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

Drills are well dispersed throughout Crete, the mainland, Cyprus, and Anatolia.
They are relatively rare on the Greek islands, Syria-Palestine, and the eastern
Mediterranean shipwrecks. Although documented in the MBA, the tool occurs in greater
concentrations during the second half of the millennium. Because of the simplicity of
solid drills, discrete regional traits are difficult to ascertain. Cypriot drills are often longer
than those from other regions, but drills generally lack explicit characteristics indicative
of trans-cultural connections. The length of a drill was not standardized, and the range
displayed in the known examples is extensive; this point is illustrated by a scatter plot of
the drills and the high coefficients of variation for each region (Figs. 4.18a, b). The width
of the Cypriot drill tips changed minimally, even as the length increased. This
phenomenon resulted in a very low R-squared value, meaning that the length and width
of Cypriot drills did not have a linear relationship. A better correlation exists between
length and width for the Anatolian and Mainland drills, judging by their comparatively
high R-squared values. These narrow implements could consistently make perforations
with diameters between 0.4‒0.7 cm. Drills with tips greater 1.0 cm are also preserved
than but they constitute less than ten percent of the total drill count.
G2: Hollow or tubular drills
Hollow or tubular drills are better documented through mortises in masonry and
the stone cores that were removed in the drilling process than by any physical specimens
of the implement. This section reviews what is known about the tubular drill, before
considering whether or not a group of metal cylinders were employed as hollow drill bits.
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