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

and similarities in tool popularity. The discussion of these patterns and their implications
for craft industries represent a substantial portion of this dissertation.
II. Framework of the study, research design and procedures followed
The notion that interregional contact may be detected in a post-production
metallurgical stage—the consumption of the finished metal products—led to the
development of this project, with three research questions in mind. The first inquiry asks:
What were the mechanisms and factors that influenced artifact distributions and regional
tool preferences? Second, what can tool distributions and frequencies reveal about the
associated craft industries over broad spatial and temporal spans? Finally, is it possible to
detect mobile craftspersons or interregional parallels in craftsmanship through tool links
and similarities? These questions are scrutinized throughout the dissertation and form the
research agenda of the project.
The limits that shape this study are broadly defined by the second millennium BC
and the geographic spaces of the Aegean, Anatolia, eastern Mediterranean, and Syria-
Palestine. Peripheral locations to these regions, such as the central Mediterranean,
Balkans, Mesopotamia and Egypt, were not considered due to reasons of feasibility. It is
acknowledged that these excluded areas may have influenced the development of the tool
and craft industries examined in this project, and this issue will be examined in post-
doctoral study. The regions under study witnessed developments in metallurgy and
architecture that were similar to each other during the Middle and Late Bronze Ages.
Architectural advancements, specifically the ability to cut stone, during the second
millennium seem to parallel innovations in metallurgy, including the propagation of tin-
bronze and the perfection of masonry tools.
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