. (ed.), Knossos Pottery Handbook: Neolithic and Bronze Age (British School at Athens Studies Vol. 14; London), 151–96.Google Scholar
Hatzaki, E. 2007c. ‘Review of Knossos: South House by P.A. Mountjoy (London 2003)’, American Journal of Archaeology 111.2. (Online reviews <http://www.ajaonline.org>.)Google Scholar
Hatzaki, E. 2013. ‘The end of an Intermezzo at Knossos: Ceramic wares, deposits, and architecture in context’, in Knappett, C., Macdonald, C. and Banou, E. (eds.), Intermezzo: Intermediacy and Regeneration in Middle Minoan III Crete (British School at Athens Studies 20; London), 37–45.Google Scholar
Hatzaki, E. in press. ‘Pots, frescoes, textiles and people. The social life of decorated pottery at Late Bronze Age Knossos, Crete’, in Bennet, J. and Peters, M. (eds.), Technologies of Representation (Sheffield Round Table 2008).Google Scholar
Hayden, B. 2001. ‘Fabulous feasts: A prolegomenon to the importance of feasts’, in Dietler, M. and Hayden, B. (eds.), Feasts: Archaeological and Ethnographic Perspectives on Food, Politics, and Power (Tuscaloosa), 23–64.Google Scholar
Hood, M.S.F., Huxley, G. and Sandars, N. 1958–9. ‘A Minoan cemetery on Upper Gypsadhes’, Annual of the British School at Athens 53–4, 194–262.Google Scholar
Hood, S. 2011. ‘Knossos Royal Road: North, LM IB deposits’, in Brogan, T.M. and Hallager, E. (eds.), LM IB Pottery: Relative Chronology and Regional Differences (Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens Vol. 11.1; Athens), 153–74.Google Scholar
Hornung, E., Krauss, R. and Warburton, D.A. 2006. Ancient Egyptian Chronology (Leiden and London).Google Scholar
Jones, R.E. 1986. Greek and Cypriot Pottery: A Review of Scientific Studies (Athens).Google Scholar
Knappett, C. 2004. ‘Technological innovation and social diversity at Middle Minoan Knossos’, in Cadogan, G., Hatzaki, E. and Vasilakis, A. (eds.), Knossos: Palace, City, State (British School at Athens Studies Vol.12; London), 257–64.Google Scholar
Kopytoff, I. 1986. ‘The cultural biography of things: Commoditization as process’, in Appadurai, A. (ed.), The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge), 64–91.Google Scholar
Koschel, K. 1996. ‘Opium alkaloids in a Cypriote Base-Ring I vessel (bilbil) of the Middle Bronze Age from Egypt’, Ägypten und Levante 6, 159–66.Google Scholar
Leonard, A. Jr 1994. An Index of the Late Bronze Age Aegean Pottery from Syria-Palestine (Studies in Mediterranean Archaeology 114; Jonsered).Google Scholar
Macdonald, C.F. and Knappett, C. 2007. Knossos: Protopalatial Deposits in Early Magazine A and the South-West Houses (British School at Athens Supp. Vol. 41; London).Google Scholar
Maeir, A.M. 2007. ‘The bone beverage strainers’, in Garfinkel, Y. and Cohen, S. (eds.), The Middle Bronze Age IIA Cemetery at Gesher: Final Report (Annual of American Schools of Oriental Research 62; Boston, MA), 119–23.Google Scholar
Manning, S.W. 1999. A Test of Time: The Volcano of Thera and the Chronology and History of the Aegean and East Mediterranean in the Mid Second Millennium bce (Oxford).Google Scholar
Manning, S.W., Bronk Ramsey, C., Kutschera, W., Higham, T., Kromer, B., Steir, P. and Wild, E.M. 2006. ‘Chronology for the Aegean Late Bronze Age 1700–1400 B.C.’, Science 312, 565–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Merrillees, R.S. 1962. ‘Opium trade in the Bronze Age Levant’, Antiquity 36, 287–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merrillees, R.S. 1968. The Cypriot Pottery Found in Egypt (Studies in Mediterranean Archaeology 18; Lund).Google Scholar
Merrillees, R.S. 1969. ‘Opium again in antiquity’, Levant 3, 56–79.Google Scholar
Merrillees, R.S. 1989. ‘Highs and lows in the Holy Land: Opium in biblical times’, Eretz-Israel 20, 148*–54*.Google Scholar
Momigliano, N. 1996. ‘Duncan Mackenzie and the Palestine Exploration Fund’, Palestine Exploration Quarterly 128, 139–70.Google Scholar
Momigliano, N. 1999. Duncan Mackenzie. A Cautious Canny Highlander & The Palace of Minos at Knossos (London).Google Scholar
Momigliano, N. 2007. ‘Introduction’, in Momigliano, N. (ed.), Knossos Pottery Handbook: Neolithic and Bronze Age (Minoan) (British School at Athens Studies Vol. 14; London), 1–8.Google Scholar
