Ancient Laurion: Stages, phases and landscape

Where do we stand 160 years after the first systematic exploration of the Laurion district? This paper attempts to assess the overall picture of our progress in solving the great puzzle presented by the main distinctive characteristic of the Laurion Peninsula: its very large scale. It sets off by pinpointing the main pending questions linked to the interpretation of the area’s material culture and its landscape; it proceeds to organize them in an intra-referenced sequence of stages and phases. Materials and structures related to mining and metallurgical technology are targeted. For example: how did the ore washeries evolve, how did this evolution participate in structuring the landscape? How did human collectivities co-evolve as to their internal structure? How was this reflected on changes in their landscape organization principles? The major problems of chronology are tackled by sequencing each class of material evidence (katharistêria, hydraulic technology, mining galleries and shafts)1, independently, based on purely archaeological data. A seven-phase scheme is proposed and compared with established historiographic sequences for a Laurion relative chronology to emerge. The whole network of identifiable evolution lines is proposed to be understandable within a largescale landscape perspective and this is exemplified in the case of a suggested triggering of urbanization processes within the Athenian Chora. These large-scale dynamics are made visible in structuring power relations which control land (surface and underground), water and human labour.