LAZARIDES - 2011

Lazarides. N. Sgouritsa (Athens) reports on excavation in the flat area of the settlement to the west and southwest of the slope excavated in 2009 and 2010 (Fig. 1). GPS survey showed that the settlement covered a total area of 3500m2.

A complex of rooms was revealed to wall-top level in 1979 and 1980: work in 2011 unearthed the inner walls and entrances to five rooms (Fig. 2). Three rooms and a triangular area immediately to the west were excavated to natural ground level.

The triangular area lay between the field boundary and the west wall of rooms 4 and 5 (Figs 1,2). In the north, this wall met another which disappears under the field boundary; to the south, it was interrupted by a doorway with a fine stone threshold (Fig. 3). Besides the usual pottery found throughout the settlement, the threshold area produced a coarse stone vessel with a shallow cavity and small spout (Fig. 4 a, b). Sherds from the triangular area are mainly standard LH IIIA2, LH IIIB and (a few) early LH IIIC household vessels. MH/ LH I matt-painted sherds were found in almost every area excavated. Some rooms produced a few high quality LH II sherds (Fig. 5). The triangular area yielded also a few stone tools including a fragment of a flint saw, a piece of flint and a small number of animal bones and shells.

The eastern part of the north wall of the triangular area served as the north wall of room 5. This room was accessed from the northeast through a doorway with a fine monolithic stone threshold; a stone with a single cavity for the door hinge was adjacent to it (Fig. 6). To the east of the entrance, a corridor evidently ran eastwards. Room 5 yielded numerous sherds of standard, fine and coarse LH IIIA2, LH IIIB and (a few) early LH IIIC vessels (Fig. 7 a, b), animals bones and shells (common finds throughout the complex), stone artifacts/tools (including obsidian blades and flakes), numerous steatite spindle whorls, a quadrilateral weight with a suspension hole (Fig. 8), a handmade sherd with incised and impressed decoration similar to Adriatic ware (Fig. 9), a biconical stone object (perhaps a weight: Fig. 10), a slate object with incised symbols of uncertain purpose (Fig. 11), a small bronze spatula with a loop handle (Fig. 12), a 350g discoid lead weight with incised vertical dashes on one face (Fig. 13), lumps of dark red pigment; an artifact possibly of boar's tusk; and an olive pit. In the south-east corner of room 5 a child burial contained a Psi figurine (Fig. 14). There was no direct connection between rooms 5 and 4, the latter being accessed only from the west.

Room 4, the largest in the complex, had a possible bench in its southeast corner. Also in this corner, the bones probably of a baby or an infant were buried between two stones. The pottery found was similar to that in the other rooms, although a stirrup jar and cylindrical alabastron in the southeast corner are uncommon finds in the settlement. Other finds from room 4 were: animal bones, shells, stone tools and other stone objects including spindle whorls, a cylindrical weight of imported stone (Fig. 15), an Early Minoan (?) / Middle Minoan agate seal with a suspension loop at the top and cross-hatching on the elliptical base (Fig. 16), and a discoid clay object or token (Fig. 17).

Only the walls of rooms 2 and 3 were investigated to locate their entrances. Room 2 was evidently accessed through an opening in its west wall and from the northeast through a doorway with a stone threshold (Fig. 2). The head of a small figurine was found among the stones of this threshold. Room 3 was probably connected to room 2 through an opening in its south wall, but did not communicate with room 4.

Skeletal remains in a doorway (?) in the south-west part of room 1 comprised a few long bones, part of a skull and many teeth (including some milk teeth) from the secondary burial of at least two individuals, not in anatomical order. The pottery recovered from the immediate vicinity of the skeletal remains and from room 1 was similar to that from the other rooms. Room 1 also produced animal bones and shells. The room was accessed from the east, where a monolithic stone threshold was framed by stones with grooves for the door frame.

Rooms 5d and 7a (explored in 2010) were fully excavated (Fig. 1): their shared west wall was initially the outer wall of the building. Room 5d was accessed through the south wall via a doorway with a stone threshold, with one step down to floor level. A stone with two cavities at the north-eastern end of the threshold, at a lower level, (Fig. 18) resembles that by the threshold connecting rooms 3 and 4. Room 5d yielded pottery similar to that from the other rooms plus a small knife (Fig. 19). Room 7a was accessed through an opening in its north wall (initially with a monolithic stone threshold later phase covered with small stones) and connected with room 7b via a doorway in its east wall. A tripod cooking pot was in situ on the floor in the centre of the room, with a terracotta animal figurine nearby. An older floor beneath yielded finds including a fragmentary terracotta figurine akin to Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age examples from Kolona (Fig. 14), and an obsidian flake and blade. A large storage vessel, on bedrock, contained a child burial without grave goods. The north and east walls of room 7a were braced to prevent collapse.

Eight lead objects from the cemetery and settlement were sampled for isotopic analysis and scanning electron microscopy. The isotope results place the lead finds from Lazarides into two groups of different origin. The first lies well within the borders of the field of Siphnos, while the second fits well with the field corresponding to the Laurion ores. The Laurion group includes an ingot from the settlement, and the Siphnian a duck-shaped weight which was either manufactured at Lazarides or elsewhere in the Aegean. The affinities of this rare find with weights from Cyprus and the Middle East, in contrast to the Aegean origin of the lead used, show that even minor Aegean settlements, as Lazarides, participated in the Mediterranean long distance trade network.