Ant 293: Lecture One C: History of Archaeology in Ancient Greece

Ant 293: Lecture One C:
History of Archaeology in
Ancient Greece

Disciplines of Classical Greece Studies
Philology: the study of language in written
historical sources;
Political history
History of art and architecture

Since the end of the Middle Ages, classical
archaeology has gone through several
periods, each marked by one type of
information:
1. literary texts;
2. works of art;
3. sites and “material culture”;

Each phase represents a change in the
approach and perception of Greek
antiquity;

1. Literary Texts
Manuscripts
apart from a few visible monuments and
some artifacts found by chance, classical
antiquity survived during the Middle Ages
thanks to manuscripts;

After the fall of Constantinople in 1453,
Greek intellectuals brought classical
manuscripts to Italy;
The Venetian printer Aldus Manutius
systematically published the Greek authors
in 1494;

from the beginning of the 16th C, the
Humanist movement spread to the rest of
Europe;
in 1530, Francois I founded the College de
France to study antique texts;
for 3 centuries knowledge of things ancient
Greek was based on ancient texts that were
constantly re-edited and commented on;

2. Works of Art
the study of works of art and monuments
began to give classical archaeology an
aesthetic and concrete orientation by the
end of the 18th C;

a. types of collections before museums
i. cabinet: in which small valuable objects
were collected and displayed;
ii. villa: sculptures were an essential feature
of the „antique‟ atmosphere;
iii. regional: in England, the Earl of Arundel
assembled the first collection of objects
coming exclusively from Greece;

. new approaches
Winkelmann (1717-1768) sought to put an
end to the chaos caused by the confusing
zeal and confusion of the Antiquarians;
his History of Ancient Art in 1764 marked
the emergence of a genuine history of
antique art;
this work had great influence on 19th C
thinkers on history, anthropology and
archaeology;

c. refinement of stylistic criticism: late 19 th
Century
Began to shift the view away from Athenian
classicism being the high point of Greek
art;
the different periods of Greek art appeared in
all their individuality, and from then on the
originality of regional styles in all periods
were recognized;

3. Sites and „material culture‟: predatory
archaeology
the enthusiasm for antique objects led to
their systematic research, firstly in Italy
and then in Greece and the Near East;

In 1801-3, Lord Elgin removed from Athens
sculptures and blocks of architecture from
the Acropolis and these were bought by
the British Museum in 1816;

the transfer of artifacts and whole
monuments to the great European
museums only came to a halt with the
formation of national states
Greece: 1832
Italy: 1860
Turkey: 1920

New Approaches to classical archaeology
By the end of the 19th C, excavations at
Olympia marked the beginnings of
stratigraphy;
since WWII, the increasingly detailed work
of excavation has turned public interest
towards social and economic history;
it is now the „archaeology of society‟;

a. techniques
• data processing
• remote sensing
• trace element analysis
• GIS

. ongoing frictions
there is a lively discussion between
supporters of the new social quantitative
archeology and the upholders of traditional
archaeology, oriented to literary sources,
artifacts and monuments;