Books by despina catapoti
Relaki, M. & D. Catapoti (eds.) (2013) An Archaeology of Land Ownership. Routledge Studies in Archaeology.
The inextricable connection between people and land has formed one the most important directions ... more The inextricable connection between people and land has formed one the most important directions of enquiry in past and present archaeological narratives. Throughout human history, people’s relation to land has been shaped with reference to a multitude of factors, i.e. economic, political, symbolic or even emotional: in several cases, land served as a means for dividing people whereas in others, it was thought of as a unifying point, either in terms of actual co-residence or in terms of common origin.
Within archaeological studies, modes of land tenure have been mainly, albeit implicitly, studied from the viewpoint of ownership. A host of studies has argued about land ownership on the basis of the simple co-existence of artefacts on the landscape –for instance, association of ‘sites’ with land, the very much debated ‘territories’ and ‘hinterlands’ around archaeological sites; other studies have tended to extrapolate land ownership from more indirect means, as for example in those cases where the discovery of storage facilities within a building is automatically interpreted as a result of land ownership. Particularly noteworthy is the tendency to portray land ownership as the driving force behind the emergence of social complexity, a primordial ingredient in the processes that led to the political and economic expansion of prehistoric societies.
However, the association established between people and land in all aforementioned interpretive schemata is not always easy to detect analytically. Although various rubrics have been employed to identify such a connection -most notable among them the concepts of ‘cultures’, ‘regions’ or even “households”-, their analytical validity ought to be seriously questioned for they take the links between land and people as a given and not as something that needs to be conceptually defined and empirically substantiated.
The aim of the proposed edited volume is to demonstrate that the relationship between people and land in the past is first and foremost, an analytical issue, which calls for clarification not only at the level of definition, but also methodological applicability. We would like to draw attention therefore, to the processes by which links to land are established, the various forms that such links take and how they can change through time, as well as their importance in helping to forge or dilute an understanding of community at various circumstances.
The chapters of the volume derive from a similarly entitled session organised at World Archaeological Congress 6 (2008) in Dublin, with the addition of colleagues that have over the years contributed important research on the subject, bringing together an international panel of specialists from academic institutions across the world with a strong interest and publication record on land matters.
Catapoti, D. (2006) From "Power" to "Paradigm": Rethinking the Emergence of the "Palatial Phenomenon" in Bronze Age Crete. Unpublished PhD dissertation, Department of Archaeology, University of Sheffield.
Over the past century of investigation of the Minoan past, perhaps the most persistent field of e... more Over the past century of investigation of the Minoan past, perhaps the most persistent field of enquiry has been that of the “emergence of the palatial phenomenon”. Only recently has this begun to be challenged, as the discipline of Minoan archaeology has gone through several marked changes. These have been stimulated mostly by a growing body of empirical data and by new techniques of investigation, but other changes go far deeper, with the unusually rigorous scrutiny of what constitutes the very backbone of the discipline: the “palace” category itself.
One of the central themes of this thesis is the examination of the processes that led to the present state of affairs in Minoan studies, to ask how and why was the concept of the “palace” “constructed” and more recently “deconstructed”. It demonstrates that the development of these two radically opposed points of view is inextricably connected with broader developments and transformations in Post-Enlightenment Western thought. In arguing this, the thesis suggests that neither “the palace” nor its repudiation allow us to get closer to the “reality” of the (Minoan) past, as both premises constitute nothing more than “situated” points of view. If the decision to adhere (or not) to the concept of the “palace” is really a matter of perspective, then we need to pay closer attention to how these perspectives deal with fundamental issues such as (ontological and epistemological) ethics, value and responsibility. It is suggested that a future for Minoan archaeology can be guaranteed only if at this particular historical conjuncture, the ethical implications as well as consequences of archaeological/epistemological performance are assessed in more critical fashion.
Discussion proceeds by offering some insights as to how the handling of these issues can be achieved in practice and concludes with a very specific suggestion: in order to be able to re-articulate theory and practice in our study of this particular segment of the Cretan past, a new analytical question/direction of enquiry ought to be established. It is suggested that for this new question to be defined and operationalized, a radical redefinition of the “palace” question ought to be sought. Through the detailed investigation of specific case studies, the thesis deduces that the “emergence of House Society” has an immense analytical potential as a replacement of the long dominant issue of the “emergence of civilization”.
