Central Greco-Roman Cities

Argos, situated in the southern peninsula of Greece called the Peloponnese, lies on the northwest side of the Argos Plain, backed by hills to the north and west that are the eastern edge of an extensive region of mountains and intermountain basins. A road runs northward through the valley and over the hills to Nemea and Corinth. Eastward beyond the capricious rivers lie the old Mycenaean cities of Mycenae and Tiryns on their knolls, with the port of Nauplia closing the circuit to the southeast. Beyond Nauplia is the Argolid peninsula with the ancient pilgrimage and health center of Epidauros. (The term “Argolid” as used in the literature sometimes means all the area near Argos and sometimes means only the peninsula south and east of Nauplia. Herein, we will use Argolid for the latter and Argive Plain for the former.) Between Argos and the gulf about 6 km south is the marshy area of Lerna, remnant of a lake that once reached nearly to the outskirts of Argos, while the southeast part of the plain was until recently a series of lagoons (Piérart 1992). To the southwest, skirting the mountains, runs the road to Sparta. The advantages for Argos of being situated at the center of gravity in the triangular plain (Runnels 1995) continued throughout all the periods studied herein. Argos is unusual among ancient cities because we have ample modern geological investigations of regional structure, morphology, karst geology, and hydrogeology, literary evidence from antiquity, and archaeological data from decades of investigation. These materials contribute to a detailed understanding of how human settlement built on and responded to local resources. We will therefore describe the regional setting of the city before turning to an examination of the urban core. Below its mountains, the city of Argos stands on a shelf overlooking a plain of extensive fertile agricultural land that curves around the site from north to southwest. The stratigraphy is as follows, beginning with the topmost modern layers: . . . Higher plateau and mountains are Tripoli limestone. Tripoli plateau sits amid karstic mountains. (Older) Triassic and Jurassic limestones to the northeast. . . .