Abstract
In this article, the socio-economic and cultural identity of Chalcis is traced through, and combined with, the story of its material culture and, in particular, of its impressive pottery production and consumption. Through this lens, the historical conditions and daily life over more than ten centuries (from the ninth to the early twentieth century) of this relatively unknown provincial town are closely examined. This makes it possible to detect one field in which local communities reacted to, adjusted to, took advantage of, survived or sometimes succumbed to the wider turmoil of the Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek eras.
Highlights
achieve the importance its counterparts hold in other (pre-)historical periods and parts of the world
The interest in the case of Chalcis stems from the presence of two constants
the paper's focus extends from the early ninth century
Summary
The rather meagre historical record for middle Byzantine Chalcis – known as Egripos7 – is enriched greatly by the material from the excavated clusters of this period, both within the walls (Ayia Barbara Square, Fig. 1.38, and the Ayia Paraskevi area/Toulitsi plot, Fig. 1.23) and outside (the Orionos plot, Fig. 1.24). The local tableware presents the general features of the so-called Post-Byzantine pottery in their shapes, techniques, surface treatments and decorative patterns – incised or painted, abstract motifs were freely applied in the available space on both open and closed forms, under a lead glaze.[47] A large quantity of such tableware was excavated in cesspits at the Sultana Negrin plot on Kotsou Street (Fig. 1.32), perhaps pointing to a commercial use of this building These ceramics, along with a variety of plain glazed and unglazed closed vessels, have similarities in all workshops throughout the Balkans, proving a unifying interregional trend within the wider Ottoman market. Some of the cannonballs from the siege were later reused, while others were left in situ.[51]
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