Report on Excavations at the Toumba and Tables of Vardaróftsa, Macedonia, 1925, 1926.

1926 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 1-66
Author(s):  
W. A. Heurtley

The Toumba and Tables of Vardaróftsa lie at the south end of a ridge that separates Lake Amátovo and the Vardár river (Fig. 1), some 35 kilometres N.W. of Salonika (Fig. 2). To south and east the ridge falls gently to the lower levels; more abruptly on the west to the river's edge. Northward, the ridge extends to where the Toumba of Várdino crowns its other extremity, looking down on the flats round Karasouli.Between the Toumba of Vardaróftsa and the river, where now stand the village church and a few houses, rises the fine spring which no doubt attracted the original settlers to the site and assured its continuous occupation. A further reason for the selection of the site was perhaps the fact that the river is easily fordable at this point, and travellers passing from the Struma valley into Western Macedonia would make the crossing here. In Homeric times, when the Vardár formed the frontier of Priam's kingdom, the place must have had strategic importance, and in later times, when the successive settlements had raised the artificial mass high above the surrounding level, it must have offered a valuable strong-point from which the whole country-side could be commanded.

1913 ◽  
Vol 19 ◽  
pp. 133-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. A. Scutt

The area over which the Tsakonian dialect is spoken lies on the east coast of the Peloponnese between the Parnon range and the sea. Its northern boundary is roughly the torrent which, rising on Parnon above Kastánitsa, flows into the sea near Ayios Andréas, its southern the torrent which, also rising on Parnon, passes through Lenídhi to the sea. A mountain range stretches along the coast from end to end of the district, reaching its highest point (1114 metres) in Mt. Sevetíla above the village of Korakovúni. Between Tyrós and Pramateftí, the seaward slopes of this range are gentle and well covered with soil. Behind these coast hills there stretches a long highland plain, known as the Palaiókhora, which, in the north, is fairly well covered with soil, but gradually rises towards the south into a region of stony grazing land, and terminates abruptly in the heights above Lenídhi. The high hill of Oríonda rises out of the Palaiókhora to the west and forms a natural centre-point of the whole district. Behind it stretching up to the bare rock of Parnon, is rough hilly country, cut here and there by ravines and offering but rare patches of cultivable land.


1985 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 479 ◽  
Author(s):  
GT Smith

The noisy scrub-bird Atrichornis clamosus at Two Peoples Bay was censused, the number of singing males being used as the population index. Incomplete data from 1962 to 1968 suggest that the number of males varied from 40 to 50 during this period. The first rigorous census found 45 males in 1970 and this number increased to 138 in 1983. The most likely reason for this increase is the absence of fire from the area since 1970. Since 1975 the population has expanded out of its headland stronghold to the south-west of Two Peoples Bay to form a subpopulation around Lake Gardner that is well separated from the headland population by roads, firebreaks and a strip of control burnt blocks. The growth of this subpopulation has added a further safeguard to the population. Observations on the vegetation formations (heath, thicket, low forest A and low forest B) used by male noisy scrub-birds on the headland indicate that most of the best habitat (low forest B) is occupied and that an increasing number of males are occupying suboptimal habitat (heath and thicket). There is sufficiently good habitat to the west of Lake Gardner to allow at least 30 additional males to live in the area.


1950 ◽  
Vol 45 ◽  
pp. 261-298 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. M. Cook ◽  
R. V. Nicholls

The village of Kalývia Sokhás lies against the base of one of the massive foothills in which Taygetus falls to the plain three or four miles to the south of Sparta (Plate 26, 1). It is bounded by two rivers which flow down in deep clefts from the mountain shelf. The hillside above rises steeply to a summit which is girt with cliffs on all but the west side and cannot be much less than four thousand feet above sea level; this von Prott believed to be the peak of Taleton. Its summit is crowned by the ruins of a mediaeval castle which was undoubtedly built as a stronghold to overlook the Spartan plain; the only dateable object found there, a sherd of elaborate incised ware, indicates occupation at the time when the Byzantines were in possession of Mystra. The location of the other sites mentioned by Pausanias in this region remains obscure, but fortunately that of the Spartan Eleusinion has not been in doubt since von Prott discovered a cache of inscriptions at the ruined church of H. Sophia in the village of Kalývia Sokhás. In 1910 Dawkins dug trenches at the foot of the slope immediately above the village and recovered a fragment of a stele relating to the cult of the goddesses and pieces of inscribed tiles from the sanctuary. The abundance of water in the southern ravine led von Prott to conclude that the old town of Bryseai with its cult of Dionysus also lay at Kalývia Sokhás; but no traces of urban settlement have come to light at the village, and the name rather suggests copious springs such as issue from the mountain foot at Kefalári a mile to the north where ancient blocks are to be seen in the fields.


