sarakenos cave in boeotia, from palaeo lithic to …eura sian pre his tory, 6 (1–2): 199–231....

Eura sian Pre his tory, 6 (1–2): 199–231.

SARAKENOS CAVE IN BOEOTIA,FROM PALAEO LITHIC TO THE EARLY BRONZE AGE

Adamantios Sampson1, Janusz K. Koz³owski2, Ma³gorzata Kaczanowska3, Anna Budek4,Adam Nadachowski5, 6, Teresa Tomek6 and Barbara Miêkina6

1 Aegean Uni ver sity Rhodes, De part ment of Med i ter ra nean Ar chae ol ogy, Demokratios Ave, Rhodes, Greece2 In sti tute of Ar chae ol ogy, Jagiellonian Uni ver sity, ul. Go³êbia 11, 31-007 Kraków, Po land,

[email protected] Ar chae o log i cal Mu seum, ul. Senacka 3, Kraków, Po land

4 In sti tute of Geography and Spa tial Organization, Pol ish Acad emy of Sci ence, ul. Œw. Jana 22,31-016 Kraków, Po land

5 Departament of Palaeozoology, Zoo log i cal In sti tute, Wroc³aw Uni ver sity, Sienkiewicza 21,50-355 Wroc³aw, Po land

6 In sti tute of Sys tem at ics and Evo lu tion of An i mals, Pol ish Acad emy of Sci ences, ul. S³awkowska 17,31-016 Kraków, Po land

Ab stract

Sarakenos Cave, oc cu pied since the Late Palaeo lithic, is of cru cial im por tance for the study of the Mesolithic/Neo -lithic in ter face. There is a strik ing con trast be tween the iso lated Mesolithic, par tic u larly Late Mesolithic oc cu pa tions withflake tech nol ogy adapted to the lo cal bad qual ity raw ma te ri als, and with sub sis tence econ omy based on fowl ing and plantgath er ing, also adapted to the lo cal en vi ron men tal con di tions, and the Early Neo lithic groups ar riv ing some 120–140 ra -dio car bon years later, with im ported raw ma te ri als, macroblade tech nol ogy and an i mal breed ing. The Mid dle and LateNeo lithic oc cu pa tions are rep re sented by nu mer ous sym bolic ob jects such as fig u rines in di cat ing the im por tant role of thecave in rit ual ac tiv i ties.

IN TRO DUC TIONIn 1993 in the Kopais area in Boeotia (Fig. 1)

we started up a pro ject with the aim to sys tem at i -cally sur vey the karstic for ma tions all around therocky bound aries of the ba sin (Sampson, 2000,2004, 2006). Dur ing this pro ject we have lo cated,re corded, and mapped a large num ber of cavesand rock shel ters in the ba sin. The larger con cen -tra tion of caves is ob served in the lime stonebound aries of the east ern part of Kopais (Fig. 2).In the area be tween Akraifnion and Aliartos wehave ex plored and mapped 23 caves, most ofwhich are of a low el e va tion at the level of whatonce was the lake coast. In some rock shel ters afew sur face chipped flints have been found prob a -bly of Palaeo lithic age and five Neo lithic set tle -

ments have been lo cated in the east ern part of theval ley.

Be cause of its im por tance as a natu ral kar sticba sin, Ko pais has been the sub ject of ex ten sivepa laeoen vi ron men tal stud ies since the 1970s.Greig and Turner (1974, 1975) pub lished de tailed pol len dia grams and Al len (1997) of fered in for -ma tion on the vege ta tion from the Late Up per Pa -laeo lithic on wards from two new cores.

Dur ing the Late Up per Pa laeo lithic, Ko paisfea tured a vege ta tion pat tern typi cal of an opensteppe and a dry and cold cli mate (Ar tem isia,Graminae and Che no pods). The Pleis to cene –Holo cene tran si tion is re corded in the dia grams inthe form of for est ex pan sion (Quer cus, Ju ni pe rus, Pis ta cia, Ephe dra), while lay ers that cor re spond

to 4000– 3000 BC Quer cus drop, pos si bly due tode for es ta tion. The analy sis of the grain of the cor -ing sam ples sug gests that there was fluc tua tion inthe lake lev els dur ing the Late Pleis to cene andEarly Holo cene. There are also in di ca tions thatthe lake level dropped af ter 4000 and un til 2500BC.

The paly no logi cal ma te rial that has beenstud ied from the Sarake nos Cave sedi ments(Sampson and Ioakeim 2002) shows pres ence ofPine and Quer cus and an in crease of Le gu mi no -sae dur ing the tran si tion from Late Neo lithic I toLN II (sec ond half of the 5th mill. BC). The samespe cies are pres ent with small fluc tua tions dur ingthe Late Neo lithic II and the EH II. Gen er ally,from the sec ond half of the 5th mill. and un til the2nd mill. BC the plant spe cies re corded in the cave

pol len dia grams show the clear im pact of hu manson the Ko pais ba sin en vi ron ment.

EX CA VA TION AND STRA TIG RA PHYThe most suit able cave for ex ca va tion was the

cave of Sarakenos (Fig. 3), which was lo cated inthe east ern part of the for mer lake of Kopais at the al ti tude of 180m. It is the larg est karstic for ma tion in the area, found to day much higher than thelevel of the plain. The cave has a large en trance,25 m. wide (Fig. 4), which light ens the cham berand gives an ex cel lent view to what was once thelake. Ar chae o log i cal re search in Sarakenos Cavebe gun in the early 1970’s by Spyropoulos (1970),and had fea tured finds from dif fer ent chro no log i -cal pe ri ods; the pub li ca tion of this ma te rial, how -ever, was never to be real ised.

200 A. Sampson et al.

Fig. 1. Map of the Kopais area

Sarakenos Cave in Boeotia 201

Fig. 2. Caves in the east ern part of Kopais

The sys tem atic ex ca va tion of the site was part of the Kopais Pro ject that started in 1994 in or derto es tab lish a chro no log i cal se quence for the de -vel op ment of the cave and the iden ti fi ca tion ofeconomical mod els in di verse pe ri ods. The re -search was con tin ued since 2000, while since2004 a new pe riod of ex ca va tions started in thecave that is continues till now.

Ex cep tional strati graphi cal data in side thecave has led to the suc ces sion of dis tinct cul turalphases, dated from the Mid dle/Up per Palaeo lithicto the Mid dle Hel la dic (2nd mill B.C.), when thecave was aban doned for rea sons yet un known(Sampson 2000). Prob a bly, the drain age of thelake, which was car ried out prob a bly to wards the

end of the Mid dle Hel la dic pe riod, was the rea sonfor the abandonment of the cave.

Trench A

Trench A was opened along the side of thecave’s area that was in ves ti gated in the past andnext to the south ern wall of the cave. Trench Apres ents a strati graphic se quence close to thatfrom nearby Trench C (Fig. 5). The spits 3 and 4be long to a clear MH stra tum, ex cep tion ally cleardue to the par tic u larly thick lay ers of burn ing. The Mid dle Hel la dic stra tum in Lay ers A3–A5 cor re -sponds to the spits C5–C8. The thin Early Hel la -dic stra tum in Layer A5 cor re sponds to Layer C9,


Fig. 3. Ground plan of the Sarakenos Cave

which gave an ab so lute date (DEM-1139, 3859±26 BP or 2400–2210 BC).

At spit 6 the last stage of the Late Neo lithic(ca. 3800–3300 BC) started, while the suc ces sivespit 7 of fered an ab so lute dat ing (DEM-672,4895±31 BP or 3697–3650 BC). Though rel a -tively thin, the stra tum of this phase con tainedabun dant pot tery spec i mens, char ac ter is tic of thispe riod. The fi nal Neo lithic phase in Trench A(LNIIb) cor re sponds to spit 10 of the adjacentTrench C.

From spit 8, which be longs to the Late Neo -lithic IIa phase (ca. 4300–3800 BC), came an ab -so lute dat ing (DEM-1065, 5407±22 BP or 4330–4250 BC) that is char ac ter is tic of this phase’sstart. Spit 9 cor re sponded to spit 12 of Trench Cand dates from the Late Neo lithic Ib (ca.4800–4300 BC), a phase noted in most caves inGreece with a long du ra tion (Tharrounia –Sampson, 1993; Cy clops Cave – Sampson 1998;

2008). Two ab so lute ages (DEM-1140, 5671±20BP or 4520–4460 BC and DEM-815, 5874±22BP or 4776–4714 BC) from Trench A and C arein side the or di nary chro no log i cal lim its of theLate Neo lithic Ib. A sam ple from spit C13 gave an ab so lute dat ing (DEM-1141, 5931±25 BP or4840–4730 BC) at the limit be tween the LateNeo lithic Ia and Late Neolithic Ib phases.

