The promontory of Kolonna on the northwestern coast of Aigina was occupied during the Neolithic period at least as early as the fourth millennium BC. The natural advantages of the site are evident: it is elevated 12 meters above sea level and protected by cliffs on three sides, with a double embayment to the south and north and abundant arable land to the east (Felten 2007: 12). Although the shallow harbor at Kolonna — later Aigina town — was considered in Antiquity to be among the most hazardous in the Aegean to approach, it repeatedly served as the main port of powerful Aiginetan states from the Bronze Age to the Archaic period. This disadvantage did not outweigh the location's other natural benefits, or the social and economic will of the city's inhabitants to succeed in spite of environmental shortcomings.
An incipient maritime small world may have come into being in the Saronic as early as the Late or Final Neolithic. It has been demonstrated that Aigina was the main source of andesite for millstones in Attica and the Peloponnese by the later Neolithic period (Runnels 1985a), and a “Saronic" fabric that appears macroscopically to be tempered with volcanic-related inclusions characteristic of Aigina is common among the FN to EBA pottery sherds recovered during a
7.3 Map showing the locations of corridor houses and fortifications in the EB II Aegean. After Tartaron, Pullen, and Noller 2006: 147, fig. 3.
Recent surface survey in the Korphos region (D. Pullen, personal communication 2001). The center at Kolonna comes into clearer focus in a mature phase of EB II in the Aegean. This was a time of increasing social complexity that witnessed the emergence of chiefdoms, the erection of fortifications at many sites, and vigorous exchange of exotic items with presumably high social value, including bronze daggers and tools, metal jewelry, fine drinking and pouring vessels of metal, and ceramic and marble vessels and figurines; in short, an era of “international spirit" (Renfrew 1972: 451—55). The relatively undifferentiated pattern of small farmsteads and hamlets in the preceding EB I period was transformed by a striking expansion of settlement and the appearance of large settlements, particularly at coastal locations oriented to maritime activity (Broodbank 2000: 279—87; Konsola 1986; Pullen 2003). This was also the time of the monumental “corridor houses" with long passages flanking the internal rooms found on the Greek mainland and at Kolonna itself (Fig. 7.3). These structures have been variously interpreted as palaces, administrative centers, residences of prominent families or lineages, or even hotels or meeting halls for traders (Felten 1986; Nilsson 2004; Pullen 1986; Shaw 1987; Weingarten 1997; Wiencke 1989).
Bronze Age Kolonna is a highly complex archaeological site, with nine separate urban phases or “cities," including massive fortification walls that were modified and strengthened over a period of 500 years (Table 7.1). From the EBA to the beginning of the LBA, roughly 2500 to 1400 BC, Kolonna was a site without peer in the Aegean outside of the brilliant Minoan civilization on Crete to the south (Rutter 2001: 125—30). Some believe that Kolonna achieved the first Aegean state-level society after the Minoans and before the Mycenaeans (Niemeier 1995).
During EH II (Kolonna phases II—III; circa 2700—2200 BC), Kolonna was a modest settlement of mudbrick houses, but had already begun to distinguish itself from other coastal and island sites in the Saronic and beyond. There is evidence of economic specialization in the production of textiles in the “Farberhaus" (phase III) and storage of agricultural surplus in the “House of the Pithoi" (phase III; Felten 2007). The monumental corridor house known as the “WeiRes Haus" of phase III (along with its predecessor the “Haus am Felsrand" of phase II) may have played a central administrative role in the community. In its layout and construction, the WeiRes Haus exhibits particularly close parallels to the House of the Tiles at Lerna, indicating early and meaningful relations (Shaw 2007; Wiencke 2000: 298—303). Ongoing excavations at Kolonna are revealing a number of large buildings in phase III, however, so the former impression of the WeiRes Haus as singular in its size and complexity may be giving way to the picture of “ . . . an accumulation of more or less homogeneous self-sufficient unities" (Felten 2007: 13).
By the latter centuries of the second millennium in EH III (Kolonna phases IV—VI early; circa 2200—2000 BC), Kolonna had been transformed into one of the most significant urban centers of the Aegean: a densely populated, heavily fortified town with monumental stone buildings and sophisticated town planning with buildings arranged in insulae separated by gravel roads. Beginning in EH III, pottery was imported, and stylistic influences on local pottery were adopted, from the Peloponnese, central Greece, and the Cycladic islands (GauR and Smetana 2008: 329, 2010: 167); and by the beginning of the MBA, these same areas had begun to import Aiginetan tableware, storage vessels, and cooking pots (Lindblom 2001: 40—42, 131—32). There is some evidence in phase IV for a copper-smelting operation.
