ABSTRACT

Time, Tradition and Society in Greek Archaeology is an innovative volume which examines the relevance of archaeological theory to classical archaeology. It offers a wideranging overview of classical archaeology, from the Bronze Age to the Classical period and from mainland Greece to Cyprus. Within this framework Spencer examines many of the issues which have become important in the study of archaeology in recent years - time, the `past', gender, ideology, social structure and group identity. The papers in this collection cover such diverse topics as the rural landscape, classical art and scientific methodologies.
Over the last century the study of classical archaeology has been orthodox and static. The essays in this collection examine it in the light of current theoretical archaeology and anthropology, making it more relevant and valuable to the study of archaeology in the 1990s. This is a diverse and topical collection, of great value to classicists, ancient historians, anthropologists and everyone interested in new approaches to archaeology.

chapter |5 pages

Introduction

chapter 2|10 pages

Challenging Preconceptions of Oriental ‘barbarity' and Greek ‘humanity'

Human sacrifice in the ancient world

chapter 4|21 pages

Tomb cult and hero cult

The uses of the past in Archaic Greece 1

chapter 5|25 pages

Present-Day Chora on Amorgos and prehistoric Thermi on Lesbo

Alternative views of communities in transition 1

chapter 7|23 pages

Dead women's society

Constructing female gender in Classical Athenian funerary sculpture 1

chapter 8|18 pages

Monumental ambitions

The significance of posterity in Greece 1