Spits 10 and 11 in Trench A be long to theLate Neo lithic Ia phase (ca. 5300–4800 BC). Anab so lute dat ing of fine pre ci sion came from spitA10 (DEM-1064, 6096±24 BP or 5040–4960BC). Spit A11 also dates from the late stage of the Late Neo lithic Ia and lead to three dates that co in -cided with the late stage of the Late Neo lithic Iaphase (DEM-1061, 6117±55 BP or 5210–4860BC, DEM-1062, 6081±33 BP or 5040–4860 BC,and DEM-1063, 6062±29 BP or 5000–4860 BC).

A floor was un earthed at a depth of 2.25 m(Spits A12, A13) that ex tended into Trench C and


Fig. 4. The en trance of the Sarakenos Cave

dated from the be gin ning of the Late Neo lithic Iaphase. It con sisted of hard earth, beaten soil, andashes and terra rossa, while it pre served fiveopen ings from postholes prob a bly, pos si bly re -lated to some sort of par ti tion at this point of thecave. The ex ten sive floor with the postholes ap -pears to have been in use for a long pe riod of timedue to the sig nif i cant thickness.

Spits 14, 15 and 16 fea ture pot tery types ofthe Mid dle Neo lithic pe riod, while a small num -ber of LNIa matt-painted and black bur nishedwares con tin ued to ap pear. A sam ple from spit 14led to an age fixed as DEM-1138, 6125±42 BP or5200–4960 BC.

Pure MN strata ap peared from the level ofspit 17 on ward, which fea tured a char coal sam pleof an age fixed as DEM-1137, 6722±20 BP or

5660–5570 BC. Spit 18 also fea tured an ab so lutedat ing (DEM-1136, 6618±22 BP or 5610–5520BC. In spit 19 MN finds were very scarce and theab so lute dat ing showed con sid er able chro no log i -cal dif fer ence from the pre vi ous layer (DEM-1118, 6794±21 BP or 5710–5650 BC.) Spit A21fea tured a sim i lar dat ing (DEM-1117, 6779±42BP or 5710–5640 BC). Sparse MN finds aroundthe hearth con tin ued to oc cur up to spit 23 (330cm) in clayish layer with lime stone éboulis. Thislayer cor re sponds to the MN/EN bound ary.

Trench A – Ex ten sion

Trench A was ex tended in or der to study inmore de tail the lay ers of Mesolithic and EarlyNeo lithic, as well as the tran si tion from the for -


Fig. 5. Trench A. A floor of the early Late Neo lithic

mer to the lat ter. Squares 5, 6, and 9 were ex ca -vated. The se quence of lay ers be low spit 23 (330cm) con sisted of the fol low ing lithostratigraphicunits (Fig. 6).

Unit 1 – a layer of dark brown clay witheboulis con tain ing sta lac tite frag ments, car bon atece mented. Up to the depth of 360 cm the layercon tained rare frag ments of painted pot tery(white-on-red, red-on-grey, black) and un paintedsherds with smooth red or black sur face. Sin glecharcoals of de cid u ous trees and ro dent re mainsalso oc curred.

Unit 2 – a layer of light brown clays with asmall quan tity of an gu lar eboulis was seen from adepth of 360 to 410–430 cm. The unit con tained(Fig. 7) thin-and thick-walled mono chrome ce -ram ics (hemi spher i cal and necked vases) andstone ar ti facts (among oth ers, a sickle in sert on ablade from yel low flint (silex blond) and some ob -sid ian blades) which sug gest the Early Neo lithicage of this unit. A sin gu lar hearth was iden ti fied

at a depth of 418 cm. A se ries of AMS ra dio car -bon dates was ob tained: the mid dle por tion (380–390 cm) gave the date of 7460±50 BP(6430–6220 BC) (Poz-9842); the lower por tion (400–410 cm)– the date (square 11) of 7 560±50 BP (6470–6330/6320–6250 BC)(Poz-9843) and, at the bor -der of units 2 and 3 the date 7 680±40 BP (6600–6450 BC) (Poz-22182). Unit 2 yielded bones ofdo mes ti cated an i mals, namely sheep/goat (Ovis/Capra sp.). 55 bone frag ments match the size ofsheep and goat and prob a bly be long to these spe -cies. The skel e tal re mains were: 5 teeth, 1 ver te -bra, 5 rib frag ments, 1 car pal bone (lunatum), 2ul nae, 2 ra dius, 1 pel vis frag ment, 1 fe mur, 1 cal-caneus, 1 ta lus, 3 meta tar sals and 1 pha lanx. A cut mark can be seen on a frag ment of a limb bone(prob a bly ra dius); small bone frag ment (1 cmlength) shows traces of burn ing and an other ofgnaw marks of small car ni vore (fox or small dog). Re mains of other fau nal spe cies in unit 2 are veryrare, and be long to birds (rock par tridge –


Fig. 6. Profil W of Trench A, sq. 5–6, with pro jec tion of AMS dates on the lithostratigraphic se quence. Note:sed i ments are slop ing to the East and South; in con se quence of this the depths in sq. 14, 15 are not ex actly cor re -spond ing to the rel a tive po si tion of sam ples on pro file W

Alectoris graeca, rock pi geon – Columba liviaand jack daw – Corvus monedula). These birds are known also from the pre-Neo lithic lay ers of thecave, and rep re sent rocky en vi ron ments.

In be tween unit 2 and 4 there is a weakly de -vel oped clayey sed i ment, red dish in col our, withrare eboulis, de fined as unit 3. In the West pro fileunit 3 is sev eral cm thick, whereas in the Northand the East pro files its thick ness is up to 30 cm.The ex ca va tion of squares 2 and 3 in the north ernpart of trench A in the year 2008 al lowed to de ter -mine the con tents and struc ture of unit 3: on onelevel in the cen tre of a red dish layer 3 flat heartsup to 50 cm in di am e ter were dis cov ered. One ofthe hearth is lo cated next to a large lime stone

block at the bound ary of squares 2 and 3. The cul -ture ma te ri als from the up per por tion of unit 3(ex ca va tions in 2008 in clud ing) con sisted only ofabout 10 stone artefacts namely: 2 ini tial macro-blade cores from dolomitized lime stone peb bles,sin gle plat form flake core from sand stone (lat eralprep a ra tion of the back), a tra peze on an ob sid ianmacroblade, and flakes from lime stone and brown radiolarite. More over, two sherd were found: afrag ment of the rim of an everted bowl frombrown clay with min eral tem per, well smoothedand frag ment of the belly of a spher i cal thin-walled ves sel with cream col ored sur face andwith min eral tem per. The level with the hearths inunit 3 pro vided the fol low ing ra dio car bon AMS


Fig. 7. Finds from EN Mono chrome phase lay ers (unit 2): 1 – sickle blade from the yel low flint, 2, 3 – in ten tion -ally trun cated ob sid ian blades, 4–8 – mono chrome pot tery

dates: 7780±50 BP (6690–6500 BC) (Poz-22647); 7740±50 BP (6650–6470 BC) (Poz-27941) and 7810±50 BP (6780–6500 BC) (Poz-27242). This dates are older from the ear li estdates for unit 2 (7680 BP) and – at the same time – later than the fi nal dates for unit 4 (7950–7960BP). The pres ence of mono chrome ce ram ics, themacroblade tchnique and Melean ob sid ian in di -cate that unit 3 (at least its mid dle and up per por -tion) cor re spond to the ear li est Neo lithic set tle -ment on the Sarakenos Cave. The fauna from unit3 (fau nal re mains from the ex ca va tions in 2007only were iden ti fied) is rep re sented by only a fewbird bones (com mon quail – Coturnix coturnix,rock pi geon – Columba livia, corn bunt ing –Emberiza calandra and star ling – Sturnus sp. cf.vulgaris and red-billed chough – Pyrrhocoraxpyrrhocorax).