By EH III, all around Aigina the “international spirit" had broken down, ushering in a period of diminished activity and even abandonment over much of the Saronic and northeastern Peloponnese, which endured until the last phases of the MBA. Although there are variations across the area, the trend is a strong one that is clearly documented by both survey and excavation data (Wright 2004: 119—28). The inland Nemea Valley in the southern Corinthia is a particularly well-studied example, having been targeted by an intensive surface survey and a long-term excavation at Tsoungiza, its most prominent
Prehistoric settlement. These investigations indicate that the valley suffered virtually complete abandonment from sometime in EH III to MH III/LH I, a phenomenon sometimes known as the “Middle Helladic hiatus" (Cherry and Davis 2001: 151-55; Wright 2004: 119-28; Wright et al. 1990: 628-29). The reasons for this nadir in human activity are not well known: in the case of the Nemea Valley, flooding of the valley floor has been postulated (Cherry and Davis 2001: 155-56); elsewhere, finds of daggers, spear points, and sling stones at fortified coastal sites in the Aegean suggest violent destructions (Branigan 1999; Doumas 1990).
By contrast, Kolonna, almost uniquely in the southern mainland region, grew in prosperity and complexity through MH (circa 2000-1600), establishing relations beyond the Saronic with central and northern Greece (Maran 2007; Sarri 2007), the Cycladic Islands (Crego 2007; GauB and Smetana 2008; Niko-lakopoulou 2007; Overbeck 2007), the Argolid (Nordquist 1995: 44, 50-51; Philippa-Touchais 2007; Touchais 2007; Zerner 1978: 156-58, 1993: 48-50), and Minoan Crete (GauB 2006; GauB and Smetana 2007: 61-65; Hiller 1993). The prosperity of Kolonna's MBA inhabitants is evident in the material remains. By MH I, the community had expanded beyond the fortification wall to an “inner extension" or “inner suburb" that was then enclosed with a less imposing wall; still later, in early Mycenaean times, a further “outer extension" enlarged the urban area to almost the entire promontory (Fig. 7.4). Notable is the so-called Large Building Complex, founded early in MH just inside the massive fortification wall, and persisting until early Mycenaean times spanning several major architectural phases (GauB and Smetana 2010). The footprint of the complex may have reached 680 square meters in the MBA, making it one of the largest known structures on the mainland; it has been interpreted as a mansion with a possible administrative function suggested by a clay stamp and a clay seal (GauB and Smetana 2010: 172). The finds from the Large Building Complex include enormous amounts of pottery and faunal remains. The pottery of the complex's second architectural phase (Kolonna IX) comprises imports from the Cyclades and Minoan Crete, locally manufactured vessels of Minoan type, Aig-inetan matt-painted (Siedentopf 1991), and solid painted. The imported and imitation Minoan pottery demonstrates not merely close exchange relations with Crete, but also the possibility that Minoan craftsmen (potters, at least) were resident on Aigina (GauB 2006; Hiller 1993). The local vessels of Minoan type exhibit significant departures from Aiginetan potting traditions: they are wheelmade, they lack the omnipresent potters' marks found on contemporary Aiginetan vessels, and their forms are dominated by small, open shapes and cooking ware (GauB and Smetana 2007: 63, 66). Other objects that testify to Minoan influence, if not presence, are an ashlar block with a Minoan-style double-axe mason's mark reused in a Late Roman context (Niemeier 1995: 78), a Minoan-type loomweight, fragments of three Minoan stone vases, a ceremonial
7.4 Site plan of Bronze Age Kolonna, Aigina. After GauB and Smetana 2007: 58, fig. A.
Stone hammer, Minoan jewelry, a stone kernos, and fragments of a potter's wheel (Hiller 1993: 199).
