The Antikythera Survey Project (AkSP) was a collaboration between the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and the Canadian Institute, co-directed by Aris Tsavaropoulos (26th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities, Piraeus & Islands), James Conolly (Trent University) and Andrew Bevan (University College London). The project ran from 2005 to 2007 and aimed to investigate the history and human ecology of Antikythera, one of the smallest and most remote inhabited islands in the Mediterranean.
Situated along key axes of maritime movement, Antikythera’s marginal status yet highly-connected position shaped its episodic and often turbulent history, beginning in the Final Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. This location allowed the island to play a distinctive and at times unconventional role within broader Mediterranean networks, as evidenced by the presence of a fortified pirate settlement during the Hellenistic period and dramatic demographic shifts, including cycles of abandonment and reoccupation during the Late Roman, Byzantine, and Venetian periods. Owing to the island’s small size, the AkSP project successfully conducted a complete survey of the entire island, employing an interdisciplinary program of fieldwork, artifact analysis and environmental study.
Select Bibliography
Bevan, A. & J. Conolly. 2011. “Terraced fields and Mediterranean Landscape Structure: an Analytical Case Study from Antikythera, Greece.” Ecological Modelling 222: 1303–1314.
Bevan, A. & J. Conolly. 2013. Mediterranean Islands, Fragile Communities and Persistent Landscapes: Antikythera in Long-term Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Johnston, A., A. Quercia, A. Tsaravopoulos, A. Bevan & J. Conolly. 2012. “Pots, Piracy and Aegila. Hellenistic ceramics from an Intensive Survey of Antikythera, Greece.” Annual of the British School at Athens 107: 247-272.
Palmer, C., S. Colledge, A. Bevan & J. Conolly. 2010. “Vegetation Recolonisation of Abandoned Agricultural Terraces on Antikythera, Greece.” Environmental Archaeology 15.1: 64-80.
Pentedeka, A., E. Kiriatzi, L. Spencer, A. Bevan & J. Conolly. 2010. “From Fabrics to Island Connections: Macroscopic and Microscopic Approaches to the Prehistoric Pottery of Antikythera.” Annual of the British School at Athens 105: 1-81.
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