You are invited to an online lecture on Thursday October 30th at 7.00 pm (Greek time)/ 5.00 pm (Irish time) / 12.00 (EST) by Dr Claire Cave, on “Passing the Time at Ireland's Ancient Monuments”.

Abstract: There are places in Ireland where you can travel back in time. At some wonderful prehistoric sites, you can share an experience with people who lived over 5000 years ago. You can stand in the same place as our ancient ancestors stood and wait for the same event to happen. If you are inside the burial chambers of Newgrange or Dowth on the shortest days of the year at winter solstice, you can see sunlight enter the dark tombs just as it was planned by those who built the monuments all those millennia ago. If you climb to the top of Carnbane East at Loughcrew to see equinox sunrise at Cairn T, you are repeating the journey of neolithic pilgrims. In this presentation, Clare Tuffy talks about her many years of being at Newgrange for sunrise and Dowth for sunset at winter solstice and Loughcrewat equinox time. She shares what it’s really like to be there and how visitors from all over the world react to these wonderful monuments.

Register here to attend:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/SKEwP7eGS7yh9pqQ-x0VPw

You are invited to an IIHSA Lecture (in person) on Thursday November 21, 2024 at 7.00 pm (Greek time)/ 5.00 pm (Irish time) / 12.00 (EST) by Stefano Ruzza (PhD candidate, La Sapienza University of Rome and National and Kapodistrian University of Athens), Which Mycenaeans? Forms of Regionalism in the Copais Basin in LH IIIA-B.

Abstract: The term ‘Mycenaean’ coined more than one hundred years ago, is widely used to label the Late Bronze Age culture that flourished in the Aegean. Despite its usefulness, though, this term is too broad and fails to consider the cultural, social, economic, organisational, and political differences that existed within the Mycenaean World. When regionalism is accounted, the Copais Basin in NW Boeotia is an interesting case study from several points of view. Indeed, it is somehow at the border between the Southern Greek Mainland, the heart of the Mycenaean civilisation, and its northern periphery. Its prehistoric inhabitants, also, partly drained the lake to claim new land to farm showing not only unparalleled skills but also an original economic strategy. Within this framework, I reconsider all the archaeological evidence retrieved within the region to discuss the meaning they may have had for the inhabitants of the basin in LH IIIA–LH IIIB (roughly 1400–1200 BC). Finally, I aim to stress how, despite its incredible potential, NW Boeotia is somewhat neglected by archaeological research when compared to other regions such as SE Boeotia, Argolid and Messenia.

The lecture will be held in person at the IIHSA in Athens: 7.00 pm (Greek time)/5.00 pm (Irish time)/12.00 (EST). If you would like to attend the lecture online, contact us at irishinstitutegr@gmail.com and we will provide you with a Zoom link.

You are invited to an IIHSA Lecture on Wednesdau, May 29th, 2024 at 5.30 pm (Irish time) / 7.30 pm (Greek time)' / 12.30 pm (EST) by Diamantis Panagiotopoulos (University of Heidelberg) on ‘Unmuting Minoan Koumasa. Data, metadata, and paradata of the 2012-2023 campaigns.’

Abstract: More than one hundred years after the first archaeological exploration at Koumasa, a new interdisciplinary research programme commenced in 2012 under the auspices of the Archaeological Society at Athens with the basic aim of systematically exploring the Minoan settlement adjacent to the cemetery and correlating the results of the new research with those from the old excavations. The first decade of fieldwork was full of surprises and insights that lead to a radical reassessment of the original research concept. The lecture presents a concise overview of the most important results of the new excavations in the cemetery and the settlement, explores their significance for our current understanding of Bronze Age Crete, and finally discusses to what extent current strategies of processing excavation (meta)data can impact the production of archaeological knowledge.

The event will be held in person at the IIHSA. Please register via Eventbrite to reserve a seat.
Any queries, please contact us at irishinstitutegr@gmail.com

You are invited to an IIHSA In Person Lecture on Thursday, May 9th 2024 at 7.30 pm (Greek time)/ 5.30 Irish time by Anastasia Dakouri-Hild (Associate Professor, Art Department, University of Virginia) Eleni Andrikou (Director, Ephorate of Antiquities of East Attica, Greek Ministry of Culture) & Stephen Davis (Assistant Professor, School of Archaeology, University College Dublin), ‘The Kotroni Archaeological Survey Project (KASP) at Ancient Afidna in Northern Attica: a Synthesis from the Seasons of 2019-2023.’

