 Hi, everyone. Thanks, Jan and Alessandro, for bringing us all together. I'm pretty tight on time, so I'm going to cut straight to it and get with the chronological whiplash and go through to the Middle Holadic to Late Holadic I in central Greece. We know comparatively little about the early Second Millennium Middle Holadic Society on the Greek mainland. The prevailing view is that it appears to have been fairly egalitarian with little material evidence for social differentiation. Now, rather than simply due to an inherent poverty, Joseph Moran has argued that the Middle Holadic period was characterized by a social value system that put a limit on individual conspicuous consumption and any displays of material wealth. Early Middle Holadic societies seem to be more concerned with what he calls group-related altruistic qualities like hospitality and domestic virtues, which put an emphasis on a collective communal or kin-based identity rather than on individuals. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the mortuary realm, where even in wealthy burials on the mainland, such as at Verana in Attica, or the earlier burials in Grave Circle B at Massini, grave goods are limited to mostly spindle walls and drinking vessels. This social norm, as we all know, began to change relatively quickly at the end of the Middle Holadic and during Late Holadic I, where some individuals began to differentiate themselves from their respective societies through ostentatious displays of material wealth. As Sophia Putzaki has argued, this led to a breakdown in the relatively undifferentiated Middle Holadic social fabric and the implementation of a clear hierarchical system grounded in processes of gift exchange, conspicuous consumption and competition. Now, this shift has mostly been documented in mortuary contexts in the Peloponnese or Attica. Unfortunately, due to a lack of stratified material remains, contemporary central Greece has remained poorly understood, both in mortuary and settlement contexts. While important Middle Holadic and Late Holadic I assemblages from inland settlements like Ocominos, Eutresis and Thebes are known, the material from these sites has been inconsistently published, comes from unstratified contexts, and has not been quantified to examine trends. The recently excavated pottery from Mithruini's Lochris provides a stratographically secure and fully quantified data set from a settlement context, which adds a crucial dimension to these patterns of development. Mithruini's location on the Northern European Gulf is also important, as it is on key maritime and terrestrial routes facilitating north-south interaction. My analysis of the Mithrui Middle Holadic pottery has resulted in a seven-phase subdivision of the period and clear synchronisms with other stratified MH sequences on the mainland. Salvatore Vitali and I have also developed a four-phase LH1 pottery sequence, as the only stratographically secure assemblage in all of central Greece to span the entirety of the middle holadic and LH1 periods. This combined sequence allows an unprecedented level of relative dating accuracy. A latest fundamental has used this LH1 sequence to describe complex reorganization, the emergence of social stratification, and a clear elite at Mithrui. This process must have required a complete re-alignment of the underlying social value system impacting all aspects of life. In this paper I argue that the origins for these changes can actually be found much earlier in the middle holadic period. Trends in MH inter-regional interaction are crucial for understanding the networks of communication that catalyze this process, gradually overturning and replacing previous social values and allowing a new central Greek LH1 elite identity to emerge. Pottery production and consumption practices during the first half of the middle holadic period at Mithrui were relatively consistent. The majority of fine pottery belonged to the so-called grey minion pottery class with a limited morphology entirely of open eating and drinking vessels. Vessel sizes were typically very large with the average diameter of the smallest drinking shape, the cantheros, being at about 17 centimeters and regularly up to 20 centimeters. Along with their high swung strap handles, this may have facilitated easy passing between participants. These large vessels suggest communal eating and drinking practices using common vessels. Painted pottery is rare and exclusively employs red iron-based dull pigments painted in simple rectilinear motifs limited to large closed shapes or utilitarian basins. This type of painted pottery is dominant for much of the middle holadic period until the final middle holadic phase. In Mithrui MH phase 4, these practices were challenged for the first time, paralleled by a change in inter-regional interactions. Key connections were established with powerful centers like Agirini on Kaya and Kelona on Agina. These connections became more frequent through the remainder of the middle holadic period, peaking in MH phase 7 where that when they constitute more than 10 percent of the total pottery assemblage. I have here some photos of the macroscopic fabric groups which were the key criteria for identifying these possible imports at Mithrui along of course with other technical and stylistic features but if anyone wants to give me money for a petrographic analysis I'd love to get involved. Thanks. A similar range of likely imported pottery can be observed at other middle holadic Central Greek