Analysis of botanical, faunal, and human skeletal remains from the recent excavations at the Large Building Complex has revealed important information about how some inhabitants of Kolonna lived and died in the MBA (Forsten-pointner et al. 2010; Galik et al. 2010; Kanz et al. 2010). The plant remains are dominated by the domesticated grain crops emmer wheat, bread wheat, and barley, with lentils as the main identifiable pulses. Grape, fig, and olive were also cultivated. The faunal assemblage consists of 3,178 terrestrial and 1,772 aquatic specimens. The terrestrial animals are overwhelmingly domesticated livestock, predominantly sheep/goat (66%), with lesser amounts of pig (20%) and cattle (14%). Only miniscule numbers of wild animal bones are present. This is a fairly standard faunal assemblage for the MBA and LBA, although the mix of domesticates varies and Gerhard Forstenpointner and colleagues note that the high percentage of sheep and goat is more characteristic of the Aegean Islands and Crete than the mainland, where cattle are more prominent. The remains suggest a mixed livestock economy in which both primary products (meat, hides) and secondary products (milk, hair, wool) were used, but a large percentage of animals were not slaughtered before four to five years of age. The inhabitants of the Large Building Complex also consumed fish, shellfish, and snails. Mollusks (bivalves and gastropods) make up 67% of the marine assemblage. Fish are perhaps underrepresented because of poor preservation of small bones, yet several species including dentex, pandora, sea bream, grouper, barracuda, and mullet indicate a mix of near-shore and open-sea fishing. Remains of fins, ribs, and scales imply processing on site. Alfred Galik and colleagues also find closer parallels for the marine assemblage in Middle and Late Minoan Crete (e. g., Kommos) than in contemporary mainland sites. Taken together, these studies portray a varied and robust diet, but it must be remembered that the material comes only from the limited context of the Large Building Complex, an apparently elite setting where residents might be expected to have access to a better diet than others at Kolonna or in other settlements on the island.
The study of 48 subadult human skeletons recovered from intramural burials — chosen because Kolonna's adult cemeteries have not been located — produced results that support the impression of a generally prosperous community. The burials come from excavations of the last 20 years and range chronologically from EH I to LH (subphase not specified). Although these individuals died in utero (stillbirth), immediately or shortly after birth, or within the first year of life, there are few signs of malnutrition of the mother during pregnancy, or stress response in respiration, nutrition, or blood circulation after birth. Instead, death is more often attributed to perinatal failure: prematurity, congenital defects, acute diseases, and birth complications occurring at or immediately after birth (Kanz et al. 2010: 483—84). Stillbirth and death shortly after birth were surely common, unavoidable occurrences in the Bronze Age. A lingering question is whether meaningful trends can be extracted from a small sample spread over almost 2,000 years, but if it is accepted that the data fairly represent general trends in the health of Kolonna's population, a comparison with children at Lerna and Asine shows a much lower occurrence of malnutrition at Kolonna as measured by rates of dental hypoplasia and other indicators of metabolic problems.
The wealth and wide connections of Kolonna's inhabitants are suggested by the so-called Aigina Treasure. The mysterious history of this hoard, if that indeed is the right term for it, is well known (Higgins 1979), but recently new information has emerged, leading to a conference in which the historiography of the treasure was updated (Williams 2009) and the objects were reanalyzed stylistically and technically (Fitton 2009). The hoard is a spectacular collection of gold jewelry, comprising earrings, pendants, diadems, bracelets, necklaces, rings, and plaques, with lapis lazuli, amethyst, jasper, and rock crystal beads as secondary decorations (Fitton et al. 2009; Fig. 7.5). There is a basic consensus among scholars that the treasure probably did originate on Aigina in the MBA and should be viewed as a group that may have been looted from a MH tomb.2 Most accept that the pieces could have been made in an Aiginetan workshop, but not necessarily all in the same generation. The widest divergence of opinion concerns the identity of the craftspeople and the techniques and stylistic influences intrinsic to the individual pieces. Stefan Hiller (2009) supposes that Minoan artisans, part of a small but affluent colony residing on Aigina, created such jewelry mainly for their own community, at the same time as their fellow expatriates manufactured Minoan-style vessels. While Hiller's scenario
7.5 "Master of Animals" pendant from the Aigina Treasure. © Trustees of the British Museum.