Papers by despina catapoti
ARtefact: A Conceptual Framework for the Integrated Information Management of Archaeological Excavations
Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2022
An Archaeology of Land Ownership: Introducing the Debate DESPINA CATAPOTI AND MARIA RELAKI
Routledge, Oct 23, 2013
University of Sheffield, 2005
Over the past century of investigation of the Minoan past, perhaps the most persistent field of e... more Over the past century of investigation of the Minoan past, perhaps the most persistent field of enquiry has been that of the "emergence of the palatial phenomenon". Only recently has this begun to be challenged, as the discipline of Minoan archaeology has gone through several marked changes. These have been stimulated mostly by a growing body of empirical data and by new techniques of investigation, but other changes go far deeper, with the unusually rigorous scrutiny of what constitutes the very backbone of the discipline: the "palace" category itself. One of the central themes of this thesis is the examination of the processes that led to the present state of affairs in Minoan studies, to ask how and why was the concept of the "palace" "constructed" and more recently "deconstructed". It demonstrates that the development of these two radically opposed points of view is inextricably connected with broader developments and transformations in Post-Enlightenment Western thought. In arguing this, the thesis suggests that neither "the palace" nor its repudiation allow us to get closer to the "reality" of the (Minoan) past, as both premises constitute nothing more than "situated" points of view. If the decision to adhere (or not) to the concept of the "palace" is really a matter of perspective, then we need to pay closer attention to how these perspectives deal with fundamental issues such as (ontological and epistemological) ethics, value and responsibility. It is suggested that a future for Minoan archaeology can be guaranteed only if at this particular historical conjuncture, the ethical implications as well as consequences of archaeological/epistemological performance are assessed in more critical fashion. Discussion proceeds by offering some insights as to how the handling of these issues can be achieved in practice and concludes with a very specific suggestion: in order to be able to rearticulate theory and practice in our study of this particular segment of the Cretan past, a new analytical question/direction of enquiry ought to be established. It is suggested that for this new question to be defined and operationalized, a radical redefinition of the "palace" question ought to be sought. Through the detailed investigation of specific case studies, the thesis deduces that the "emergence of House Society" has an immense analytical potential as a replacement of the long dominant issue of the "emergence of civilization". Contents Acknowledgements iv List of Plates vi List of Figures x List of plates 0 Plate 1.1 Images of a palace: Architectural reconstructions of Knossos (a) by G. Lappas & J. Sardelli (Mathiolakis poster 1984), (b) by N. Gouvoussis (Mathiolakis poster 1981) (after Klynne 1998: Figures 7,9). 0 Plate 2.1 "Palatial' territories (after Cherry 1986: Figure 2.2). " Plate 3.1 Ex Oriente lux: (a) Mari (b) Knossos (after Graham 1962: Plates 2,148). " Plate 3.2 Pottery shape charts for drinking, pouring and serving vessels from the following areas/deposits: (a) Palace Well (Early Minoan I), (b) West Court House (Early Minoan IIa), (c) E. II. 7/K. I tests (Early Minoan IIa), (d) South Front (Early Minoan IIb) and (e) Upper East Well (Early Minoan III) (after Day and Wilson 2002: Fig. 8.4).
What makes a Cultural Heritage Expert?: Bridging the Gap between Higher Education and Professional Practice in Greece
Journal of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology & Heritage Studies, 2020
Although the professional sector of heritage in Greece has experienced profound transformations, ... more Although the professional sector of heritage in Greece has experienced profound transformations, in recent years, due to the ongoing financial crisis, another key shift that calls for serious consideration is the (implicit and/or explicit) requirement for heritage professionals to manage a variety of tasks associated with different scientific fields. In the wake of these developments, Greek universities have begun to reconfigure their role in knowledge production. The article presents an in-depth examination of postgraduate programs in cultural heritage offered by Greek universities and how they relate to emerging agendas in the professional sector of heritage in Greece. This twofold investigation (a) demonstrates that most postgraduate programs currently put a surplus of emphasis on instrumentalism, professional experience, and the coverage of a wide range of module topics and (b) explains the reasons why this triad in academic education also forms the dominant vision for the herit...
Journal of Material Culture, 2020
In this article, the authors use the question of whether the Neolithic should be maintained as an... more In this article, the authors use the question of whether the Neolithic should be maintained as an analytic category to argue that such a paradigmatic view of history is possible and useful only when we drastically redefine the role that technics play in archaeological narratives of the past. Using Simondon’s and Leroi-Gourhan’s theories of technology, they argue that analysis should move away from categorizations based on concrete objects and instead frame itself through the exploration of technical ensembles. They suggest that the operational solidarity of pottery-, bread- and mudbrick-making constructs the Neolithic as a technical interface in which a complex network of synergies and radial properties is played out, allowing the mapping of the Neolithic, not by object appearances and/or densities, but by points of convergence between technical regimes that redefine the modes of being in the world by providing the conditions under which new ‘objects’ become possible.
Documentation of Local Cultural Features in the Euro-Mediterranean Region: A Documentary Dedicated to the Lyrical …
The Euro-Mediterranean Student Research Multi-conference ... Unity and Diversity of Euro-Mediterr... more The Euro-Mediterranean Student Research Multi-conference ... Unity and Diversity of Euro-Mediterranean Identities ... DOCUMENTATION OF LOCAL CULTURAL FEATURES IN THE EURO-MEDITERRANEAN REGION: A DOCUMENTARY DEDICATED TO THE LYRICAL POETRY OF LESVOS AND ...
