292 crafts: Greece the north they were overrun by the Germanic tribes, and in the south they were under pressure from the expanding Roman Empire, which imported its technologies and craftwork into the regions it conquered The Celts found themselves isolated on the British Isles, the only place in Europe where they continued to flourish They carried with them the craft traditions they had learned on the Continent, continuing to work with bronze, silver, gold, and enamel as well as with iron and wood After the advent of Christianity, craftwork was directed to the production of objects of religious significance, including such items as chalices and crosses GREECE BY SPYROS SIROPOULOS The appreciation of craftsmanship by the Greeks is evident in the fact that one of their supreme gods was Hephaestus, the craftsman-god, responsible for the construction not only of weapons (such as the famous armor of Achilles or the thunderbolts of Zeus) but also of various objects for daily use, such as tripods and statues In addition to Hephaestus, the goddess Athena was the protector of craftsmen; not only was she wise, she was also an expert in ceramics, weaving, and woodworking In the National Museum of Berlin there is a red-figure vessel (with red figures on a black background) dating to the fift h century b.c.e., on which Athena is depicted finishing up with great care the clay molding of a large horse, while woodworking tools hang behind her The economy of almost all Greek cities depended mainly on farming, fishing, small industry, and trade However, during the height of the fi ft h century b.c.e the Athenians established an almost civic way of life, meaning that many people turned away from farming for a living A new cast of skilled craftsmen developed, practicing special skills necessary for the well-being of the polis, or city-state, and its citizens Not all professions enjoyed the same respect, and not all workers were considered worthy of being free citizens Manual labor was frowned upon, considered something only slaves or metics (“resident aliens,” who did not enjoy citizenship) did For free citizens only professions such as the practice of medicine, rhetoric, or sculpting, painting, and teaching were considered appropriate In Sparta it was inconceivable for freeborn citizens to work and be paid for working, but this was not true everywhere In Corinth, for example, people respected and honored craftsmen and manual labor The Republic of Plato (ca 427–347 b.c.e.) is a valuable source of information about the kinds of crafts and professions that developed within an organized city In the Republic, Socrates and Adeimantos discuss a great number of the crafts and professions necessary for the smooth functioning of the civic mechanism Equally useful is an excerpt from Pericles, written by the Roman Plutarch (ca 46–120 c.e.), in which the statesman Pericles, the leader of the Democratic Party in Athens during the fi ft h century b.c.e., names all the crafts and professions necessary for the construction and decoration of the Acropolis It seems that glassmaking was passed from Egypt to Greece via Crete, where findings date from the second millennium b.c.e The earliest glass objects were beads Various vessels begin to appear about 1500 b.c.e Some fine artifacts of dark blue glass, in imitation of lapis lazuli, are found in Mycenae Glassworkers adapted techniques used by potters and metalworkers, modeling molten glass around a core of hardened glass and pressing it into open molds to produce inlays, small vases, jars, and bowls A more complex process was the heating and fusion of preformed rods of glass Not much glass survives from Greece during the Archaic (600–400 b.c.e.) and Classical (480–323 b.c.e.) periods, and it seems that pottery was the craft used to provide tableware Small vases found in Greece, made by the sand-core technique are dated to the sixth century b.c.e., but their origin is unknown (In the sand-core technique threads of molten glass were wound around a shaped core of sand After the glass hardened, the sand was removed.) It was not until the Hellenistic Period (323–31 b.c.e.) that glassmaking became more common, when the invention of glassblowing in the first century b.c.e., probably in Syria, made work simpler for glassmakers Baskets were a very functional item of daily use, the oldest preserved artifacts dating to the Mesolithic Period (8000– 4000 b.c.e.) Basket making takes skill but only simple tools, such as a knife, a needle, and a pair of pliers In Classical Greece, lower-class women or metics would supplement their income by constructing baskets and bags, mats, rugs, and other items using weaving, plaiting, or coiling techniques Materials varied from reed, cane, rush, and sisal fiber to ashwood splints Baskets were used by traders in the market, fishermen, and even miners A vase of the sixth century b.c.e from Corinth shows miners loading baskets with clay from a pit, while younger slaves pull the baskets up with ropes The construction of weapons was not the only task of metalworkers A number of items for daily use, for farming, hunting, fishing and other work, were constructed by freeborn citizens or metics with the help of slaves Vase paintings often depict a tall shaft for melting metals Blasts of air were introduced at the back by hand, while the mass of wrought iron was extracted at the base The most common fuel was charcoal Iron was especially difficult to work; the furnace had to be broken in order to extract the wrought iron, so it could be used only once Woodworkers skilled at sawing, joining, and finishing produced a wide variety of useful and ornamental objects, from jewelry boxes to furniture Woodcarving, a quite different craft, produced objects such as bowls, toys, and other items that could be created from a piece of wood with only a saw, a mallet, fi les, gouges, and sandpaper Even items used in worship were constructed from wood A red-figure cup by Epictetus (fl 520–500 b.c.e.) shows a youth adding the final details to a wooden herm A herm is a statuette of the god