Mountjoy, P.A. 1986. Mycenaean Decorated Pottery: A Guide to Identification (Studies in Mediterranean Archaeology 73; Gothenburg).Google Scholar
Mountjoy, P.A. 1993. Mycenaean Pottery: An Introduction (Oxford).Google Scholar
Mountjoy, P.A. 2003. Knossos: The South House (British School at Athens Supp. Vol. 34; London).Google Scholar
Mountjoy, P.A. 2007. ‘The Mycenaean and Late Minoan I–II pottery’, in Renfrew, C. (ed.), Excavations at Phylakopi in Melos 1974–77 (British School at Athens Supp. Vol. 42; London), 307–70.Google Scholar
Na'aman, N. 2011. ‘The Shephelah according to the Amarna letters’, in Finkelstein, I. and Na'aman, N. (eds.), The Fire Signals of Lachish: Studies in the Archaeology and History of Israel in the Late Bronze Age, Iron Age, and Persian Period in Honor of David Ussishkin (Winona Lake IN), 281–99.Google Scholar
Popham, M.R. 1970. The Destruction of the Palace at Knossos: Pottery of the Late Minoan IIIA Period (Studies in Mediterranean Archaeology 12; Gothenburg).Google Scholar
Popham, M.R. 1984. The Minoan Unexplored Mansion at Knossos (British School at Athens Supp. Vol. 17; London).Google Scholar
Popham, M.R., Catling, E.A. and Catling, H.W. 1974. ‘Sellopoulo Tombs 3 and 4. Two Late Minoan graves near Knossos’, Annual of the British School at Athens 69, 195–257.Google Scholar
Sanders, S. 2006. ‘Part III: Alphabetic cuneiform texts’, in Horowitz, W. and Oshima, T., Cuneiform in Canaan: Cuneiform Sources from the Land of Israel in Ancient Times (Jerusalem), 157–66.Google Scholar
Sparks, R. 2004. ‘Canaan in Egypt: Archaeological evidence for a social phenomenon’, in Bourriau, J. and Phillips, J. (eds.), Invention and Innovation: The Social Context of Technological Change 2: Egypt, the Aegean and the Near East, 1650–1150 B.C. (Oxford), 27–56.Google Scholar
Stockhammer, P.W. 2012a. ‘Performing the practice turn in archaeology’, Transcultural Studies 1, 7–42.Google Scholar
Stockhammer, P.W. 2012b. ‘Materielle Verflechtungen – zur lokalen Einbindung fremder Keramik in der ostmediterranen Spätbronzezeit’ (Habilitationsschrift, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg).Google Scholar
Stubbings, F.H. 1951. Mycenaean Pottery from the Levant (Cambridge).Google Scholar
Urem-Kotsou, D. and Kotsakis, K. 2007. ‘Pottery, cuisine and community in the Neolithic of north Greece’, in Mee, C. and Renard, J. (eds.), Cooking up the Past: Food and Culinary Practices in the Neolithic and Bronze Age Aegean (Oxford), 225–46.Google Scholar
Warburton, D.A. (ed.) 2009. Time's Up! Dating the Minoan Eruption of Santorini (Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens Vol. 10; Aarhus).Google Scholar
Warren, P.M. 1997. ‘Late Minoan III pottery from the city of Knossos: Stratigraphical Museum extension site’. in Hallager, E. and Hallager, B.P. (eds.), Late Minoan III Pottery. Chronology and Terminology. Acts of a Meeting held at the Danish Institute at Athens August 12–14, 1994 (Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens Vol. 1; Athens), 157–84.Google Scholar
Warren, P.M. 1999. ‘LM IA: Knossos, Thera, Gournia’, in Betancourt, P.P., Karageorghis, V., Laffineur, R. and Niemeier, W.-D. (eds.), Meletemata: Studies in Aegean Archaeology presented to Malcolm H. Wiener as he enters his 65th Year (Aegaeum 20; Liège and Austin), 893–903.Google Scholar
Warren, P.M. 2011. ‘Late Minoan IB pottery from Knossos: Stratigraphical Museum Excavations, the North Building’, in Brogan, T.M. and Hallager, E. (eds.), LM IB pottery: Relative Chronology and Regional Differences (Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens Vol. 11.1; Athens), 183–95.Google Scholar
Watrous, L.V. 1992. Kommos 3. The Late Bronze Age Pottery (Princeton).Google Scholar
Wilson, D.E. and Day, P.M. 2000. ‘EM I chronology and social practice: Pottery from the early palace tests at Knossos’, Annual of the British School at Athens 95, 21–63.Google Scholar
Ziffer, I., Bunimovitz, S. and Lederman, Z. 2009. ‘Divine or human? An intriguing plaque figurine from Tel Beth-Shemesh’, Ägypten und Levante 19, 333–41.Google Scholar