The Center for Hellenic Studies

Bronze Age
Hellenic Studies Series

The Purpled World: Marketing Haute Couture in the Aegean Bronze Age

During the Aegean Bronze Age (ca. 3000–1500 BCE), the spread of woolen textiles triggered an increased demand for color. The dyes included those made from the labor-intensive processing of crocus stamens for saffron dye and even more costly dyes made from certain sea snails (the Muricidae/Murex). Minoan and Mycenaean textile producers (the palaces) operated mainly in the Black Sea region, rich in gold. “Purpled world” is Morris Silver’s term for this… Read more

Hybrid Event

Fellow Talk | Maria Choleva

17 November 2022, 11:00 am ET

Is technology a dis-embodied entity estranged from the socio-historical human experience, as the Western modern view of production would assert? Are techniques and tools adopted and transferred as neutral technical information or as socially and culturally significant practices? How is the body-material-tool relationship shaped by culture, materializing human behavior, social relations, and worldviews? Read more