Abstract: The contemporary site of Kotroni is located about 30 km north of Athens, near the modern town of Kapandriti. Situated in the northern part of Diacria, the site lies to the north of the river Marathon which feeds the Marathon reservoir today. In the early 19th century G. Finlay described an isolated hill rising “to the height of several hundred feet. On its summit there are remains of an ancient fortress, and traces of habitation on its sides […] the hill is beautifully situated overlooking the fine undulated and well-wooded country through which the river of Marathon flows”. The citadel has been identified as the center of the ancient, constitutional demos of Afidna, and alleged to have been one of the original twelve districts which the legendary king Cecrops II brought together initially to create the polis of Athens, with the process of synoecism completed by the founder hero of the city, Theseus. KASP explores this significant diachronic archaeological landscape within its environmental, geographical, and cultural landscape utilizing a combination of historical research, digital applications, and conventional field techniques such as survey. The project systematizes piecemeal information about this landscape known to scholarship since the 19th c. and substantially and non-destructively augments the record by means of systematic collection of surface artifacts, remote sensing, geophysics, geological and geomorphological analysis. This talk presents the results of the 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2023 seasons including the outcomes of remote sensing, geoarchaeology, geophysics, and intensive survey. We discuss new evidence for habitation and economic activity within the immediate catchment area of the citadel, and identify several new sites dating from prehistory through the Ottoman era discovered during the survey.

The lecture will be attended in-person only in the IIHSA’s seminar room. Book here with Eventbrite:

We invite you to the screening of The Mourning Rock (‘Agelastos Petra’) followed by a discussion with the film’s director, Phillipos Koutsaftis. In association with the screening of the film (with English subtitles), the Director will talk to us about the making of the movie and the area of the ancient and modern Elefsina (Eleusis). The past and the present coexist in a place spoiled by modern industry but which long ago hosted the Eleusinian Mysteries, the sacred ceremonies that initiated the ancient Greeks into the miracles of life, death and the afterlife.

The event will take at the IIHSA, Notara 51A in Exarcheia, 10683. In order to reserve a seat, please contact us at irishinstitutegr@gmail.com
To attend online please register at the link below

We are delighted to invite you to the Opening Lecture 2023 of the IIHSA, which will take place on Wednesday, 25th October 2023 at 19.30 (Greece time)- 17.30 (Ireland time). It will be held online. Dr Amanda Kelly will speak on the topic ‘The Bridges of Minos' County (Aqueducts of the Greater Iraklio Area, AGIA). The lecture is preceded by a short presentation of the work of the Institute by the Director, Professor Joanne M.A. Murphy.

Since 2019, Amanda Kelly has been mapping the Roman, Venetian and Ottoman-Egyptian aqueducts of Candia/Kandiye (modern Iraklio) in Crete as part of her wider project on “The Aqueducts of the Greater Iraklio Area (AGIA)” which is generously funded by the Gerda Henkel Foundation. The project is kindly facilitated by both the IIHSA and the Ephorate of Antiquities of Heraklion. Her initial fieldwork in 2019 not only mapped the length of the Roman aqueduct supplying the city of Knossos but also that section of the 19th-centuryOttoman-Egyptian aqueduct of Kandiye built directly over it and a shorter tract of the Venetian aqueduct of Candia that either ran alongside it or was, in turn, itself partially overlaid by the19th-century system. In 2021, Amanda directed her attention to the Venetian aqueduct of Candia, identifying its springs, mapping a series of rock-cut channels, photographing the in-situ inscriptions, documenting a previously-unknown stone pipeline, and studying several stunning bridges along its course. Last summer, Amanda Kelly and Evan O’Keefe (of ProvEye) conducted a drone study of all the aqueduct bridges (Roman, Venetian and Ottoman Egyptian), along the aqueduct routes to create virtual models for future study. In her talk, Amanda will present these impressive, but relatively inaccessible, monuments and share her thoughts on how best to study and protect them for future audiences.

In order to attend the event and receive the relevant Zoom link, please register via google forms and it will be sent to you: https://tinyurl.com/msyjpjnw

This lecture is co-hosted by the Department of Classics, Trinity College Dublin

“On all the line a sudden vengeance waits,

And frequent hearses shall besiege your gates.”

--To the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady

It has been said that archaeologists excavate burials, not funerals. It is certainly true that the presence of a body, or bodies, whether preserved or implied by the presence of grave goods, is the defining feature of mortuary contexts in prehistory. However, in Early Iron Age west-central Europe the grave itself represents just one inflection point, a single stage in a process extending back in time to the period before the interment as well as after it. The four-wheeled and two-wheeled vehicles found in late Hallstatt and early La Tène burials in the West Hallstatt zone and other evidence for post-depositional activity in a select number of elite graves are part of a complex, multi-stage process that appears to have been accompanied by mourning activity including the cutting of hair, opening of the grave to remove or insert objects or persons, and depositing food offerings after the laying to rest of the dead. Some of these activities, represented by evidence of burning and small stone altars on burial mound surfaces, appear to have gone on for several generations, as this presentation will demonstrate. Viewed as a process rather than an event, the funeral rituals of the early Iron Age in west-central Europe provide a window into how people dealt with death in the past even in the absence of documentary evidence.