Unit 4 is com posed of dark brown al mostblack clays with a high est con tent of loamy frac -tion and or ganic mat ter. To wards the floor thislayer passes into brown and red dish clays, sand -ier, with a small com po nent of or ganic frac tion.This unit was reg is tered at a depth of 410/430 cmand 500 cm. Micromorphological ex am i na tions(Bull ock et al., 1986, Stoops, 2003) showed thatthe top por tion of this dark brown clays (sam plesMS1 and MS2 on the pro file – Figs 8, 9) con -tained a large amount of un sorted plant re mains:roots, stalks and leaves, within silty ma te rial withquartz grains. The pres ence of the plant re mains is of anthropogenic or i gin and the groundmass isanthropogenically re worked. In groundmass frag -mented shells with sec ond ary cal cium car bon atesare rec og niz able. The grains of min er als areunweathered. In sep a rated ag gre gates typ i cal iron


Fig. 8. Micromorphological fea tures of unit 4, sam ple MS 1 (see Fig. 6)

nod ules oc cur. Illuviation pro cesses are weaklymarked as ini tial clay coat ings; frag mented claycoat ings oc cur also in cracks form ing struc turessim i lar to papules (Kemp, 1991) aris ing in freez -ing con di tions. Strong anthropization of this unitcon trasts with the pres ence of rare ar ti facts: onlyone ob sid ian bladelet has been found in it. On theother hand, the up per por tion of unit 4 con tainedlime stone peb bles with scars shap ing flake cores,mainly discoidal, and lime stone flakes (Fig. 10).Ini tially these ar ti facts may have been over lookedin the mass of lime stone rub ble in the cave. Thus,the pres ence of scars on the lime stone peb bles that were brought from the ex te rior of the cave, fromthe al lu vial at the foot of the slope, is an ar gu mentin sup port of the in ten tional na ture of these spec i -mens. Only one radiolarite bladelet (Fig. 10: 5)

and one par tially cor ti cal small flake from blackhornstone (Fig. 10: 4) were found in the up per -most part of unit 4.

Unit 4 fea tured rel a tively abun dant re mainsfrom small mam mals and birds (Ta ble 1). Bird re -mains (63 iden ti fied frag ments) mainly rep re sentspe cies con nected with open and dry en vi ron -ments and/or rocky ar eas. It is highly prob a blethat most of these spe cies nested on the cliffs, inrock crev ices or on ledges around the en trance ofthe cave. Only 3 spe cies re quired other breed ingen vi ron ments: the Pochards (Aythyini) – open wa -ter bod ies, the Corn Bunt ing (Emberiza calandra) and the Hawfinch (Coccothraustases coccothraustases) – woods and shrubs, Some of these spe cies ap peared in units 2 and 3. The most abun dant isthe pi geon (60% of re mains) prob a ble dweller of



rocks in the vi cin ity of the cave, rep re sented byyoung and very young spec i mens. This spe ciesmust have been par tic u larly at trac tive to the hu -man in hab it ants of the cave dur ing the sed i men ta -tion of unit 4, because some burnt bones with ashwere recorded inside the cave.

Unit 4 fea tured small mam mals, namely ro -dents and in secti vores (36 iden ti fied frag ments).Ro dents are rep re sented al most ex clu sively bygrass land and open coun try dwell ers. The Guen-ther’s vole (Microtus guentheri) is an en demicspe cies re stricted to Anatolia and the south-east -


Fig. 10. Lime stone and sand stone ar ti facts from the top of unit 4

ern Bal kans. It is found in dry ar eas, mead ows,pas tures with sparse veg e ta tion on well-drainedsoils. Rem nants of mouse (Mus sp.) are un iden ti -fi able on the spe cies level, but prob a bly rep re sentsout-east ern Bal kan or Med i ter ra nean spe cies.

Charcoals from the top of unit 4 con tain pre -dom i nantly oak (Quercus robus and Quercuspubescens) and Pru nus (iden ti fi ca tion by B.deLarebeyrette). All these data con firm that the sed -

i men ta tion of unit 4 took place in de cid u ous wood environment.

Dat ing of unit 4 is based on AMS dates fromthe top of this unit – the humic sublayer rich ineboulis [(depth of 410 cm; square 7/11) – 7950±50 BP (7050–6690 BC) (Poz-22649); (depth of429 cm; square 7/11 – 7960±50 BP (7050–6690BC) (Poz-22648); (depth of 395 cm, square 5) –7960±40 BP (7050–6690 BC) (Poz-22666);


Ta ble 1An i mal re mains from Sarakenos Cave

No Taxon Habitat preferencesAr chae o log i cal pe riod

TotalUnit 4 Unit 3 Unit 2/3 Unit 2

1 Pochards – (Aythyini) open wa ter 5/1 5/1

2 Rock Par tridge – Alectoris graeca dry, open rocky coun try 2/1 1/1 3/2

3 Com mon Quail – Coturnix coturnix open fields and mead ows 1/1 1/1

4 Rock Pi geon – Columba livia rocks, cliffs, prec i pices 26/3 1/1 1 2/1 30/5

5 Pi geon – Columba sp.rocks, de cid u ous ormixed for ests

13/2 1 1/1 15/3

6Swal lows Hirundinidae (Crag Mar -tin Ptyonoprogne cf. rupestris)

craggy rocks 1/1 1/1

7 Corn Bunt ing – Emberiza calandraopen en vi ron ments,scrub

1/1 1/1 2/2

8Hawfinch – Coccothraustescoccothraustes

de cid u ous or mixedwood land

1/1 1/1

9 Star ling – Sturnus sp. (cf. vulgaris)open en vi ron ments, open wood lands, rocks

11/3 1/1 12/4

10Red-billed Chough – Pyrrhocoraxpyrrhocorax

high moun tains, rockyar eas

1/1 1/1 2/2

11 Jack daw – Corvus monedula cliffs, wood land 1/1 1/1 2/2

12Corvids Corvidae indet. (Jack daw or Chough)

cliffs, wood land 1 1

13 Hedge hog – Erinaceus sp. open wood, scrub 1/1 1/1

14 Mole – Talpa sp. grass land, wood land 1/1 1/1

15Guenther's vole – Microtusguentheri

dry mead ows, grass land 6/4 6/4

16 Pine Vole – Microtus (Terricola) sp. mead ows, rocky hab i tats, wood land

2/2 2/2

17 Vole – Microtus sp. var i ous hab i tats 21/18 21/18

18 Field Mouse – Apodemus sp. var i ous hab i tats 1/1 1/1

19 Mouse – Mus sp. grass land, bushes 4/3 4/3

20 Hare – Lepus sp. open hab i tats 1/1 1/1

21 Sheep/Goat – Ovis sp./Capra sp. var i ous hab i tats 1/1 24/1 25/2

22cf. Sheep/Goat – cf. Ovis sp./Caprasp.

var i ous habitats 31 31

The first num ber in the col umn re fers to NISP (the num ber of iden ti fied spec i mens) the sec ond to MNI (the min i mum num ber ofin di vid u als). Birds (Aves): 1-12; in sec tiv o rous mam mals (Insectivora): 13-14; ro dents (Rodentia): 15-19; lagomorphs(Lagomorpha): 20; even-toed ungulates (Artiodactyla): 21-22

(depth 420 cm, square 14 – 7980± 50 BP(7050–6690 BC) (Poz-22183)]. The oak char coalfrom the lower por tion of unit 4 (depth 460–465cm, square 14) has been dated to 8590± 50 BP(7730–7530 BC) (Poz-21360). The time span ofunit 4 cor re sponds to the Up per Mesolithic(7950–8590 BP). There is only one date from thispor tion of sed i ments which was not in cluded inthis time span: 9990±50 BP (Poz-22184), fromthe depth of 450 cm in square 14.

The lower unit 5 of black-brown clay sed i -ments, strongly plas tic, that con tained hearths insitu and nu mer ous charcoals. Micromorphology(sam ple MS 3 on the pro file – Fig. 11) shows thevughy-chan nel microstructure in a larger part ofthin sec tions. Coarse ma te rial con sists mainly ofquartz, sparse feld spars and rocky frag ments. The

grains of quartz have cracked sur faces and sharpedges. The red dish brown ma te rial is anthropoge-netically changed. The groundmass con sists ofloamy silty ma te rial mixed with frag mented or -ganic re mains and de stroyed clay coat ings. Thissed i ment fills the cracks; on edges of thin sec tionthe de com posed or ganic re mains are ver ti cally ar -ranged. These cracks could be the re sult of des ic -ca tion of loamy and clayey ma te rial in the cave.This unit is strat i fied at a depth of 500 to 570 cm.

Micromorphological anal y ses were per -formed also for the hearth in square 14 (sam pleMS 4 – Fig. 12). The pro file of the hearth showsthat the hearth was made in a ba sin-shaped de -pres sion sub se quently bur ied by loamy clay,which was then burnt in ox i diz ing con di tions,thus the red dish color (Fig. 13). The crumb and



vughy microstructure in thin sec tions oc cur. Thegroundmass is more mas sive. Pore and cracks inthe hearth were due to high tem per a ture. In min er -al og i cal com po si tion dom i nates small quartzgrains, spo rad i cally feld spars, bi o tite and rockyfrag ments, while the or ganic mat ter is represented by charcoals (Fig. 12).

