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Lighting practices in early Greece (from the end of the Mycenaean world to the 7th century BC
Author(s) -
Parisinou Eva
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
oxford journal of archaeology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.382
H-Index - 31
eISSN - 1468-0092
pISSN - 0262-5253
DOI - 10.1111/1468-0092.00066
Subject(s) - pottery , argument (complex analysis) , popularity , period (music) , history , archaeology , simple (philosophy) , ancient history , literature , art , aesthetics , philosophy , epistemology , law , political science , biochemistry , chemistry
Reconsideration of the materials of lighting from a number of Early Greek sites leads to a review of the long‐standing scholarly argument about an abrupt break in the use of typologically distinctive lamps in the period between the 11th and early 7th centuries BC. According to this, there is a marked absence of easily identifiable lamp‐types, after the elaborate stone and clay Minoan and Mycenean series. Drawing on a combined approach to both its literary and archaeological aspects, I shall attempt to re‐assess the truth of this ‘traditionally’ negative argument. In particular, certain pottery series, such as bowls, kothons and similar categories of plain pots with wide geographical distribution and popularity from the Mycenaean to Historical times (mainly until the 3rd century BC) will be reviewed and suggested as possible sources of light. In addition, I shall suggest — with the aid of a simple experiment — other simple ways of lighting a lamp by means directly available from nature.