Voula - Agios Nikolaos Pallon Site - 2015

Voula - Agios Nikolaos Pallon Site. Eutuchia Lygkouri-Tolia, Anna-Maria Anagnostopoulou and Mairi Giamalidi (Ephorate of Antiquities of West Attica, Piraeus and the Islands) report on systematic excavation conducted at this site.

The site has an area of 3998 sq.m and is located near the sea front of Voula in a residential area: the name of the site comes from oral tradition, reported as early as the 19th century by travellers, in connection with the name of the church located here.

Architectural remains indicate rooms in use from the Classical, Roman and Byzantine periods (fig. 1). In the Classical period, part of a burial enclosure was located here, along with two walls parallel to each other, possibly related to a road. Part of a stele and a section of a relief with a lion's head give evidence for a burial space here.

During the Roman period, there was a workshop here with four kilns, two of which were located within the Classical precinct. To the E of the kilns were a set of 13 rooms, organised around three building units. Unpainted coarse ceramics were found here, along with fragments of stone and tile. Small finds suggest that this space continued to be used into the Byzantine period.

In the Byzantine period, two churches were located, each consisting of a single room. Ancient marble spolia were used in their construction. The first church had also re-used the walls of the Classical burial precinct. Inside, there was a sarcophagus containing the remains of at least 14 individuals, adults and children.