ARCHAEOLOGICAL MEETING OF THESSALY AND CENTRAL GREECE, 2006-2008
FROM PREHISTORY TO THE CONTEMPORARY PERIOD

Paper abstract

STISSI Vladimir
Professor of Classical Archaeology, Head of the Archaeology Department, University of Amsterdam. Pottery specialist at the Halos Archaeological Project and the Boeotia Ancient Cities Project.
The countryside of Classical-Hellenistic Halos, a comparative approach

The Helleno-Dutch surveys conducted in the plains of Almyros and Sourpi, around ancient Halos, since 1990, have revealed a large number of archaeological sites of all periods. These include small rural sites, presumably farmsteads, of the Classical and/or Hellenistic period, of the kind also found in other surveys in Greece, for example in Laconia, Methana and Boeotia (where I have worked on sites from around Tanagra). In the paper I will try to show that both the pottery assemblages and the way these sites are spread over the landscape around Halos and Tanagra seem closely comparable to the more general Greek pattern, and indeed strongly suggest they are inhabited farmsteads. One specific element of the situation in Halos, however, is the peculiar history of its urban center, which seems to have been very small in the Classical and Early Hellenistic period, suddenly becoming quite large with the new foundation of the city around 300 BC. This must have affected the surroundings too. In the final part of the paper, I hope to be able to offer a closer look at the chronology of the rural sites in relation to that of the city, mostly basing myself on the ongoing study of the pottery of Hellenistic Halos by Colette Beestman-Kruyshaar. This will then again enable a comparison between the situation at Halos and that in other areas of Greece, where urban centers usually seem to have had a more stable position.

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