A Survey of Evidence for Feasting in Mycenaean Society

Abstract

The study of feasting on the Greek mainland during the Middle and Late Bronze Age provides insights into the nature of Mycenaean society. Grave goods demonstrate changes in feasting and drinking practices and their importance in the formation of an elite identity. Cooking, serving, and drinking vessels are also recorded in Linear B documents. Feasting scenes appear in the frescoes of Crete and the islands, and the Mycenaeans adapt this tradition for representation in their palaces. Feasting iconography is also found in vase painting, particularly in examples ofthe Pictorial Style. Mycenaean feasting is an expression of the hierarchical sociopolitical structure of the palaces. JAMES C. WRIGHT people frequently use vessels to make offerings to deities or perform rituals, such as toasting or leaving food remains for the dead, and these vessels are not apriori evidence for feasting, unless the remains are so substantial that they indicate unusual consumption of food or drink.3 I intend to argue closely on the basis of good evidence for feasting as a common but variably performed ritual, remains from which are recoverable by archaeologists. It is not my purpose to examine the organic residues and archaeological deposits of feasts, especially since that is the subject of two other articles in this volume.4 Instead, the information collected for this research is that which to our eyes presents consistent patterns of form and decoration, of assemblage, and of context and deposition, evidence that represents a style peculiar to the practice of feasting and formal drinking during the era we define as Mycenaean. By "Mycenaean" I mean the assemblage of artifacts that constitutes the characteristic archaeological culture that originates on the mainland of Greece in the late Middle Bronze Age, finds its fullest expression in the palaces during Late Helladic (LH) IIIA-B, and can be traced through the postpalatial LH IIIC period.5 Different scholars will define differently the chronological and geographical range of this culture, but probably will not disagree that it takes recognizable form about 1600-1550 B.c. and ends about 1100-1050 B.c.; is characterized by settlements with palaces and writing in Linear B; and in its broadest extent encompasses coastal Thessaly, central Greece, the Peloponnese, Crete, the Aegean islands, and perhaps some settlements on the western Anatolian coast. In this article I necessarily consider evidence from Crete and the Aegean islands, since much of what we characterize as Mycenaean is derived from the earlier palace-based societies of Middle and Late Bronze Age Crete and the island cultures of the Aegean. Identifying the formative processes through which these were incorporated into Mycenaean culture, however, has proven difficult and confusing.6 The essays by Borgna and Steel in this volume treat the subject of the Mycenaean feast on Crete and Cyprus, where previous indigenous traditions of feasting can be documented. The authors confront the problem of the adaptation of distinctive, perhaps ess...

The Archaeology of Food and Social Diversity

“…Meanwhile, archaeologists investigate feasting in prehistoric, historic, and modern cultures while employing diverse theoretical perspectives and methodologies (Dietler and Hayden 2001b;Joyce 2010;Klarich 2010;Twiss 2008;Wills and Crown 2004;Wright 2004). A similar variety is found in definitions of feasting; no single definition dominates the archaeological literature.…”

A Foreign Potter in the Pylian Kingdom? A Reanalysis of the Ceramic Assemblage of Room 60 in the Palace of Nestor at Pylos

“…The most visible manifestation of its significance lies in the numerous storage vessels containing oil in rooms 23 and 24, directly behind the megaron. The production of this valuable commodity appears to have been Wright 1984;Shelmerdine 1987. moved to the palace during its final years, even though production of perfumed oil at other places did not stop.…”

“…Shelmerdine 1984;Wright 1984;Davis and Bennet 1999;Galaty 1999;Whitelaw 2001;Bendall 2004;Hruby 2006;Lis 2006. 9. Blegen and Rawson 1966, p. 240.…”

Cypro-Archaic Bird Iconography: Types, Uses, and Meanings

“…Fewer offerants are 22 See Chapter 1 for a discussion. 23 See Chapter 1 and Mylonas (1948, 72), Hamilakis (1998), Dabney et al (2004), andWright (2004). 24 For faunal evidence of goats, see Ekman (1976), Croft (1989), Steel (2004, 290), Calder (2011, Moody (2012, 240), Smith, Weird, and Serwint (2012, 176).…”

“…Thrushes were also caught and eaten in antiquity (Odyssey 22.468). Mylonas 1948, 72;Hamilakis 1998;Dabney et al 2004;Wright 2004. 123 Reese 2007, 50.…”