The project

This project aims to investigate how trade networks, technological knowledge, and patterns of exchange were organised during the Early Byzantine period (5th-7th centuries AD), using glass as a proxy and Greece and the Aegean as geographic case study. Existing evidence suggests that Greece occupied a key position within glass distribution from the primary glassmaking centers to the secondary workshops and consumption sites.

The project combines published analytical data from Greece, Cyprus, Italy and the Balkan and new material from the Peloponnese and central Aegean expanding the geographical coverage to key areas helping to assess the distribution of glass through maritime routes. The project is built upon three interrelated questions: how glass production, procurement and circulation were organised in Early Byzantine Greece; which social, economic and environmental factors shaped distribution patterns; and how Greece participated in wider Mediterranean exchange networks.