Assumes that most of the objects find their closest parallels in Minoan typology and iconography, other scholars favor comparanda from the Near East, Anatolia, Egypt, or the Greek mainland as inspirations for individual objects (various contributions to Fitton 2009; Koehl 2011). Perhaps the most useful statement one can make is that the Aigina Treasure underscores the unusual wealth and wide foreign connections that the community at Kolonna enjoyed in the MBA. The treasure seems to represent a synthesis of influences, perhaps filtered through Cretan connections and individuals.
The significance of the Aigina Treasure is highlighted by the more recent discoveries at Kolonna of an EH III hoard and a warrior's grave of MH II. The hoard, excavated in 2000 in House 19 of the "inner town," bears some similarities with the later Aigina Treasure in its content and wide geographical affinities. It consists of a number of gold pins with loop terminals, gold and silver bracelets, several gold and silver pendants with embossed and wire decoration, and one or more necklaces with beads of gold, silver, carnelian, faience, and rock crystal (Felten 2007: 15, 2009: 34—35). The traditions from which these pieces come include northeastern Aegean, Anatolian, Levantine, Mesopotamian, and Cretan. This hoard has several important implications. It implies that in EH III an elite group already existed that could assemble such a rich collection of precious jewelry, and thus the Aigina Treasure may be part of a much longer local tradition. Furthermore, since those who hid the jewelry lived in a period before the earliest Minoan objects appeared in MH I, they were apparently able to forge such far-flung connections without Cretan intermediaries.
The warrior's grave is conventionally known as the Middle Bronze Age Shaft Grave of Aigina, and it is explicitly offered as a forerunner of, and possible model for, the somewhat later shaft graves at Mycenae (Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997).
Opinion is divided on whether it is a true shaft grave, however; according to Oliver Dickinson's (1977: 56) widely recognized definition, a shaft grave comprises a rectangular shaft cut into soft rock and earth, with built or rock-cut ledges some way down the shaft on which a roof of wooden beams would rest, creating a cavity for the burial chamber below it. The roof was covered with clay and the shaft above it was then filled with earth, stone, and sometimes offerings from a funerary meal. A tumulus might finally be raised above the grave. The Aigina grave does not entirely match this definition, in that the cut shaft is extremely shallow, with most of the grave built up of limestone rubble. There is no indisputable ledge, though Imma Kilian-Dirlmeier has plausibly detected a horizontal row of flat stones that could have served to hold in place a roof that does not survive (Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997: 17, fig. 4). Others have classified the burial as a “built tomb" or a “built cist" (Cavanagh and Mee 1998: 27; Hiller 1989: 138—39). The consequence of this debate is that it may not be possible to hold up the Aigina tomb as the model for the form of the later shaft graves at Mycenae, Lerna, and Ayios Stephanos; it must be pointed out, however, that the earliest shaft graves in Grave Circle B (MH niA—IIIB) at Mycenae do not display the fully developed, canonical form of the later (end of MH to LH IIA) examples (Graziadio 1988).
On the other hand, the prominent location and contents of the shaft graves at Aigina and Mycenae betray certain shared conceptions of the status and treatment of the deceased. Both were built in extraordinarily conspicuous locations just outside of the contemporary settlement's walls — in the case of the Aigina shaft grave, against the outer face of the enclosure wall of the inner extension during Kolonna IX. This may have been a unique honor; unlike those at Mycenae, the grave seems not to have been part of a cemetery, unless the latter was destroyed by construction during later periods. Kilian-Dirlmeier (1997: fig. 35) restores a 2-meter-thick tumulus over the shaft grave at Kolonna; the grave circles at Mycenae may have been covered by a low mound, separate mounds over individual graves, or no mound at all, but at both sites these reconstructions remain hypothetical (Mylonas 1966: 89—90).
The grave offerings at Kolonna are often thought of as a sampling, on a more modest scale, of the riches to come in Grave Circle A at Mycenae, but a better comparison is Grave Circle B, closer in date to the Kolonna shaft grave and less opulent in grave goods. The contents of the Kolonna burial include a bronze sword with a gold hilt and ivory pommel; several bronze daggers, including one with a decorated gold sheet molded around the handle; a bronze spear point; a gold diadem decorated with repousse crosses; a gold knife with gold animal-head fittings; boar's tusk plaques from several helmets; six obsidian arrowheads; Minoan pottery of mature Kamares style dating to MM II; Middle Cycladic pottery from Melos and perhaps elsewhere in the Cyclades; and local matt-painted and plain vessels for drinking, eating, pouring, and storage
7.6 Examples of imported and high-status objects from the Aigina MH II "shaft grave." (a) Kamares Ware vessel, imported from Crete, MM II; (b) gold diadem; (c) bronze sword with ivory pommel and gold fittings. After Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997: p. 28, fig. 27:16 (vessel); p. 19, fig. 6:9 (diadem); p. 18, fig. 5:1 (sword).
(Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997; Fig. 7.6). It has been noted that the artisanship and decoration of the metal objects reflect mainland rather than Cretan traditions (Hiller 2009: 37), a claim supported by the similarity of motifs on the molded gold sheet to those on locally manufactured matt-painted pottery (Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997: 57). The pottery fits well with the assemblage of local and imported wares in Kolonna settlement IX, ceramic phase I, chronologically equivalent to MH II (GauB and Smetana 2007: 63, 66) and roughly contemporary with the Aigina Treasure.3
All of these artifact types are present in abundance in the shaft graves at Mycenae. Like many of the interments in Grave Circles A and B, the Kolonna shaft grave contains a warrior burial of a type that persists through the Mycenaean period and survives the collapse of the palaces (Deger-Jalkotzy 2006). That the elite individuals and families marked out by these shaft graves enjoyed preeminent status within the community is demonstrated by their setting and rich offerings, but it is specifically the warrior status of the individual buried at Kolonna that prefigures the striking (and decidedly un-Minoan) Mycenaean preoccupation with martial equipment and iconography, as well as the possibly decisive role of violence in the emergence of the Mycenaean palace states (Acheson 1999; Bennet and Davis 1999; but cf. Wolpert 2004). The twin concerns with maritime and warlike pursuits (and perhaps even with naval warfare) are highlighted in a small number of MH Aiginetan matt-painted barrel jars decorated with ships and in one case a scene of armed warriors aboard a rowed ship (see Fig. 3.10; Rutter 2001: 128-30; Siedentopf 1991: fig. 4, pl. 38.162). There are very few Aiginetan pottery vessels deposited with the dead in Grave Circles A and B, undermining notions that Aigina had direct involvement in Mycenae's emergence to complexity. At the close of the MH period, however, Kolonna's long-standing relationship with Crete may have provided a conduit for Mycenae's initial contacts with the Minoan world. More likely than this is that Kolonna's massive fortification walls, paralleled in the contemporary Aegean only at Troy and Kea (Niemeier 1995: 75), and the precocious warrior burial, exerted a strong influence on an aspiring elite familiar with the prowess and the products of the island polity.
During the MH demographic free fall in Attica and the northeastern Pelo-ponnese, the Aiginetans leapfrogged these areas to establish longer-distance trade relations with central Greece, the Cycladic Islands, and Crete. The impressive distribution of Aiginetan pottery plots the maritime routes over which the cargoes were moving, as well as overland routes by which fewer pots made their way to inland settlements (Fig. 7.7). Goods from Aigina may have been transferred across the Isthmus of Corinth to sites in central Greece along the Corinthian Gulf (e. g., Kirrha, Eutresis) through intermediaries living in the northern Corinthian plain. A number of sites in this intermediate zone, including Korakou, Gonia, Peridkaria, Aetopetra, Arapiza, and Ayios Gerasimos, seem to have been occupied from EH III through the Mycenaean period (Lambropoulou 1991: 144). They seem to have coexisted in a stable, heterarchical settlement pattern over much of the Bronze Age (Pullen and Tartaron 2007: 148, 150-52). During MH, their only detectable external contacts were with Aigina, indicated by the presence of matt-painted, red-slipped and burnished, and coarse plain and cooking vessels in Aiginetan gold-mica fabric. At Gonia, these types constitute 19% of the total ceramic assemblage; at Korakou the figure is 9% (Lambropoulou 1991: 145).
