Late Holocene shorelines in east Attica (Greece)

Evelpidou, Νiki; Karkani, Anna; Kampolis, Isidoros; Pirazzoli, Paolo A.

doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2016.10.031

Cited by 5 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…This approach has been widely adopted in Mediterranean coastal studies (e.g. Kraft et al, 2007;Goodman et al, 2008Goodman et al, , 2009Kayan, 2014;Marriner et al, 2014;Delile et al, 2015;Morhange et al, 2016;Evelpidou et al, 2017;Flaux et al, 2017;Giaime et al, 2017;Pennington et al, 2017;Seeliger et al, 2018) to investigate lateral and vertical changes in the sediment stratigraphy and to probe the evolution of the landscape, notably shoreline migration.…”

Section: Historical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elaia, Pergamon's maritime satellite: the rise and fall of an ancient harbour city shaped by shoreline migration

Seeliger

Pint

Feuser

et al. 2019

J Quaternary Science

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Throughout human history, communication and trade have been key to society. Because maritime trade facilitated the rapid transportation of passengers and freight at relatively low cost, harbours became hubs for traffic, trade and exchange. This general statement holds true for the Pergamenian kingdom, which ruled wide parts of today's western Turkey during Hellenistic times. Its harbour, located at the city of Elaia on the eastern Aegean shore, was used extensively for commercial and military purposes. This study reconstructs the coastal evolution in and around the ancient harbour of Elaia and compares the observed environmental modifications with archaeological and historical findings. We use micropalaeontological, sedimentological and geochemical proxies to reconstruct the palaeoenvironmental dynamics and evolution of the ancient harbour. The geoarchaeological results confirm the archaeological and historical evidence for Elaia's primacy during Hellenistic and early Roman times, and the city's gradual decline during the late Roman period. Furthermore, our study demonstrates that Elaia holds a unique position as a harbour city during ancient times in the eastern Aegean region, because it was not greatly influenced by the high sediment supply associated with river deltas. Consequently, no dredging of the harbour basins is documented, creating exceptional geo‐bioarchives for palaeoenvironmental reconstructions.

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Section: Historical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elaia, Pergamon's maritime satellite: the rise and fall of an ancient harbour city shaped by shoreline migration

Seeliger

Pint

Feuser

et al. 2019

J Quaternary Science

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“…Common dating methods are based on the investigation of their dimensions, especially width and course, gateways and towers, masonry style, as well as integrated pottery, inscriptions and spolia used [2].By applying a multi-proxy approach, this paper presents the results of a geoarchaeological, geophysical, microfaunal, and geochronological research on the buried part of the city wall in the south-western part of Ainos in order to (1) verify its construction style and age; (2) prove its further extension in less-studied and difficult-to-access areas; and (3) decipher the general landscape evolution in this part of the city during the past 5000 years. This approach has been widely adopted in Mediterranean coastal studies e.g., [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21] to investigate lateral and vertical changes in the sediment stratigraphy and to probe the evolution of the landscape, notably coastline migration. Furthermore, Elaia [22], as well as Tayma [23], can act as valuable examples for investigating buried wall structures using a multi-proxy approach.…”

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confidence: 99%

Using a Multi-Proxy Approach to Detect and Date a Buried part of the Hellenistic City Wall of Ainos (NW Turkey)

et al. 2018

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Throughout mankind's history, the need to secure and protect the home settlement was an essential one. This holds especially true for the city of Ainos (modern Enez) in Turkish Thrace. Due to its continuous settlement history since the 7th/6th century BC, several different types of city walls were built-sometimes even on top of each other-several of which have been preserved over time. To decipher the construction style, the course and the age of a buried city wall segment in the southern part of the former city, a geoscientific multi-proxy approach including magnetic gradiometer (MG) and electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) measurements in combination with granulometrical, sedimentological and microfaunistical investigations on sediment cores was applied. We were able to (1) present reasonable arguments for its Hellenistic age; (2) reveal the course of this wall segment and extrapolate it further north into a less studied area; and (3) demonstrate that in this near-coastal area, the former swampy terrain had been consolidated for constructing the wall. Our multi-proxy approach serves as a valuable example for investigating buried structures in archaeological contexts, avoiding a less-economical, time-consuming, or even forbidden excavation.They were primarily erected to provide security for the settlers and to give shelter in troubled times for the people living nearby. Additionally, they were an object of the city's representation, its power, and wealth. City gates, especially, were often decorated by rich ornaments to impress incoming guests. Fortifications counted among the biggest and most expensive building projects of communities. Due to their massive construction, ancient city walls, or at least parts of them, have survived at many sites until today. As important hints with regard to the historical and cultural evolution of civilizations, they are still the focus of current research [1][2][3][4].Chronology presents a huge problem when studying the history, construction, and utilisation of ancient city walls-especially of buried or partly ruined ones. Common dating methods are based on the investigation of their dimensions, especially width and course, gateways and towers, masonry style, as well as integrated pottery, inscriptions and spolia used [2].By applying a multi-proxy approach, this paper presents the results of a geoarchaeological, geophysical, microfaunal, and geochronological research on the buried part of the city wall in the south-western part of Ainos in order to (1) verify its construction style and age; (2) prove its further extension in less-studied and difficult-to-access areas; and (3) decipher the general landscape evolution in this part of the city during the past 5000 years. This approach has been widely adopted in Mediterranean coastal studies e.g., [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21] to investigate lateral and vertical changes in the sediment stratigraphy and to probe the evolution of the landscape, notably coastline migration. Furthermore, Elaia [22],...

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The 2019 Bays of East Attica Regional Survey (BEARS) Project: New Archaeological Evidence for the History of Coastal Settlement, Economy, and Connectivity from Porto Rafti (Greece)

Murray

Pratt²,

Stephan

et al. 2021

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This paper presents the findings of the inaugural season of the Bays of East Attica Regional Survey project (BEARS). The project aims to clarify the history of human activity around the bay of Porto Rafti in eastern Attica. Surface finds from Raftis Island demonstrate that it was the location of a major Late Helladic IIIC site probably linked to the cemetery at Perati, as well as of limited Late Roman occupation. The Pounta peninsula yielded a large quantity of obsidian lithics, indicating significant activity during the Final Neolithic/Early Bronze Age, with lesser quantities of material dated to the Late Helladic IIIC and Roman/Byzantine periods. At Koroni, surface finds of Late Helladic IIIC and Archaic/Classical date indicate that activity at the site predates the third-century Ptolemaic military camp excavated by American archaeologists in 1960. Overall, these survey data provide a range of new evidence and insight into the history of the Porto Rafti area and its connections to other regions of the Aegean. Methodologically, the project’s work also demonstrates the value of conducting archaeological surface survey even in areas with extensive modern development.

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Late Holocene shorelines in east Attica (Greece)

Cited by 5 publications

References 26 publications

Elaia, Pergamon's maritime satellite: the rise and fall of an ancient harbour city shaped by shoreline migration

Elaia, Pergamon's maritime satellite: the rise and fall of an ancient harbour city shaped by shoreline migration

Using a Multi-Proxy Approach to Detect and Date a Buried part of the Hellenistic City Wall of Ainos (NW Turkey)

The 2019 Bays of East Attica Regional Survey (BEARS) Project: New Archaeological Evidence for the History of Coastal Settlement, Economy, and Connectivity from Porto Rafti (Greece)

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