Vasi in pietra minoici di Festòs,Studi di Archeologia Cretese 5

Such a large quantity of stones vases have been found at Phaistos that production of these items can be considered to be one of the characteristics of this centre between the end of the third millennium and the second half of the second millennium BC. In P. Warren’s work (1969), it seems that the activity of Minoan artisans was limited during the Protopalatial period to a mere repetition of the inventions of the previous period, and indeed most of the vases retrieved from MM IB - II contexts were considered to be EM III - MM IA products, which had been re-used in the later period. The publication of important deposits such as the Kamilari tomb (LEVI 1961-1962A) and Quartier Mu at Mallia (DETOURNAY 1980, POURSAT 1996), and now the studies on the stone vases from Phaistos, have demonstrated that a large amount of technical and formal innovations occurred during the Protopalatial period, and new shapes were also introduced. The typological analysis of the Phaistos stone vases has allowed the identification of more than 30 shapes. The chronology and distribution of the shapes roughly follows that observed in other Cretan contexts. The beginning of production at Phaistos can be dated to the EM II period, but it is much more abundant during the Protopalatial period, and seems to have been aimed especially, if not exclusively, at the ritual sphere. These objects were perhaps used during ceremonies that took place within the palace and in the courts that lay to its west. The shapes that can be defined as properly palatial, because they were documented almost exclusively within the palace, are: the large bowl (shape 11), the lamp (shape 20), the handlamp (shape 21), the libation table (shape 27), and the palette (shape 28). The others occur in both the palace and the settlement. Contextual analysis has shown that about one third of the vases used or produced in the course of the Protopalatial period were found within the palace. Some of these shapes have had a relatively long history, from at least EM II until the end of the Protopalatial period. It is uncertain whether some of those found in Protopalatial contexts were first produced and used in the Prepalatial period. It is, however, certain that they maintained a substantial typological homogeneity throughout the various periods. The fact that elements linkable to the production of stone vases were found in the destruction levels of the various rooms of the palace has led to the suggestion that it was not only the place of consumption, but also the place of production of these artefacts. An alternative explanation could be that the unfinished objects were brought into the palace as offerings by those individuals who participated in the rituals that took place within the palace. It cannot, however, be excluded that production areas existed within the palatial building itself. In this case, it is possible that members of those groups that worked in the areas around the palace and within the settlement also worked occasionally within the palace. It is also possible that craft production was itself part of the ritual (INOMATA 2001). It seems fair to hypothesise that at least a considerable part of the stones vases of the Protopalatial period were produced for use during the performance of palace ritual. Production probably took place in workshops located outside of the palace. It has been stressed that numerous contexts in the area of the settlement have provided relatively large amounts of stone vases: the quarter to the west of Piazzale Occidentale I, the quarter along the southern slopes of Acropoli Mediana (rooms CV- CVII), the quarter at Chalara and Ayia Photinì. Abundant traces of craft activities of various type have been identified in each of these areas (TODARO forthcoming), including those linked to the production of stone vases. In each of these it has been possible to identify spaces in which the stones vases could have been used: spaces characterised by the presence of stuccoed floors, often with one or more benches, and with a clay portable hearth in the centre. The shapes from the settlement are mainly bowls, vases that imitate ceramic shapes, or bird-nest vases, which are especially abundant in rooms with both bench and hearth. In my opinion, the bird-nest vases constitute a sort of trait d’union with the palace, as they were used in the entrances of the palace (rooms L and LIX). The bird-nest vases could have constituted a symbolic element connected to the storage and consumption of agricultural products (PALIO 2004). It cannot be excluded that the production, circulation and use of the stone vases was correlated with the control of the ceremonies of the palace, ceremonies that could in some way have had their origin in the ritual activity that was performed outside of the tombs since the Prepalatial period. A large quantity of bird-nest vases was found in the external area of tholos A at Platanos; similarly, the bird-nest vase represents, in a later phase, the most common shape among the stone vases: vases of the same type were used in the so-called offering courtyard where, in Levi’s opinion, a libation offering to the dead took place. If tombs represented the place in which the communities negotiated their social identity, and claimed their right to possess and control territory (BINTLIFF 1977), they were also the burial-places of an elite that controlled a certain territory (SOLES 1988). Branigan himself underlines the richness of the Mesara tombs, and stresses the fact that they were the expression of