Early Cycladic Sculpture in Context From Beyond the Cyclades

This second volume on Early Cycladic (and Cycladicising) sculptures found in the Aegean, examines finds from mainland Greece, along with the rarer items from the north and east Aegean, with the exception of those discovered in the Cyclades (covered in the preceding volume), and of those found in Crete. The significance of these finds is that these are the principal testimonies of the influence of the Early Bronze Age Cycladic cultures in the wider Aegean. This influence is shown both by the export of sculptures produced in the Cyclades (and made of Cycladic marble), and of their imitations, produced elsewhere in the Aegean, usually of local marble. They hold the key, therefore, to the cultural interactions developing at this time, the so-called international spirit' manifest particularly during the Aegean Early Bronze II period. This was the time when the foundations of early Aegean civilization were being laid, and the material documented is thus of considerable significance. The volume is divided into sections wherein contributions examine finds and their archaeological, social, and economic contexts from specific regions. It concludes with an overview of the significance and role of these objects in Early Bronze Age societies of the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean region. This will be the first time that this material has been systematically gathered together. Highly illustrated, it follows and builds on the successful preceding volume, Early Cycladic Sculpture in Context (Oxbow 2016).
About the Author: Michael Boyd (born 8th January 1970) is a Senior Research Associate at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at the University of Cambridge. His main research interests lie in the archaeology of death and in the prehistoric Aegean, where he has worked in the Peloponnese and Cyclades. He is co-director of current excavations on Keros and co-editor of the Keros publications series. He has published a book on Mycenaean funerary practices, and is co-editing a volume on funerary archaeology, Staging Death, and another on the origins of play and ritual. He has worked widely in Greece and Bulgaria.
About the Author: Colin Renfrew (Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn) was formerly Disney Professor of Archaeology and Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research in the University of Cambridge, and Master of Jesus College Cambridge from 1986 to 1997. He has excavated at a number of sites in prehistoric Greece and in the Orkney Islands, and is the author of many publications, including Prehistory: the making of the human mind (2008). He is Fellow of the British Academy, Foreign Associate of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, and was the recipient of the Balzan Prize in 2004.
About the Author: Marisa Marthari is Ephor of Antiquities (Emerita) at the Greek Archaeological Service and formerly Director of the Ephoreia of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities for the Cyclades and Samos, where she conducted numerous excavations and directed projects on museum exhibitions and presentation of archaeological sites.