Anthropology, Department of
Date of this Version
2006
Abstract
Early in the excavation of Nestor's palace at Pylos it was apparent that the palace was a place of large-scale communal feasting. Both Homer's literary account of Nestor ' sf east sf rom the Odyssey and the overwhelming number of kylikes in the pantry rooms provided obvious evidence of this. It has only been later, after the decipherment of Linear B and reconstruction of the megaron frescoes that the purposes, reasons, and organization of the feasts began to be explored. This paper will examine the physical remains, specifically the pottery from the pantries, the wine magazine, and the faunal evidence along with the interpretive evidence found in the Linear B documents and megaron frescoes, to reveal a hierarchical society that offered sacrifices to Poseidon shortly before it destruction. The feasts of the society will then be considered in a simple anthropological context, so the feasts move from the realm of Bronze Age Greece to the larger sphere of common human behaviors.
Comments
Published in Nebraska Anthropologist Vol. 21 (2006). Copyright © Deanna L. Wesolowski; published by The University of Nebraska-Lincoln AnthroGroup.