The collapse of empires at the end of the Bronze Age in the eastern Mediterranean heralds the beginning of one of the most significant political and economic shifts in world history. Following this collapse new economic and political forms developed that shaped the nature of states and empires of the later first millennium BC. The centuries between the terminal Bronze Age (ca. 1200 BC) and the end of the first millennium BC represent, therefore, a critical formative period for emergent Mediterranean states and empires. This period, however, is poorly documented historically, and has had limited systematic archaeological evaluation.
Drs. Lisa Kealhofer and Peter Grave will study the development of economic relationships during the first millennium BC in western Anatolia as a means to understand the formation of these new political and economic structures. Using trade ceramics as a proxy for exchange relationships, the team will look at how trade networks change through this critical transitional period. Previous studies of this transition have focused on coastal eastern Mediterranean sites. By targeting coastal and inland Anatolia the goal is to develop a more appropriately scale and robust understanding of regional and localized economic dynamics both for western and central Anatolia, and the wider east Mediterranean sphere.
The project involves ceramic sampling from Iron Age and Late Bronze Age sites currently (or recently) excavated across western and central Turkey. Analytically this includes two components: ceramic geochemistry and residue analyses. Geochemical analyses (Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis and ICP-MS) will provide "fingerprints" for individual trade centers both within Anatolia, and with other centers participating in the wider east Mediterranean exchange system. The researchers will sample several hundred tradewares at each of ca. 16 sites to model the scalar and organizational dynamics of economic networks of the region during the Iron Age (ca. 4000 samples). Soil samples and general sedimentary histories for each site region will also be studied. These data will be integrated with regional geographic information and the ceramic geochemistry through a GIS database. The two-year duration of sampling is designed to maximize flexibility in sampling breadth and depth across Iron Age Anatolia.
This project represents a new phase of close on-site collaboration among researchers and institutions based in Turkey, Europe, Australia, Japan, and the US. Establishment of a robust geochemical model for Iron Age trade ceramics of Anatolia will provide a major national and international scientific resource for ongoing research in the archaeology, social and economic history of the region. And finally, understanding the creation of new economies in this period of major political disruption will contribute to larger issues related to how new types of political economies are created.
