Archaeological excavations at Kilise Tepe, Turkey.

One of the major turning points in the history of the Old World fell around 1200 BC, when the sophisticated Late Bronze Age palace states in Greece, Anatolia and Syria collapsed. Literate administrations, international commerce and diplomacy vanished overnight, ushering in a long period in which a new order emerged, leading eventually to the Classical world. As in similar circumstances elsewhere, such as post-Roman Britain, the archaeological record of this time, when there was no call for public architecture and little interaction between different regions, is scanty and hard to interpret and to date. Explanations of the general phenomenon of 'systems collapse' and of this particular instance abound, but data are currently too fragmentary in chronological and contextual terms to discriminate between them.
The site of Kilise Tepe 45 km north of the Mediterranean coast opposite Cyprus, promises to make a significant contribution. Work in the 1990s showed that the site has substantial architecture from the Hittite Empire, a unique, well-preserved public building from the terminal stage of the Late Bronze Age, and continuing occupation in the subsequent centuries down to about 700 BC. Building on fieldwork in 2007-9, one further season of excavations and two study seasons are now planned for 2010-12 to allow us to recover a sufficient body of data and to process it ready for publication. We will define the nature of the two successive LBA buildings and process their well stratified deposits with their artefactual and environmental contents. At the centre of the site we have a sequence of occupation which carries us through the centuries after 1200 BC; characteristically for the 'Centuries of Darkness' there are no monumental structures to distinguish one imperial phase from another, but we will be following up the appearance of a new architectural tradition in the shape of a circular timber-framed structure, and a stratified sequence of open spaces above this will deliver the range and development of ceramics, give us physical dating evidence, and allow us to monitor changes of subsistence and production strategies through this time.
The project will also show how the control of a centralized state can be reflected in the material footprint of its administration, how the dissolution of that control invites a reassertion of local subsistence strategies and artisanal traditions, and how a local centre can become involved in new commercial networks. It will help to bridge the artificial divide between the separate western academic traditions of Classical and Near Eastern archaeology. Colleagues specializing on the ceramic traditions of the Hittite provinces (C. Glatz), and the Pre-Hellenic Aegean (L. Preston with C. Bouthillier) will contribute their own expertise both during the field seasons and to the publication programme. Post-doctoral colleagues (Dr M.M. Hald and Dr. P. Popkin) will continue to process and analyse the botanical and faunal data so as to illuminate agricultural, stock-breeding and pastoral strategies in Anatolia for the first time during the periods under investigation.

In this way we aim to throw new light on all aspects one of the principal turning points in the history of the Old World in a part of the eastern Mediterranean which at present is almost completely unexplored.

The impact of this archaeological project will primarily be felt in its modern geographical setting, by the population of and visitors to the local villages from which our workers come, and to the towns of Silifke and Mut. This will be promoted primarily via the local officials and the museum directorship, with their contacts in the media and cultural organizations such as the Sanat Klübü at the provincial capital of Mersin, but in due course through a Turkish language component of the project website. Through an enlarged museum display and a dedicated brochure about Kilise Tepe we will aim to keep the local community and visitors informed.