De spite strong anthropization this unit con -tained only a few stone ar ti facts in the level of550–570 cm. Sev eral bladelets (Fig. 14: 1) andone flake were made from radiolarite, black flintand chal ce dony. Only one tool was found in thisunit: a dis tal notch on a blade-flake from finegrain brown sand stone (Fig. 14: 2). More over,there were blade-flake sin gle plat form cores anddiscoidal cores for flakes made on chunks and

lime stone peb bles. The chro no log i cal po si tion ofthis unit is based on ra dio car bon AMS date on ade cid u ous char coal frag ment from the top por tion(depth 500 cm, square 14): 9940±60 BP (9680–9270 BC) (Poz-21418), and also on the date of10050±50 BP (9870–9360 BC) (Poz-21359). It ishighly prob a ble that the en tire unit 5 rep re sentsthe very be gin ning of the Ho lo cene, and thelithics are of Early Mesolithic age. The pres enceof bones of bats – Vespertilionidae fam ily (iden ti -fi ca tion by B. Woloszyn) in di cates that the cli -mate was some what cooler than the pres ent Med i -ter ra nean cli mate, closer to the conditions of thePannonian Plain.

Unit 6 – the low er most sed i ment ex ca vated in trench A – is a light brown clay with out eboulis


Fig. 12. Micromorphological fea tures of the hearth in unit 5, sam ple MS 4 (see Fig. 6)

and with out anthropogenic traces, ex cept abacked bladelet from radiolarite (Fig. 14: 3). Thisunit was un cov ered to a depth of 590 cm (Fig. 15). The Fi nal Pleis to cene age of this unit is con firmed by the AMS date on a de cid u ous char coal fromthe top por tion (depth of 510 cm, square 11) –11910±60 BP (11980–11620 BC) (Poz-21361).

De spite the rare artifactual ev i dence the ar -chae o log i cal finds from the base of strati graphicunit 2 and from the up per/mid dle part of unit 3can be at trib uted to the Mono chrome phase of theEN, which pre ceded the painted phase of this pe -riod. Chro no log i cally this Mono chrome phase ofthe EN in Sarakenos, dated be tween 7860 and7560 BP (6500–6400 BC) is com pa ra ble with theear li est ra dio car bon dates from the Greek Neo -lithic [e.g. 7611±83 BP (6591-6222 BC) (P-169)from Sesklo;8180+-150 BP (7503-6625 BC)(Q-655) and 7557±91 BP (6537-6180 BC) (P-1202) from Nea Nikomedea – Pyke and Yiouni,1996; 7550±60 BP (6461-6215 BC) (LJ-3180)from Achilleion – Gimbutas et al., 1989), in clud -ing the dates from ear li est EN strata at Elateia –Wein berg, 1962 (7480±70 BP = 6450-6171 BC(Grn-2973) – from trench 1, NE part) which is ter -ri tori ally clos est (about 40–50 km west) to theSarakenos Cave.

The lower part of the se quence in Trench Ashows two im por tant hi a tuses:

1. be tween units 2, 3 and 4 i.e. be tween themono chrome phase of the Early Neo lithic and theLate Mesolithic, a hi a tus of only 120–140 ra dio -car bon years,

2. be tween units 5 and 6, i.e. be tween theEarly Mesolithic and the Fi nal Palaeo lithic, a hi a -tus of about 2000 radiocar bon years.

Trench B

Trench B mea sures 2.80 × 2.50 m. and startsfrom the level of Mid dle Neo lithic where the soilwas un dis turbed (Fig. 16). The MN spits 16–22 of Trench A cor re spond to the spits 1–6 of Trench Band this was also con firmed by the ab so lute dat ing in spit 3 (DEM-1164, 6891±25 BP or 5790–5730BC). A thin layer of the Early Neo lithic datesfrom the end of 7th mill. BC (DEM-1211, 7261±20 BP or 6200–6035 BC).

The Mesolithic stra tum com prised manyhearths re mains, mainly in the NE cor ner of the


Fig. 13. Sec tion of the hearth in the lower part of unit5 (square 14)

Fig. 14. Trench A. Bladelet and notched im ple ment from unit 5 (1, 2) and backed bladelet from unit 6 (3)

trench, but fea tur ing hardly any finds. The oc cur -rence in this stra tum of stone de bris from the roofat tested to cold cli ma tic phases cor re spond ing tothe Lower Mesolithic pe riod. Three ab so lutedates from this stra tum (DEM-1206, 9233±30 BPor 8530–8340 BC, DEM-1209, 9177±31BP or8450–8290 BC, and DEM-1210, 9230±30 BP or8530–8340 BC) dated this layer to the be gin ningof the Mesolithic. The same thick layer of hearthsoc curred also in Trench A led to older dates about600–700 years BP. Other parts of the trench(DEM-1207, 8057±36 BP or 7080–6840 BC andDEM-1208, 8073±30 BP or 7105–7040 BC) were dated to the Up per Mesolithic, con tem po ra ne ousto those of Trench A.

The low est part of the se quence con sists ofdark brown ish clay with out lime stone rub ble andbrown clay with weath ered lime stone frag ments

fill ing the chan nels cut in the bed rock, lined withcar bon ate pre cip i ta tions (Fig. 17). The darkbrown ish clay fur nished some Fi nal/Late Palaeo -lithic (Epigravettian?) artefacts, among them aconcave re touched trun ca tion on an ob sid ianblade. Small charcoals from these sed i ments havebeen dated by Ra dio car bon Ac cel er a tor Unit atthe Lab o ra tory in Oxford to 12345±70 BP(13100–12150 BC).

The un dated low est brown clay fea tured sev -eral flint and radiolarite artefacts that can be at -trib uted to the Mid dle/Up per Palaeo lithic tran si -tion or to the Ini tial Up per Palaeo lithic. The Leva- lloisian points and flakes from cen trip e tal coresoc cur parallely to the blades de tached from bi po -lar cores, re sem bling the “tran si tional” in dus tryfrom layer VI (trench TD-II) in Temnata Cave(Bul garia) (Drobniewicz et al., 2000). Among oc -


Fig. 15. Trench A extension. The Mesolithic and Palaeo lithic lay ers

ca sional re touched tools there are some side-scrap ers, denticulated-notched im ple ments and ablade with dis tal thin ning by Kostenki tech nique.

Trench D

Par al lel to trench A, from 2004 the ex ca va -tion con cen trated on a new trench (Trench D) inthe cen tre of the cave (Figs 18, 19). Ini tially itmea sured 4 x 4m but later it moved to wards thesouth and east and dou bled in size (36 sq.m). Thetrench was opened at the level of Late Neo lithicIa, and it re vealed floors at var i ous depths, apleth ora of pot tery, an i mal bones, and stone tools. Fur ther more, hearths of spe cial in ter est were re -corded. From the start of the ex ca va tion ex ten sive floors and hearths ap peared, while finds weremore abun dant in the east ern part of the trench.

The LN pot tery was plenty and of ex cep tionalqual ity, whereas in the Mid dle and Early Neo -lithic pot tery samples were dramatically reduced.

In Trenches A and D it has been ob servedthat, while an abun dance of pot tery and other ob -jects is noted within the higher strata, the num berof finds falls from the LNIa level down wards, al -though strata were gen er ally thicker. In some lay -ers with yel low ish clay de pos its pot tery was con -sid er ably scanty. How ever, the use of the cave inthe Late Neo lithic Ia was par tic u larly long, sinceit oc cu pies a con sid er able number of layers.

