AGIA TRIADA - 2008

Agia Triada. V. La Rosa (SAIA/Catania) reports on the 2008 excavation season, which focused on the large stoa in the so-called agora, which can be assigned to a late phase of LMIIIA2 (2nd half of the 14thCt BC).
A reconstruction of the monument made in 2005 proposed the working hypothesis that the furthest 2 areas of the building and the steps at the N limit were a late addition to the complex. To test this hypothesis, a trench was opened to the E of the steps to expose the foundation wall of the building which appears to be bonded with the E wall of the staircase. A 2nd trench, inside area VII, produced no indication in the bedrock for the existence of an earlier end wall that was later removed. At present, therefore, there is no evidence that the furthest 2 areas of the building were later extensions. Surface clearing in front of area VI of this building confirmed that the large wall with off-sets (of the start of LMIB) was already in ruins before the layout of the square in front of the stoa. A white-stuccoed channel which ran across the whole area was almost certainly connected with a workshop: the link with the various structures in the area suggests a construction date towards the end of the 15thCt BC.