Athens, Ancient Agora - 2017

Athens, Ancient Agora. John Camp (ASCSA) reports on continued excavation. In Section Beta Zeta they continued to explore the remains of the middle Byzantine settlement (11-12th AD) which was built over the Poikile Stoa after several centuries of the abandonment of the area. In Room 3, at the extreme northern end of the trench, they found large masses of debris, mostly broken tiles and bricks, but also an unusually large number of bronze coins.
In Beta Theta East they excavated the abandonment fill itself, which consisted of loose, undifferentiated earth and significant amounts of broken, discarded tiles. They have not yet found any trace of hard-packed gravel. It appears that if a road ran along the front of the stoa, it too will have been abandoned in the 5th/6th century AD, like the stoa itself.
The fill over the Eridanos river was also investigated. While much of the channel is still covered with large stone slabs, in places these are missing. Built into the northwest side of the channel were several large Doric columns drums of poros limestone. Their flutes measuring ca. 0.14 m., suggest a diameter of ca. 0.90 m. Assorted other large square blocks and slabs were used as well, now heavily eroded by the flow of the river.
In addition to these column drums, a survey of the Byzantine walls in both parts of Section BΘ showed that numerous candidates for other pieces from the superstructure of the Poikile Stoa were built into the later walls. They include primarily euthynteria blocks, step blocks, and orthostates, recognizable by the characteristic yellowish-tan poros limestone, their dimensions, the neatly-cut and beveled rebates, and the claw chisel work on most of the visible surfaces.
The cover slabs of the northern channel lie at a somewhat lower level than the southern. They also consist of large marble blocks, one of which proved to be decorated with a large hoplite shield with offset rim, carved in relief (Fig. 1). The shield decorates the upper part of a large marble slab, at least 1.80 m. in height. The lower, undecorated part is set off from the shield by a projecting ovolo moulding, below which are three lines of a worn inscription: ΠΥΡΡΑΛΕΥΣ/ΠΥΡΡΟΥ/ΓΑΡΓΗΤΤΙΟΣ (name, patronymic, deme), which might indicate that the monument was funerary rather than dedicatory, at least in one phase of its use.
Several pieces of large-scale fragmentary marble statuary came out in the dismantling of Byzantine Wall 4 at the east end of the section. Most impressive was the muscular left thigh and back of a slightly over life-sized male figure, nude except for a skin/pelt draped over his left shoulder. If the animal skin is a lion, then a figure of Herakles is probably the preferred identity. Also recovered was part of a round altar decorated with a Doric frieze, preserving part of a triglyph and the adjacent metope with a carved garlanded boukranion (Fig. 2), and a fragmentary inscription preserving parts of ten lines of text (Fig. 3). The letter-forms suggest a late Hellenistic/Early Roman date, perhaps around 100 BC, and the text seems to be a list of names of Athenians, with patronymics.
Southeast of the river and running roughly parallel to it and the façade of the Stoa, they uncovered a partially preserved run of four limestone blocks in a row. As preserved, they run for a distance of ca. 5.20 m., and the tops of two of them show signs of heavy foot wear, as though they were walked on repeatedly while still in situ and largely buried. Their low level vis-à-vis the river suggests that they are of some antiquity. The blocks are only 0.30 – 0.38 m. wide, seemingly too narrow for a structural wall, and perhaps they are best understood as a boundary wall of some sort, designed to define the limits of a temenos or enclosure.
From the northern area, Section Beta Zeta they continued to produce a scatter of ostraka in the late archaic levels. One of the handsomest, scratched on a glazed rooftile, was cast against Habron of the deme of Marathon (ΗΑΒΡΟΝ| ΜΑΡΑΘΟΝΙΟ|).
In similar fills of the first half of the 5th century BC they recovered a stretch of 5 or 6 reeds (Fig. 4) set side by side, perhaps part of a mat or roofing of some sort. There are no obvious means of attachment of the reeds to one another. Also found in one of the later walls in section BZ was a small lion-head’s spout of marble, presumably from a fountainhouse, or a sima at the edge of a roof.
They also returned to a collapsed Mycenaean chamber tomb (J 1:10) partially excavated in 2013 (Fig. 5). They excavated more of the fill over the collapse, consisting of a good deal of fragmentary but high quality pottery of the late 6th and early 5th centuries BC. Below, in the tomb fill proper, they found scattered bones, two pitchers, a small piriform jar similar to others found in nearby tombs, and an unusual piriform rhyton or funnel decorated with painted spirals (Fig. 6). The pottery suggests a date for the tomb in the 14th century BC (LH IIIA). In all, ten pots and 3 stone spindle whorls have been recovered, along with two bronze blades and what seems to be a pair of tweezers.
Further west in Section Beta Zeta, they explored more of the upper levels of the north-south road lined in most periods with shops along its eastern side. The main feature, a large brick and tile drain, runs along the east side of the road, collecting waste water from rooms on both sides of the street. Another of these feeder drains cutting across the street was found at the extreme north end of the excavation area. It was cut through the hard-packed road surfaces and the casual arrangement in which it was covered in its final phase with reused rooftile fragments suggest that it was laid and used in the later Roman period (4th/5th AD). The road itself, dating to the middle Roman period (2nd/3rd AD), consisted of the usual surfaces of very hard-packed gravel.
In Section OO investigation of the architectural remains of houses and/or industrial establishments continued. Towards the south, they found two successive mosaic floors, a lower one of small beach pebbles set in mortar, the upper, later one of marble chips. Neither is representational and they look more like the sort of waterproofing of floors found in industrial establishments where significant amounts of water were to be used.
Further north, they continued to explore a pit they partially excavated last year. It produced large fragments of moulds for a bronze statue. Some pieces seemed to be from a nude figure, though at least one fragment may also preserve the traces of drapery. The fragments are larger than usually encountered and the date seems to be early Classical. The pit itself is where the moulds were actually used and then left. The stand for the casting of the final piece was found in situ. The pit was lined with substantial and well-preserved mudbricks, of various sizes, largely baked by the heat of the casting process.
Among the interesting finds from Section OO was a bone die, which instead of 6 faces on a cubical form, has six faces, each of which takes the form of a rhomboid or elongated diamond (Fig. 7).