Copper of the Kabeiroi: Bronze age metallurgy at Mikró Vouní on Samothrace and its Minoan connections

Abstract

The prehistoric settlement of Mikró Vouní lies on the southwestern coast of the island of Samothrace in the northeastern Aegean. The site’s stratigraphic sequence spans from the beginning of the Late Neolithic to the end of the Middle Bronze Age. Its importance has been emphasized due to the finding of Minoan pottery and clay mini-documents with Linear A inscriptions, indicative of the active links the settlement held with a Cretan palace (Knossos) in the 18^th century BCE. The excavation yielded important finds related to Bronze Age metallurgy, namely furnaces, moulds, tuyères, crucibles and pieces of slag deriving from several contexts of different chronological periods, spanning from EBA II to MBA III. Notably the metallurgical finds of the MBA II-III periods derive from contexts with Minoan or Minoanising pottery and clay mini-documents suggesting a Minoan administration at the site. Recording of all relevant finds was followed by sampling of crucibles and slags that were subjected to laboratory analysis. The current article focuses on an investigation of metal production with the application of optical microscopy and SEM/EDS analysis aiming to reconstruct the prevalent processes that took place at the site during the Early and Middle Bronze Age. The results are significant as they provide crucial information on the technical intricacies of arsenical copper production in the early stages and the introduction of tin bronze technology most probably associated with the Minoan interaction on site. Evidence for cementation and co-smelting of Cu and Sn ores represent the earliest examples so far reported for the north Aegean. As the iconography of the Minoan clay documents’ seal impressions indicates, religious ideology of the Minoan palatial administration appears as an arena for encouraging metal manufacturing and trading in the north Aegean and beyond. In this context, Samothrace appears well incorporated into long-distance exchange networks for the procurement of tin to sustain bronze working practices, as the findings from Mikró Vouní suggest. Metallurgical technology seems to resonate in mythic accounts of the well-known smith deities, the Kabeiroi, who were essentially the same divinities as the Great Gods of Samothrace.