The seminar size will be limited to only 20 people in order to have a fruitful and educational discussion. In case you have any questions, please contact the Assist. Director: irishinstitutegr@gmail.com

You are invited to an IIHSA Hybrid Lecture on Thursday, May 4th 2023 at 5.30 pm (Irish time) / 7.30 pm (Greek time) by Dr Vana Orphanou, ‘A techno-biographical approach to hoarding in Late Bronze Age Europe.’

Hoarding of metal objects is a trademark cultural phenomenon of Bronze Age Europe. The removal from circulation of this valuable commodity has raised time and again important questions and hypotheses about the management of resources, the management of wealth, and the management of social interactions in prehistory. These hoards can take various forms over time and space, even within prehistoric Europe, and they have been understood as anything from ritual / symbolic to functional / economic. In this lecture, a technological and biographical approach (techno-biographical) to Late Bronze Age metal objects from hoards in the Carpathian Basin attempts to address old and new questions about how and why clusters of metal objects found their forever-home underground. Emphasis is put on the object biographies and technological attributes of metal types that form a common denominator for the hoards under investigation. Hypotheses about the making of the objects and the making of the hoards will be discussed in the context of a community of practice in late 2nd mil. BC Carpathian Basin. This work forms part of the ERC project The Fall of 1200 BC awarded to Assoc. Prof. Barry Molloy, and it was conducted at the facilities of the School of Archaeology and the Laboratory for Artefact Biographies (LAB) at University College Dublin.

The lecture is co-hosted by the School of Archaeology, University College Dublin.

The event will be held in person at the IIHSA. To reserve a seat please send an email to irishinstitutegr@gmail.com

In order to attend the event online please register via Eventbrite below

Chiara De Gregorio (HGGS-DAAD, Institute of Classical And Byzantine Archaeology): “The Ayia Triada Necropolis in EMIII-MMI and the Connections with the Neighboring Area".

The Ayia Triada necropolis is located ca. 3 km west of the Palace of Phaistos and has been occupied from the Early Minoan until the Late Minoan times, with traces of later use. My dissertation focuses on studying and publishing the finds of the excavations undertaken in the Late Prepalatial necropolis: the so-called area of the Camerette. It comprises two blocks of small-sized quadrangular rooms (the Camerette 1-10, the rooms a-c), a paved area and a possible wall with baetyls, which are located 7 meters south of tholos A and its annexes. Therefore, I have examined the excavations’ documents and the architectural context and carried out the typological and comparative analysis of the pottery uncovered during the excavations of the Italian Archaeological School at Athens between 1997 and 1999 and by the Italian Mission in Crete in 1904. Up to now, this study has documented different phases of exploitation of the area during the Late Prepalatial period and the beginning of the Middle Minoan IB (2300/2200-1850 BC). At the same time, the pottery assemblages have mostly been connected to activities of communal sharing of beverages and food by a considerable number of people. Thus, the ultimate purpose of this research project is to define the chronological sequence of events in the area of the Camerette and the functions of this space over time, as well as the community connected to it. The comparison with the neighbouring areas and the broader Cretan context contributes to final historical synthesis.

There is a tension in discussions of Minoan religion between synchronic and diachronic perspectives. In a sense even the language we use reflects this. The term "Minoan religion" creates assumptions about institutional structures, with formal hierarchies and codified beliefs and practices. Such intellectual monoliths view religion as somewhat distinct from the rest of Minoan "history" and society. For this reason, I have variously argued for a diachronic perspective, by which Minoan religion is interactive with social change, and is sensitive to the changes of Minoan society, political, and historical. In this seminar I shall review some of the more recent ideas that are emerging in discussions of Minoan religion. I shall discuss how they offer us a much more sophisticated way of understanding how strongly religion and community interacted dynamically throughout the chronological phases of Minoan culture.

Ten students can attend the seminar in person. In order to reserve a seat please contact the Assist. Director at irishinstitutegr@gmail.com.Ten students can register via Eventbrite to attend online here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/5th-theoretical-seminar-on-the-multifaceted-aspects-of-ritual-tickets-603991052497

The lecture is co-hosted by Trinity College Dublin, Department of Classics, The University of Dublin.
In case you have any questions, please contact the Assist. Director: irishinstitutegr@gmail.com

You are invited to an IIHSA Hybrid Lecture on Thursday, March 2nd 2023 at 5.30 pm (Irish time) / 7.30 pm (Greek time) by Dr Francesco Ferrara (Scuola Superiore Meridionale in Naples), “Basileus and Basìleia: royalty and architecture at the origins of Hellenism”.