In the south side in 2005 un usu ally large fig u -rines of the Late Neo lithic were found, whereas at a lim ited space of the east ern ex ten sion in 2006frag ments of fig u rines were traced to gether intens, and many more, al most in tact. To tally, 160parts or in tact fig u rines were found around and


Ta ble 2Micromorphological fea tures of sed i ments from Sarakenos Cave, Trench A extension

Sam -ple

Depthcm

Microstructure Chan nel

Groundmass Pedofeature

Coarse ma te rial Fine ma te rial Nod ulesIn fill ings and

coat ings

Or ganic mat terother bi o log i cal

actiwity

1 300-310

Subangularblocky, ag gre -gates stronglysep a rated

Vughs

Quartz grains,feldspares,small rock frag -ment

yel low ishbrown silty loam, b-fab ric - cristalitic,micromass -

Typic anddigitatedironnod ules

Calciun car bon -ate coat ing and infilling

De com posedplants, shellsfrag ment

2 310-320

Subangularblocky, ag gre -gates stronglysep a rated

Vughs,crumb

Quartz grains,spo rad i callyfeldspare rockfrag ment

or ange brownsilty loam,b-fab ric –grano andmosaicstriated

Typic ironnod ules

Clay coat ingandhypocoaring,weak de vel -oped andde stroyed claycoat ings

De com posedplants andcharcoalsmixed withgroundmass,shells frag ment, frag mentedbones

3 500-505 Crumbs, vughsVughs,chan nels,crumb

Quartz grains,

Or ange brownsilty loam,b-fab ric –mosaicstriated

Typic ironnod ules

Clay coat ingandhypocoaring,weak de vel -oped and de -stroyed claycoat ings, clayin fill ings

De com posedplants in ver ti -cal ar range ment as fill ing ofcracks

4 510 CrumbVughs,crumb

Quartz grains,spo rad i callyfeldspare, rockfrag ment,

Zone of red -dish or ange and dark brownsilty loam withash in chan nels, b-fab ric -specled

Typic ironnod ules

Clay coat ingandhypocoaring,and de stroyedclay coat ings

De com posedplants

be low a horn of deer (Fig. 20). In 2007 the eastpart of the trench, lay ers of LN II were dug whichgave coarse pot tery, mostly rounded. Up to 60 cmdepth, fig u rines’ frag ments were spot ted whichre sem ble the ones found in 2006. It seems that thelayer that con tained the fig u rines ex tends east-wards, but fur ther de pos its, and more re cent or -ganic res i dues, 3 m thick, need to be removed inthe future.

Of ex treme im por tance was the rev e la tion oftwo clay-made pits at the east ern side of trench D(Fig. 21). Around them, at a depth of 1.00 m,


Fig. 16. Strati graphi cal sec tion of Trench B

Fig. 17. Trench B. The Mesolithic and Palaeo lithiclay ers


.81 .giF

D hcnerT fo noi tces dna nalp dnuor

G

spans a Late Neo lithic Ia floor of thick clay layermixed with ashes upon which four post hole werefound. The pits were stuffed with stones and soil,and in them coarse Late Neo lithic II sherds werefound along with an i mal bones and fig u rine frag -ments. These were due to the LN II cut ting indeep and in ter sect ing the LN I floor.

In 2007 trench D in its north side reached aMesolithic level (depth of 1.10–1.40 m). withdark red soil, con tained small peb bles, ex ter nallyde cayed, and fea tured a few flints and more mi -crofauna (Fig. 22). In squares 13, 14 the layer ofUp per Palaeo lithic was un earthed, which has afair col or ation. Un for tu nately, this level hasturned into stone in var i ous places due to in tensedrip ping and was hard to de tach. This layer wasex am ined at a depth of 2.60 m and gave a mar -ginal number of flints.

The study of stra tig ra phy showed that the ENlayer in trench D is far thin ner that the one in

trench A, and at its up per side there is a thin layerof eboulis that was also spot ted in trench A.

THE POT TERY SE QUENCE

Early and Mid dle Neo lithic

Start ing from the be gin ning of the Neo lithic(ex cept for the mono chrome phase) the over allquan tity of EN and MN painted ware in side theSarakenos Cave is not large due to the lim ited useof the cave dur ing these pe ri ods. It has been ob -served that small, thin-walled vases pre vailed inthis phase, while large coarse vases and pithoidswere ab sent. An anal o gous case was the Cy clopsCave on Youra (Sampson, 1998, 2008). It hasbeen also noted that closed shapes oc cur morecom monly than open ones.

The typ i cal red dec o ra tion on white-creamcol oured ground pre vailed on the painted pot terydur ing this phase. In most cases, dec o ra tive mo -


Fig. 19. Sarakenos Cave. Sea son of 2008


Fig. 20. Fig u rines around a horn of deer

Fig. 21. Trench D. Clay-made pits of Late Neo lithic II

tifs were painted upon a layer of slip. Dec o ra tionrep er toire mainly con sists of lin ear and sim plemo tifs that, in com par i son with the matt-painteddec o ra tion mo tifs, ap pear sig nif i cantly lim ited inin spi ra tion. Among the early painted ware oc curcer tain mo tifs re lated to the cre ation of a re servedzone in ei ther a loz enge or tri an gu lar ar range -ment; this zone is filled with par al lel lines or netpat tern (hatched or cross-hatched pat terns). Thebor der ing band often occurs in a rhomboid(lozenge) shape.

The painted ware from Cen tral Greece con sti -tutes a sep a rate group ing in pot tery than the cor re -spon dent one from Thessaly. Theocharis (1973,77) stresses this dif fer en ti a tion in de scrib ing thepot tery from Chaeronea as more con ser va tivethan the Thessalian ware; he re gards dec o ra tionmo tifs from Cen tral Greece as more sim ple andse vere in ar range ment than the Thessalian ones,with a pre vail ing ten dency for ge om e try in style.

Efstratiou (1985) had be lieved that the paintedware from Ayios Petros are to be placed within awide range of in flu ence from the Chaeroneagroup and not from Thessaly, where dec o ra tionmo tifs are geometric but are rendered in freestyle.

Late Neo lithic I

In Late Neo lithic I ex cept for the plain mono -chrome and coarse ware (Fig. 23), an im por tantabun dance of dec o rated, matt-painted ware oc -curs, as well as the dis tin guished ad vanced pot -tery wares, such as the grey, black bur nished (Fig. 24), and the urfirnis.

Black bur nished ware

The black col our is typ i cal of this pe riod andsim i lar with the cor re spond ing one from Thessaly (Tsangli, the Laris sa Cul ture), Euboea (Varka,


Fig. 22. Trench D. Neo lithic and Mesolithic layers


Fig. 23. Types of vases of LN Ia

Tharrounia), and Boeotia. Apart from the vases’sur face, this black col our also pen e trates in the in -te rior due to pro longed re duc ing fir ing con di tions(Childe, 1936/37, 27). In con trast to what was be -lieved un til re cently, pet ro log i cal anal y ses hasshown that these vases were fired in rel a tively low tem per a tures. Ana lysed sam ples from Tharrouniaand Varka in Psachna (Sampson, 1977) provedthat this pot tery ware was fired in re duc ing con di -tions and tem per a tures lower than 750°. An ex -per i men tal re pro duc tion of this pot tery that hasde fined their spe cific pro duc tion pro ce dure wascon ducted in the labs of the In sti tute of Nu clearPhys ics, NCSR Demokritos (Kylicoglou andManiatis, 1993). The tech nol ogy of these vases isar gu ably of par tic u larly high stan dards, fea tur ingex cep tional qual ity of slip and bur nish ing. Inmany cases, their vit ri fied, most lus trous slip isevo ca tive of the Clas si cal black-glazed vases. Ex -cept for the par tic u larly thin walls, what is alsoev i dent of the spe cial care taken in their pro duc -tion is their re lief dec o ra tion, which ap pears tohave been ex e cuted with the use of a mould. Bur -nished dec o ra tion is a tech nique gen er ally foundon many sam ples. It is pro duced with the use of abur nish ing im ple ment, while es pe cially lus trousor na ments ap pear af ter firing.

At Otzaki and Arapi Magoula black bur -nished make their ap pear ance to wards the end ofthe Sesklo phase (Grundmann, 1932, 102, 109).In the Peloponnese, black bur nished seem to ap -pear at Franchthi ear lier than matt-painted ware(Jaco- bsen 1973); the same is true for Cor inth(Lavezzi, 1978, 430). Ac cord ing to Holmberg(1964, 35) the cen tre of their pro duc tion was lo -cated in Boeotia and Pthiotis, from where theyspread through out Greece. More over, this ware

has been lo cated at Lerna (Caskey, 1958), Asea(Holmberg, 1944, 41, 48) and Ayiorgitika in Ar -ca dia (AJA, 1928, 533).

In Cen tral Greece, black bur nished have been found at Chaeronea and Orchomenos (Kunze,1931), Ayia Ma rina, Souvala, and Kalami inBoeotia (French, 1972), Elateia (Wein berg 1962,pl. 60a,d), Eutresis (Caskey 1960), the CorycianCave (Touchais, 1980, 132, figs. 21–23), NeaMakri (Theocharis, 1956, 18), Palaia Kokkinia(Theocharis, 1951, Fig. 7), the Eu rip i des Cave onSalamina, Pousi Kalogeri in Markopoulo, theKitsos Cave (Lam bert 1981, pls. X–XXI), andAstakos in Akarnania (Benton, 1947, fig. 11: 71).

Gray ware

Al though it was ini tially be lieved that greyware was the pot tery tech nique in di cat ing the be -gin ning of the Late Neo lithic pe riod, both ear lierand more re cent digs have proven that both greyand black bur nished wares si mul ta neously ap pearin the be gin ning of this era.