2002 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 230-245 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mihail Zahariade ◽  
Myrna K. Phelps

Ancient Halmyris lies in the NW corner of the Dobrudja region in SE Romania. It liesc.2.5 km east of the village of Murighiol on a rocky promontory which is slightly higher than the surrounding marshes. This is at the E end of the Dunavat peninsula (known in antiquity asExtrema Scythiae Minoris: Jord., Get.266) and it is bordered by the Danube delta on the north and east, Razelm lake on the south, and the Tulcea hills on the west (fig. 1). The site was occupied continuously from at least the mid-first millennium B.C. up to the 7th c. A.D. The local environment, flora and fauna were favourable to settlement until as a result of natural causes the Danube became almost inaccessible; from that point on, the settlement became vulnerable to human and other natural events and eventually it became deserted.The site is known today as Bataraia or Cetatea. In the early 20th c. the locals still called it the Genoese stronghold (Geneviz-Kaleh). In antiquity it lay on the bank of the southern arm of the Danube called Peuce (now known as Sfantu Gheorghe). Today the southern arm of the Danube runs 2 km north of the site and it is connected to Lake Murighiol by the Periboina canal. Until 1983 there were two lakes,c.100 andc.200 m from the site, modern relics of the ancient course of the river. To the east lie the Dunavat hills and to the south is Dealul Cetatea (“fort hill”) (fig. 2).


Antiquity ◽  
1961 ◽  
Vol 35 (138) ◽  
pp. 91-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimiter P. Dimitrov

The site of the Thracian city of Seuthopolis lies about 8 km. to the west of Kazanluk, in the famous Valley of Roses, between the Balkan Range and the Sredna Gora Mountains. A spacious terraced area was formed by the erosion of the River Toundja (the ancient Thracian Tonsus); this is bounded to the north and east by a sloping plateau, on the site of the villages of Koprinka and Dounavtsi; and to the south, the steep slopes of the heights (site of the village of Morozovo (formerly Gorno Cherkovishté), the last of the Sredna Gora foothills, dropped down to the river banks. The last and lowest step of this terraced area projects deep into the bends of the Toundja to the south, forming a peninsula, or tongue of land, the banks of which are 4 to 5 m. in height; to the west and south it is bounded by the River Toundja, and to the east the Golyama Varovitsa or Chiflikchiiska River, a small, but always swiftly flowing tributary of the Toundja, guards its approaches. The Thracian city of Seuthopolis was situated precisely on this spot, called ‘Chiflika’ (The Farm), on the left bank of the River Toundja, defended from the west, south and east by natural barriers of water (PLATE IX).


1911 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 215-249
Author(s):  
H. A. Ormerod ◽  
E. S. G. Robinson

The following notes were made by us on a short journey in Pamphylia during March 1911.It had been our intention on reaching Adalia about the middle of the month to go at once into Lycia, but the lateness of the season made the higher ground impossible, and it seemed better to spend a short time in examining the country in the immediate neighbourhood of Adalia, much of which was still imperfectly known (Fig. 1).The best description of the Pamphylian plain is that given by Lanckoronski. From the Kestros to the Melas stretches a low-lying, swampy plain, traversed by three great rivers which come down from the Pisidian highlands, feverish in summer, and during the winter months impossible for wheeled traffic. To the west of the Kestros rises a rocky plateau of travertine some hundred feet above sea-level, on which stands the town of Adalia (Attaleia) on cliffs above the sea, which diminish towards the west. To the north of Adalia rises a third level, which viewed from the south, resembles a high raised beach, running roughly parallel with the present coast as far as the village of Barsak. To the east of that point the hills turn in a north-easterly direction and sink gradually down towards the Kestros. The western part of the plateau is crossed by two main roads, leading respectively to Istanoz and Buldur.


