Middle and Late Bronze Age Metal Tools from the Aegean, Eastern ...

count (Figs. 3.5b and 3.9a) — this, in spite of well-documented storage centers for
agricultural surplus at Knossos, Mallia, and Phaistos. The dearth of Minoan agricultural
implements is underscored by the fact that Evely’s seminal work on Minoan tools does
not show any agrarian items. The Aegean palatial archives and storerooms point to a
successful agricultural industry as part of a staple-based economy. 169 Evidently, the
combination of high costs for manufacturing metal items and the availability of cheap
stone and wood alternatives resulted in a limited number of bronze tools for farming. The
lack of such metal implements, however, did not coincide with inadequate agricultural
yields, judging by the surplus storage areas in the Cretan palace centers. 170
Commonalities in agricultural tools between the eastern Mediterranean and the
Aegean are few. The scanty occurrence of agricultural metal implements within the
Aegean tool assemblages is striking (Fig. 3.5a, b; 3.9a-c). The preferred agricultural tool
in prehistoric Greece was the sickle, which aided the harvest of cereals. Of the 80 LBA
Aegean tools, sickles comprise 65 (81.3%) of the known examples (Figs. 3.9a-c). Sickles
are also the most common agricultural tool in Anatolia and the Uluburun shipwreck. The
171
Aegean world is noted for its multiplicity of crops as early as the Neolithic period.
Archaeobotanical evidence from LBA Aegean sites has revealed a wide range of cereals
(wheat, barley, corn, emmer, hulled barley, bread wheat) and pulses (lentils, chickpea,
pea, bean, celtic bean, bitter vetch, Spanish vetchling). 172
Despite this rich assortment of
crops, the Linear B, Linear A and Cretan Hieroglyphic texts each only have two grain
169
Christakis 2008.
170
For a discussion on the implications of storage in the Neopalatial palaces, see Christakis 2008.
171
Halstead 1992, 107.
172
Halstead 1992, 108, Table 1; Hansen (1988, 42) also reports the primary plants and crops from the
Aceramic Neolithic through the Late Bronze Age in Greece. Also see, Palmer 2008, 623.
79