Modeling Maritime Travel in the Bronze Age Cyclades (Greece)

Summary

In this paper, I model maritime connections in the central Cyclades (Greece) to better understand small world network interactions during the Early Bronze Age (ca. 3100-2000 BCE). Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS), I create a cost raster of local and seasonal wind and wave patterns in the Aegean. Based on this, I generate an anisotropic model of the time it takes to sail outward from various settlements. When compared with ethnographic and archaeological evidence about travel times for habitual interaction, I predict which Early Cycladic communities would have interacted with one another on a regular basis. This allows for a more complete understanding of the intensity and frequency of Early Cycladic intercommunity relations. By relying on travel times rather than absolute distance, this model offers an understanding of community interactions based on meaningful scales of human movement and social time.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 17354