The New Chronology of Iron Age Gordion argues that the history and archaeology of the site of Gordion, in central Turkey, have been misunderstood since the beginning of its excavation in the 1950s. The first excavation director, Rodney Young, found evidence for substantial destruction during the first decade of fieldwork; this was interpreted as proof that Gordion had been destroyed ca. 700 B.C. by the Kimmerians, a group of invaders from the Caucusus/Black Sea region, as attested in several ancient literary sources. During the last decade, however, renewed research on the archaeological evidence, within, above, and below the destruction level indicated that the catastrophe that destroyed much of Gordion occurred 100 years earlier, in 800 B.C., and was the result of a fire that quickly got out of control rather than a foreign invasion. This discovery requires a reassessment of Anatolian history during the entire first millennium B.C. and has serious implications for our understanding of the surrounding regions, such as Assyria, Syria, Greece, and Urartu, among others. The New Chronology of Iron Age Gordion is the product of a multidisciplinary research program, with dendrochronology and radiocarbon dating working hand in hand with textual and artifact analysis, each of which is treated in a separate chapter in this volume. All of these categories of evidence point to the same conclusion and demonstrate that we need to look at Gordion, and much of the ancient Near East, in a completely new way. University Museum Monograph, 133

The period of Anatolian history between the death of the semi-legendary king Midas of Gordion ca. 700 BC and the advent of the Achaemenid Persian Empire ca. 550 BC is dominated by certain narratives: the rise of the Mermnad Lydian Kingdom, from Gyges to Croesus; the demise of the Urartian Kingdom and ‘Neo-Hittite’-type culture and polities; and the invasion of shadowy forces from the Steppe: Cimmerians, Scythians and Medes. The discoveries of Geoffrey and Francoise Summers’s project at the massive walled city on Kerkenes Da?? have changed the cultural history and texture of Anatolia during this time period, opening up insights into the spread of Phrygian culture and language and inviting further discussion of how the period is framed. This book honors their accomplishments by presenting papers addressing the dynamics and events of that period from various angles, and in various regions and places, as well as other interventions on Iron Age Anatolia, from dating of kings to rare and potentially influential medical techniques. The volume sheds light on and also advocates for further synthesis of the regional dynamics affecting the Mediterranean, Near East and Anatolia together, toward the production of revised, more nuanced narratives.

An interdisciplinary consideration of how eastern Mediterranean cultures in the first millennium BCE were meaningfully connected. The early first millennium BCE marks one of the most culturally diverse periods in the history of the eastern Mediterranean. Surveying the region from Greece to Iraq, one finds a host of cultures and political formations, all distinct, yet all visibly connected in meaningful ways. These include the early polities of Geometric period Greece, the Phrygian kingdom of central Anatolia, the Syro-Anatolian city-states, the seafaring Phoenicians and the biblical Israelites of the southern Levant, Egypt’s Twenty-first through Twenty-fifth Dynasties, the Urartian kingdom of the eastern Anatolian highlands, and the expansionary Neo-Assyrian Empire of northern Mesopotamia. This volume adopts an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the social and political significance of how interregional networks operated within and between Mediterranean cultures during that era.

Explores the formation of power during secondary polity formation by integrating multifaceted ceramic and material analyses of Gordion.

This volume contains the excavation report for 12 cremation burials from the Phrygian site of Gordion in central Anatolia. These tombs, dating from the later seventh century to the third quarter of the 6th century BCE, were excavated by The University Museum between 1950 and 1969, and by the German brothers Alfred and Gustav Korte in 1900. The processes for interment through construction of tumulus and cremation procedure are carefully detailed, followed by an analysis of associated finds. Two tumuli of the Hellenistic period, both covering stone chambers with inhumation burials within, are included in an appendix. Further appendices discuss other specific materials excavated from the cremation burials. A discussion of the contemporary inhumation and cremation tumulus burials at Gordion in the Phrygian period, highlighting their continuities and significant differences, forms part of the conclusion, as does discussion of sociocultural developments at Gordion between ca. 650-525 BCE as illuminated by the mortuary remains. The tumuli afford insights into questions related to gender, religion, adult/child identity, trade, social status, ethnicity, transcultural affiliations, ceramic developments, jewelry manufacture, high-status artifact display (including ivory), feasting behaviors, animal sacrifice, hero cult, and widespread "killing" of artifacts associated with the cremation burials. This entirely new publication of Gordion's tumuli makes available at last the elite cremation burials of the later Middle and early Late Phrygian (Achaemenid) periods excavated by The University Museum. By including the two Korte tumuli, it provides a complete assemblage of the cremation tumuli at Gordion. They afford remarkable new insights into life, death, and an elaborate system of value at Gordion during this most turbulent century.

ArcheoLogica Data wants to reach an Italian and international audience of scholars, professionals, students, and, more generally, early-career archaeologists, and it accepts contributions written both in Italian and English. ArcheoLogica Data proposes to indissolubly associate data and interpretation. It embraces that global idea of ​​archaeological data that integrates all the discipline declinations without any thematic or chronological constraints. Data is at the centre, and around lies everything that can stem from it: interpretations, hypotheses, reconstructions, applications, theoretical and methodological reflections, critical ideas, constructive discussions.

The city on the Kerkenes Dag in the high plateau of central Turkey was a new Iron Age capital, very probably Pteria. Founded in the later seventh century BC, the city was put to the torch in the mid sixth century and then abandoned. Between 1999 and 2011 what we have called the Cappadocia Gate, one of the seven city gates that pierce the 7 km of strong stone defenses, was excavated in its entirety. This volume documents as fully as possible the results of those excavations. The location of the gate and its architecture are discussed and illustrated, with a chapter devoted to its partial restoration. Cultic installations within the gate structure include a built stepped monument with semi-iconic idol, an aniconic stela, and graffiti representing similar stones. Sculpture set up at the back of the gate comprised many fragments of a life-sized statue supported by a plinth bearing adorsed sphinxes carved in relief. The remains of two human victims of the destruction are examined, as are animal bones that perhaps provide evidence of meals consumed by builders of the gate. Pottery and other finds, including well-preserved iron door bands, are presented, as is an exceptional ornament of gold and electrum. A final chapter attempts to place these remarkable discoveries in a wider context. The gate plan and the cultic installations and sculpture set up inside the gate appear to be entirely Phrygian. Combined with evidence of Paleo-Phrygian inscription and graffiti already published (OIP 135), this volume sheds dramatic new and unexpected evidence for the power, wealth, and sophistication of an eastward expansion of Phrygia. The brief existence, hardly more than 100 years, together with the excellent stratigraphic context of the destruction level, provide an unparalleled window onto the first half of the sixth century BC on the Anatolian Plateau.