The Hellenistic period material of the I-J 16/17 sondage of Smyrna's Agora.

vABSTRACTMaster ThesisThe Hellenistic Period Material of the ?I-J 16/17?sondage of Smyrna?s AgoraGülten ÇEL KDokuz Eylul Universitynstitute Of Social SciencesDepartment of ArcheologyThe Roman State Agora, one of the outstanding public buildings ofancient Smyrna, is among the few remains which have survived to our presentday. While the excavation and restoration work in this area is going on, thehellenistic found from the sondage in 2003 constitutes the subject of this thesis.The majority of the Hellenistic findings from I-J 16/17 sondage consists ofvarious pottery forms that were popular in this period. The weight is on theWest Slope material. One of the important forms in categorization is themoldmade bowls and they are similar with the Pergamene examples with theircharacteristic features. The food and fish plates, drinking vessels and variousother ware that are typical forms used in the greek kitchen, are the local redPergamene . The question of whether these forms were locally produced or hadanother origin can be answered only by hypothesis for now. The presence of aproduction centre near Phokaia is thought to supply the demand in a grandscale. Another hypothesis is questioning the relation between the potteryproduction in ancient Smyrna with the modern pottery production centre ofMenemen.About the dating of the materials, we had to be more careful because ofthe possibility that the sondage area may be a ?filling?.On dating the materialsalong with style comparision with the other hellenistic centres, two Smyrnacoins dating, from the 2nd century B.C., found in 1030 and 2023 levels, wereour primary criteria factors.Key Words: 1) Smyrna 2) Agora 3) Hellenistic 4) Pottery