The conference explored a range of approaches to the built environment of the Mediterranean
world from the Neolithic through to the Hellenistic period, with the aim of relating
archaeological evidence to the wider historical context. It provided a valuable opportunity
for specialists in a wide range of periods to exchange ideas and information about new
developments in the subject: the papers ranged in date from the Neolithic period to the late
Roman Empire, crossing the conventional divide between prehistoric and Classical archaeology,
and geographically far beyond the Aegean, from Italy to North Africa, Egypt and the Black Sea.
The principal themes included:
- the relationship of the built environment to social and political structures
- methods of interpreting and analysing built space
- the identification of households in the archaeological record
- changing conceptions of public and private
- the identification of functional areas within the house
- the archaeology of the domestic economy
- space and gender
- the problems of reconciling literary evidence relating to the house with the surviving
remains of houses
The conference was sponsored by the
British School at Athens,
who will be publishing the proceedings in the series BSA Studies.
Further information about the conference volume. We would also like to acknowledge the support of the
British Academy and the Society for the
Promotion of Hellenic Studies.
The conference was part of the British Academy/AHRB-funded project
Strategies,
Structures and Ideologies of the Built Environment.
