Rising tensions and new cooperation tendencies in the Eastern Mediterranean area are highlighted by energy politics. Latest natural gas discoveries in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea have prompted...Show moreRising tensions and new cooperation tendencies in the Eastern Mediterranean area are highlighted by energy politics. Latest natural gas discoveries in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea have prompted many to wonder whether natural resources might help the area to reach peace and prosperity. However, the recent tensions and navy confrontations reveal that competition extends beyond the race for energy. By focusing on the 2018 energy dispute between the Republic of Cyprus (in alliance with Greece) and Turkey, this thesis paper examines the fluctuations of geopolitical strategies in the Eastern Mediterranean, as well as their influence on regional cooperation and the new foreign relations realities between the competing regional powers. What impact do regional and international powers' actions and policies have on regional security? Does the discovery of energy resources lead to closer cooperation or increased competition? This thesis paper looks beyond the economic importance of energy resources and analyses the energy problem in the Mediterranean Sea as primarily a geopolitical and strategic one, with economics playing a secondary role.Show less
The media has played a centripetal role in shaping public opinion and setting domestic and foreign affairs agendas. The Republic of Turkey is a ubiquitous factor in Greek historiography, nation...Show moreThe media has played a centripetal role in shaping public opinion and setting domestic and foreign affairs agendas. The Republic of Turkey is a ubiquitous factor in Greek historiography, nation-building processes, and foreign security policy. Throughout their unstable and fluctuating relations, the Greco – Turkish dyad has received copious media attention. In 2019 Turkey and Libya signed a maritime exclusive economic zone (EEZ) Memorandum of Understanding. Such a settlement allegedly balked the EU's planned project to enhance the EastMed pipeline and violated Greece's EEZ, consequently causing an intense media reaction throughout Greece. This thesis applies Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to the publications of Kathimerini and Ta Nea, Greece's most widely read daily newspapers. The analysis brings insight into the media's sociopolitical role, its position regarding the citizenry and the state, and Turkey's importance as an external agent that reinforces the Greeks' in-group cohesion. Considering Aristotelian topoi to approach CDA, the analysis indicates that the Greek media's narrative on the Turkey-Libya settlement frames (i) Turkey as a threatening 'other,' (ii) portrays Greece as the referent object, and (iii) rejects the validity of such a settlement under international law, reinforcing the previous two points.Show less
Research master thesis | Archaeology (research) (MA/MSc)
open access
This research attempts to investigate the degree of contact between different Late Chalcolithic sites of the island, as well as the possibility of extra-insular interactions at the time, by looking...Show moreThis research attempts to investigate the degree of contact between different Late Chalcolithic sites of the island, as well as the possibility of extra-insular interactions at the time, by looking at similarities and differences between red and/or black burnished pottery wares that appear across the island simultaneously. Moreover, the possibility of contacts is being examined, with the inclusion of a Red Black Burnished Ware dataset from Tepecik, Anatolia. Therefore, the main research question is: What can a comparative study of red and/or black burnished wares from various sites across and outside Cyprus tell us about regionalism, connectivity and transfer of craft in the Late Chalcolithic? These research questions are investigated by examining the relevant existing publications as well as available datasets of pottery assemblages. Red and/or black burnished wares from five sites across the island are re-examined, namely: • Red and Black Stroke Burnished Wares (RB/B) from Lemba-Lakkous, Kissonerga-Mosphilia and Chlorakas-Palloures along the west coast • Red Lustrous and Red and Black Lustrous Wares (RL and RBL) from Ambelikou-Agios Georghios in the northern part of the island • Fabric A and Fabric E form Politiko-Kokkinorotsos in the central lowlands A comparative study of the aforementioned assemblages is conducted, comparing them in terms of materials, materials, technology (vessel forming and firing, surface treatment and decoration) and vessel shapes. Following the same methodology, an assemblage of Red Black Burnished Ware (RBBW) from Tepecik, Anatolia is incorporated in the dataset and compared with the Cypriot assemblages on the same aspects (materials, technology (vessel forming, surface treatment and decoration) and vessel shapes. However, one needs to keep in mind that the inclusion of an assemblage from Anatolia does not aim to give a definitive answer to the possibility of relations between the pottery traditions in question. It functions merely as a pilot project, to see whether this hypothesis is indeed plausible and worthy of further investigation.Show less
In this paper the influence of paganism on the burial traditions, rituals, and practices of Late Antique Christianity from the Eastern Mediterranean is researched. This is achieved through the...Show moreIn this paper the influence of paganism on the burial traditions, rituals, and practices of Late Antique Christianity from the Eastern Mediterranean is researched. This is achieved through the study of the overall archaeological record which is related to death and burials as well as of other historical sources where the relationship between Christians and pagans becomes apparent. Christians and pagans lived together and peacefully most of the time for more than five hundred years. Christianity emerged in a world full of pagan gods and cults and therefore was inevitable not to remain intact. This unintentional and long communion between Christianity and paganism becomes obvious through the archaeology of death from certain sites in Greece, Syro-Palestine, and Egypt, where grave goods and manifestations of funerary art, inscriptions and epitaphs, bear witness to an immediate contact between the two. The archaeology of death, although vague for the eastern part of the Mediterranean due to insufficient research, illustrates the influences of paganism on Christianity, giving at the same time an insight on the emerging Christian identity and the Christianization processes that the Roman world faced during the period of Late Antiquity.Show less
