The Archaeology of a Colchian Landscape: Results of the Eastern Vani Survey.

Abstract

This dissertation examines rural settlement patterns around the 1st millennium BCE site of Vani in Western Georgia (ancient Colchis) through the presentation of the results of a new intensive archaeological survey. Beginning in the 8th to 7th centuries BCE and extending into the Hellenistic Period, Vani grew to become an important place in the Colchian landscape. Evidence from the 7th-1st centuries BCE in particular, points to the emergence of a wealthy elite and suggest growing political and religious authority at the site. Unusually well-preserved and showing evidence for the emergence of strong political authority and increased contact with peoples living on the borders of Colchis, Vani has become one of the most important sites for reconstructing ancient Colchian society in the 1st millennium BCE. The Eastern Vani Survey (EVS) was developed as an intensive survey component of the larger Vani Regional Survey project to examine an area to the east of the ancient site that had hitherto been little explored archaeologically. The main goals of the project were to better understand rural settlement to the east of Vani, to evaluate and characterize the level and complexity of social organization in the environs of the site and to use this new data to contextualize previous research on Vani and its region. The data recovered by the Eastern Vani Survey, combined with previous research in the area, revealed that settlement to the east of Vani was dispersed with particular places in the landscape serving as focal points of communal and/or elite activity. The most important of these places are Mshvidobisgora, Gabelauri, Isriti, Kveda Bzvani and Kveda Gora. The survey has also made it clear that a good deal of the increase in Classical and Hellenistic ceramic material evidenced in the region is tied very closely to developments at Vani and suggests an expanded use of ceramics. Though these developments are very related to changes in population in the region between the 7th-1st centuries BCE, the ceramic data from the survey alone does not allow a quantification of that growth.