Land and Underwater Archaeological Investigations at Liman Tepe

Hayat Erkanal of the Ankara University Mustafa V. Koç Research Center for Maritime Archaeology presents the land and underwater excavations at Liman Tepe (prehistoric Klazomenai) on the Bay of Izmir, joined by project members Vasıf Şahoğlu, Ourania Kouka and Rıza Tuncel.

Erkanal outlines the sequence on land from the seventh-millennium Neolithic and the Chalcolithic into the Bronze Age. In Early Bronze Age I, a limestone-slab fortification wall enclosed longhouses containing metal and textile workshops. In Early Bronze Age II, a larger wall with horseshoe-shaped bastions protected an upper citadel and a 25-hectare fortified lower town. Oval Middle Bronze Age houses and thirteenth-century BC Late Bronze Age buildings with local and Mycenaean pottery and figurines follow.

Underwater excavations begun in 2000 with the University of Haifa showed that submerged remains north of the site were the rubble breakwaters of an Archaic and Classical harbour, used in the seventh to sixth and fourth centuries BC. Finds include pottery, electrum coins, a stone anchor stock and a sixth-century wooden anchor with an iron tip. Geomorphological work with McMaster University traced submerged coastlines and five harbours across the area, including two on Karantina Island.

The talk then reviews experimental voyages in reconstructed vessels: Uluburun II, which sailed from Rhodes to Cyprus; the Archaic ship Kybele, sailed from Phokaia to Marseille; and three sewn-plank Early Cycladic boats. Afterwards, Kouka discusses an Early Bronze Age I gold find from c. 2800 BC, Tuncel summarizes the Chalcolithic layers, and the team answers questions on Thermi, Cycladic contacts and harbour stratigraphy.