Archaeologia ◽  
1867 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 361-374
Author(s):  
Thomas Lewin

The Portus Lemanis must clearly have been one of the great thoroughfares between Britain and the Continent, and it is not a little singular that the position of a port once so famous should never have been satisfactorily settled. The common impression is that it lay at the foot of Lymne Hill. For the benefit of those who are not familiar with this neighbourhood, I should mention, in limine, that the village of Lymne or Lympne stands about 2½ miles to the west of Hythe, on the highest part of the cliff which girds in the eastern portion of Romney Marsh. On the declivity of the hill, about half-way down, is seen the old Roman castrum, called Stuttfall, occupying 10 or 12 acres. There are walls on the north, east, and west, and the east and west walls run down to the marsh itself; but, what is remarkable, the south side towards the marsh had never any wall,” and hence the erroneous notion so generally prevalent that at the foot of the castrum was once the Portus Lemanis, and that in the course of ages the sea retired from Lymne, when the port shifted to West Hythe, and that the sea again retired, when the port was transferred to Hythe. I shall endeavour to show that these changes, if they ever occurred, must have preceded the historic period, and that in the time of the Romans, as for many centuries afterwards, the only port was Hythe. In fact Portus and Hythe are the same thing, Portus in Latin being Hyð in Saxon.


1952 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
pp. 227-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen Waterhouse

For three weeks of May–June 1937 excavations of limited extent were conducted at Stavros in northern Ithaca. The main site was a small area immediately below the village square to the south-west, where chance finds by the proprietor of the land, followed in 1936 by a trial excavation, had revealed the presence of Greek graves and a Bronze Age deposit.Stavros lies on a narrow ridge commanding the bays of Phrikes to the east and Polis to the west. Along this ridge must at all times have run the route from the south of the island to Pelikata and the fertile valley of Kalamos. Below the ridge, to the south west, there is a good water-supply at Asprosykia, where late Helladic sherds are recorded. The existence of large dressed blocks lower down the slope at the head of the valley, and of other blocks and rock-cuttings farther westwards, towards Polis Bay, suggests that a not inconsiderable town stood here in classical times.


Archaeologia ◽  
1909 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 553-564
Author(s):  
C. R. Peers

The village of Basing lies in the upper Loddon Valley a mile and a half east of Basingstoke on the south bank of the river, which rises some four miles to the east, near Worting, and here runs in a flat and marshy channel. At either end of the village is a mill, the Lower Mill at the west end and Old Basing Mill at the east, near the church. A third mill mentioned in Domesday does not now exist. The ground rises gently southwards, the road running through the village along the base of the slope, and at the east end of the village is higher ground on which the church stands. At the south-west, about 500 yards from the church, are the earthworks marking the site of Basing House, and commanding at the same time the road and the approach to the bridge over the Loddon. In early days, when the river probably ran through a wider belt of marshy ground than at present, the position must have been one of great strategic importance, and in fact it continued to be so down to the time of the destruction of the house in the Civil Wars. Its strength is also witnessed to by the fact that it resisted attack after attack by the soldiers of the Parliament, and was only taken at length when the Royalist power was broken, and Cromwell himself could give all his energies to its reduction.


1938 ◽  
Vol 38 ◽  
pp. 5-5
Author(s):  
J. D. S. Pendlebury ◽  
M. B. Money-Coutts

A quarter of an hour north of the village of Tzermiadho runs a line of cliffs which eventually join the west end of the Trapeza plateau. They are fronted by a thick growth of ilex trees, which makes the examination of them a matter of some difficulty. Many shallow caves occur, and from the top left-hand corner of one, 2 metres above the floor, a narrow hole about 50 cms. in diameter leads to a small chamber some 4 metres by 2, with a height never exceeding 70 cms. Only the inmost 2 metres contained any earth. This had been covered with a thin film of stalactite, above which was found the small Early Minoan I suspension pot (see p. 22 and Plate IV, 2). There is a stalactite pillar near the south wall. In the main body of the cave the first 20 cms. below the surface produced sherds from open bowls, tubular handles, rims, and other sherds of Late Neolithic date, some with a good burnish, but most rough, as well as a few sherds of typical Trapeza Ware. There were many bones, mostly of animals, but some, including a jaw bone, undoubtedly human. Below this arbitrary level to bed-rock, which slopes down to a maximum depth of 50 cms. to the southwest, the same Late Neolithic ware was found, but with a bigger proportion of well-burnished and well-finished fragments. A few incised and punctuated sherds appeared also. Bones, again mostly animal, occurred.


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