Now showing 1 - 10 of 13
  • Publication
    In search of Tabal, central Anatolia: Iron Age interaction at Alişar Höyük
    (Cambridge University Press, 2023-05-15) ; ;
    Marsh, Ben
    Trajectories of social complexity following socio-political collapse have provided fertile ground for new theoretical and methodological perspectives in archaeology. Here we investigate ceramics from the site of Alişar Höyük, a settlement that was likely part of the Iron Age polity of Tabal. Best known from Assyrian texts, Tabal emerged in central Anatolia after the Late Bronze Age Hittite collapse, but its structure and operation remain enigmatic. Excavated in the 1920s and 1930s, a large sample of ceramics from Alişar has since been curated at the Oriental Institute, University of Chicago. Using multiple perspectives on this Middle Iron Age ceramic sample, we explore the political and economic structures at this site in terms of its interaction sphere. Our results suggest that if Alişar was part of Tabal, by the Middle Iron Age this polity was highly intra-regionally integrated, competitive and heterarchical.
  • Publication
    Cultural dynamics and ceramic resource use at Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age Troy, northwestern Turkey
    (Elsevier Ltd, 2013) ; ;
    Hnila, Pavol
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    Marsh, Ben
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    Aslan, Carolyn
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    Thumm-Dograyan, Diane
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    Rigter, Wendy
    Changes in resource use over time can provide insight into technological choice and the extent of long term stability in cultural practices. In this paper we re-evaluate the evidence for a marked demographic shift at the inception of the Early Iron Age at Troy by applying a robust macro scale analysis of changing ceramic resource use over the Late Bronze and Iron Age. We use a combination of new and legacy analytical datasets (NAA and XRF), from excavated ceramics, to evaluate the potential compositional range of local resources (based on comparisons with sediments from within a 10 km site radius). Results show a clear distinction between sediment-defined local and non-local ceramic compositional groups. Two discrete local ceramic resources have been previously identified and we confirm a third local resource for a major class of EIA handmade wares and cooking pots. This third source appears to derive from a residual resource on the Troy peninsula (rather than adjacent alluvial valleys). The presence of a group of large and heavy pithoi among the non-local groups raises questions about their regional or maritime origin.
  • Publication
    Using neutron activation analysis to identify scales of interaction at Kinet Höyük, Turkey
    (Academic Press, 2008) ; ;
    Marsh, Ben
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    Gates, Marie-Henriette
    We use NAA to characterize a relatively large archaeological ceramic sample from the Late Bronze Age to Hellenistic phases of Kinet Höyük, a coastal Turkish site in the Gulf of Iskenderun at the northeast corner of the Mediterranean Sea. The geographic extent of local Kinet wares (how local is local?) is established through comparison with sediment samples across the Kinet hinterland. Four major compositional groups are identified: local and locally imported wares, imports from Cypriot, and presumed Western Anatolian and Aegean centers, and imports that appear relatively homogenous elementally but comprise typologically diverse ceramics with attributions that range from Cyprus to the coastal mainland. Comparison with other published NAA studies for this site reinforces the elemental evidence for local production, and underlines the need for caution when assuming local production always equates with local clays particularly for coastal sites. We propose that the chronological distribution of the local and non-local groups provides a useful political economic proxy. The study indicates systemic and widespread political disruption and marginalization at the transition to the Late Iron Age in this region.
  • Publication
    Patterns of Iron Age interaction in central Anatolia: three sites in Yozgat province
    (Cambridge University Press, 2010) ; ;
    Marsh, Ben
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    Steadman, Sharon
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    Gorney, RL
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    Summers, GD
    The cultural and political changes that happened in Anatolia after the collapse of the Hittite Empire have only recently been recognised as a significant, but as yet unexplained, phenomenon. Here we present the results of analyses of ceramics from three sites south and southwest of the present-day town of Sorgun − Çadır Höyük, Kerkenes Dağ and Tilkigediği Tepe − to identity how regional groups within the Hittite core area regrouped in the aftermath of the collapse. Ceramic analyses provide a means to assess both cultural continuity and the scale and nature of interaction in a region. Results suggest some evidence of cultural continuity at Çadır Höyük from the Late Bronze Age into the Middle Iron Age, and highlight the variable local responses in the aftermath of Hittite collapse.
  • Publication
    The Archaeology of Achaemenid Power in Regional Western Anatolia
    (Cambridge University Press, 2016) ; ;
    Bilgen, Nejat
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    Marsh, Ben
    The Achaemenids conquered Anatolia in the sixth century bce. However, in contrast to the historical descriptions of political response to Achaemenid control, e.g. the so-called 'Ionian revolt' of east Greek territories in Western Anatolia, the operation of Achaemenid-period economies in this region remains obscure. Only a handful of occupation sites in western Turkey provide archaeological data contemporary with Achaemenid rule. In this paper, we compare the results of compositional analysis on Achaemenid-period ceramics from a provincial centre, Seyitömer, with comparable analyses from similar periods at Sardis and Gordion. During the period of Achaemenid control a comparatively high level of compositional and typological diversity at this provincial centre suggests a surprising increase in regional connectivity, both locally and with East Greek and Greek centres.
