Mobility and Migration

By 550 BCE, the Greek world stretched from Spain to Cyprus and from the Crimea to Cyrenaica. Migration was evidently a crucial factor in the making of the Greek world, yet the nature and extent of this migration are hotly debated. Was it, as was traditionally assumed, a matter of organised colonisation? Or was it, as argued since the 1990s, the product of more haphazard maritime exchange? Long-distance migration, involving the outwards spread of Greek individuals and culture from a single geographical core in the Aegean, is crucial to both models.

Previous research has focused almost exclusively on long-distance, inter-regional migration – identifying it in the movement of artefacts, styles, technologies, and social practices; or through the scientific analysis of stable isotopes, ancient DNA (aDNA), and biodistance. But human mobility comes in many different forms. MIGMAG also seeks capture temporary, periodic, and cyclical movements; as well as intra-regional mobility over short and medium distances. A key area of activity in this project (Work Package 1) therefore builds on theory and method from modern migration studies to reimagine migration during this period radically, to include both inter-regional and intra-regional mobilities.