Archaeology Lecture: “Kinet Höyük in the second millennium BCE, from Cilician Harbor to Hittite Port” by Marie-Henriette Gates

Lecture co-sponsored by the Boston University of Archaeology and the Archaeological Institute of America.The Middle and Late Bronze phases at Kinet Höyük were investigated in some detail during the twenty-year fieldwork project (1992-2011) at this ancient seaport in the Mediterranean's northeastern corner. They illustrate the succession of influential forces that prevailed in the eastern Mediterranean during the second millennium BCE. At the start of the Middle Bronze Age, Kinet maintained a Cilician personality, like Tarsus and Mersin. It was then drawn into the maritime commercial network that soon flourished along the Levantine coast, promoting a shared material culture marked by regional variations. These circumstances changed when Cilicia and its neighbors became part of the Hittite state, and were transformed by its central Anatolian character. Kinet, the Hittite seaport Izziya, shows that the Anatolianizing process was sudden, effective and enduring. This lecture will examine the salient features of Kinet's evolution during these many centuries, and consider them within the site's regional, historical and economic contexts.

When 5:00 pm to 6:30 pm on Thursday, January 30, 2014
Location CAS Room 224