This article is intended to serve as an introduction to the study of painted votive plaques; not that such a study is by any means novel, but since Otto Benndorf's published work on them the amount of material known has increased, and further consideration of them both as painted objects and as dedications seems desirable. As well as a general survey of their nature, name, and decoration, a more detailed account of eighth- and seventh-century examples is included, and I hope at another time to be able to extend the study to the rich later series, as well as to the Corinthian and funerary plaques which are not discussed here in detail.

An inscribed fragment from Aegina is published below for the first time. Its finding did not suggest the study of plaques, in which I was already engaged, and I attribute and acknowledge its timely appearance to the Ἀγαθὴ Τύχη, who occasionally smiles on the archaeologist.

All those concerned with the early history of Athens must give some consideration to the three ‘parties’ (the term used in this discussion rather than ‘faction’) which, it was believed in classical antiquity, divided Attica in the first half of the sixth century B.C. and formed the background to the career of Peisistratos. A considerable bibliography might be assembled on this subject and there would be little excuse for adding to it, did the present writer not feel that previous treatment of the problems involved has been too brief and disjointed. It is intended here first to examine at some length the questions at issue, even if this entails some repetition of generally accepted ideas, and then to hazard some general observations on Athenian affairs of the period.

There are, in fact, four heads under which the problems must be treated: (i) the reality of the existence of regional divisions of Attica such as the parties presuppose, and their localization; (ii) the question of the degree to which parties are, in the ancient sources, connected with these regions; (iii) the question how far persons of whose position and activities we know something can be connected with the regions and the parties; (iv) the validity of the generally accepted views of the aims and policy of the parties and their supposed leaders, followed by an effort to discover an issue which divided Athens and gave rise to the tradition of party strife.

In 1999, fieldwork was resumed by the British team at Adzhiyska Vodenitsa, Vetren, the site of an inland emporion which has been identified with ancient Pistiros (SEG 43. 486, 46. 872*). Excavations were conducted on the terrace with architectural remains in two sectors, north and south of the main east-west road. In the northern sector, 22 pits were investigated. The faunal material from these pits reveals specific butchering methods and the re-articulation of complete body parts following butchery. Among the finds are graffiti on pottery, including a votive inscription to Zeus. In the southern sector, there are traces of residential use. The report includes an account of geophysical prospection to determine the nature of land use beyond the terrace, with evidence suggesting that the settlement was directly adjacent to the River Maritsa (ancient Hebros).

A set of notes found in the Ashmolean Museum Archives, unknown until now, and written by Sir Arthur Evans, has provided the basis for this paper. In them, Evans made annotated drawings of the most important objects recovered from the Temple Repositories of the Palace at Knossos, as well as of the Repositories themselves. Some ideas and issues developed in Evans's subsequent publications can be traced in their first forms in these notes. It is very significant that next to each drawing Evans wrote a figure, evidently the total of similar objects—something he did not do to such an extent in the publications. The section dealing with the sealings may reveal their actual number, as well as a certain confusion between the actual impressed surfaces and the sealings themselves. Reproductions of Evans's pages, transcriptions, and the author's comments on important points make up the bulk of the article. A more complete and enlarged corpus of the objects is now feasible; here an abbreviated catalogue of the newly identified objects is appended.

The recent publication of a fragmentary Oxyrhynchus papyrus containing a deed of sale of a slave effected through a Rhodian bank, in the years between A.D. 238 and 244, sheds new light on the Rhodian banking system, of which hitherto little has been known, and it is worth while considering the information provided on this topic. The papyrus, carefully published by J. F. Oates, consists of two major fragments which do not join; fragment (a) contains all that survives of col. i, to which four hands contributed, and also the lower part of col. ii, while the right end of the upper part of col. ii is on the second fragment, (b), being in the same hand as the upper part of col. i; the lower part of col. ii is in the same three hands as is the lower part of col. i. The different hands represent the depositions of different persons. There is no lacuna between the end of fragment (a) and the beginning of fragment (b). These details are clearly visible on the photograph reproduced here by the kindness of the Managing Committee of the Egypt Exploration Society, to which I am much indebted. The papyrus is difficult to read in places, where the ink has faded, and the portions relevant to Rhodian matters are not all wholly clear.

Evidence for Greek settlements in the Troad is discussed, and their status, whether as full cities, or smaller communities.

The intention of this paper is to set out the evidence for the ties between the family of Herodes Atticus, the Athenian consul and sophist, and the city of Sparta. Its kernel is the re-edition in Part Two of a fragmentary inscription from Sparta, which contains — it will be argued — evidence for the marriage of a previously unknown sister of Herodes to a Spartan aristocrat. The context of this match was a long-standing association between Sparta and the family stretching back at least to the Flavian period, all the other evidence for which is first examined in Part One.

Suidas, under the heading Χαλκίοικος explains as follows: ‘The Athena in Sparta; either because she has a brazen house; or on account of her (its?) stability; or because it was founded by Chalcidian exiles from Euboea.’ Hesychius adds as synonyms Χαλκηδάνη, Χαλκίναος In Euripides we find Χαλκόπυλος as an epithet of the goddess. These variants are in themselves sufficient to contradict Suidas' two alternatives. The noteworthy feature about the sanctuary was its bronze decoration, and thus the name is descriptive of the sanctuary rather than of the goddess. It is not a cult-name, and represents no religious aspect of the goddess; in fact there is good reason to suppose that it is not even the original name of the sanctuary that crowned the Acropolis of Sparta, but one acquired at a subsequent restoration.

