Abstrakt
Western Anatolia of the Late Bronze Age is commonly defined a world between worlds. It is an area geographically separated from its neighbourhoods by the Aegean Sea on the West and high mountains ridges on the East.
During the second millennium BC., this region, characterized by its own development and customs, is embedded in two spheres of influence of two important cultural circles: Mycenaeans and Hittites. Moreover, there are contacts with the whole eastern Mediterranean and Balkans on the North.
In this rich context zoomorphic appliqués and handles started to appear on ceramic vessels. In mostly cases they belong to table ware but also to vessels of different kind.
The analytic study of the zoomorphic appliqués still suffers from a lack of academic interest as a category itself. These features of vessels have never been compared yet to ones found in other sites and taken as a possible hint to read material culture.
It is even stranger when we look at the appearance of this phenomenon in many important sites of Western Anatolia where we can trace many similarities but also differences. Animal representations were found also in other regions which were in contact with Western Anatolia but were never compared.
The aim of this brief presentation, thus, is to propose a preliminary stage of a complete and comparative examination of this material. This research could offer us a concrete potential help in our attempts to better understand the development of the material culture both in the region of Western Anatolia and the cultural transfers in the other regions during the Bronze Age.