All archaeological work is constrained: by budget, by personnel, by university structures, by local administrative structures, and so on. Our project is no different. Bill, Sarah and I worked on a project — the Eastern Korinthia Archaeological Survey (EKAS) — where we were limited in our ability to collect artifacts. What this meant was that … More Ceramicists take to the field!
Part of the thrill of archaeology is finding things. No matter how scholarly, serious, or scientific a project is (or pretends to be), people will always get really excited when something neat shows up in a survey unit or a trench. This interest even created a category called “good things” at the Corinth excavations, the … More Good things
It’s been a busy couple of weeks here at WARP, hence the radio silence, which I finally have the chance to break thanks to our decision to take the last Friday of the field season off. So much has happened and is still happening as we rapidly approach the end of our field season. Yesterday … More Radio silence
I am fond of telling non-Greek speakers how most loan-words in Greek are neuter and don’t decline. Sometimes I have tried to decline them, usually with hilarious (for other people) results. Once I talked to my uncle about whiskies — ουισκιά, a made-up plural — and got laughed at. But some loan words, special ones, get … More Η μπουλντόζα
Our Saturday trip yesterday featured the other side of the Argive plain: the more famous eastern Argolid. We visisted Mycenae, the Argive Heraion, and the middle Byzantine church of the Koimesis at Merbaka (Ayia Triada):
Normally this is Bill’s thing, but since he’s already posted today I thought that I’d give it a go. It’s been a busy week, with wild weather for Greece in June (rain! more than once!) and three visitors (Joe Desloges, Pam Tetford, and Alexis Young) joining our ranks. And despite the setbacks, it was an … More Photo Friday
Some days are better than others. Today I was tripped by a metal wire while walking around this house and jacked up my shin: Sarah says that nobody wants to see a picture of my jacked-up shin so I’ll just post a link here for those of you who want to see it. In the process I … More Blood, sweat, and fleas
We just began the first (half-)week of the 2015 field season. Whereas last year we worked in the dramatic mountainous valley around the village of Lyrkeia, this year we’re operating in the lower reaches of the Inachos river, near Schinochori and Malandreni, as the river begins to spill onto the Argive plain: It’s an equally pretty … More The beginning of the 2015 season
Yesterday afternoon Scott and I hiked up to the Frankish castle above the village of Myloi. From the top of the hill there were some magnificent views of the Argolid (click to see the full image): We also heard a good story at dinner: that the castle was the home of the queen, and that … More Some views of the Argolid
Over the past several months, a couple of different people have asked me why I like survey. My initial response is always intellectual. I talk about the importance of understanding the countryside, about the urban bias of our texts and excavations, the approach of books like The Corrupting Sea, and so on. In both cases, that wasn’t the … More Why I like archaeological survey