A. Sarpaki

Independent Researcher

Vicia articulate Horne. a not highly domesticated legume, which is used as green manure, fodder and, in times of stress, as food, is in the process of extinction. Although it was mentioned as cultivated up to the 1950s in many parts of Greece, lately, the only area, which is known to still cultivate it, is on the Cycladic island of Santorini, Thera...

Excavations at Knossos have uncovered faunal and archaeobotanical archives spanning the Neolithic and Bronze Age (7th–2nd millennia bce ), during which one of Europe’s earliest known farming settlements developed into its first major urban settlement and centre of one of its oldest regional states. Through stable isotope (δ ¹³ C, δ ¹⁵ N) analysis o...

Agricultural extensification refers to an expansive, low‐input production strategy that is land rather than labour limited. Here, we present a robust method, using the archaeological proxies of cereal grain nitrogen isotope values and settlement size, to investigate the relationship between agricultural intensity and population size at Neolithic to...

Recent finds of garlic from Late Bronze Age Akrotiri, Thera have led to research related to the historical, economic and social aspects of its use in the archaeological narrative. Garlic is an important domesticated plant in our lore, medicine, mythology, cooking, and ethnography, and is now ubiquitous in everyday use. Previously, we knew of its im...

The chapter is on the presence of the olive from the Late Neolithic to the Late Bronze Age at Akrotiri, Thera.

It presents the archaeobotanical (seed) material from the Cave 'Ourania to Froudi' near the town and Palace of Zakros.

Most research on the plant genus Phoenix has focused on Phoenix dactylifera (date palm) due to its worldwide economic importance. Comparatively less attention has been devoted to other species within this genus that are also socio-economically important at a local scale, such as Phoenix theophrasti (Cretan date palm). The aim of this paper is to br...

The Bronze Age settlement site of Akrotiri, situated on the island of Thera in the Aegean Sea (Greece), developed during a period of over 1500 years into a flourishing city. This process started from the Late Neolithic through the Early and Middle Cycladic periods to the beginning of the Late Cycladic period when at a date in the late seventeenth c...

Excavations at the Sanctuary of Poseidon at Kalaueria in the years 2003–2005 produced a small but quite interesting assemblage of charred seeds and fruits. Their analysis adds to a small existing body of such evidence and sheds light on several issues including aspects of the physical environment in the past, the agricultural economy in the area of...

It is a study on the archaeobotanical material from Neolithic Alepotrypa (Diros) Cave site in the Peloponnese.

Palaikastro, Crete: Building 1 -archaeobotany

Practices of social cohesion in the Late Neolithic of the Ionian: readings of the archaeological material from the Cave of Drakaina, Poros, Kefalonia.

This article presents two deposits of material in secondary context that came to light in 2008 and 2010 in the northern section of sector Pi at Malia, where the main phase recognized corresponds to the destruction horizon of Quartier Mu (MM IIB). Nevertheless, the ceramics of these deposits belong to an earlier phase dated to the MM IIA, a phase fo...

After extracting oil from olives a residue is left usually referred to as the olive oil processing residue (OPR). This study explores the way in which ancient societies may have used OPR as fuel for fires to generate heat and the various issues that are related to the residues of this fuel. After drying, the high heating value and structure of OPR...

Attributing a season and a date to the volcanic eruption of Santorini in the Aegean has become possible by using preserved remains of the bean weevil, Bruchus rufipes, pests of pulses, from the storage jars of the West House, in the Bronze Age settlement at Akrotiri. We have applied an improved pre-treatment methodology for dating the charred insec...

The use of local Mediterranean food plants is at the brink of disappearance. Even though there is relatively abundant information on inventories of wild edible taxa, there is also a crucial need to understand how these plants are consumed and when and how these consumption phenomena change over time and place around the Mediterranean. Additionally,...

The use of local Mediterranean food plants is at the brink of disappearance. Even though there is relatively abundant information on inventories of wild edible taxa, there is also a crucial need to understand how these plants are consumed and when and how these consumption phenomena change over time and place around the Mediterranean. Additionally,...

THE MALIA DAYS The Malia Days, organized by the Ecole française d'Athènes on November 2 and 3, 2007, focused on the organisation of space and the exploitation of resources, themes that allowed uniting the approaches of current work on two different scales, those of agglomeration and urbanism, on the one hand, and of the territorial organisation, on...

Table 1

The origins of the olive

During the years 2003–2005, a comparative ethnobotanical field survey was conducted on remedies used in traditional animal healthcare in eight Mediterranean areas. The study sites were selected within the EU-funded RUBIA project, and were as follows: the upper Kelmend Province of Albania; the Capannori area in Eastern Tuscany and the Bagnocavallo a...

It is a presentation of the archaeobotanical (seed) study of the Artisans' Quarter at Mochlos.

Palynological investigations were carried out in the coastal lowland of northwestern Crete, in the area of Lake Kournas. Results comprise the longest continuous vegetation record (9000 radiocarbon years) for Crete. From about 8500 to 7500 BP, open deciduous-oak forest occurred and appears to ree ect the driest conditions of the Holocene. After 7500...

All ground cereal and pulse plant material from the site of Akrotiri, Thera was studied through a binocular stereoscope microscope in order to detect its nature and its processing stage. The presence of various processed crops was detected, such as barley, wheat and probably legume flour. The very rare occurrence of these finds from archaeological...

What were the fine garments vividly painted in the Minoan frescoes made of? Fine cotton (cotton from Egypt is still prized today)? Or the yet finer fabric of silk? And if silk, where did the stuff, or knowledge of cultivating the silk-worms, come from? A cocoon from Santorini offers new evidence.

This paper summarizes some results of palaeoethnobotanical study at Akrotiri, Thera, and evaluates the importance of studying plant remains at such a site. (As this is the first stage of a long programme, it does not pretend to be exhaustive.) The data from the West House provides the most detailed and complete information from Bronze Age Greece co...

A third season of excavations at Palaikastro was concentrated on the central area of the new site where four main structures have been identified; Buildings 1, 3, 4 and 5. This report highlights the more interesting finds, including the head of the ivory statuette, the torso and arms of which were found last year, and the first evidence for the LM...