This paper seeks to relate the form of the Marathon tumulus to both tomb and hero cult as practiced in Attica in the Archaic period. Distinctions are made among various archaeological manifestations of hero cult and between two senses of the term heros in Archaic Greece. The named warrior heroes of the epic tradition are to be distinguished from the anonymous heroes whose cult was often located in or over Bronze Age tombs. The popularity or prevalence of various kinds of hero and tomb cult can be shown to change considerably between the eighth and early fifth centuries B.C., partly in response to political change. The genealogy of the Marathon tumulus can be traced back to the seventh-and early sixth-century aristocratic funerary complexes with tumulus, central cremation, and offering trench. Such practices seem to be a deliberate evocation of those described in the Iliad. This fact considerably alters our interpretation of the Marathon tumulus, which can now be seen as an example of the appropriation of aristocratic values and symbols to serve the needs of the new democracy.* The tumulus at Marathon is not one of the major architectural achievements of fifth-century Athens. To some, therefore, it may seem a perverse choice for an exercise in art-historical explanation.' But, though simple in form, this monument is not at all easy to explain. It is a monument that looks both forward to the full democracy of the late fifth century, and backward to the world of the Archaic aristocracy. It echoes in its design features of much earlier monuments, but, at the same time, anticipates forms of public commemoration that were to become current by the time of Pericles. Its role too is ambiguous, since it served to commemorate a battle, as a place of burial, and, in later times, as the locus of "hero cult." Hero cult is a complex issue, one too often treated simply as an aspect of Greek religion.2 This approach is clearly inappropriate in our case: the Marathon tumulus, no less than the Cenotaph in London, or the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C., is primarily a political monument, one intimately connected with collective Athenian identity and self-esteem. As such, its genealogy, its relation to earlier and later forms of commemoration, burial, and tomb and hero cult, is a matter of some importance. Burials and hero cults have been popular topics in many recent discussions of early Greece. Many scholars have tried to link changes in mortuary practice * This is a revised version of a paper I gave at Corpus Christi College, Oxford in October 1991. I would like to thank everyone who contributed to the discussion that followed, in particular Christiane Sorvinou-Inwood and Robin Osborne. For permission to reproduce illustrations, I am grateful to the Deutsches Archaologisches Institut in Athens and the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Agora Excavations. I would also like to thank Anthony Snodgrass, Nick Fisher, Hans Van Wees, Ian Morris, Sanne Houby-Nielsen, Francois de Polignac, Carla Antonaccio, and one anonym...

This is a report of an architectural survey of the site of Praisos in E. Crete, undertaken in 1992. A plan of ancient and modern features was produced, which included remains surviving above ground such as ancient walls, rockcuttings, cut blocks, and spolia, together with more detailed plans of features and concentrations of features. This documentation has been supplemented with photographs, elevation drawings, and descriptions of selected features, especially rock-cuttings. Rock-cut features, common on many Cretan sites, have rarely been described in detail or discussed properly; the article seeks to remedy this state of affairs to some extent. The remains seem to date to the Minoan, archaic, and late classical–hellenistic periods, particularly the last. Some historical conclusions are drawn.

This paper attempts to provide new insights into the nature of Greek society in the Dark Ages (1100–700 B.C.). It re-examines the relationship between the archaeological evidence and the institutions and practices described in the Homeric poems. The archaeological evidence indicates that there were marked regional differences in settlement pattern, burial customs and pottery traditions. This must, it is argued, reflect profound regional differences in social organisation. Ethnographic analogies are used to make sense of some of these regional patterns. Two of the larger and more stable communities in Dark Age Greece, Athens and Knossos, are subjected to detailed scrutiny. A close contextual analysis of the relationship between pot style and mortuary representations in these two sites reveal two patterns which are divergent rather than convergent. In Athens burial customs and later pot style appear to be part of an age and sex linked symbolic system. In Knossos however, there is no clear patterning, either in pot style or mortuary representations. Instead there is a continuum of variation. Such fundamental differences cannot be accomodated within the concept of a uniform ‘Homeric Society’. It is suggested here that the institutions and practices described in Homer only operated at an inter-regional level.

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Two seasons of fieldwalking were undertaken in the environs of the city of Praisos in Eastern Crete in 1993 and 1994. This is a preliminary report on the results. The topography of the area is described, as are the survey methods used. Finds include sites of FN/EM I date; MM ‘megalithic’ structures and one possible sanctuary; few remains of Neopalatial date. Attention is concentrated on the LM III, PG, G and Orientalising periods which saw a movement of settlement from the refuge settlement of Kypia above Kalamafki to Praisos itself. The urban survey of 1994 indicates that Praisos was a considerable settlement well before the Classical period, and there seems to be some overlap in the periods in which Kypia and Praisos were occupied. Further work was also undertaken on the Classical and Hellenistic periods in the Praisos area. Later periods have proven more difficult to pin down through analysis of their surface remains.