The architectural phenomenon of the Macedonian Royal Palaces, despite the short duration of its development if compared to earlier “palatial systems”, has deeply marked the history of European architecture up to the modern era. The royal peristyle-house, which originated in Macedonia in the late 4th century BCE, is one of the concurrent aspects of a new historical course inaugurated by the Macedonian conquests in the East. In this seminar meeting will be highlighted the major role of the Macedonian basileion, and the Macedonian court society as well, in shaping the Hellenistic antelitteram “new world”, investigating its architectural forms and social functions.

The problem observed in the attempt to identify ritual actions, lies in the fact that Aegeanists remained trapped in their erroneous endeavor to reveal beliefs and reconstruct religious rituals. The insatiable desire of archaeologists to interpret excavation findings as indications strictly for religious and in general cosmological expressions of the people in prehistoric Aegean, often resulted in arbitrary conclusions. Ritual is a complicated action, thus frustrating and hectic when it comes to its theoretical analysis. Therefore, the present seminar endeavours to approach ritual in prehistoric Crete by standing in the middle between the arbitrary and/or the over-reconstructed interpretations, dealing with the term of ritual as a social aspect which may offer indications concerning social organization in the Late Bronze Age. Under a bottom-up perspective, the possible contribution of rituals to the formation of the social milieu will be discussed with the students. In more detail, the impact of domestic rituals on establishing social ties and rules, which govern social order or disorder will be investigated in contrast to the so-called palatial rituals. Are there any similarities and or differences? If yes, what do they tell us about Minoan society? Moreover, the discerning of those characteristics that distinguish private from public/collective rituals is a key issue, whilst it is also worth trying to distinguish ritual objects from those being used in everyday life. Finally, a new definition on ritual, which applies to Minoan archaeology, will be suggested.

The seminar size will be limited to only 20 people in order to have a fruitful and educational discussion. In case you have any questions, please contact the Assist. Director: irishinstitutegr@gmail.com

It is very common that sport has been associated to rituals, s it is also very common for rituals to be associated with sport. Although it is very important to be identifying the similarities, so as to understand their impact both to life as well as the material record, it is also very important to discern their differences. This brings to the fore some previous work that Kyriakidis has done on games, but also crystalized practice in general. Particular attention will be paid to the impact of these practices on animal (human) learning and their potential function as mechanisms of influence. Practice, as an element that is essential for many games, but could also be associated to rituals, is a type of action that will be analysed here more as something independent and separate but with a significant overlap in its outcomes.

The seminar size will be limited to only 20 people in order to have a fruitful and educational discussion. In case you have any questions, please contact the Assist. Director: irishinstitutegr@gmail.com

The seminar is co-hosted with the Department of Classics, Trinity College Dublin.

2022 is a milestone year for both Greece and Ireland marking the 100th anniversary of the Asia Minor catastrophe and the establishment of the independent Irish State. To mark the occasion, we have invited a number of Greek and Irish experts to give brief talks exploring the impact of the Greek and Irish diaspora on the formation of modern Greece and Ireland:

Prof. Alexander Kitroeff: “Greek and Irish immigrant encounters in America in the 20th century”

Dr Maurice Casey: “How Irish emigration to America shaped Ireland in 1922”

 Dr Alexandra Mourgou: “Population mobility, displacement, and popular culture: From the multi-ethnic societies of the Ottoman Empire to a national state's places of rebetiko in Piraeus”

This hybrid event is organised by the Irish Institute of Hellenic Studies with support from the Embassy of Ireland. The event will be followed by a reception.

The event will take place on Friday, 2nd December 2022 at 18:00 in “Kostis Palamas” Hall.
Address: 48 Akadimias str. & Sinastr., 105 62 Athens. To book to attend in person, please email irishinstitutegr@gmail.com by November 28th, 2022.

To book to join online, please register below via Eventbrite.

Dr. Fotis Ifantidis (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki), «Biographies of personal adornment in Neolithic Greece»

Beads, pendants, and annulets comprise just a small -and quite fragmented- part of a vast “toolkit” of corporal decoration uncovered from excavations in Neolithic Greece. While the configuration of a “panoramic” view of facets of use and production of personal ornaments in Neolithic Greece is confronted with multi-leveled problems, a closer look at the conditions of use, reuse, or deposition may highlight multiple narratives on the biographies of these - closely linked to the body -artifacts.