Diário Oficial

Cahiers du Centre D'Etudes Chypriotes, 2023

The transition from the 12th to the 11th c. BC in Cyprus constitutes a watershed, that marks the close of the Late Bronze Age and the inception of the Early Iron Age in conventional Cypriot terminology. This transformative phase remains poorly known and ill defined, not least because of the remarkable dearth of stratified settlement strata exposed to this day on the island. Recent investigations by the French Archaeological Mission at Kition, within the locality of Bamboula, have brought to light a continuous stratigraphic succession of floor layers spanning from the 13th to the 11th c. BC, thus marking an exceptional instance on an island-wide basis. The aim of this contribution is to provide a comprehensive presentation of the stratigraphic, architectural and artefactual remains exposed at Kition-Bamboula that provide crucial new data for the transitional 12th-to-11th c. BC horizon. In particular, through the contextual analysis of well-stratified pottery remains, the study aims to discuss the transformations observed on the island’s ceramic repertoire and especially as regards the impact of the largescale adoption of wheel-made technology for the production of ceramic finewares. The study will also elucidate the extra-insular connections maintained by the cosmopolitan harbour town at Kition, based on the analysis of the plethora of imported commercial jars contained within the settlement’s pertinent levels. Finally, this contribution will discuss a series of idiosyncratic phenomena, such as infant jar-burials and purple-dye production, dating to the settlement’s transitional phases of the 12th and 11th c. BC. Ultimately, our contribution aspires to shed light on the continuities and innovations characterising the Cypriot material culture and the transformative capacities of the island’s communities at the dawn of the Early Iron Age.

Form Akademisk, 2023

Reconstruction is an essential tool for gaining knowledge of shipwrecks in maritime archaeology. This paper examines some theoretical and practical consequences of viewing vessels not as finished objects but as things that are continuously being made during their lifetime. This is done by proposing perspectives on things that uphold their biography as an essential characteristic. To illustrate this, the 16th-century shipwreck Bispevika 16 (Oslo harbour) will be an example of a vessel showing minor and significant technical changes throughout its life. Its most manifest change is the addition of an outer layer of carvel planks on the lapstrake-built hull. This makes this vessel one of a growing number of archaeologically known converted lapstrake-built vessels in Northern Europe.