Communication networks of the southern Aegean and the eastern Mediterranean in the Minoan era

My dissertation project explores how parts of the Cretan population were able to establish and dominate networks of bronze and tin exchange in the Aegean and beyond, despite the scarcity of copper and the absence of tin ores in Crete and the deficiency of a central military power.

My working hypothesis assumes that competition among different geographic, social, religious, and ideological groups for access to goods, foreigners, products, and ideas was an integral part of life of the Minoan civilization. These contests consisted in many cases of the exhibition of exotica, such as imports, based on which the scale of exchange increased. In the course of time new groups and ideologies arose, which advanced the scale of exchange. Afterwards society and exchange networks changed radically through the volcanic eruption of Thera and its aftermath.