The Cambridge-Bradford (Durham-Leiden-Edinburgh) Boeotia Project: The First 40 Years of a Regional Landscape Survey in Central Greece

John Bintliff, Emeritus Professor at Leiden University and the University of Edinburgh, reviews forty-one years of the Boeotia Project in central Greece, co-directed since 1978 with Anthony Snodgrass. Beginning with the history of Mediterranean surface survey from early travellers to intensive fieldwalking and off-site coverage, the talk presents methods and results from rural hinterlands and urban centres around Haliartos, Thespiai, Hyettos, Tanagra, and Koroneia.

Around Thespiai, grid collection and GIS cost-surface analysis of dense off-site ceramic scatters test Tony Wilkinson's theory of agricultural intensification, indicating that Classical and Hellenistic farmers carted urban rubbish into surrounding fields as manure when the city reached its maximum extent, before a Late Hellenistic and Early Roman contraction. Inspired by the Teotihuacan survey, the team mapped multi-period Thespiai from its Neolithic tell through its seventy-hectare Classical-Hellenistic peak, Late Roman kastro, and Byzantine and Ottoman villages up to 1811. Bintliff also outlines GPS-assisted grids identifying household assemblages at Koroneia, geophysical surveys of villas and city plans at Tanagra and Haliartos, soil geochemistry on farmsteads, and ceramic sourcing by Philip Bes and Athanasios Vionis showing the dominance of local pottery production.

For the medieval and post-medieval periods, the talk traces the shift from Late Antique Tanagra to the early Byzantine refuge at Kastri, Middle Byzantine hamlets, and Frankish towers overlooking Greek villages. Combining surface ceramics with Ottoman tax registers studied with Machiel Kiel, the project compares the prosperous village of Panaya with the serf estate at Ginossati, alongside recordings of traditional longhouses and Chiara Piccoli's 3D reconstruction of Hellenistic Koroneia. Questions afterward cover post-Roman ceramic dating with John Hayes, local pottery production, Ottoman archives, and sampling permits.