Lesbos wine: ΟΙΝΟΣ ΑΥΘΙΓΕΝΗΣ or regional vintage spread throughout the Lesbian sphere?

Abstract

Judging from chemical results obtained on some 68 samples of archaic Lesbian amphoras both from Lesbos itself (Mytilene, Methymna, Eressos et alii) and from overseas sites (viz. Abdera, Istros, Berezan, Nadlimanskoe and Olbia) and in comparing them with chemical pottery references of the Lyon Lab data bank for both Lesbos and Eastern Greece, it appears that less than ca. one third of them only – consisting of various grey ones only -were manufactured on the island, for most of them in the western part of it. The remaining part of ca. two thirds clearly originated from outside the island, mostly from the Troad / Hellespontus sphere, judging from comparisons with our available references for these areas. It is first of all the case for most the so-called Lesbian red jars, except one part of them from an unknown centre (distinct from Thasos as erroneously put forward by Clinkenbeard). Consequently, Lesbian wine-label would rather correspond to a single vine species or blend of various ones than to a strictly delimited vineyard

Keywords

• determination of origins
• archaic period
• lesbian amphoras
• lesbos wine