Middle Helladic (central) Euboea and its cultural connections: The state of research

With the British excavations at Lefkandi (1964-1966) and the publication of Dickinson’s The Origins of the Mycenaean Civilisation in 1977, Euboea suddenly became a region of major interest for the study of the Middle Bronze Age (MBA), and the stratigraphy of Xeropolis emerged as an important reference point. Until that time, the MBA of the second largest Aegean island was almost unknown. Sackett et al. stated in 1966 in the introduction to their survey, that ‘the gaps in our knowledge of Bronze Age Euboea are so serious as to amount in some areas to a total blank’.1 Nowadays, Euboea has lost again its focal position in research, as the site of Lefkandi has actually still not been published in detail and the glory has passed by Euboea and gone to other regions, such as the Argolid, Boeotia and —especially— the opposite shore of the Euboean Gulf: Pevkakia, Mitrou and the Malian Gulf. V. Nikolopoulos dedicated less than half a page of his 2015 article on prehistoric Euboea to the Middle Helladic (MH) period.2 Nonetheless, over 40 MBA sites are now known on Euboea (Fig. 1), and several of them have been subject to excavation. Unfortunately, only one of the sites of the island, Kalogerovrysi, in the hinterland of Phylla, has been fully published, and this is probably one of the less important sites. In what follows, the history of research of MBA Euboea will be summarized, in order to determine the actual state of research of this period and to provide an outline of the principal characteristics as well as the major research questions relating to the study of the Euboean MBA.