Abstract
The Hellenistic farm site of Tria Platania in Macedonia, Greece, has revealed large quantities of charred olive remains, indicative of olive oil production from the fourth to the second century b.c. There, besides stones (the endocarp), new archaeobotanical elements such as olive pulp and flesh (the mesocarp) and kernels (the seed) were recovered for the first time in the archaeobotanical record in Greece. It is the purpose of this paper to present some of the material recovered from Tria Platania and interpret it in the light of developed model sequences of olive processing. In addition, Olea assemblages from other Greek sites are discussed in which Olea remains have been interpreted in various ways.
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Acknowledgments
We would like to thank Mrs. E. Poulaki-Pandermali, the Director of the Ephorate of Pieria, for giving permission to study the archaeobotanical material from Tria Platania and for using the excavation plan. I wish to thank Prof. M.E. Kislev for access to unpublished material, Dr. Jane Renfrew and two anonymous referees for their suggestions and comments and to Gates Cambridge Trust, which funded the project.
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Margaritis, E., Jones, M. Olive oil production in Hellenistic Greece: the interpretation of charred olive remains from the site of Tria Platania, Macedonia, Greece (fourth–second century b.c.). Veget Hist Archaeobot 17, 393–401 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-008-0155-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-008-0155-9