The following notes are the results of several journeys in the district between Brusa and Mihallitch, which, in spite of its accessibility, is archaeologically ill known.

they deal with:—

1. The Byzantine Churches of Triglia and Syge.

2. The Byzantine fortresses: Caesarea Germanice, Katoikia, Koubouklia.

3. Besbicus-Kalolimno.

4. Inscriptions.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the way in which Greek architects designed Doric capitals. There have been earlier attempts to do this kind of thing, but the difficulty has remained of carrying conviction, of showing that the characteristics and relationships noted do not just happen accidentally but embody the intentions of the designers. This is the excuse for devoting so much of what follows to questions of procedure, to methodological objections and their rebuttal. Readers who are prepared to take such matters on trust will find the results of the investigation set out on pp. 84–93, 97–103.

In memoriam Eos Zervoudaki2

The terracotta model presented in this article depicts the roof of a small temple or naiskos. It was discovered during the excavation of a Late Geometric apsidal temple, probably dedicated to Poseidon Heliconius, at Nikoleika near Aegion. An account of the excavation can be found in the article by Erophile Kolia in this volume. The present article focuses on interpretation and analysis of the model in the context of the religious, social and political life of Achaea during the second half of the eighth century bc.

Protoattic vases have not been classified to anything like the same extent as the Black Figure vases which follow them, or even the Geometric which precede them. Much has been written on this fabric, in fact a complete bibliography down to the Nessos vase alone would include upwards of ninety publications, some of considerable length; but the standard work is still Boehlau's Frühattische Vasen in J.d.I. 1887, 33 ff. In the forty-nine years since Boehlau wrote, a lot of new material has appeared, and there has long been need for a further, though not yet final, study of the subject.

The mutilated inscription generally called the ‘Constitution of Chios’ was first discovered in the village of Tholopotami and published in 1909 by Dr. Jacobsthal and Professor U. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff. The examination of the stone and the photographs and squeezes were all made under very difficult conditions, and shortly afterwards the stone disappeared from sight and record. It found its way finally into the hands of the local authorities, and, Chios being then under Turkish rule, was sent to the Archaeological Museum at Istanbul, where it remained without attracting the notice of later travellers. The inscription has been included in several collections of Greek epigraphical texts, accompanied by the short commentaries of editors who were relying on the original description and readings. I examined the stone at Istanbul in 1949, and cannot suggest a full restoration of the text, any more than did the first editors in their short but admirably comprehensive account.

The principal discoveries in 1986 at this prehistoric settlement in Macedonia were two Iron Age apsidal buildings and a late Bronze Age storeroom with masses of cereals and other crops preserved by charring.

In this article I wish to present in detail a number of vases which have received only a brief mention in publication until now, or are otherwise unpublished. Most are chance finds from inhumation burials discovered during cultivation or road building. Some of the graves were slab-cists, but the majority were simple pit-graves. In some cases they were grouped together. No traces of tumuli survive, but this possibility should be considered. By comparison with material from neighbouring areas and from associated finds, this pottery can be dated to the Early Iron Age, c. 1000–700 B.C.

The restoration of the inscription is discussed, and the number of missing lines calculated. On the basis of the surviving text, the minimum number of amphorae awarded is calculated at 1423.

Dörpfeld's excavations in the Nidhri plain of Levkas have recently been attracting renewed interest which is long overdue. The cemetery of round graves at Steno is not only one of the richest Early Bronze Age sites known in Greece, but also one of the most intriguing, and potentially one of the most informative. It is proposed to examine here three aspects of these graves—their date, the cultural contacts for which they provide evidence, and their social significance.

The only ancient topographer to mention the Heraion of Perachora calls it an oracle. Strabo's words are: ἐν δὲ τῷ μεταξὺ τοῦ Λεχαίου καὶ Παγῶν τὸτῆς ᾿Ακραίας μαντεῖον ῾῾Ηρας ὑπῆρχε τὸ παλαιόν Commenting on this passage Payne says: ‘No trace of this aspect of the cult has yet been found’. I suggest that it has been found, though not recognised, and may explain a puzzling feature of the site revealed by the excavation.

In this paper I wish to question the views of the early relations between Corinth and Megara which were expressed in Perachora I (1940) and reinforced in JHS 1948, 59 ff. It was there maintained that the Heraeum was founded by Corinth on Corinthian soil c. 850 B.C., and this was put in the following general setting (JHS LXVIII 64). ‘The foundation of the Heraion at Perachora will have been part of the same movement of Argive expansion which dorised Megara and lopped off her southern territories.’ On this hypothesis the Dorian occupation of the Megarid occurred not before the Ionian migration, as all the literary tradition states, but after the Ionian migration; for on archaeological grounds alone the Ionian migration must have commenced during the tenth century at the latest. When Dunbabin wrote in JHS, the results of excavation at Smyrna were not known; these results, inter alia, prompt this paper.

This article explores in detail the mysterious lacuna in the record of Knossos during the sixth century BC, between the abandonment of the collective tombs of the Early Iron Age and the revival of the city's fortunes in Classial times. The archaeological evidence, indicating a deep recession, is marshalled in three chronological sections: (i) the full stop in the seventh century, (ii) the Archaic gap, and (iii) recovery in the fifth century. Parallel developments at Amnisos are also discussed. In the light of any relevant clues from the written record, we evaluate the likelihood of various possible causes of the sixth-century recession at Knossos, whether natural or human.