"Mediterranean Landscapes in Post Antiquity: New frontiers and new perspectives highlights the fact that the study of landscape has in recent years been a field for considerable analytical archaeological experimentation. This new situation has made it possible to rethink the orientation of some theoretical approaches to the subject; equally these methods have been profitably used for the formation of a new theoretical and conceptual framework. These analytical trends have also featured in the Mediterranean area. Although the Mediterranean is the home of classicism (which also defines a particular archaeological methodology), it has seen the implementation of projects of this new kind, and in regions of Spain and Italy, after some delay, the proliferation of landscape archaeology studies. There are examples of more-or-less sophisticated postcolonial archaeological work, albeit conducted at the same time as examples of unreconstructed colonial archaeology. It is not easy to resolve a situation like this which requires the full integration of the different national archaeological cultures into a truly global forum. But some reflection on the cultural differences between the various landscape archaeologies, at least in the West is required. These considerations have given rise to the idea of this book which examines these themes in the framework of the Mediterranean area"--Publisher's description.

The study of landscape has in recent years been a field for considerable analytical archaeological experimentation. Although the Mediterranean is the home of classicism, it has seen the implementation of projects of this new kind, and in regions of Spain and Italy, after some delay, the proliferation of landscape archaeology studies.

Varied approaches to an overlooked time period in the history and archaeology of the Mediterranean This book presents multidisciplinary perspectives on Greece, Corsica, Malta, and Sicily from the fourth to the thirteenth centuries, an often-overlooked time in the history of the central Mediterranean. The research approaches and areas of specialization collected here range from material culture to landscape settlement patterns, from epigraphy to architecture and architectural decoration, and from funerary archaeology to urban fabric and cityscapes. Topics covered in these chapters include late Roman villas; the formation of Byzantine and Islamic settlements in western Sicily; reuse of protohistoric sites in late antiquity and the middle ages in eastern Sicily; early Christian landscapes and settlements in Corsica; the transition from late antiquity through Byzantine rule to Muslim conquest in Malta; trade network trajectories of the Aegean islands and Crete; and crosscultural interactions in medieval Greece. Together, these essays show the potential of post-Ancient and post-Classical archaeology, highlighting missing links between the Roman world and medieval Byzantium and broadening the horizons of new generations of archaeologists. Contributors: Carla Aleo Nero | Effie F. Athanassopoulos | Giuseppe Bazan | Amelia R. Brown | Gabriele Castiglia | Angelo Castrorao Barba | David Cardona | Santino Alessandro Cugno | Michael J. Decker | Franco Dell’Aquila | Scott Gallimore | Matt King | Rosa Lanteri | Pasquale Marino | Roberto Miccichè | Philippe Pergola | Filippo Pisciotta | Natalia Poulou | Grant Schrama | Claudia Speciale | Davide Tanasi

Reviews the palaeoenvironmental evidence and its incorporation with landscape archaeology across the Mediterranean, from the Early Neolithic to the end of the Roman period.

The Mediterranean landscape record is recognized for its length and richness and the opportunity it offers to study the interaction between humans and their landscape. This volume explores a variety of current archaeological issues in the context of specific landscapes from southern Spain through Greece and Cyprus to Jordan and from antiquity to recent times. Over the last 25 years, researchers have initiated a dramatic expansion in theoretical approaches—both anthropological and classical. Over the same time span, a huge volume of field survey projects has been carried out in the Mediterranean arena. The contributors to Mediterranean Archaeological Landscapes take stock of what has been learned, identify lacunae, and consider new approaches to our understanding of the rich surface landscape record of the Mediterranean. Their goal is to explore theoretically diverse interpretative themes and the methods that make those approachable.

In this volume, deriving from two conferences held in Rome and Leicester in 2016, nineteen leading European archaeologists discuss and interpret the complex evolution of landscapes - both urban and rural - across Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (c. AD 300-700). The geographical coverage extends from Italy to the Mediterranean West through to the Rhine frontier and onto Hadrian's Wall. Core are questions of impacts due to the socio-political, religious, military and economic transformations affecting provinces, territories and kingdoms across these often turbulent centuries: how did townscapes change and at what rate? What were the fates of villas? When do post-classical landscapes emerge and in what form? To what degree did Europe become an insecure, defended landscape? In what ways did people - cityfolk, farmers, nobility, churchmen, merchants - adapt? Do the elite remain visible and how prominent is the Church? Where and how do we see culture change through the arrival of new groups or new ideas? Do burials form a clear guide to the changing world? And underlying much of the discussion is a consideration of the nature and quality of our source material.

Research on late antique and early medieval migrations has long acknowledged the importance of interdisciplinarity. The field is constantly nourished by new archaeological discoveries that allow for increasingly refined pictures of socio-economic development. Yet the perspectives adopted by historians and archaeologists are frequently different, and so are their conclusions. Diverging views exist in respect to varying geographical areas and scholarly traditions too. This volume brings together history and archaeology to address the impact of the inflow and outflow of migrations on the rural landscape, the creation of new settlement patterns, and the role of migrations and mobility in transforming society and economy. Such themes are often investigated under a regional or macro-regional viewpoint, resulting in too fragmented an understanding of a widespread phenomenon. Spanning Eastern and Western Europe, the book takes steps toward an integrated picture of territories normally investigated as separate entities, and critically establishes grounds for new comparisons and models on late antique and early medieval transformations.