Because there has never been a systematic site survey on Aigina, the handful of known MH sites have been discovered as the result of informal explorations or as chance finds. In the mid-1990s, the MH catalogue consisted of eight confirmed sites and eleven uncertain sites (Fig. 7.8). These sites are mainly sherd scatters or occasionally graves, but beyond Kolonna architecture is lacking. It is at present impossible to know if this pattern is a fair representation of reality, and we are not in a position to answer Wright's (2010: 808) query concerning whether there were centers on the island apart from Kolonna serving as magnets for
7.7 Distribution of Aiginetan "gold mica" pottery exports. After Rutter 2001: 127, fig. 12, with additions.
Small villages and hamlets. Very small amounts of MBA material have been recovered in excavations at Lazarides, an elevated site in east-central Aigina with views over most of the Saronic (Sgouritsa 2010), and at the location of the later temple of Aphaia in the northeastern corner of the island (Pilafides-Williams 1998: 82—83, 156). These and other sporadic finds are not suggestive of alternative centers, or of a complex hierarchy of sites below Kolonna. There is a comparable dearth of MH I—II sites around the Saronic, but an important exception is the recent discovery at Megali Magoula near Galatas, across from Poros, of a small but impressive settlement enclosed by an elliptical fortification wall (Konsolaki-Yiannopoulou 2003a, 2010). The MH pottery is a mixture of Peloponnesian and Aiginetan types with a chronological concentration in MH II. Alongside mainland gray Minyan and Argive Minyan, much of the fine to semifine matt-painted pottery is Aiginetan, including large and small basins and a few examples of cylindrical pyxides and barrel jars. Megali Magoula prospered along with Kolonna IX and X, perhaps in part by serving as intermediary for Aiginetan products with trade partners in places like Lerna and Asine (Konsolaki-Yiannopoulou 2010: 73).
At the end of the MBA, Kolonna X (MH Ill—early LH) witnessed a further expansion of the town to the east, enclosed by yet another wall in early LH, this time of large rubble construction reminiscent of cyclopean masonry. The ceramic evidence suggests that the outward focus that the Aiginetans had maintained on more distant trading partners during the Middle Helladic hiatus shifted back to the regions surrounding the Saronic Gulf, where two related transformations were taking place starting in MH III/LH I: the “colonization" of the interior of the northeastern Peloponnese, which saw resurgent populations establishing new sites or reoccupying old ones that had been effectively abandoned since the late third millennium (Rutter 2007: 42—43); and the social, political, and economic developments of the Shaft Grave Era, most prominently the emergence of complexity at Mycenae. The Aiginetan ceramic industry responded to the increased demand for household pottery closer to home by expanding production in a range of standardized and specialized forms: larger closed and open vessels including water jars, barrel jars, and kraters; smaller drinking and eating vessels such as goblets, kantharoi, and handleless bowls; and four types of cooking pots (Rutter 2007: 36). A pottery kiln dating to the early years of LH that was recently excavated in the southwestern part of the Large Building Complex may have played a role in the increased production. The Saronic small world centered on Aigina was thus revived, starting in MH III and peaking in LH I—II. This was the era of the greatest cohesion of the Kolonna-centered Saronic world, and for most sites in the Saronic and northeastern Peloponnese, the time of greatest abundance of Aiginetan imports (Lindblom 2001: 41-42).
Mycenae was not yet connected in any meaningful way to this network, but soon would be. Before we turn to the expansion of Mycenae, it is worth reflecting on why Kolonna had become such a monumental settlement with such broad contacts, and why the pottery produced on the island was one of few Aegean products to be so widely disseminated. It was partly a matter of Aigina's fortunate geographical position, and the opportunities for efficient transport by sea. It had also to do with the excellent sources of clay and temper to which potters at Kolonna had access. Moreover, Kolonna filled a power vacuum, surviving and flourishing while communities all around disintegrated, by forging new ties with more distant partners. A distinct distribution pattern had developed by the late MH for two main ceramic production and export industries: Aiginetan; and lustrous decorated wares centered in the southern Peloponnese or Kythera (Zerner 1993). In the southern Peloponnese, there is much lustrous decorated and little Aiginetan; in central Greece and Attica, the situation is
7.8 Map of Aigina showing the locations of known MH sites. After Kilian-Dirlmeier 1997: 109, fig. 62.
Reversed; and in the northeastern Peloponnese, there is much of both (Rutter 2007: 36).
