A synthesis of research on the material culture of Greece in the Archaic and Classical periods. The book shows how material evidence can be used to address historical questions for which literary evidence is often insufficient, and situates Greek art within the broader field of Greek material culture.

Part I. Approaches to Greek Archaeology: 1. Introduction: classical archaeology and its objects; 2. Great traditions: classical scholarship and classical archaeology; 3. Modern archaeologies of Greece; 4. Chronology and terminology; Part II. Archaic Greece: 5. Archaic Greece, 1000-700 BC; 6. The Aegean, the Levant and the West: the orientalising phenomenon; 7. Gods, heroes and sacred places; 8. The city, the state and the Polis; 9. Art, narrative and monumentality; 10. Regional archaeologies; Part III. Classical Greece: 11. Defining the classical: classical art; 12. Cities and sanctuaries of Classical Greece; 13. The archaeology of democracy: Classical Athens; 14. Beyond the Polis: the countryside of Classical Greece; 15. Epilogue: towards Hellenistic archaeology.

'... a magisterial survey of the current state of Greek archaeology ...'. The Anglo-Hellenic Review'... deserves the attention of us all ... an excellent account of what the discipline is, where it has been, and where it is now'. Bryn Mawr Classical Review