Hierarchies, Heterarchies, and Urbanization Processes: The View from Bronze Age Cyprus

Authors

  • Priscilla Schuster Keswani Washington State University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1558/jmea.v9i2.211

Keywords:

hierarchy, urbanization processes

Abstract

Neo-evolutionist models of the rise of civilizations have attracted increasing criticism because the hierarchical, centrally organized politico-economic systems which they posit (i.e. chiefdoms and states) are not always evident in the archaeological record of societies in transition to urbanism or other modes of social complexity. Alternative models based on the concept of hierarchy, or complexity that is not necessarily associated with highly centralized socio-political hierarchies, offer a new way of analyzing and interpreting such cases. In this paper I consider urbanization processes in Late Bronze Age Cyprus, which diverge from the paradigm of hierarchy inasmuch as they seem to have begun in the absence of prior 'chiefdom' societies and culminated in the emergence of a number of autonomous regional polities with a diversity of hierarchical and hierarchical characteristics. I discuss the differing patterns of internal organization which these polities display and explore the possible reasons for those differences, focusing on variations in local settlement histories and geographical or logistical factors such as proximity to important copper resources.

Author Biography

  • Priscilla Schuster Keswani, Washington State University
    Priscilla Keswani received her doctorate in anthropology from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor in 1989. Her research interests encompass many facets of the development of social complexity, urbanism, and the archaeology of mortuary practices. She has published and presented a number of papers on the mortuary evidence for social hierarchy in Bronze Age Cyprus, the organisation of local exchange systems, the social and ritual context for the user of domestic animals, and typological analysis of utilitarian pottery aimed at elucidating storage practices and systems of ceramic production and distribution. She is currently a visiting assistant professor in anthropology at Washington State University, Pullman, and an adjunct instructor at the Borough of Manhattan Community College-CUNY.

Published

1997-04-01

Issue

Section

Articles

How to Cite

Keswani, P. S. (1997). Hierarchies, Heterarchies, and Urbanization Processes: The View from Bronze Age Cyprus. Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology, 9(2), 211-250. https://doi.org/10.1558/jmea.v9i2.211