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Melian obsidian in NW Turkey – Neolithic Trade in the Aegean – Novo Scriptorium
Su NovoScriptorium un post che testimonia il commercio di ossidiana nel periodo preistorico, in particolare nel Neolitico, nel quadrante nordovest turco. Un estratto in inglese, per me significativo in questo momento perché cita l’ossidiana, che torna continuamente da alcune ore.
In this post we present selected parts of the very interesting paper titled “Melian obsidian in NW Turkey: Evidence for early Neolithic trade”, by Catherine Perlès, Turan Takaoğlu and Bernard Gratuze (2011).
“The Cycladic island of Melos was the main source of obsidian in the Aegean world. This raw material was exploited and distributed throughout the region from the Final Palaeolithic period until the Bronze Age (Carter 2009; Runnels 1983; Torrence 1986). (…) In the Early and Middle Neolithic of Greece (ca. 6600–5800 CAL B.C.), obsidian trade appears to have been in the hands of itinerant specialists who were both seafarers and skilled knappers; they were responsible for the exploitation of the Melian quarries and for the production and distribution of obsidian blades and bladelets (Perlès 1990a, 2004). (…) The presence of obsidian in the Final Palaeolithic and Mesolithic deposits at Franchthi Cave, four millennia earlier, shows, however, that knowledge of both navigation techniques and the island’s resources was established well before the onset of the Neolithic (Perlès 1987, 1990b). (…) Melian obsidian artifacts have been identified at numerous Early Neolithic sites (ca. 6800–6000 CAL B.C.) on the Greek mainland and on some Aegean islands (Perlès 2001; Torrence 1986). More recently, several Early Neolithic sites in western Turkey have yielded obsidian from Melos and demonstrate that its distribution extended to the eastern side of the Aegean Sea. (…) New archaeological excavations conducted at Early Neolithic sites dated to ca. 6500 CAL B.C., such as Yeşilova, Ege Gübre, Ulucak, Araptepe, and Dedecik-Heybelitepe in the Izmir region shed new light on the Neolithization of west-central Turkey (Çilingiroğlu and Çilingiroğlu 2007; Derin 2007; Derin et al. 2009; Sağlamtimur 2007; Lichter 2002; Lichter and Meriç 2007). Several of these sites have yielded Melian obsidian, sometimes in large quantities (Lichter and Meriç 2007).
Rome’s Commerce with India – Travel between Italy and the Near East – Novo Scriptorium
Su NovoScriptorum un lungo post – in lingua inglese – in cui si dettagliano i movimenti commerciali del periodo d’oro dell’Impero Romano verso l’est asiatico, Cina e India in particolare, ma credo anche Giappone. Un estratto:
The first two centuries of the Roman Empire witnessed the establishment and development of a profitable commerce between two great regions of the earth, the Mediterranean countries and India. We need not wonder at this. In the first place, the century after Christ was an era of new discoveries and enterprises, for the western world, after ages of struggle, was united under the firm rule of Rome, and, in the enjoyment of lasting peace and prosperity, was ripe and ready for fresh developments in the intercourse of men; in the second place, the welding of the races of the West and of the near East into one well-governed whole brought into sharp relief the prominent geographical feature formed by Asia Minor, Palestine, Arabia, and the north-eastern corner of Africa. By using the near East as a base, merchants filled with the western characteristic of energetic discovery and the will and power to expand, backed by the governing power of Rome and the prestige of her great name, and helped by Roman capital, were readier to push eastwards by land and sea than they had been before. The moving force from first to last came from the West; the little-changing peoples of the East allowed the West to find them out. We have, then, on the one side India of the Orient, then, a disjointed aggregate of countries and, while open to commerce, content generally to remain within her borders and to engage in agriculture. On the other side we have Rome, also at first agricultural, but now risen after centuries of triumph to be mistress of a vast empire of peoples, with whom and through whom she conducted all her commerce. The peculiar attitude of Indians and Romans towards commerce caused them to meet each other rarely along any of the routes which linked them over long distances, and to conduct their affairs over unexplored seas and dangerous solitudes on land by means of intermediaries.
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