sites. Kaliopisari has highlighted clear agonite and pottery at Okomenos and other Central Greek sites alongside some likely pey and yellow slipped. Goldman presents some probable agonite and pottery from Eutrisis amongst her matte painted class. Furthermore, her red burnished and black burnished classes contain shapes we now know to be Cycladic in origin particularly Cycladic goblets and bowls including a magnificent bright red Cycladic goblet with direct parallels at Agirini on Kaya. Regular interregional interaction through what appears to be a KN centric network must have significantly altered the world view of those within middle holadic Central Greece. It likely provided new opportunities in an emerging economy promoted the communication of ideas and transmitted new social values. An introduction which would have profound impact seems to have been the concept of status display through conspicuous consumption. From Mitru MH Phase 4 onwards the previously ubiquitous red dull painted pottery was joined by locally produced black manganese based matte painted pottery which becomes dominant at the end of the middle holadic period. Matte paint is a consistent feature of the contemporary ceramic assemblages from Agirina and the Cyclades and its first appearance at Mitru in exactly the same phase as an increase in interregional interaction suggests that this technique may have also been imported. From Mitru MH Phase 5 onwards small eating and drinking vessels are occasionally decorated for the first time with increasingly complex matte painted motifs though I should acknowledge that the matte painted motifs on the middle holadic pottery are still pretty basic they basically just rectilinear. This decorated drinking pottery allowed more customization and differentiation. Furthermore there is a 20% decrease over time in the diameter of canthorough rooms and vessels overall have significantly smaller volumes. These smaller vessels in late middle holadic phases indicate smaller portions and the handle on drinking canthoroi virtually ceased to be high swung by LH1 when the shape evolves into the well-known LH1 goblet. All of these shifts are consistent with an overall change in drinking practices towards smaller group or individual consumption where differentiation was important. The appearance of a subgroup of locally produced matte painted pottery in the last phase of the middle holadic period reinforces the idea that these shifts were connected to various interregional connections. While the best described examples come from Mitru similar pottery has been identified at other late middle holadic contexts in central Greece including by Tobias Cruff at Eretria and at Agia Paraskevi and possibly also at Medeon or Cominos, Thieves and Eutresis according to descriptions from Calliope Sari. This subgroup appears to show agonitin-like characteristics. Agonitin decorative syntax and motifs most commonly hanging layer triangles and wavy lines appear on small open shapes jars and more specialized shapes such as barrel jars and basket handle jars. These latter shapes are without precedent at Mitru but are well-attested at Kolona. All of these vessels have been coated with a pale wash making the pinkish central Greek clay appear closer to the paler agonitin clay. Along with direct agonitin imports this agonitinizing pottery suggests that an agonitin aesthetic had become a clear source of social capital in central Greece by the end of the middle holadic period. This production and importation was likely facilitated by the position of Kolona as the dominant economic and political power associated with the central mainland at the time. Individuals likely aimed to symbolically connect themselves to the center of power to compete for status in their own communities. New patterns of practice were recontextualized emphasizing the display of material wealth and exotica eventually replacing the general middle holadic egalitarian ethos with an acceptance of elite individuals who could openly display their elevated status through material means. Such a shift in social attitudes would have provided an environment which encouraged competition and rapidly increasing inequality precisely what is visible in the subsequent LH1 archaeological record. However some important questions remain. If Cayenne Pottery represented the clear majority of non-local pottery at Mitru throughout the latter half of the middle holadic period and was clearly the key external connection, why are agonitin aesthetics imitated? Equally curious is that at the beginning of LH1 at precisely the time a political elite becomes clearly visible in the material record there is a drastic drop in the percentage of imported pottery. Why does this happen at precisely the point where the display of exotica and an emphasis on external connections should have been so important? I propose that the answer to these questions may lie partially in the changing socio-economic seascape in the western String Cycladic Islands. The late MH2 and early MH3 period sees a peak in the central Greek and Cayenne interactive network but as has been argued by many and most recently by Natalie Abel Agiorini on Cayenne begins to come under significant Cretan influence by Agiorini phases 5 and 6. This period is precisely when Cayenne Pottery all disappears in the Mitru and wider central Greek record and it also coincides with a drastic drop in the presence of central Greek imports on Cayenne. If Agiorini and its presumed control over the valuable mineral