Many scholars have focused on the intrinsic properties of the Aiginetan pottery itself relative to local and imported alternatives (e. g., Zerner 1993). The Aiginetan product was more standardized in its form, the result of consistent forming and firing practices, including levigation, uniform clay composition, and controlled firing conditions (Philippa-Touchais 2007: 110), lending the impression of greater reliability. Its well-executed and attractive matt-painted decoration was appreciated for its aesthetic properties, inspiring local imitation. There is also strong evidence of superior performance for the pots' intended uses (Rutter 2007: 42). The cooking ware was lighter in weight but better made and more durable than the norm; the porosity of the fabric inhibited cracking during expansion and contraction cycles, while the volcanic rock temper apparently possessed favorable thermal expansion characteristics. The result was higher thermal shock resistance and fewer failures under thermal stress. The several forms of water jug (stamnoi, hydrias, amphoras, and large jugs) were larger, lighter, with thinner walls, thus more practical for transporting water, and their porosity promoted evaporation of moisture through the body wall and into the atmosphere, keeping the liquids they contained cooler.
While the performance characteristics of Aiginetan pottery have long been acknowledged, in recent years scholars have attributed to the trade in Aiginetan pottery far more profound influences. Anna Philippa-Touchais (2007: 110—12) asserts that the aesthetic of Aiginetan MBA pottery not only inspired imitations at Argos and elsewhere, but actually created a network of “common references," a kind of koine of instantly recognizable shapes, fabrics, and technical excellence that attained an ideological value for local elites wishing to display their connections with an external world in the context of communal feasting.
This sentiment is echoed in studies of Aiginetan ceramics in Thessaly and Boeotia, and at Lerna. Despite the fact that imported Aiginetan vessels are quite rare in Thessaly, Joseph Maran (2007) believes that “Magnesia polychrome," manufactured in or around Pefkakia beginning in MH II, emulates the shapes and decoration of Aiginetan matt-painted pottery. According to Maran, the adoption of these novel table and cooking vessels actually transformed methods of food preparation and consumption. These new practices became strategies in communal eating and drinking ceremonies to emphasize the connection of those who possessed them to elite practices in distant southern Greece. As at Argos, aspiring elites sought to differentiate themselves in society through the use of such exotic objects. Maran sees the spread of this influence, which began with exposure to a limited number of genuine Aiginetan specimens, to the northern Aegean and the Izmir region (Maran 2007: 174). In Boeotia, the aesthetics of Aiginetan pottery had a strong effect by MH II, as potters began to combine Minyan and matt-painted styles. This interaction can be traced through a succession of changes from yellow and red Minyan matt-painted, to polychrome mainland in MH III, and ultimately to Mycenaean style (Sarri 2007: 163). At Lerna, a massive collection of broken pottery and animal bones in the fill of two shaft graves of LH I, representing funerary meals that must have involved hundreds or even thousands of participants, contains Aiginetan pottery in the amount of more than 50% of between 15,000 and 18,000 sherds (Lindblom 2007). In such an obviously communal and symbolically charged event, vessels manufactured at Kolonna, an impressively fortified place possessing a maritime fleet and advanced technological knowledge, could serve as a powerful demonstration that the followers of the deceased had access to a network of social relations beyond the reach of most members of the communities on the Argive Plain (Lindblom 2007: 126). It may have been especially important to display wealth and esoteric knowledge if one purpose of the ceremony was to transfer rights and privileges to an heir of the deceased under potentially contentious circumstances. We might imagine that the Lerna shaft grave deposit represents the kind of competitively charged communal event that Philippa-Touchais and Maran have in mind for Argos and Pefkakia. The social ramifications implicit in the acquisition and use of Aiginetan wares thus extend well beyond the economic value of the pots or the exchange networks that moved them.