The Cambridge Prehistory of the Bronze and Iron Age Mediterranean, 2015
Reviewing the Classics
European Journal of Archaeology, 2022
A Nationalist Palimpsest: Authoring the History of the Greek Nation Through Alternative Museum Narratives
For the purposes of EUNAMUS/Work Package 3, three cases studies from Greece were examined in orde... more For the purposes of EUNAMUS/Work Package 3, three cases studies from Greece were examined in order to illuminate various aspects pertinent to the broader theme of the project: i.e. how national identity is built and reinforced through reference to the past as well as the use of this past in national museum exhibitions. The three cases considered were: the first exhibition hosted at the National Historical Museum of Athens in 1884. The full title was ‘Exhibition of the Monuments of the Holy Struggle’ curated by the historian Konstantinos Paparrigopoulos. The second case study was the exhibition hosted at the National Archaeological Museum of Athens in 1964. The exhibition is commonly referred to as the ‘Sculptures Collection’, the curatorial work for this project was done by Christos Karouzos and his wife, Semni Karouzos. The ‘Neolithic Exhibition’ hosted at the Archaeological Museum of Volos, in Thessaly, Central Greece was also examined in detail. The exhibition opened in 1975 and ...
For the purposes of EUNAMUS/Work Package 3, three cases studies from Greece were examined in orde... more For the purposes of EUNAMUS/Work Package 3, three cases studies from Greece were examined in order to illuminate various aspects pertinent to the broader theme of the project: i.e. how national identity is built and reinforced through reference to the past as well as the use of this past in national museum exhibitions. The three cases considered were: the first exhibition hosted at the National Historical Museum of Athens in 1884. The full title was ‘Exhibition of the Monuments of the Holy Struggle’ curated by the historian Konstantinos Paparrigopoulos. The second case study was the exhibition hosted at the National Archaeological Museum of Athens in 1964. The exhibition is commonly referred to as the ‘Sculptures Collection’, the curatorial work for this project was done by Christos Karouzos and his wife, Semni Karouzos. The ‘Neolithic Exhibition’ hosted at the Archaeological Museum of Volos, in Thessaly, Central Greece was also examined in detail. The exhibition opened in 1975 and ...
Until recently, the dominant management model of archaeological sites in Greece largely drew upon... more Until recently, the dominant management model of archaeological sites in Greece largely drew upon a logic of enframing (Thomas 2004: 79; see also Díaz-Andreu & Champion 1996; Dietler 1994; Olsen 2012), which understood the past as "gone" and "completed", a temporal entity in other words, whose closure and finitude needed to be guaranteed through physical demarcation (Olsen, 2012: 215). We shall call this "the enclosure model", for in essence, it sought to isolate monuments from the sphere of the everyday. The tendency to spatially distinguish the past from the present has its roots in modernity, particularly the 19 th century: at the time, prominent archaeological sites across the Mediterranean were marked out (and henceforth rendered "visible") as loci of exclusive membership (i.e. products of archaeological activity, arenas of intellectual/ scientific discourse) but above all, as representational spaces of collective appeal, accommodating both nationalist and colonialist narratives (cf.
What makes a Cultural Heritage Expert?: Bridging the Gap between Higher Education and Professional Practice in Greece
Journal of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology & Heritage Studies Vol. 8, No. 2, pp. 123-140, 2020
Although the professional sector of heritage in Greece has experienced profound transformations, ... more Although the professional sector of heritage in Greece has experienced profound transformations, in recent years, due to the ongoing financial crisis, another key shift that calls for serious consideration is the (implicit and/or explicit) requirement for heritage professionals to manage a variety of tasks associated with different scientific fields. In the wake of these developments, Greek universities have begun to reconfigure their role in knowledge production. The article presents an in-depth examination of postgraduate programs in cultural heritage offered by Greek universities and how they relate to emerging agendas in the professional sector of heritage in Greece. This twofold investigation (a) demonstrates that most postgraduate programs currently put a surplus of emphasis on instrumentalism, professional experience, and the coverage of a wide range of module topics and (b) explains the reasons why this triad in academic education also forms the dominant vision for the herit...