resources at nearby Lavrion in southern Attica had reorientated itself primarily towards a Cretan network this would have dramatically impacted the networks of inter-regional interaction up the UB and Gulf. The new social value system now in place in central Greece allowed inequality to be expressed and the consumption of rare exotica was a primary way to do so but the changes in the south may have made the acquisition of such exotica from known centres of economic power like Kolona much more difficult. It seems possible that there was a genuine economic and political divide at this time with competing networks of influence identifiable through the distribution of Agoniton and Cretan material culture and respective imitation phenomena. The Cretan network extended to the western Cyclades and the southern Peloponnese while an Agoniton network though initially embracing Cretan MH2 later extended around the Saronic Gulf into the Argalid and north into central Greece. While these fears may have overlapped or interacted with each other in some places especially the Argalid they are generally operated in distinct arenas during this period. For example in all the Middle Hellatic and LH1 assemblages of central Greece I know of only a handful of genuine Cretan imports that have ever been identified. Similarly very few genuine Agonian or central Greek imports have ever come to light on Crete at least as far as I know despite this period being one of the first great eras of interaction in the eastern Mediterranean. Now near the end of the Middle Hellatic period elites in central Greece may have made a conscious determination to reorient themselves away from Kea towards Kolona an equally interconnected competitor with whom they were already familiar. However with the Ubean Gulf largely cut off due to Kea's strategic control over its access new routes of reliable interaction between Agona and central Greece may have been required. As Donna Kriego originally proposed in 2010 one of these routes may have run overland or across the Isthmus near MH Koraku and up through the Corinthian Gulf a route which as Julia and Dan has shown on Thursday played a crucial role in facilitating interaction in the subsequent Lake Bronze Age. If correct this new network cut out the elites on Ubean Gulf who now found themselves on the periphery of a reorientated network of interaction. Some Exotica may have still been available such as those filtered through the interests of central Greek exchange networks possible heirlooms or acquired through northern connections but the remaining demand may have been fulfilled through the local imitation of Agony and Pottery but this was unlikely to be sustainable or as effective and new strategies to express status and identity were probably required. In this context by LH1 there seems to have been a need to be for a reemergence of material culture which emphasizes uniquely central Greek stylistic characteristics and I believe an example of this is the appearance of the well-known mainland polychrome or Buwishon bi-chrome pottery at the beginning of LH1. As an aesthetic product with distinctive manufacturing techniques and decorative syntax the class stands out as a high quality product in contrast to contemporary painted traditions elsewhere. Buwishon bi-chrome may have partially filled a need to locally reinforce a new central Greek elite identity within its own right. Furthermore fundamental has demonstrated important changes at Mitru in LH1 settlement organization building practices and public architecture which also acted as local symbolic representations of the new central Greek elite identity. Most importantly in the late MH and LH1 the built chamber tomb begins to appear new examples of which have recently been excavated at both Mitru and Eleon in Buwishon. As discussed by Nikos Papidimitriou these tombs are the monumental burial type of choice for emerging central Greek elites but they bear little relation to the contemporary shaft grave culture in the Argalid or on Aegina apart from a broad repertoire of burial goods adhering to a so-called warrior identity. Seen in the context of the development over the previous centuries I argue in agreement with Fundamental that Buwishon bi-chrome together with central Greek built chamber tombs evidence for light horse drawn chariotry and the appearance of a central organising authority in both the settlement and mortuary realms emerged out of a need to articulate a locally defined central Greek elite ideology of power that went beyond mere conspicuous consumption of increasingly hard-to-require exotica from the south. In spite of the long-standing connections between central Greece, Kea and Aegina through much of the middle holadic period the new central Greek elite identity in fact needed to be independent of southern centres of power. By early LH1 the levels of inequality within central Greece had risen to a point where status could be predominantly expressed using a locally defined repertoire of symbols, performance, practice and material consumption. What it meant to be an elite in central Greece and how that status could be communicated had changed dramatically from the early middle holadic period. A new social order had emerged based on a new value system. While inter-regional interaction had played a role in catalyzing this process, ultimately LH1 central Greek elite identity had to be locally defined and negotiated due to uneven inter-regional connections and shifting networks. Thank you very much.