In Cen tral Greece such vases have been re -cov ered at Orchomenos, Chaeronea, Elateia, NeaMakri (Theocharis, 1956, figs. 33–36), the Athe -nian Acrop o lis (south ern slopes), the Eu rip i desCave on Salamina (Phelps, 1975, 236), the Cory-cian Cave (Phelps, 1975, fig. 32: 22; Touchais1980), and Astakos in Akarnania (Benton, 1947,179; Phelps, 1975, Fig. 11: 66–68). In the KitsosCave (Lam bert, 1981, pl. XXXIII), grey sherdsare lim ited in number.

In Thessaly, grey ware was mainly found inthe Otzaki and Tsangli Phases, to gether withblack and matt-painted wares. They have also ap -peared in Tsani (AJA, 1947, 174), and MagoulaArapi (AA, 1955, 188).

Urfirnis ware

In the Sarakenos Cave, this cat e gory is rep re -sented by few sherds lo cated within LNIa andMN strata, at the tran si tional pe riod be tween theMid dle Neo lithic and Late Neo lithic Ia pe ri ods.Clay is com monly red dish, ex cep tion ally pure,with out any in clu sions, but is some times grey -ish-tile in col our, pos si bly due to dif fer ent firingconditions.

The urfirnis pot tery is con sid ered as a Pelo-ponnesian in no va tion that gen er ally dif fused in


Fig. 24. Black bur nished carinated bowl of LN Ia

Cen tral Greece, and to the pres ent it has been re -cov ered in Attica, Boeotia, and Euboea. It is stillnot known why though at Franchthi (Theocharis,1973) and in other sites in the Peloponnese, suchas Cor inth (Walker-Kosmopoulos, 1957; fig. 30),and Lerna (Caskey, 1960, 161), the ex qui siteurfirnis vases date from the Mid dle Neo lithic pe -riod, in Cen tral Greece they are found in de laywithin the early phases of the Late Neo lithic Ia.How ever, it could be said that a dat ing in the tran -si tional pe riod from the Mid dle to the Late Neo -lithic is safer in ref er ence to Cen tral Greece. AtVarka in Psachna, Urfirnis ware was found within the ear li est stra tum of the set tle ment, along withthe lim ited in num ber MN painted ware, andTheocharis (1959, 287) had al ready dated this cat -e gory to the early Late Neolithic period.

Mattpainted ware

The matt-painted cat e gory be longs to the pot -tery ware most widely dif fused dur ing the LateNeo lithic pe riod through out Greece. Matt-painted ware ap peared in the LNIa phase, soon af ter theap pear ance of the black bur nished and greywares, but, un like these, it fea tures a long du ra -tion. It pre vailed dur ing the lon gest part of thesuc ces sive LNIb phase, as proven by the ex ca va -tions of the Sarakenos Cave and the SkoteiniCave at Tharrounia (Sampson, 1993). Vases ofthe late matt-painted ware may ex hibit a greaterva ri ety in re spect of the ground and dec o ra tivemo tifs colours, whereas bichrome vases withblack and red dec o ra tion also begin to appearduring this phase.

Matt-painted vases in all re gions are com -monly man u fac tured from cal car e ous clay andfired at low tem per a tures. Typ i cally in matt-painted ware, the col our of dec o ra tion mo tifs ismatt and the black paint is made of man ga neseclays (Kylikoglou and Maniatis, 1993). How ever, cases where the col our of the mo tifs is not matt do also oc cur. Thus, vari a tions in the ap pear ance ofthese vases have been ob served in Euboea, e.g. atVarka of Psachna (Sampson, 1977) and at Tharro- unia, where five dif fer ent groups were spec i fied.A sim i lar vari a tion was also ob served in theSarakenos Cave and Chaeronea (H. Tzavella un -der pub li ca tion). The shapes were open carinatedbowls or closed ves sels with high neck and han -

dles un der the mouth 28 open and 14 closed typesof vases have been found in Sarakenos Cave.

Matt-painted ware dec o ra tion is in fi nite inva ri ety (Fig. 25, 26). In fact, it can be said thatthrough out the Neo lithic Age it is the Late Neo -lithic I painted ware that pre vails in style, orig i -nal ity, and qual ity of dec o ra tion. A lim it less va ri -ety of dec o ra tive mo tifs oc curs, while cer taintypes are also rep li cated. A char ac ter is tic of thepot ters’ un lim ited in spi ra tion in this pe riod is thefact that one can hardly find any sim i lar i ties be -tween the dec o ra tive mo tifs of dif fer ent sites, de -spite the vi cin ity, as in the case of Chaeronea,Sarakenos, Varka of Psachna, and Tharrounia.

In the last years, new the o ries in archaeologyin sist on the study of se man tics of all dec o ra tivemo tifs found on pot tery, which cer tainly can notbe ac ci den tal, and in most cases are in dic a tive ofthe crafts man-pot ter’s dis po si tion and tem per a -ment. The ideo log i cal mean ing of the dec o ra tivepat terns is un ques tion able, and con sid er ing thatthis ma te rial is to day avail able to us only throughpainted pot tery, the value of its sig nif i canceshould be ap pre ci ated. Is it merely a co in ci dencethat in the early Late Neo lithic pe riod man ex -presses him self through so many dec o ra tive mo -tifs in the en tire Greek ter ri tory, from North ernThessaly to the south ern end of the Peloponnese?And what could the ab sence of ex pres sion in un -painted and monochrome pottery that prevails inlater Neolithic phases mean?

Matt-painted ware is widely spread but par -tic u larly abun dant in sites of the Peloponnese,such as Franchthi (Jacobsen, 1969, 369), Alepo-trypa (Papathanassopoulos, 1996), Lerna(Caskey, 1959, 204), and Cor inth (Wein berg,1937). In Cen tral Greece, this ware oc curs atElateia (Wace – Thomp son, 1912, 112, 204),Chaeronea, Orchomenos, Ayia Ma rina (PAE,1910, 163–167), Eutresis (Caskey, 1960, 130),the Kitsos Cave (BCH, 1971, 714), PousiKaloyeri, Nea Makri (Theocharis, 1956), and theCave of Pan (Ergon, 1958). In Euboea, a ma jorcen tre of pro duc tion should be marked in the val -ley of Psachna – Triadha, Skoteini Cave at Thar-rounia (Sampson, 1993). In West ern Greece, thispot tery oc curs at Astakos (Benton, 1947), andLeukas. In Thessaly, it is widely dif fused, withma jor sites of re cov ery those of Otzaki, Tsangliand Arapi Magoula (Milojcic, 1955, 173, Fig. 6).



Fig. 25. Frag ments of mattpainted pot tery

Fig. 26. Frag ments of mattpainted pot tery

Late Neo lithic II

The LNII pot tery is un der study as a wholehere, de spite the in no va tions in pot tery tech nol -ogy noted in the sec ond half of this pe riod that in -tro duced new pot tery types, such as the nu mer ousred bowls, the rolled rim type, and the last gen er a -tion of scoops. The abun dance of pot tery foundwithin the Sarakenos LNII strata is mainly courseand mono chrome, while dec o rated sam ples arelim ited. Clay oc curs in var i ous to nal i ties of col our and it is al ways well fired. The type of slip pre -vail ing is fairly thick and com monly red, while ablack slip is not absent.

Gonia ware

As a rule, this cat e gory of pot tery is mainlyfea tured by painted dec o ra tion in red and black.Dec o ra tion in red pre vails over all, while the useof black is lim ited in the out lin ing the ba sic dec o -ra tive mo tifs in red. Red paint is in this case com -monly lus trous, in con trast to that oc ca sion ally tobe found among matt-painted ware. On the con -trary, black paint is dull, ob vi ously due to the ma -te ri als in use, rich in man ga nese in clu sions. Broad

dec o ra tive bands/zones con sti tute an other mainchar ac ter is tic of the Gonia-type ware (Fig. 27).

The stra tum within which the great est amount of Gonia-type vases were found is at trib uted tothe early LN II pe riod or the tran si tion be tweenLN Ib and LN IIa phases. There fore, it is the lat est painted ware to have been re cov ered and the onlyone of the LN II pe riod. How ever, its dif fu sion inMain land Greece seems to be par tic u larly lim ited, while the found sam ples apart from the ones fromthe Sarakenos Cave are rep re sented by a lim itednum ber of sherds from the Cave of Pan and theSouth ern Slopes of the Acrop o lis at Ath ens (forthe dif fu sion of this ware, see Phelps, 1975).

