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Day by Day Blog Week One Week Two Week Three Week Four Week Five Week Six
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Week One - June 26, 2006
The staff and students come from Penn, the University of Arizona as well as from several other colleges and universities and represent a number of fields including anthropology, archaeology, Classical Studies and architecture. The Co-Directors of the project include Dr. Anastasia Panagiotopoulou, Ephor of Antiquities of the 5th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquties in Sparta, Dr. Mary Voyatzis, Chair of the Classics Department of the University of Arizona and myself. The project has grown out of my research at the site beginning in the 1970’s when I worked there as a part of my doctoral dissertation work. I conducted a topographical and architectural survey at the site in 1996 together with a number of Penn students. Our current project is a full collaboration with our Greek colleagues from the 5th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities in Sparta and we are pleased to have representatives of the Greek Archaeological Service among our team. We are a group of approximately 20 (which will grow to 25 later in the season) divided among the two villages. We eat breakfast separately but lunch and dinner together. The villages are very small, the population of Ano Karyes is 23 and Xastanochoroi about 10. We come close to doubling the population of both.
Our Sunday excursion is a walk from Mt. Lykaion to Bassai and the fifth century Temple of Apollo Epikourios. It is a walk of 8.29 miles and we cover the distance in about 2.75 hours. ~DGR
We are digging in the southeast region of the structure as well as on a nearby embankment on the southwestern edge of the hippodrome. Each trench has a supervisor, who is an experienced excavator, with a student assistant and a Greek workman from the Greek Archaeological Service. Our colleague and Co-Director Dr. Anastasia Panagiotopoulou who has been the Ephor of Antiqutities of the 5th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities has sent a representative to work with us for the five weeks of work, Angelike Tsingkou. During the course of the week we are able to open a third trench at the southern aspect of the hippodrome.
Our daily schedule runs something like this: We eat breakfast at 6:15 am. Those living in Ano Karyes eat in what we call the Upper Dining Palace. Those who live in Xastanochoroi eat in the ‘Lower Dining Palace.’ We leave for the site in vans at approximately 6:45 and arrive at 7 am when work begins. We work through the morning with one or two cookie breaks until approximately 1:30 when we pack up and go back to Ano Karyes where we all eat together in the Upper Dining Palace. Each of us takes turns serving on the breakfast and lunch committees to prepare and clean up the meals. After lunch we have approximately 1 hour to rest before reconvening in the lab (the Cultural Center of the village) for afternoon indoor work. The lab is the place where each group of the project works indoors and has their computer or computers and work space. The architects, the surveyors, the excavators as well as the museum personnel, those who catalogue the finds, wash the pottery and organize the baskets of pottery.
We have had a good deal of rain this week, four afternoons out of five creating some serious problems for us since the trenches have been flooded on several occasions, substantially delaying our work. We have learned the skills of bailing the trenches and being patient while the trenches dry out (fig. 1). We have also had to start new areas of some of the trenches since the time needed to fully dry the trenches is long. Thus far in the summer, Greece has been unusually cool and wet and we are told that this is unusual. I have been coming to Greece for over 30 years and I do not remember a July with this much rain. One night, driving back to Ano Karyes from Megalopolis after dinner, we were witness to an absolutely spectacular display of lightening that must have been to the west of Mt. Lykaion. From our vantage point on the road from Megalopolis driving west, it appeared that the lightening, characterized by huge zig zag bolts and several different colors, red, orange, blue, was above Mt. Lykaion and we could only imagine that Zeus was active and probably perturbed that evening. Imagine what the ancient Greeks would have thought if they had seen an event such as this!
The topographical survey under the direction of Tom Fenn of the University of Arizona has commenced and is undertaking trench support as well as the continuation of a systematic survey of all visible architectural blocks at the site. His team includes Nick Kendall and Christian Teuchtler of the University of Pennsylvania and Susan Mentzer of the University of Arizona (fig. 2). The topographical survey team works in connection with the architectural team under the direction of Pam Jordan of the University of Pennsylvania. The architects (Pam Jordan, Miranda Gardiner, John Lee and Ximena Valle) are drawing every architectural block by hand and creating the first ever actual-state plans of the site (fig. 3). All the students are working hard and are contributing substantially to the success of the project.
Those of us who live in Ano Karyes live in rooms in local houses. We are spread through the village and come together for work in the Cultural Center which is our lab as well as for meals in the Dining Palace. We have bought a new refrigerator for the dining room, a gift from the project to the Village of Ano Karyes, since this dining room is used for various local events during the year and we depend heavily on the refrigerator during our summer months in residence. Those of the group living in Xastanochoroi live in a converted school house, now a ‘xenona’ or hotel (fig. 4 ).
~DGR |
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