A presentation of two unique collections in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, which include characteristic examples, superb in quality and variety, of the finest artistic creations of the Neolithic and Cycladic civilizations. Household articles, tools, weapons, object of minor art, pottery and sculpture, made by people who lived in Greece between five and seven thousand years ago, and showing a cultural level that almost reaches perfection.

Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age Cycladic culture is best known for its flat female idols carved out of the islands' pure white marble. This beautiful illustrated book explores these periods in Cycladic culture and how the natural environment of the islands shaped its art. It also addresses the settlements of these periods and the artifacts produced by their potters, marble-carvers, and metalworkers. Maps are interspersed throughout the text, along with a chronological table, plans of known settlements, cemeteries, and individual tombs, as well as photographs of archaeological digs and landscapes by well-known photographers. Items from the Museum's Collection are also presented, followed by commentary and comprehensive text that venture at the items' probable significance and functions.

This textbook offers an up-to-date academic synthesis of the Aegean islands from the earliest Palaeolithic period through to the demise of the Mycenaean civilization in the Late Bronze III period. The book integrates new findings and theoretical approaches whilst, at the same time, allowing readers to contextualize their understanding through engagement with bigger overarching issues and themes, often drawing explicitly on key theoretical concepts and debates. Structured according to chronological periods and with two dedicated chapters on Akrotiri and the debate around the volcanic eruption of Thera, this book is an essential companion for all those interested in the prehistory of the Cyclades and other Aegean islands.

The sculpture of the early bronze age Cyclades has been systematically studied since the time of Christos Tsountas at the end of the 19th century. But that study has been hampered by the circumstance that so many of the subsequent finds come from unauthorized excavations, where the archaeological context was irretrievably lost. Largely for that reason there are still many problems surrounding the chronology, the function and the meaning of Early Cycladic sculpture. This lavishly illustrated and comprehensive reassessment sets out to rectify that situation by publishing finds which have been recovered in controlled excavations in recent years, as well as earlier finds for which better documentation can now be provided. Using the material from recent excavation projects, and drawing on the papers presented at a symposium held in Athens in 2014, it is possible now to undertake a fresh overview of the entire body of sculpture from the Cycladic islands which has been found in secure archaeological contexts. Beginning with early examples from Neolithic settlement sites and extending into a consideration of material found in later contexts, the 35 chapters are divided into sections which examine sculpture from settlements, cemeteries and the sanctuary at Kavos, concluding with a discussion of material, techniques and aspects of manufacture.

First published in 1985, this ground-breaking book surveys the development of Cycladic sculpture produced by unidentified artists who worked in the Aegean islands forty-five hundred years ago. Illustrated with numerous objects from American collections—with particular emphasis on some two dozen pieces in the Getty Museum—this volume surveys the typological development of Early Cycladic sculpture and identifies, where possible, the work of individual sculptors. Newly revised and updated, this book is a concise introduction to the field.

A case study of the Greek Cyclades, documenting new ways of studying global island archaeology.

Recent excavations and new theoretical approaches are changing our view of the Cyclades. This volume aims to share these recent developments with a broader, international audience. Essays have been carefully selected as representing some of the most important recent work and include significant previously-unpublished material.

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 civilisation 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).