Download the complete Call for Papers here.

Dear Colleagues,

We are glad to inform you that an international e-symposium on python in the Classical and Byzantine eastern Mediterranean will take place on May 8, 2024, on Zoom.us. A pithos (πίθος; plural “pithoi” and “dolia” in Latin) was a large storage container form and pithoi were found in relatively large quantities in the entire Mediterranean, from Spain to Syria and Egypt to France, where they were manufactured between the Neolithic and Medieval periods. Pithoi were used for bulk storage, primarily for fluids, grains, and olives, comparable to the drums, barrels, and casks of recent times. Besides these uses, they were also utilized as burial containers secondarily. During the long time of their use, the form and the function of pithoi were not changed on the whole. They were exported or imported over the entire eastern Mediterranean.
So far, the study of this vessel form has been overlooked, whereas there is still a huge amount of unpublished material from excavations, field surveys, and museums in the entire Mediterranean. On September 7-9, 2022, the Catalan Institute of Classical Archaeology organized in Tarragona the first international meeting on these vessels, entitled “Dolia in the Hispania provinces in the Roman period. State of the art and new perspectives” (cf. https://icac.cat/en/actualitat/noticies/2022/doliaexhispaniadefinitiveprogramme/>) which focused mostly on the western part of the Roman Mediterranean. In our e-meeting in 2024, we only focus on pithoi between c. seventh century B.C. and 13th century A.D. and attempt to set out a comprehensive model for the study of pithoi, including their definition, typology, chronology, contexts, function, regional characteristics, production and distribution patterns in the whole eastern Mediterranean geographies. We also intend to create a complete bibliography of previous publications on pithoi.
We warmly invite contributions by scholars and graduate students from a variety of disciplines related to this large vessel form. Intended to bring together scholars of Greek, Roman, and Byzantine ceramic archaeology to discuss a range of issues concerning this vessel’s characteristics, this video conference should be an excellent opportunity to increase our knowledge about this form. The following theme groups are the main questions of the symposium, which are prescriptive:

• Pithoi from archaeological field projects, museums and private collections,
• Graeco-Roman pithoi in comparison with the pithoi of the Neolithic period, Bronze and Iron Ages in the Near East and eastern Mediterranean,
• Graeco-Roman pithoi in comparison with the Minoan and Mycenaean pithoi,
• Etymology of pithoi in ancient Near Eastern, eastern Mediterranean and Aegean languages,
• Ancient Greek and Latin textual sources on pithoi,
• Typological evolution and design of pithoi,
• Storage, shipping, weight and measures of pithoi,
• Decoration of pithoi,
• Manufacturing technics and major production centers of pithoi in the Hellenistic, Roman and Early Byzantine periods,
• Distribution of pithoi,
• Typological and functional features between pithoi and some related storage vessels during the Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods,
• Similar vessel forms in the ancient Near East and their relations to Archaic and Classical Greek pithoi,
• What ancient Greeks, Romans and Byzantines thought about afterlife? Pithoi in the eastern Mediterranean funerary contexts,
• Domestic and commercial contents of pithoi: commodities and their trade through pithoi (i.e. pithoi as means of networking),
• Relations of pithoi to wooden or stone storage vessels,
• Roman pithoi in the eastern and western Mediterranean, and their differences,
• Hellenistic and Roman gravestones and other iconographic media depicting pithoi,
• Miscellanea.
  On these themes and questions, all approaches and methods susceptible to bringing some progress to our current knowledge are welcome: archaeology, ancient history, history of art, cultural anthropology, etc. The symposium will take place virtually on Zoom. All the readings and discussions in our e-conference will be in English and recorded for later viewing as a podcast on YouTube. The proceedings of the symposium will be published in 2026. The symposium is free of charge.
  We would be delighted if you could consider contributing to our symposium and contact us with the required information below before March 1, 2024. Our e-mail address is: gulserenkan@hotmail.com and/or terracottas@deu.edu.tr
  Please note that we have extended our abstract submission deadline to March 1, 2024.
  For all your queries concerning the symposium, our phone number is +90.544.938 54 64. The organizers seek to widen participation at this symposium and would like to encourage colleagues from all parts of the world to attend. We kindly request that you alert any interested researchers, colleagues, and students within your research community who would be interested in participating in this e-conference, either by forwarding our first circular and poster through Academia, Researchgate, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or other similar social media or by printing them and displaying in your institution. Please share them also on your ListServs. We hope you can join us on Zoom, and we look forward to seeing you!