Of crit i cal im por tance is the ques tion whether these polychrome vases from the Sarakenos Caveand the other above-men tioned sites in Attica areei ther lo cal prod ucts or vases that were trans -ported and dif fused from the North ern Pelopo-nnese. The pos si bil ity to as so ci ate their oc cur -rence with the move ment of transhumants, whovar i ous schol ars have de scribed as trans port ers ofthis pot tery, seems to be rather a con ve nient andro man tic ex pla na tion. Al ready by the Late Neo -lithic, the ex is tence of large an i mal herds can be


Fig. 27. Pot tery of Gonia type

ac cepted, to judge from the huge quan tity of an i -mal bones in the cave, while, in or der to sup portthem, these would need to be trans ported sea son -ally. Stock-breed ers trans fer ence from the Pelo-ponnese to the moun tains of Boeotia dur ing thesum mer sea son has al ready been men tioned sincean cient times and is known to have lasted un til re -cently. Sophocle’s pas sage re fer ring to shep herdsfrom Argolid on Elikon Moun tain (Oedipus Rex)is sur pris ingly elu ci dat ing and, al though it waswrit ten in the 5th cen tury BC, it re fers to sig nif i -cantly ear lier pe ri ods of time. How ever, it is dif fi -cult to be lieve that stock-breed ers could haveused sim i lar lux u ri ous ves sels dur ing their mov -ing, un less some sort of ex change com merce wasprac tised at the same time. Nev er the less, sys tem -atic anal y sis of this ware from the Sarakenos Cave and the related sites in the Peloponnese couldpossibly contribute more to this problem ofprovenance.

Pat tern bur nished ware

It is a cat e gory of dec o rated pot tery that haspuz zled schol ars un til re cently in ref er ence to itsman u fac ture tech nique and or i gins. This is usu -ally a fine qual ity ware, de spite the fact that theclay is com monly fea tured by many in clu sionsand a grey core. A thin layer of slip, com monlyun bur nished, cov ers the out side, and in the case of open shapes, also the in side sur face of the vases.In suc ces sion, dec o ra tive or na ments are per -formed with the use of a bur nish ing tool. Af ter fir -ing, these pat terns ac quire a lus trous qual ity andstand out strik ingly on the un bur nished ground.Mi cro scopic ob ser va tion (Kylicoglou and Ma nia- tis, 1993) proved that in tense bur nish ing makesclay mol e cules be come more con densed, whichre sults in the char ac ter is tic gloss of or na ments.The vases of the pat tern bur nished ware would befired at a tem per a ture of 750–800°C, while ex per -i men tal pro duc tion of such vases has shown thatbest results follow the application of a coarse-grained slip.

In the Sarakenos Cave, pat tern bur nishedware date from the be gin ning of the Late Neo -lithic II pe riod, and they co-ex ist with red bur -nished ware and bowls of the rolled rim type. This also holds for Euboea and the Peloponnese(Phelps, 1975, 309). At Kum Tepe, on the otherhand, pat tern bur nished ware have oc curred

within an ear lier stra tum and do not co-ex ist withred bur nished bowls.

In Attica, pat tern bur nished ware have beenre cov ered at Asketario in Raphina (PAE, 1953/54, 66), in the Kitsos Cave (Lam bert, 1971, 711),at the Athe nian Agora (Immerwahr, 1971, pl. 69:35), Thorikos (Thorikos, 1967, 24–27), Velatouri(BCH, 1965, Fig. 24), and on Aegina (Renfrew,1972, Fig. 2; Wal ter and Felten, 1937, 20–23). InCen tral Greece such vases oc cur at Orchomenos(Kunze, 1934, pl. XI, fig. 18) and Astakos(Benton, 1947). In Thessaly this par tic u lar ware is rare but has been noted at Tsangli (Wace–Thomp -son, 1912), Kouphovouno (Theocharis, 1958),and Mylopotamos (French, 1972). In Euboea, ithas been found at Plakari in Karystos, Votsika inPsachna, and Tharrounia (Sampson, 1981).

In the Peloponnese, pat tern bur nished warehave been re cov ered at Lerna (Caskey, 1958, pl.37a,b), Prosymna (Blegen, 1937, 357), Franchthi(Jacobsen, 1969, 1973), Cor inth (Wein berg,1937, 511; Phelps, 1975), in the Klenia and Gonia Caves (Phelps, 1975), at Asea (Holmberg, 1944),Ayios Demetrios in Leprea (Zachos, 1987), andVoidokoilia (PAE, 1977, 250, Fig. 4).

In the Aegean, pat tern bur nished ware werefound at Ayio Gala and Emborio on Chios (Hood, 1981), on Samos (Furness, 1956; Felsch, 1988),at Kephala on Keos (Coleman, 1977, pl. 41C),while sam ples were un earthed in the Zas Cave onNaxos and Paros (French, 1961, 114). It is in ter -est ing to note that this spe cific pot tery ware washardly dif fused in the Dodecanese.

THE FIG U RINES

The fig u rines from Sarakenos Cave, dated inthe Late Neo lithic II phase of the cave, add up toan im por tant set, both in quan tity and in qual ity.They mostly rep re sent hu man fig ures and less fre -quently an i mals, with the ex cep tion of two min ia -ture mar ble fig u rines and a mar ble beak-shapedacrolith. They are sim ple rep re sen ta tions, how -ever, in some cases, and a ten dency to wards morenaturalism can be observed.

The big-sized heads, legs or feet, make us be -lieve that many of these fig u rines where ac tu allystat u ettes, with a height about 0.40 m, per hapseven larger. Sim i lar big-sized fig u rines werefound in Thessaly.


The plas tic ma te rial of the cave fea tures acon sid er able num ber of heads. These are mostlymade from a flat (oval or tri an gu lar) clay flankstuck on the up per part of a cy lin dri cal neck. Thetri an gu lar face is com mon for fig u rines of this pe -riod. It is found through out the south and northBal kans, the Aegean and Cy prus dur ing the LateNeolithic period.

Amongst the better pre served fig u rines, wecan dis tin guish a type with joined legs. They arefe male nat u ral is tic fig ures, whose lower part hasbeen pre served. Their post is not com mon, but itcan be found in fig u rines from the mainland.

Con trary to the fe male, male fig u rines did not con sti tute a widely spread choice for Neo lithicfig u rine sculp tors. The male ithy phal lic torso, in -deed, de picts in de tail the creases of the body inthe stom ach area, sim i lar to the torso of ORF33/Sar 33. Both ex am ples can be – roughly – com -pared with a male torso from Thessaly. InSarakenos Cave the male types abound, whereas,gen er ally, dur ing this pe riod they were rarer in the Helladic area.

Fi nally, we should stress the pres ence of anew type in the plas tic ma te rial of Sarakenos,which has had no par al lels so far. They are malesit ting on the ground fig u rines, with legs widelyspread, so that the plas tic ally de picted phal lus isem pha sized (Fig. 28). We could even main tainthat this type is the male coun ter part of fe male fig -u rines in child-birth po si tion. Of the three ex am -ples un earthed, only one al lows us to com pre hend their position better.

It is the first time such a nu mer ous con cen tra -tion of fig u rine plas tic ma te rial was found in amain land cave, while both its na ture and po si tionare still prob lem atic re gard ing its use. It is pos si -ble, in other words, that, among other, one use ofthe cave re lated to cult ac tiv i ties, in which ant lerus age was in volved. In any case, the over all bigsize of the fig u rines found in the cave, dis tin -guishes it from other known caves of the LN pe -riod. On the other hand, the se man tics of these ac -tiv i ties and prac tices per haps in cluded both malefig u rines of the type with widely spread legs andfe male with joined legs as well. We hope that new data will be avail able in the course of the continu-ation of the excavation.

The fig u rine types sug gest a lo cal ‘work -shop’, with a style in tensely nat u ral is tic and forms

roughly at trib uted. The forms share par al lels to ase ries of fig u rines re cently found at a Neo lithicset tle ment near to Thebes. It is noted that all fig u -rines date back to the later phase of the Neo lithic(4500–4000 BC), when the fig u rine man u fac turein other ar eas of Greece had dwin dled. The ab -sence of fig u rines from the lower lay ers, ex ceptfor one in Trench A which was dated in Mid dleNeolithic, is also characteristic.

EVO LU TION OF LITHIC IN DUS TRIES IN THE NEO LITHIC LAY ERS

In the EN and MN lay ers there are only veryfew lithic ar ti facts; this con firms the view that theuse of the Cave dur ing sev eral short oc cu pa tionep i sodes was lim ited. In the EN and MN pe ri odsMelian ob sid ian was reg u larly used (in MN phase 88% of ar ti facts are made of ob sid ian); only a few flint and radiolarite ar ti facts oc cur. Of par tic u larsig nif i cance is the oc cur rence of yel low flint(silex blond), the raw ma te rial typ i cal for EN andMN macroblade in dus tries in East ern Greece


Fig. 28. Trench D. Male fig u rine

(PerlÀs, 1990a; Kozlowski et al., 1996). All theraw ma te ri als, in clud ing ob sid ian, were workedoff-site. Cores and debitage prod ucts from ini tialcore re duc tion are al most ab sent; only splint eredpieces oc cur, rep re sent ing on-site pro duc tion.End-scrap ers and re touched blades rep re sent thegroup of re touched tools. Start ing from the MNtanged ar row heads on blades be gin to ap pear.

