My first and greatest debt is to my teachers, notably Grahame Clark and Glyn Daniel, who taught me that it is not the material data alone but the approach to the subject which governs the hypotheses which finally we accept. It is they, and those colleagues who take pleasure in discussing the general problems of prehistoric archaeology, who have made studying the subject so rewarding.
I have incurred many obligations to friends and scholars in Greece, indeed one of the most agreeable aspects of working in the Cyclades has been the generosity and cooperation of all those archaeologists with whom I have had contact. Among those who have kindly permitted me to study unpublished material are Dr and Mrs N. Zapheiropoulos, Mr Christos Doumas, today the most active worker on problems of Cycladic prehistory, Professor N. Kontoleon, Dr S. Alexiou, Mr M. S. F. Hood and Professor J. L. Caskey, who also gave me the welcome opportunity of assisting in his excavations at Kephala in Kea. To Professor Blegen, Mr Jerome Sperling and the Director of the Ankara Museum I am grateful for access to the Kum Tepe material and for permission to publish my drawings of it. I wish also to thank Miss Sylvia Benton, Frau E. M. Fischer-Bossert, Mr Hector Catling, the late Dr C. Karousos, Professor Dora Levi, Dr G. Papathanasopoulos, Miss B. Philippaki, Mrs Patricia Preziosi, Dr David Trump and Professor Saul Weinberg for valuable advice or access to unpublished material. The late Mr R. W. Hutchinson was a kind and good friend, and an unfailing source of unexpected yet useful information.
I have had the great pleasure of cooperating with Dr J. R. Cann and Dr J. E. Dixon in the study of obsidian, and they have advised on other petrological points, as have Dr Janet Seton Springer (née Peacey) and Professors A. N. Georgiades and G. M. Paraskevopoulos in Athens. Mr J. M. Charles has been most helpful with his metallurgical knowledge.
During my stay in Greece, first as a Strathcona Student of St John’s College and the School Student of the British School of Archaeology at Athens, then as holder of a Greek Government scholarship, and recently with the support of the Research Fund of the University of Sheffield, the hospitality of the School and the friendship of its members, has been generous. I have greatly benefited there from discussions with Dr Peter Warren on Cretan problems, and with Dr David French and Mr Roger Howell on the prehistory of the Greek mainland. Dr French has kindly allowed me to refer freely here to his unpublished doctoral dissertation. I am grateful to my former research supervisors Dr F. H. Stubbings and Mr A. H. S. Megaw for their counsel, and to Professor J. D. Evans for his collaboration in our joint excavations at Saliagos.
It was Dr John Coles, its General Editor, who invited me to write this book which owes much to his encouragement and to the care of Miss Janice Price. The maps have been drawn by Mr J. E. Hall, Mr C. R. Jones and Miss S. G. Ottwell, the plans by Mr N. S. Hyslop, and the diagrams by Mr H. Walkland. Mr P. R. Morley printed many of the photographs from my negatives, and for the others, or for permission to use them, I am grateful to the Managing Committee of the British School of Archaeology at Athens (as for permission to publish my drawings of Cycladic material), the Trustees of the British Museum, the Director of the National Museum in Athens, the Keepers of the Departments of Antiquities of the Ashmolean Museum, of the Musée du Louvre, and of the Nationalmuseet in Copenhagen, to the Director of the German Archaeological Institute in Athens, to Mr M. S. F. Hood, Professor J. L. Caskey, Professor N. Kontoleon, Mrs Dolly Goulandris and especially to Dr and Mrs N. Zapheiropoulos and Mr Christos Doumas. The frontispiece is the work of Ino loannidou and Lenio Bartziotis, with the kind permission of Mrs Goulandris.
My wife has been a constant source of encouragement, spiritual and practical, throughout the preparation of this work. Inevitably we have found working in the Cyclades the most personally enjoyable part of this research. Mr M. Bardanis, Mr Z. Vaos, Mr N. Gavalas, Mr V. Kaloudas, Mr G. Kastrisios and the museum officials in the Cyclades have been very helpful. To all these colleagues, to those friends in the islands who have been so very hospitable, and especially to the friendly people of Apeiranthos, my very grateful thanks.
July 1970
Sheffield