bronze age environment and economy in the troad - Universität ...

chapter 1: environment and archaeology
to have been unsuitable for a dense tree growth. Already
during the second part of the Postglacial (from 7000 BP
onwards) the anthropogenic influence becomes significant. The
first recognisable influence of man on the vegetation is with
agriculture and pastoral activities, but according to Pons and
Quézel (1985), there is still not enough knowledge about
anthropogenic influence for prehistoric periods, because of
inadequate location of pollen sites. Human influence on the
vegetation in relation to the formation of maquis vegetation has
recently provoked controversial discussions. A short
presentation of this aspect is given in chapter 4.
Vegetation history for the Troad is indirectly recorded, or deduced
from Greek pollen data in van Zeist and Bottema (1991).
According to this scheme the modern woodland is a relict of
sclerophyllous mixed forest.
From palaeogeographic investigations (Kayan 1996) we know
about the slow progradation of the delta. The ground water
level was high, and therefore marshy vegetation was widespread
within the area. Wood cutting and clearing of the vegetation
was surely practiced from the beginning of the settlements,
and there are signs from soil science (Pustovoytov in
prep.), archaeozoology and not least from archaeobotany, that
the vegetation was already partially open, but still with larger,
oak wooded areas (Uerpmann, Köhler and Stephan 1992) in
Early Bronze Age.
The landscape descriptions of the last century by Barker-Webb
(1822) and Virchow (1879) show a vegetation very similar to
the modern. Only the valley, which is well drained today, was
more marshy.
1.1.3 The history of archaeobotanical
research in the Troad
The excavations by Blegen from 1932 gave first rise to systematic
archaeobotanical investigations in Troy. Phytolith
analysis of cultural layers mainly from Troy I/II was conducted
by Rapp and Mulholland (Mulholland, Rapp, and Gifford
1982, Mulholland and Rapp 1987). Samples were taken, e.g.
from burnt bricks of the Troy II Megaron IIA, a witness of the
early blossoming of the city, but also from ashy layers and soil
predating the settlement. The aim of conducting these analyses
was to recognise changes in past plant communities and plant
use by humans. Rapp and Mulholland found that stems of the
grass Arundo donax (giant reed), which is common on
Mediterranean river sides, was the main contributor to the
phytoliths in almost all the samples and was possibly used as
building material. The samples from the Megaron brick contained
only few phytoliths, mainly grass. These bricks were
also sampled for pollen with better success (Huber and Rapp
1987). The taxa recorded were Pinus sp. (pine), Quercus sp.
(oak), Pistacia sp. (pistachio), Asphodelus sp. (asphodel),
Caryophyllaceae (pink family), Gramineae (grass family), and
Compositae (daisy family), a very typical combination for the
Mediterranean. Earlier pollen analysis was conducted by
Gennett and Gifford, also with samples from archaeological
layers (Gennett and Gifford 1982). They found very high
numbers of Pinus pollen.
Besides the investigations on phytoliths and pollen, analyses of
botanical macrofossils were conducted. The latest analysis by
Shay is based on two samples of emmer grain from Troy I
levels (Shay, Anderson, and Shay 1982).
Earlier analyses were similarly restricted to small amounts of
material (Schiemann 1951, Lindau 1922, Wittmack 1890).
Wittmack identified plant remains from storage rooms that
were sampled by Virchow. The remains were dated to Troy II
levels. This ‛wheat’ was abundant in “hand high” (!) elongated
layers (Virchow 1879, p. 68). There was a lot of confusion
with the identifications. First the wheat was identified as
Triticum durum var. trojanum (Wittmack 1881, p. 779) and
thought to be emmer. Then Wittmack made several revisions
of his identifications so that his former Triticum durum var.
trojanum changed to Triticum vulgare var. trojanum and was
thought to be two-grained einkorn (Wittmack 1886, p. 33). The
wheat grains from these earlier layers (older than Troy II) were
described as bigger and thicker than the later finds (Wittmack
1890). Schiemann (1951) corrected Wittmack’s identifications
further. Several of the former Triticum monococcum grains
were now designated as Triticum dicoccum. This confusion
indicates the problems of cereal grain identification in general.
At that time, sampling was not advanced enough to extract the
more readily identifiable chaff remains.
Besides the cereals, Schiemann found silica skeletons of Hordeum
cf. maritimum (sea barley), Bromus sp. (brome grass).
and Vitis vinifera. Other crops found by Wittmack in Troy II
layers were Pisum sativum, Vicia faba in minor amounts and
small lentils (2.3 mm in diameter). Further remains from a
layer, older than the previous, which were collected from vessels,
included mainly wheat and Vicia ervilia. The only weed
that was mentioned by Wittmack was Fumaria sp. (fumitory),
which was a modern contaminant in the samples.
Considering the rich finds of early excavations and the incomplete
study of this material, it is very regrettable that most of
the plant remains from Virchow’s collection disappeared
during wartime. A part of Schiemann’s collection is now in the
Botanical Garden in Berlin-Dahlem (Raus 1992), but the
original material was destroyed by bombing during the Second
World War (Kilian 1997). Huge amounts of grain excavated
during Blegen’s excavations are also lost, i.e. they are not in
the archives of the museums in Çanakkale or Istanbul (Rose,
pers. com.).
Beside the new investigations (since 1991) in Troy and Kumtepe
no other archaeobotanical research has been conducted in
western Anatolia until recently, when Dr. Emel Oybak (Izmir
Region Excavations and Research Project Team) started in
1996 with archaeobotanical analysis from the sites Bakla Tepe
(Chalc.-Early Bronze Age) and Liman Tepe (Chalc.-Late
Bronze Age) in the Izmir province (Oybak 1997).
1.2 The archaeology of Kumtepe and Troy
and the origin of the samples
The geographical position of the Troad between the Black Sea
region and the Aegean on one side and the prehistoric settlement
centres of Inner Anatolia on the other side, defines it as a
focal point of cultural and economic relations during the prehistory
of these regions.
The following paragraphs summarise the early archaeological
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