‘Fields of discourse’ revisited
Far from Equilibrium: An archaeology of energy, life and humanity
An Archaeology of Land Ownership
Cahiers « Mondes anciens », 2021
Download at https://journals.openedition.org/mondesanciens/3264. This paper offers a detailed ove... more Download at https://journals.openedition.org/mondesanciens/3264. This paper offers a detailed overview of past approaches to the world of maritime interaction in the southern Aegean during the third millennium BC, including Tsountas’ pioneering launch of the term “island cultures of the Cyclades”, Renfrew’s thought-provoking “Emergence of Civilisation” in the southern Aegean, and Broodbank’s insightful analysis of “insularity” and long-distance seafaring. Taking as its point of departure recent phenomenological approaches emphasizing a range of factors, from the notion of the seascape to bodily performances related to the sea, the central argument put forward is the need for a more integrated approach to the “maritime”, which departs from island-centred perceptions of the sea and seafaring and stresses the analytical value of concepts such as mobility, hybridity and relationality, through reference to the Early Bronze Age longboat.
“Le dur ne dure pas, seul dure le doux”
Cahiers « Mondes anciens »
Identifying Accessibility Barriers in Heritage Museums: Conceptual Challenges in a Period of Change
Museum International
Why the Neolithic is (r)evolutionary
Journal of Material Culture, 2020
In this article, the authors use the question of whether the Neolithic should be maintained as an... more In this article, the authors use the question of whether the Neolithic should be maintained as an analytic category to argue that such a paradigmatic view of history is possible and useful only when we drastically redefine the role that technics play in archaeological narratives of the past. Using Simondon’s and Leroi-Gourhan’s theories of technology, they argue that analysis should move away from categorizations based on concrete objects and instead frame itself through the exploration of technical ensembles. They suggest that the operational solidarity of pottery-, bread- and mudbrick-making constructs the Neolithic as a technical interface in which a complex network of synergies and radial properties is played out, allowing the mapping of the Neolithic, not by object appearances and/or densities, but by points of convergence between technical regimes that redefine the modes of being in the world by providing the conditions under which new ‘objects’ become possible.
Uploads
Books by despina catapoti
Within archaeological studies, modes of land tenure have been mainly, albeit implicitly, studied from the viewpoint of ownership. A host of studies has argued about land ownership on the basis of the simple co-existence of artefacts on the landscape –for instance, association of ‘sites’ with land, the very much debated ‘territories’ and ‘hinterlands’ around archaeological sites; other studies have tended to extrapolate land ownership from more indirect means, as for example in those cases where the discovery of storage facilities within a building is automatically interpreted as a result of land ownership. Particularly noteworthy is the tendency to portray land ownership as the driving force behind the emergence of social complexity, a primordial ingredient in the processes that led to the political and economic expansion of prehistoric societies.
However, the association established between people and land in all aforementioned interpretive schemata is not always easy to detect analytically. Although various rubrics have been employed to identify such a connection -most notable among them the concepts of ‘cultures’, ‘regions’ or even “households”-, their analytical validity ought to be seriously questioned for they take the links between land and people as a given and not as something that needs to be conceptually defined and empirically substantiated.
The aim of the proposed edited volume is to demonstrate that the relationship between people and land in the past is first and foremost, an analytical issue, which calls for clarification not only at the level of definition, but also methodological applicability. We would like to draw attention therefore, to the processes by which links to land are established, the various forms that such links take and how they can change through time, as well as their importance in helping to forge or dilute an understanding of community at various circumstances.
The chapters of the volume derive from a similarly entitled session organised at World Archaeological Congress 6 (2008) in Dublin, with the addition of colleagues that have over the years contributed important research on the subject, bringing together an international panel of specialists from academic institutions across the world with a strong interest and publication record on land matters.
One of the central themes of this thesis is the examination of the processes that led to the present state of affairs in Minoan studies, to ask how and why was the concept of the “palace” “constructed” and more recently “deconstructed”. It demonstrates that the development of these two radically opposed points of view is inextricably connected with broader developments and transformations in Post-Enlightenment Western thought. In arguing this, the thesis suggests that neither “the palace” nor its repudiation allow us to get closer to the “reality” of the (Minoan) past, as both premises constitute nothing more than “situated” points of view. If the decision to adhere (or not) to the concept of the “palace” is really a matter of perspective, then we need to pay closer attention to how these perspectives deal with fundamental issues such as (ontological and epistemological) ethics, value and responsibility. It is suggested that a future for Minoan archaeology can be guaranteed only if at this particular historical conjuncture, the ethical implications as well as consequences of archaeological/epistemological performance are assessed in more critical fashion.
Discussion proceeds by offering some insights as to how the handling of these issues can be achieved in practice and concludes with a very specific suggestion: in order to be able to re-articulate theory and practice in our study of this particular segment of the Cretan past, a new analytical question/direction of enquiry ought to be established. It is suggested that for this new question to be defined and operationalized, a radical redefinition of the “palace” question ought to be sought. Through the detailed investigation of specific case studies, the thesis deduces that the “emergence of House Society” has an immense analytical potential as a replacement of the long dominant issue of the “emergence of civilization”.
Papers by despina catapoti