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TINA

Maritime Archaeology Periodical

In the Aegean, although islands and islets provide evidence. Such occasions involved high-risk. Fisher-
shelter, food, and water for sea-goers, they also cause men drifting off-course, however, may have spurred
strong currents that sometimes run contrary to each discovery of new lands, raw materials, and encounters
other . In the absence of sails before the 3 millen- with other communities.
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rd
nium BCE and due to all of the other risk factors, few FISHInG AS SOCIAL enGAGement
days of the year could be spent practising offshore
fishing. An experimental study from Attica to Melos As indicated by the archaeological record, through-
had to make frequent stops due to waves, winds, and out Aegean prehistory, fishing and shellfish gathering
exhaustion of the paddlers, as movement against the remained integral parts of social and economic life.
wind direction was impossible . Agouridis mentions Fishing was practiced using several different methods.
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in his article an anecdote told by a Greek fisherman The most ancient method that is archaeologically vis-
who had drifted from Skyros to Andros after a storm . ible is the fish hook. Although infrequent, fish hooks
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Even the highly developed ships of 16 century Medi- have been found at prehistoric Aegean sites . The fin-
th
terranean were victims of drifting due to winds . est assemblage discovered to date comes from the Cave
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Many adventures of this sort must have ended in of Cyclope on Youra . The hook-and-line method must
disaster, or with fishermen carried away to unknown have been the foremost method of fishing through the
islands and shores. Such events and their transmis- ages. Gallant notes that ancient literary sources refer
sion from generation to generation must have result- to 35 fish species, of which 28 were captured using
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ed in taboos, rituals, and superstitious thoughts about hook-and-line, and 15 by this technique exclusively .
maritime activities . These unfortunate events might Unfortunately, nets rarely preserve in archaeological
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have resulted in the discovery of unknown lands, raw deposits, and we are uncertain about their early use in
materials, or interaction with people living across the prehistory. However, we know that weaving techniques
Aegean. had developed already in the late 7th millennium BCE,
To sum up, offshore exploration of the sea was defi- and there is no reason to assume that fishing nets were
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nitely practiced in the prehistoric Aegean. The main an invention of Bronze Age . The earliest net from the
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motives facilitating these risky engagements were Aegean was found in Akrotiri on Thera . Thankfully,
more likely to be, however, acquisition of raw mate- iconographic evidence from the Bronze Age Aegean
rials, especially obsidian and metal, or colonization of provides insights about fishing methods, as well. Nets,
new lands. Offshore fishing was arguably not a major long lines, divers, and on-boat fishing are represented
or regular activity for these communities because ter- on seals, frescoes, pottery and other media . Earlier
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restrial resources provided sufficient food; and on-land depictions of activities related to shellfish collecting,
and inshore fishing, involving almost no risk to life, diving, fishing, or any other maritime activity, howev-
could be easily practiced in many areas of the Aege- er, are absent from the artistic imagery.
an. Nevertheless, times of famine and food shortag- The dearth of prehistoric imagery encouraged us to
es might have forced people to occasionally explore return to historical records. Although there are several
the offshore seascapes. There were possibly sporadic sources that are always cited in studies dealing with
offshore fishing activities in all periods for gaining Aegean fishing, we realized that a major source had
prestige or adventure, as suggested by ethnographic been neglected in these discussions.
64 ISAAKIDOU 2005; MASSETI et al. 2006; TrANTALIDOU 2011.
65 ZEDEr 2008; ÇILINGIrOĞLU 2017a.
66 AGOUrDIS 1997, 3.
67 AGOUrIDIS 1997, 3, note 3.
68 AGOUrIDIS 1997, 9.
69 see BrAUDEL 1972, fig. 21.
70 cf. MALINOWSKI 1984, 124ff..
71 POWELL 1996, 158.
72 SAMPSON 2005.
73 GALLANT 1985.
74 BArBEr 1991; ÇILINGIrOĞLU 2009.

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