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Greek Potters at Al Mina?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

John Boardman
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Extract

The subject of this paper is a small group of cups found by Sir Leonard Woolley in his excavations at Al Mina (now in the Turkish Hatay). It has been hitherto ignored because, with some reason, the vases were believed neither to be Greek imports nor the products of Cypriot or North Syrian potters. I hope to demonstrate that they could be the work of Greek potters established at Al Mina towards the end of the 8th century B.C. by discussing their apparent relationship to contemporary Greek, Cypriot and North Syrian work. Most of the cups and fragments are in Oxford, and there are fragments in the London Institute of Archaeology and the Museum of Classical Archaeology in Cambridge which I have seen. Nos. 1–23 in Fig. 1 and Plates XXIV–XXV illustrate the shapes and all the types of decoration met in the group.

All are two-handled cups, the Greek geometric skyphos. The shape, with decoration of this type, is most common in Euboeo-Cycladic vases of the second half of the 8th century, and a considerable number of these skyphoi were carried to Al Mina by the Greeks. It was rarely imitated in Cyprus, as we shall see, and is not at home further east.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anatolian Studies , Volume 9 , December 1959 , pp. 163 - 169
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute at Ankara 1959

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References

1 After the preliminary report in AJ. XVII (1937), 1–15Google Scholar, the excavator published an account of the site and finds in JHS. LVIII (1938), 1–30, 133–170Google Scholar. The early Greek pottery has been published by Robertson, C. M. in JHS. LX (1940), 2–21CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and cf. JHS. LXVI (1946), 66Google Scholar; Woolley, , JHS. LXVIII (1948), 148CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Boardman, , BSA. LII (1957), 5–8Google ScholarHistoria VII (1958), 250Google Scholar. For the later, Attic vases see Beazley, J. D., JHS. LIX (1939), 1–44Google Scholar. Miss Joan du Plat Taylor is engaged on a study of the Cypriot and locally-produced wares from the site. I am deeply indebted to her for discussing the pottery with me and reading through a draft of this paper. (See now Iraq XXI (1959), 62–92Google Scholar.)

2 Cf. Boardman, , BSA. LII (1957), 5 f., 24 fGoogle Scholar.

3 e.g. Kerameikos V, 1, pl. 87, 3951Google Scholar (Attic); Johansen, F., Les Vases Sicyoniens 36Google Scholar, for the practice in Protocorinthian; BSA. XXXV (1934–1935), pl. 37, 24 and 28Google Scholar (Chian; many other unpublished examples from the excavations at Emporio). Something of the same effect is found on Myc. III vases.

4 Notably the “slip-filled” patterns on some Euboean cups of a type found at Al Mina; cf. BSA. XLVII (1952), pl. 1B, 10–27Google Scholar; LII (1957), pl. 2(a)a; Praktika 1952, 162, fig. 10Google Scholar.

5 Cf. Swedish Cyprus Expedition II, pl. 166, i.1533Google Scholar.

6 e.g. JHS. LX (1940), 5, fig. 2lGoogle Scholar (Al Mina, Euboeo-Cycladic); Kerameikos V, 1Google Scholar, pls. 35, 59, 97, 118–120 (Attic).

7 I intend to publish a brief survey of the use of the multiple brush on Greek and Near Eastern pottery, in which the points mentioned here will be developed.

8 In the Late Bronze Age on White Slip II, Base Ring II.

9 The multiple brush was used free-hand on the compass for the hooks on vases like CVA British Museum II, pl. 1, 5 and 16. Otherwise perhaps only on the unusual vase, Swedish Cyprus Expedition II, pl. 104, A.13.40 ( = IV, 2, fig. xxii.1), for the crosses. My evidence for this generalisation is not as complete as it might be. I have only examined Cypriot vases in Oxford and London. For the detection of the use of a multiple brush only a good photograph can replace autopsy.

10 Cf. Tufnell, O., Lachish III, 296 ff.Google Scholar; Swedish Cyprus Expedition IV, 2, 270, n. 1Google Scholar.

11 BMC Vases I, 2, 206Google Scholar. From Salamis.

12 CVA. II, pl. 4, 2. From the Sandwith Collection.

13 Swedish Cyprus Expedition IV, 2, 275Google Scholar. For some other skyphoi see CVA. British Museum II, pl. 4, 1 (imitation, no multiple brush); Myres, J. L., Cesnola Collection nos. 1703–4 (Greek), 1706Google Scholar (imitation); Murray, A. S., Excavations in Cyprus 110Google Scholar, fig. 160, 3 (Greek); du Plat Taylor, J., Myrtou-Pighades 70Google Scholar, fig, 29, 473 (Greek), 474 (imitation); Arch. Reports 1957, pl. 4e (imitation).

14 Swedish Cyprus Expedition II, pl. 30, 1 top left (Stylli 2.16)Google Scholar.

15 Robertson, , JHS. LX (1940), 21Google Scholar, dates the break between Levels 7 and 8 to the very beginning of the 7th century. As Miss Taylor points out to me, Level 7 is rather nebulous. Architecturally it is a continuation of Level 8, and hardly any finds are labelled “Level 7” rather than “Levels 6–7”. The break should be between Levels 6 and 7 architecturally. Level 7 could be forgotten with no prejudice to the interpretation of the finds.

16 Swedish Cyprus Expedition II, pls. 162, 3Google Scholar; 166 (Bichrome IV).

17 Cf. Dunand, M., Byblos II, 145, fig. 139, 7781Google Scholar.

18 e.g. JHS. LX (1940), 5Google Scholar, fig. 2a, c, e (Al Mina; Euboeo-Cycladic); EADélos XV, pls. 39, 51Google Scholar; 40, 53; 41, 59 (Cycladic); BSA. XLVII (1952), pl. 1B, 7–9Google Scholar (Euboean). Cypriot vases influence other Greek wares of this period in many other ways which do not concern us here.