Abbreviations other than those in standard use:

PK I–VII = ‘Excavations at Palaikastro I' to VII’. I in BSA 8 (1901–2) 286–316; II in BSA 9 (1902–3) 274–387; III in BSA 10 (1903–4) 192–321; IV in BSA 11 (1904–5) 258–308; V in BSA 12 (1905–6) 1–8; VI in BSA 60 (1965) 248–315; VII in BSA 65 (1970) 203–42.

PKU = The Unpublished Objects from the Palaikastro Excavations 1902–6 (BSA Supplementary Paper 1), 1923.

PKU II = ‘Unpublished objects from Palaikastro and Praisos’ BSA 40 (1939–40) 38–59.

PK Settlement = ‘Minoan Settlement at Palaikastro’ Darcque, and Treuil, (Eds.), L'Habitat Egéen Préhistorique, Paris, 1990, 395–412.Google Scholar

PK Survey = ‘An Archaeological Survey of the Roussolakkos Area at Palaikastro’, BSA 79 (1984) 129–59.

PK 1986–88 = ‘Excavations at Palaikastro, 1986’ to ‘1988’ 1986 in BSA 82 (1987) 135–54; 1987 in BSA 83 (1988) 259–282; 1988 in BSA 84 (1989) 417–45.

TAW III,1 = Hardy, D.A. (Ed.) Thera and the Aegean World III Volume 1 Archaeology, London 1990.Google Scholar

¹ The excavations were carried out under the auspices of the British School at Athens. We are grateful to the Managing Committee of the School and in particular Prof. J.N. Coldstream, Chairman, for continued support and encouragement. We are especially pleased to acknowledge the School's officers in Athens and Knossos, Dr E. French, Dr R. Jones, Mr G. Sanders, Dr C. Morris and Dr A. Peatfield for their ready assistance with unexpected conservation problems. We are also grateful to Dr I. Tzedhakis and Dr C. Davaras and M. Tsipopoulou for permission to excavate and to P. Michaelidou for working with us as the representative of the Greek State. Financial support was provided by the Institute for Aegean Prehistory, The British Academy, the British School at Athens and private donors. We thank the French School at Athens for allowing J. Driessen and A. Farnoux to participate.

The excavations were directed by L.H. Sackett and J.A. MacGillivray. The architects were J. Driessen and P. Jerome, the surveyor D. Smyth. S. Dandali was the Administrative Assistant. Trench supervisors were S. Thorne, M. Prent, H. Davis, S. Hemingway, I. Grundon, J. Doole, H. Hatzakis and L. Tabac assisted by A. Jerome, K. Walsh, A. Hazendonckx, M. Walters, H. Parton, N. Simonds, K. Low, T. Davis and M. Ashcroft. The video notebooks were kept by S. MacGillivray. The site sieve was supervised by J. Weingarten. The wet sieve was supervised by A. Sarpaki assisted by R. Weilbacher. The apotheke was run by A. Aertssen and A. Sackett. The catalogue was kept by L. Cooke and fed into the computer by B. Howenstein. The pottery processing was supervised by A. Farnoux, the bone by C. Walker and S. Wall. Conservators were P. Harrison and M. Moak assisted by V. Batton. Draughtsmen were L. Bernini and R. Moak. Twenty-three workmen and technicians were supervised by the School's foreman N. Dhaskalakis, the four washerwomen were directed by A. Aertssen. Many distinguished scholars and specialists visited during the excavations and we are most grateful for their comments and advice.

This report was written by J.A. MacGillivray and L.H. Sackett incorporating texts by J. Driessen and A. Farnoux. Special reports by M. Moak, J. Weingarten and J. Driessen are included in sections 4–6. The plans are the work of J. Driessen and D. Smyth, the photography is by L.H. Sackett, the drawings of pottery and small finds are by L. Bernini and R. Moak, and the drawings of the ivory statuette are by M. Moak.

² AR 1989–90, 75.

³ The orientations used in the descriptions of buildings in this report are adjusted to ‘site north’ as used in previous reports, see PK 1988, 417 n.2. Thus, the northwest facade of Building 5 on Street 4–5 is described here as north, the southwest facade on Street 5–6 as west, and so on.

⁴ Palyvou, C., ‘Architectural design at Late Cycladic Akrotiri’ in TAW III, 1, 46.Google Scholar

⁵ Palyvou, Ibid., 48.

⁶ PM I, 306, Fig. 223 bottom row; Fig. 226 S, T, U.

⁷ Televandou, C.A., ‘New Light on the West House Wall-Paintings’ in TAW III, 1, 321–2 Fig. 14.Google Scholar

⁸ Summarised by Hood, S. in ‘Warlike Destructions in Crete c.1450 B.C.’ in Proceedings of the Fifth International Cretological Conference, Herakleion, 1986, 170–8.Google Scholar

⁹ For recent discussion of cylindrical stands see Betancourt, P. and others, ‘Ceramic Stands’ in Expedition Fall 1983, 32–37.Google Scholar

¹⁰ We owe to Harriet Blitzer the suggestion that the eastern slab is a re-used LM I anvil for metallurgical use with bun ingots.

¹¹ The colours caused by the burning of the ivory legs range from brown–black to grey–blue to white. If compared to fresh ivory samples heated for one hour, the maximum temperature reached would have been 871 degrees Celsius, see Baer, , Indictor, , Frantz, and Appelbaum, , ‘The Effect of High Temperature on Ivory’ in Studies in Conservation 16 (1971) 1–8.Google Scholar

¹² Mud and dirt were swabbed from the surface with a 50/50 solution of IMS and water on cotton wool. Most of the insoluble salts were removed mechanically; where mechanical removal of difficult salts threatened the ivory's skin, a weak solution of formic acid was used successfully.

¹³ The overall height of .492 m is based on an approximate spacing of torso to legs due to the missing waist and measuring the statuette excluding the drilled pegs which would have been concealed in the base. With the pegs included the overall height is .5270 m.

¹⁴ I am indebted to Dr Olga Krzyszkowska for her help in identifyng the type of ivory used, for a description of hippo ivory see her Ivory and Related Materials. (BICS Suppl.59), 1990, 38–47. I would also like to thank F. Poplin and A. Caubet for sharing their opinions.

¹⁵ Residue from dowel holes examined using a Scanning Electron Microscope comes from conifer wood.

¹⁶ Eighty-one gold foil fragments were found with the legs measuring .00025 m to .00050 m in thickness.

¹⁷ See CMS XI 140 b. c (low rounded-gable shape, design, technique).

¹⁸ See stamped pyramidal weights at Mallia (Maisons IV, Pl. XXVII) and from Palaikastro (‘parallelepipeds’ in PKU II, no. 38, fig. 23).

See also PK 88/1464 –SM 8116, a bell-shaped clay weight with seal impression on apex, horizontally bored loomweight?). Elliptical seal impression: bull standing to left, en regardant (style close to J.G. Younger's Dot-Eye Mumps Group, see Kadmos XXIV, 1985, 71.

¹⁹ Coldstream, J.N. and Huxley, G.L., Kythera, London 1972, 291–2.Google Scholar

²⁰ Downey, W.S. and Tarling, D.H., ‘Archaeomagnetic dating of Santorini volcanic eruptions and fired destruction levels of Late Minoan civilization’ in Nature 209, 1984, 509–23.Google Scholar

²¹ Archaeology 42, No. 5, 1989, 26–31.