The lithic group ings from LN lay ers are much larger, but also made on ob sid ian, whose ra tio isbe tween 93 and 97%; other raw ma te ri als arescarce (flint, radiolarite, opal). Blades, mostlypro duced off-site, are fre quent (lam i nar in dex upto 55%). It is note wor thy that the waste from re -duc tion se quences ap pears more fre quently in thecase of flint and radiolarite than in the group ofob sid ian ar ti facts. The fre quency of re touchedtools is rel a tively high (22%). Tools are rep re -sented by end-scrap ers, re touched blades, denti-culated and notched im ple ments, ar row heads (in -clud ing bifacial points). It is in ter est ing that sickle in serts are very rare: this func tion could be at trib -uted to some re touched trun ca tions, but only twoblades (from the lat est LN phase) show highgloss. This in di cates mi nor im por tance ofharvesting activities in the vicinity of the Cave.

The LN as sem blages from the SarakenosCave are sim i lar to other LN lithics from the caves of cen tral and south ern Greece (Skotini – PerlÀs1993, Kitsos, Alepotrypa – kind in for ma tion of G. Philippakis). This sim i lar ity can be seen in thehigh ra tio of ob sid ian (91–98%), off-site pro duc -tion of blade blanks, high in dex of blades, low in -dex of debitage waste, rel a tively high in dex of re -touched tools rep re sented mostly by end-scrap ers, re touched blades, and the ar row-heads.

ECON OMY OF THE SITE

The scar city of finds does not al low for there con struc tion of the sub sis tence econ omy of theLate/Fi nal Palaeo lithic oc cu pants when the cavefunc tioned as a short-term camp. More over, wecan sup pose that these groups were not iso lated,cir cu lat ing not only on the main land but alsomain tain ing con tacts with the Cyclades (pres enceof ob sid ian from Melos, si mul ta neously with thefirst oc cur rence of this raw ma te rial in theFranchthi Cave – PerlÀs, 1984). More can be saidabout the Mesolithic be hav iour and econ omy.

There is a strik ing con trast be tween the high de -gree of anthropization of the Lower Mesolithiclay ers and the small num ber of lithics, par tic u larly in the Late Mesolithic. This is the ef fect of strongiso la tion of the Mesolithic groups in the Kopaisba sin; iso la tion and dif fi cult ac cess to si li ceousrocks re sulted to Late Mesolithic groups us ing lo -cal lime stone and sand stone peb bles and pro duc -ing atyp i cal cores and flake artefacts. An other as -pect of ad ap ta tion to the lo cal en vi ron men tal con-ditions was the re place ment of big game hunt ingby fowl ing and in creas ing role of plant food. TheMesolithic of the Sarakenos Cave is one of the ex -treme ex am ples of the changes in sub sis tenceecon omy and tech niques of tool pro duc tion be -fore the man i fes ta tion of the first, Early Neo lithic, food pro duc tion econ omy.

Un like the Mesolithic, the EN econ omy wasbased mostly on an i mal (sheep/goat) breed ing.The EN, and also MN groups, used the Cave as ashel ter for sea sonal pas to ral ac tiv i ties.

Within Late Neo lithic strata (end of 5th mil -len nium BC) large quan ti ties of carbonised seedsfound on a floor tes tify ce real and le gume cul ti va -tion in the Kopais re gion (Sampson and Mega-loudi, 2006; Megaloudi, 2008). This in di cates that the spe cies was stored in that place.

The main spe cies re cov ered was einkorn.Triticum monococcum is a very re sis tant wheattype and can grow on de prived soils with out ma -nure, but the ba sin of Kopais Lake can not be con -sid ered as a re gion of such soils. One could saythat this “spe cial iza tion” in einkorn could rep re -sent a sort of cul tural tra di tion al ism as it was pro -posed by Sarpaki (1995) in the case of Balo-menos Toumba at Chaeronea, where con sid er able num bers of Triticum monococcum were also re -vealed. The wild an ces tor of the spe cies would beTriticum boeoticum, a na tive element of the Greek landscape.

A huge group of an i mal bones from the Neo -lithic lay ers of the cave is cur rently be ing stud iedby Dr Trantalidou. Among the do mes ti cated spe -cies oc cur bones of wild an i mals, es pe ciallycervids.

CON CLU SIONS

The Sarakenos Cave is there fore cen tral to the re search of the Neo lithic not only be cause it is one


more case of cave set tle ment, but also be cause the na ture of its find ings ini ti ates a dis cus sion on theim por tance of the sym bolic items for caves, and,gen er ally, the no tional or sym bolic char ac ter ofthe cul tural ma te rial of caves. The par ex cel lencesym bolic items in Sarakenos Cave, such as fig u -rines, also pose the ques tion whether cer tain sym -bolic ac tiv i ties took place in side the cave, evenritual or sacral.

Sarakenos Cave is of cru cial im por tance forthe study of the Mesolithic/EN in ter face. There isa strik ing con trast be tween the iso lated Meso-lithic, no ta bly Late Mesolithic, oc cu pa tions with“prim i tive” tech nol ogy adapted to lo cal raw ma te -ri als and with sub sis tence econ omy based onfowl ing and plant gath er ing, also adapted to thelo cal en vi ron men tal con di tions and the ENgroups, ar riv ing to the cave some 120–140 ra dio -car bon years later, with im ported raw ma te ri als,macroblade technology and animal breeding.

It is also of great im por tance that in side thecave a very early phase of the Mesolithic was es -tab lished, dat ing from the 10th mill. BC, eventhough the finds were scarce. Fur ther more, achro no log i cal se quence in the 9th and 8th mill. was also es tab lished. So far, the Lower Mesolithic had been dated to the mid dle of the 9th mill. BC in theCy clops Cave (Sampson, 1998; Sampson et al.,1998, 2003) and in the Franchthi Cave (PerlÀs,1990b, while the Mesolithic set tle ment of Kyth-nos (Sampson et al., 2002; Sampson, 2006b)dates from a very early phase of the Lower Meso-lithic in the be gin ning of the 9th mill. BC. It seemsthat the Mesolithic pe riod in the Hel la dic areawhich has been stud ied ex ten sively re cently, isbound to sur prise us in the fu ture.

Our re search in the area sug gests that the ev i -dence for Palaeo lithic set tle ment in the Kopais ba -sin is rather ir reg u lar. The Sarakenos Cave sawspo radic vis its by Epigravettian groups and in theSeidi Cave (Stampfuss, 1942; Schmidt, 1965) wehave ev i dence of Late Gra vet tian oc cu pa tion. Insome other caves and rock shel ters ex am ined inthe ba sin and around it, Palaeo lithic re mains werefound (Roland, 1980). The is sue will be clar i fiedthrough ex ca va tions in some of these sites. How -ever, with the ex cep tion of the Sarakenos Cave,the ab sence of Early Up per and Mid dle Palaeo -lithic re mains in this area is strik ing, while innearby Euboea (Sampson, 1996) there are sev eral

open air sites of this pe riod. This is prob a bly dueto palaeo geo graphi cal or palaeoclimatic reasons.

Un like the Palaeo lithic, dur ing the Neo lithicpe riod and the Bronze Age the hu man oc cu pa tionin the Kopais ba sin ap pears to be pres ent both inopen air and cave sites. In this pe riod, the Sara-kenos Cave dig gave am ple ar chae o log i cal ev i -dence for reg u lar ex ploi ta tion of the aquatic re -sources (fish, shells). It is rather prob a ble that insome places around the lake ex isted lake set tle -ments as in Kastoria (Chourmouziades, 2002) and Xynias Lake (Sampson, 1980).

Ac knowl edg ments

The Sarakenos Pro ject is sup ported by the Univer-sity of the Aegean and INSTAP. The Pol ish par tic i pa -tion in Sarakenos pro ject has been sup ported by Spe -cific Tar geted Eu ro pean Un ion Re search Pro jectFEPRE (The For ma tion of Eu rope: Pre his toric Pop u la -tion Dy nam ics and the Roots of Socio-Cul tural Di ver -sity).

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* in greek


sarakenos cave in boeotia, from palaeo lithic to …eura sian pre his tory, 6 (1–2): 199–231....

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