Northern Aegean Found to Be Earliest Producer of Commercial Amphorae

An amphora is retrieved from the bottommost of the Aegean Sea. Credit: Ministry of Culture

New archaeological findings are challenging long-held beliefs astir the origins of large-scale commercialized successful the past Aegean, suggesting that the Northern Aegean portion was a large commercialized powerfulness centuries earlier than antecedently thought.

The important and antecedently unrecognized relation of galore commercialized amphora workshops successful Northern Greece was highlighted astatine the planetary conference, “Amphoras and the Archaeology of Ancient Economies: Regional Production – Regional Circulation: Amphoras and Aegean Communities,” organized by the Ephorate of Antiquities of Chalkidiki and Mount Athos.

Shifting the commercialized hub to the Northern Aegean

Archaeologist Konstantinos Filis, caput of the Department of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities for the Ephorate, told the Athens-Macedonian News Agency (AMNA):

“Until recently, we believed that Attica (Athens) and Corinth were the archetypal city-states to nutrient commercialized amphorae for distributing lipid and perchance different user goods, chiefly to the Western Mediterranean. However, it present appears that the Northern Aegean became commercially progressive overmuch earlier.”

This prominence continued for centuries. Mark Lawall, a Professor of Archaeology astatine the University of Manitoba, Canada, and a league committee member, praised the value of the workshops, peculiarly those successful the portion of Ancient Mende, connected the occidental seashore of the Pallene peninsula successful Halkidiki.

“The ascendant accumulation halfway successful the 5th and 4th centuries BC was located here,” Lawall stated, noting that “most amphorae successful the Athenian Agora during the 5th period originated from Northern Greece.”

Mende’s strategical determination connected the confederate extremity of the Kassandra Peninsula allowed it to pass with Greek cities successful some Southern Greece and the Northern Aegean, arsenic good arsenic with distant colonies connected the Black Sea.

The “containers of the era”

Filis referred to commercialized amphorae arsenic “the containers of the era,” noting that their survey reveals indispensable social, cultural, and economical information.

He explained that the portion had a “well-organized system with a important surplus of cultivation products,” which was disposed of successful markets extracurricular the area. This strategy of “early exports” began arsenic aboriginal arsenic the precocious 8th period BC:

The earliest benignant of commercialized amphorae, known arsenic “Thermaic” oregon Geometric amphorae, originated from the Thermaic Gulf country and perchance accumulation centers successful Chalkidiki.

These containers person been recovered crossed the Northern Aegean and arsenic acold westbound arsenic Pithekoussai (Naples), making them the earliest commercialized amphora types successful the full Aegean space.

Recent excavations by the Ephorate of Antiquities of Chalkidiki person uncovered galore store remains and monolithic retention pits filled with commercialized amphorae successful assorted areas of Chalkidiki, peculiarly connected the Kassandra peninsula and successful the portion of modern Ierissos (ancient Akanthos).

The standardized packaging of antiquity

Filis elaborated that “commercial amphorae” were vessels with standardized, functional characteristics. Just arsenic a modern idiosyncratic recognizes a vino vessel without a label, truthful excessively did past merchants and consumers.

“Each portion produced its ain circumstantial shape. This was evidently a benignant of advertisement for the producers, portion traders and consumers were capable to admit the root and contents of the amphora,” helium said.

In the wider Thessaloniki area, Filis identifies the cardinal past larboard arsenic Karabournaki, which is linked to past Therme. This settlement, nether excavation for the past 30 years, apt served arsenic the commercialized hub for inland settlements similar Toumba, Stavroupoli, and Polichni. Significant quantities of commercialized amphorae person been recovered there, which were past distributed inland via onshore networks.