Pallini - Loutros - 2004

Pallini - Loutros. Anastasia Rammou (Numismatic Museum, Athens), Panagiota Zouvelou (Ephorate of Antiquities of East Attica) report the following:

The site of Loutros is located on the NW part of the Mesogeia plain, to the S of modern Pallini and at a distance of 12km from the sea. The area is watered by torrents running down from Mt Penteli, which eventually join the Great Torrent of Raphina.  Sustained archaeological testing across this fertile plain was made possible thanks to the construction of the “Stavros-Raphina avenue” in 2002-2004. The former 2nd Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities conducted numerous rescue excava- tions, which proved that the area had been continuously inhabited from Neolithic times to Late Antiquity.  The Early and Middle Neolithic periods are represented at Loutros by circular, above-ground constructions, which were prob- ably used for storage. Several clusters of such constructions were found across an area of ca. 1 hectare. Together with them, paved floors and open fireplaces were discovered; based on the associated finds, they may have been workshop areas. The whole installation seems to have been protected from the E with successive curving walls. To the E of the periboloi (i.e. outside the protected part) a Middle Neolithic burial was excavated, and there are indications for more in the area.  The total absence of habitation spaces suggests strongly that the investigated area lay beyond the limits of a settlement. The discovery of a large settlement at Ano Balana, in close proximity to Loutros, suggests close links between the two sites; the study of this relation may help us to understand the internal organization of the local community and their strategies for exploiting space outside the Neolithic village.