| The emergence of the palace-centered state is the most striking political development of the Late Bronze Age on the Greek mainland. Yet in spite of the impression we may have of their pervasive political presence, many areas, even in the so-called “Mycenaean heartland,” were not integrated politically into any palace. In this talk I will compare two small regions, the northern Corinthia and the Saronic Gulf, which followed different trajectories in their engagements with palatial power. In the former case, I will argue that in spite of natural advantages of agricultural fertility and strategic location, the northern Corinthia witnessed neither the emergence of a palace nor political integration into one, and I will offer explanations for this based on recent surface survey results. In the latter case, it is possible to track a diachronic process of peer-polity competition between Mycenae and Kolonna, which may have culminated in the absorption of this region into Mycenae’s political orbit. Together, these cases offer archaeological strategies for investigating the process of, and limits to, palatial political integration. |
