Geoarchaeological and Palaeoenvironmental Researches in the Area of Ancient Phaistos (Crete, Greece): Preliminary Results

The need to extend knowledge of the area of Phaistós and its surrounding area through an investigation of its settlement patterns, urban history, and, more in general, its landscape in its diachronic dimension, prompted the Italian Archaeological School in Athens to undertake an Italian-Greek synergasia in the summer of 2007, in close collaboration with the local ephoria. This need led to the idea of drawing up a project based on surface investigations, archive researches and material analyses. This project is presently being coordinated by Maria Bredaki (director of the 23rd Ephoria from 2007 to 2010, and currently director of the Institute of Cretan Studies), Emanuele Greco (director of the Italian Archaeological School in Athens), and Fausto Longo (assistant professor at the University of Salerno). The project places special emphasis on geomorphological and paleoenvironmental investigations begun in 2009, also thanks to a collaboration with IGME, the CNRS of Aix-en-Provence, UMR 7330, and Project DIKIDA. Over the last two years, a geomorphological map was perfected and the geological study furthered. The geomorphological approach, in particular – based on 1:5000 and 1:10,000 maps, aerial photointerpretation, field surveys, and a DEM constructed for the purpose – has allowed the team to highlight certain aspects of the landscape and understand the principal ancient and current morphological dynamics of climatic change and tectonic and human activity. During the 2011 campaign, nine core samples were taken along a 50-meter-long stretch of the riverine-marshy depression of Gria Saita, east of the Phaistós plain. The CEREGE laboratories of Aix-en-Provence are presently conducting sedimentological analyses, analyses of fossiliferous content, studies of ceramic remains, bioindicator analyses, and radiocarbon dating. We intend to present their results at the meeting to shed light on the environmental characteristics of the plain at the foot of the site of Phaistós and the transformation dynamics of the ancient landscape