Athenian Twilight: A.D. 267–600

The excavations that have been conducted since 1931 by the American School of Classical Studies in the Athenian Agora have illumined virtually all phases in the development of the civic centre from its modest beginnings in the time of Solon to its dramatic end in the third century of our era. The exploration has also made it possible to trace the history of habitation in the area from Neolithic times down to the present day. One of the periods for which the excavations have yielded especially abundant documentation is late antiquity, more specifically the centuries from the third through the sixth. The new evidence has led to the correction of various misapprehensions that had arisen because of the paucity of evidence previously available for the study of this period. The results are the more interesting because our detailed knowledge of what happened in the Agora now helps in understanding contemporary developments in the city as a whole. Athens in fact has become a useful ‘case history’ for the study of the actual way in which ancient civilization went to pieces in one of the best known and most characteristic communities of the ancient world.