  • Publication
    Angkorian Khmer stoneware: production and provenance
    (Elsevier BV, 2021-12) ; ;
    Stark, Miriam T
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    Ea, Darith
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    Chhay, Rachna
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    Marsh, Ben
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    Phon, Kaseka
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    Sugiyama, Hiroshi
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    Tabata, Yukitsugu
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    Sato, Yuni
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    Sovannara, Sok Keo
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    Chhay, Visoth
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    Veerawan, Sutee
    From ∼ 900 to 1450 CE the Angkorian Khmer state extended control over much of inland Southeast Asia. This economically complex polity supported a large number and a diverse range of specialist producers across its territory. Given the limited types of textual data, our understanding of the Angkorian Khmer economy is heavily reliant on archaeological data to address key issues such as the relationship between specialist producers and the Angkorian elite. Here our focus is on the production side of this question through elemental characterization (Neutron Activation Analysis) of a large sample of high temperature ceramics - stonewares - from 15 Angkorian Khmer complexes in Cambodia and Thailand. In the majority of cases we can identify kiln-specific compositional signatures as the groundwork for the next stage of analysis: studying the consumption-side dynamics of Angkorian stoneware distribution. The study also highlights the spatial resolution of stoneware NAA possible in this context. Together, defining patterns of stoneware production, distribution and consumption will allow a new bottom-up perspective on the operation of the Angkorian Khmer political and ritual economy.
  • Publication
    Ceramics, trade, provenience and geology: Cyprus in the Late Bronze Age
    (Cambridge University Press, 2014) ; ;
    Marsh, Ben
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    Schoop, Ulf-Dietrich
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    Seeher, Jurgen
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    Bennett, John W
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    Stopic, Attila
    The island of Cyprus was a major producer of copper and stood at the heart of east Mediterranean trade networks during the Late Bronze Age. It may also have been the source of the Red Lustrous Wheelmade Ware that has been found in mortuary contexts in Egypt and the Levant, and in Hittite temple assemblages in Anatolia. Neutron Activation Analysis (NAA) has enabled the source area of this special ceramic to be located in a geologically highly localised and geochemically distinctive area of western Cyprus. This discovery offers a new perspective on the spatial organisation of Cypriot economies in the production and exchange of elite goods around the eastern Mediterranean at this time.
  • Publication
    Post-collapse: the re-emergence of polity in Iron Age Boğazköy, Central Anatolia
    (Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2009)
    Kealhofer, Lisa
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    Genz, Herman
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    Marsh, Ben
    How communities reorganize after collapse is drawing increasing attention across a wide spectrum of disciplines. Iron Age Boğazköy provides an archaeological case study of urban and political regeneration after the widespread collapse of eastern Mediterranean Late Bronze Age empires in the early twelfth century BC. Recent work at Boğazköy has significantly expanded our understanding of long-term occupation in north central Anatolia. This work counters previous suggestions that Boğazköy was abandoned after the collapse of the Hittite Empire during the Early Iron Age. In this paper, we focus on the Iron Age occupations at the site to show how growth in the scale and complexity of ceramic production and trade during this period provides another line of evidence for economic and political re-emergence. Based on the increasing diversity of non-local ceramics and ceramic emulations during the Iron Age, we suggest that only in the Late Iron Age, 500–700 years after Hittite collapse, did Boğazköy re-emerge as a significant polity in central Anatolia.
  • Publication
    Between the states: Iron Age interaction in southwestern Anatolia
    (Elsevier BV, 2015)
    Kealhofer, Lisa
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    Bahar, Hasan
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    Marsh, Ben
    This paper explores how Iron Age Anatolian communities constructed their identities within the fluid political and economic landscape of the Eastern Mediterranean after the Late Bronze Age collapse. Our study focuses on archaeological survey ceramics from sixteen sites in the Konya-Beyșehir region (KBR), south central Anatolia, a contested zone between the Phrygian and Neo-Assyrian polities. We use a combined stylistic and geochemical analysis to address political/economic interaction within this landscape. Comparing KBR site ceramic decorative styles with those of inland and coastal Anatolian sites allows us to identify local patterns of emulation. We differentiate emulation from actual exchange using geochemical elemental characterization. Together these techniques allow us to evaluate how local communities used emulation and exchange to construct their identities. Our results reveal that Iron Age KBR communities operated within a complex regional exchange sphere, and beyond this showed greatest affinity with Phrygian ceramic styles.
  • Publication
    Scaling ceramic provenience at Lydian Sardis, Western Turkey
    (Academic Press, 2013) ; ;
    Marsh, Ben
    We present a multistage strategy to define the scale and geographic distribution of 'local' ceramic production at Lydian Sardis based on geochemical analysis (NAA) of a large diverse ceramic sample (n = 281). Within the sphere of local ceramic production, our results demonstrate an unusual pattern of reliance on a single resource relative to other contemporary Iron Age centers. When our NAA results are combined with legacy NAA provenience data for production centers in Western Anatolia, we can differentiate ceramic emulation from exchange, establish probable proveniences for the non-local component of the dataset, and define new non-local groups with as yet no known provenience.