An even more direct influence may have been at work in Aigina's relationship with the settlement at Ayia Irini on the island of Kea (Crego 2007, 2010; Overbeck 2007; Overbeck and Crego 2008), just outside the Saronic Gulf. Ayia Irini IVa was founded in a developed phase of Middle Cycladic after a hiatus spanning the end of Early Cycladic (Ayia Irini III) and the earliest part of the Middle Cycladic. The settlement was apparently colonized from outside, with an intrusive ceramic repertoire including a system of potters' marks; immediate engagement in vigorous trade with the mainland, the Cyclades, and Crete; and an impressive fortification wall. Donna May Crego (2010: 843) points out that there is little evidence for traditional women's crafts, and burials of the period are not yet known, suggesting to her the initial settlement of Ayia Irini IVa by a male, commercially oriented installation rather than a typical village. As for the origin of the settlers, in an earlier article John Overbeck and Crego (2008: 305) pointed to central Greece, perhaps Boeotia, on the strength of the abundance of mainland pottery types such as gray Minyan. More recently, in something of a reassessment, Crego (2010) relocates the settlers to Aigina, highlighting shared elements that add up to a special relationship between the two islands. She sees links to Kolonna in the fortification wall and the system of potters' marks. More salient still are indications of close relations in the ceramic assemblages (Crego 2010: 842—45). Although true Aiginetan matt-painted pottery makes up only around 3% of the pottery corpus of phase IVa at Kea, locally produced yellow-slipped (12%) appears to be an emulation of Aiginetan matt-painted adapted to local clays. Further, the two settlements exchanged vessel types rarely found outside their local contexts: at Kolonna the old and new excavations, as well as the shaft grave, have yielded a range of Keian vessels, including the rare white-on-gray, found in numbers matching those known on Kea itself. In parallel, potters at Ayia Irini manufactured barrel jars and bulbous jars in yellow-slipped fabrics, imitating the shape and appearance of Aiginetan matt-painted prototypes. The latter shape is rare outside Aigina. Crego concludes that Ayia Irini IVa was founded from Kolonna as a trade station to distribute Aiginetan products and to provide access to the metal deposits at nearby Lavrion on the Attic mainland. The wide contacts of the new settlement can be explained by Kolonna's existing maritime network of ties to the mainland, Cyclades, and Crete. In the subsequent phase IVb, commercial interests continued, but the far greater occurrence of burials and women's equipment suggests a fully formed village and an incipient Kean identity separate from Aigina. The dominant influence of Aigina had declined by the late MBA (phase V), when Minoan pottery was imported and imitated, Minoan architectural styles were adopted, and Linear A script was used (Davis 2008: 195). By the following phase VI, corresponding to the beginning of the LBA, Minoan influence was pervasive in every aspect of material culture. If Crego's interpretation of Ayia Irini IVa is accepted (and there are certainly alternative explanations of the evidence; e. g., Davis 2008: 194—96), it shows Kolonna in an expansive mode, extending its small world beyond the confines of the Saronic Gulf.
Aigina's unusual success in production and export, amounting to the better part of a millennium of competitive advantage, might be further illuminated if
We think in terms of connectivity. Recalling the discussion of social network theory in the previous chapter, we can suggest that the principle of preferential attachment (Barabasi and Albert 1999), by which new vertices attach disproportionately to sites that are already well connected, applies forcefully to Kolonna's situation in the MBA and early LBA. Kolonna was a peer of several highly developed EH II communities in the northeastern Peloponnese and Cycladic islands, but unlike most others survived the EH III decline as a prosperous community, filling a yawning power vacuum. Although the growth of the Aiginetan potting industry was perhaps stimulated by contact with protopalatial Crete, this cannot explain the initiation of exchange relations with the Cyclades, the Peloponnese, and central Greece, for which the role of intrepid and enterprising individuals must have been decisive. By means of this precocious outreach, Kolonna became more “connected" than any other settlement in the region. As demographic recovery proceeded and new settlements were established in MH III—LH I, a period of continuous growth began with the addition of new vertices and new paths between them, but the huge competitive advantage held by Aiginetan producers in terms of experience, efficiency, and established connections meant that these new nodes connected to Aigina preferentially, in agreement with the ceramic evidence from the Saronic and surrounding areas. Under conditions of continuous growth and preferential attachment, a node that acquires more connections than others will accumulate them at an increasing rate, causing the difference in connectivity to multiply as the network grows (Barabasi and Albert 1999: 511). I suggested in Chapter 6 That this dynamic might illuminate the emergence of Mycenae during the Shaft Grave Era or the dominant position of Knossos in the neopalatial period, but we can now apply the same idea to Kolonna's long-term prominence from EH III to LH II. This process, the impetus for which may have originally been economic, was a key factor leading to a situation where the emergence of rival centers of political power is suppressed, as argued by Pullen and Tartaron (2007) for Kolonna's relationship with the Saronic region and beyond. A consideration of connectivity within the framework of network theory augments the interpretations of the ceramic evidence, outlined above, to begin to answer Wright's (2010: 808) question: “How do we assess the regional influence or connectedness of Aegina beyond [the Saronic Gulf] area?"
World History
