The Village beyond the Village: Communities in Rural Landscapes in Ancient Greek Countrysides

Abstract

Villages in the Classical Greek world consisted of more than a nucleated settlement: the human relationships of rural village communities linked together a variety of spaces and locations in the wider countryside. This means that no one site or location in the landscape makes sense without reference to others with which it was entwined. Moreover, these relationships, and hence the uses of particular sites and places, changed rapidly over time. These aspects of the Classical village are most evident in the occupation histories of excavated small, rural sites. Five such sites from across the Greek world are Pyrgouthi (Berbati Valley, near Mycenae), Sant'Angelo Vecchio and Fattoria Fabrizio (chora of Metaponto, Basilicata), the Vari House (Mt. Hymettus, Attica), and the Umbro Greek site (Bova Marina, southern Calabria).