a dominant group (BRANIGAN 1984). The situation of the settlement at Phaistos could in some way testify to a similar phenomenon, with several groups sharing or competing for control of the site and of the activities that were performed in the palace (SCHOEP 2006). The rich assemblage of stone vases from room IL (especially bowls) could be explained by the particular function of this room as a connecting point between the outside and the inside of the palace, at a time in which access to the palace and especially to the central court, the focus of ritual activity, seems to have been restricted (DRIESSEN 2002). A strong contraction began in MM IIIA, and this trend continued until the end of LM I. Stone vases were generally found outside the palace in the first phase of the Neopalatial period, the reconstruction of which had started at that time: in the Casa a Sud della rampa, and in Chalara. The shapes are the same as those of the MM II period, although it cannot be excluded that the production of many of these vases actually dates back to MM II or earlier. The interesting thing is that many of the shapes used in the settlement, for example the lamps and the plates, were only previously found in the palace. The LM I period is characterised by a further restriction in the uses of the stone vases, with a meaningful concentration in one of the most important areas of the palace, namely rooms 8-11, which inherited the functions of the bench sanctuaries of the first palace. The presence of numerous offering tables, (n. 725, 726, 727), whose typology is correlated to the vases of the northern part of the island, recalls the use of these vases in the first palace. The bird-nest vases from the LM IB building at Ayia Photinì, within an assemblage in which ritual feasting was probably prepared and consumed (PALIO forthcoming), recalls uses already attested during the period of the first palaces. An interesting aspect is the identification of several working areas in various parts of the settlement. Numerous archaeological correlates of stone vase workshops were identified in each of the three buildings of the quarter to the west of the Strada Nord; the presence of a certain number of flakes and off-cuts in the same area, in the so-called «Grande Frana» ( fig. XIX), together with a bowl (cat. n. 563), should also be highlighted. Various elements in the Casa a Sud della rampa also suggest the production of stone vases; two unfinished vases (a bowl, cat. n. 448, and a bird-nest vase, cat. n. 838) were found during work for the construction of the modern ramp for the Tourism association in the quarter to the south of the Acropoli Mediana. Moreover, another off-cut was amongst the materials retrieved from beneath the floor of room CVII. As far as the areas located at a certain distance from the palace are concerned, one or more workshops existed at Chalara and in the Protopalatial settlement at Ayia Photinì. Phaistos presents a distinctive situation, also encountered in other Cretan palatial sites: a) identification of stone working areas both within the palace and in the settlement, and also the decentralization of this activity in rather distant areas (Chalara, Ayia Photinì); the co-existence of artisan activity that took both place within the palace and in other areas not apparently directly connected to palatial control; b) the plausible location of the workshops on the upper story of the buildings: this can be argued, at least in the palace, from the dispersal of the indicators of production activity in several rooms, but it cannot be excluded that the workshops in the buildings to the West of Piazzale I were also located upstairs; c) the presence of various artisan activities concentrated in the same area; d) if the idea that cultic activities were mainly performed within the complex of rooms LI/LIII -LV, or in all the south-west wing of the palace. At Phaistos the situation appears to be complex due to the presence of workshops in each of the habitation nuclei, besides the palace. This situation seems to be characterised by aggregated workshops of artisans, perhaps with different competences, strictly connected to the small groups in which the artisans are effective and important members (COSTIN 1991); the production of each nucleus was not restricted to a single elite group, but was the prerogative of the members of the various groups that constituted the Phaistian society in the Protopalatial period. As numerous stone vases were seemingly used within the same contexts in which they were produced, it seems as though artisans worked mainly for their groups: this is the case of the assemblages of the Acropoli Mediana, Chalara and Ayia Photinì, where assemblages such as those from rooms CVII, Delta and Iota’, in the north and south sectors respectively, and Epsilon can be correlated to rooms in which the performance of some ceremonial activity could also be supposed due to the presence of benches, hearths and particular ceramic shapes. It is more doubtful in the quarter to the West of Piazzale I, where these rooms, with the exception of rooms XCV and CX in the building of the southernmost terrace, do not seem to be documented. The case of the palace is more complex. Despite the presence of many elements that could attest to craft activities even here, the cultic activities seem to be undoubtedly more prominent. Different types of production of stone vases therefore exist, according to the use of these vases. Similarly, different artisans existed connected to the various groups that constituted Phaistian society in the Protopalatial period.