Listed 12 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "LAVRIO Town ATTIKI" .
KOPROS (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
Gaidouronissi is believed by some researchers to be the seat of the ancient deme of Coprus.
POTAMOS HYPENERTHEN (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
The name Potamos is applied to three demes on the southeast side of Attica, between Thorikos to the North and Prassiae to the South: 1) Potamos Hypenerthen 2) Potamos Kathyperthen 3) Potamos Deiradiotou or Deirades
POTAMOS KATHYPERTHEN (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
The name Potamos is applied to three demes on the southeast side of Attica, between Thorikos to the North and Prassiae to the South: 1) Potamos Hypenerthen 2) Potamos Kathyperthen 3) Potamos Deiradiotou or Deirades.
AMFITROPE (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
Amphitrope, north of Besa and in the district of the mines, placed by Stuart at Metropisti. (Bockh, Inscr. No. 162; Steph.; Hesych.)
AZINIA (Ancient demos) ATTIKI
Azenia, the only demus mentioned by Strabo (l. c.) between Anaphlystus and Sunium. (Harpocr.; Hesych.; Steph.; Bekker, Anecd. i. p. 348.) It was probably situated in the bay of which Sunium forms the eastern cape. Opposite this bay is a small island, now called Gaidharonisi, formerly the Island or Rampart of Patroclus (Patroklou charax or nesos), because a fortress was built upon it by Patroclus, who commanded on one occasion the ships of Ptolemy Philadelphus. (Strab. l. c.; Paus. i. 1. § 1; Steph. s. v. Patroklou nesos.) Ten miles to the south of this island, at the entrance of the Saronic gulf, is Belbina, now St. George, which was reckoned to belong to Peloponnesus, though it was nearer the coast of Attica.
This extract is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited August 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
GAIDOURONISSI (Island) LAVREOTIKI
Patroklou Nesos, a small island off the southern coast of Attica, west of the promontory Sunium, so called from Patroclus, one of the generals of Ptolemy Philadelphus, who was sent by this king to assist the Athenians against the Macedonians, and who built a fortress in the island. It is now called Gaidharonisi.
LAVRION (Ancient city) ATTIKI
Laurium, Laureion, Laurion, Adj. Lauriotikos (hence hai glaukes Lauriotikai,
Aristoph. Av. 1106, silver coins, with the Athenian figure of an owl). A range
of hills in the south of Attica, celebrated for their silver mines. These hills
are not high, and are covered for the most part with trees and brushwood. The
name is probably derived from the shafts which were sunk for obtaining the ore,
since Laura in Greek signifies a street or lane, and laureion would therefore
mean a place formed of such lanes,--i. e., a mine of shafts, cut as it were into
streets, like a catacomb. The mining district extended a little way north of Sunium
to Thoricus, on the eastern coast. Its present condition is thus described by
Mr. Dodwell : - One hour from Thorikos brought us to one of the ancient shafts
of the silver mines; and a few hundred yards further we came to several others,
which are of a square form, and cut in the rock. We observed only one round shaft,
which was larger than the others, and of considerable depth, as we conjectured,
from the time that the stones, which were thrown in, took to reach the bottom.
Near this are the foundations of a large round tower, and several remains of ancient
walls, of regular construction. The traces are so extensive, that they seem to
indicate, not only the buildings attached to the mines, but the town of Laurium
itself, which was probably strongly fortified, and inhabited principally by the
people belonging to the mines. Some modern writers doubt whether there was a town
of the name of Laurium; but the grammarians (Suidas and Photius) who call Laurium
a place (topos) in Attica appear to have meant something more than a mountain;
and Dodwell is probably correct in regarding the ruins which he describes as those
of the town of Laurium. Near these ruins Dodwell observed several large heaps
of scoria scattered about, Dr. Wordsworth, in passing along the shore from Sunium
to Thoricus, observes:--The ground which we tread is strewed with rusty heaps
of scoria from the silver ore which once enriched the soil. On our left is a hill,
called Score, so named from these heaps of scoria, with which it is covered. Here
the shafts which have been sunk for working the ore are visible. The ores of this
district have been ascertained to contain lead as well as silver. This confirms
the emendations of a passage in the Aristotelian Oeconomies proposed by Bockh
and Wordsworth, where, instead of Turion in Puthokles Athenaios Athenaiois sunebouleuse
ton molnbdon ton ek ton Turion paralambanein, Bockh suggests gests Laurion, and
Wordsworth argurion, which ought rather to be agureion, as Mr. Lewis observes.
The name of Laurium is preserved in the corrupt form of Legrana or
Alegrana, which is the name of a metokhi of the monastery of Mendeli.
The mines of Laurium, according to Xenophon (de Vectig. iv. 2), were
worked in remote antiquity; and there can be no doubt that the possession of a
large supply of silver was one of the main causes of the early prosperity of Athens.
They are alluded to by Aeschylus (Pers. 235) in the line-- argurou pege tis autois
eoti, thesanros chthonos.
They were the property of the state, which sold or let for a long
term of years, to individuals or companies, particular districts, partly in consideration
of a sum or fine paid down, partly of a reserved rent equal to one twenty-fourth
of the gross produce. Shortly before the Persian wars there was a large sum in
the Athenian treasury, arising out of the Laurian mines, from which a distribution
of ten drachmae a head was going to be made among the Athenian citizens, when
Themistocles persuaded them to apply the money to the increase of their fleet.
(Herod. vii. 144; Plut. Them. 4.) Bockh supposes that the distribution of ten
drachmae a head, which Themistocles persuaded the Athenians to forego, was made
annually, from which he proceeds to calculate the total produce of the mines.
But it has been justly observed by Mr. Grote, that we are not authorised to conclude
from the passage in Herodotus that all the money received from the mines was about
to be distributed ; nor moreover is there any proof that there was a regular annual
distribution. In addition to which the large sum lying in the treasury was probably
derived from the original purchase money paid down, and not from the reserved
annual rent.
Even in the time of Xenophon (Mem. iii. 6. § 12) the mines yielded
much less than at an early period; and in the age of Philip, there were loud complaints
of unsuccessful speculations in mining. In the first century of the Christian
era the mines were exhausted, and the old scoriae were smelted a second time.
(Strab. ix.) In the following century Laurium is mentioned by Pausanias (i. 1),
who adds that it had once been the seat of the Athenian silver mines.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited June 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
POTAMOS HYPENERTHEN (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
Potamus (Potamos or Potamoi), the name of two demi, as appears from an inscription quoted by Ross (p. 92), though apparently only one place. It lay on the east coast north of Thoricus, and was once a populous place: it was celebrated as containing the sepulchre of Ion. (Strab. ix. pp, 398, 399; Paus. i. 31. § 2, vii. i. § 2; Plin. iv. 7. s. 11; Suid.; Harpocr.) Its harbour was probably the modern Dhaskalio; and the demus itself is placed by Leake at the ruins named Paleokastro or Evreokastro, situated on a height surrounded by torrents two miles to the south-west of Dhaskalio, a little to the south of the village Dardheza. The port Dhaskalio was probably, as Leake observes, the one which received the Peloponnesian fleet in B.C. 411. (Thuc. viii. 95.)
POTAMOS KATHYPERTHEN (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
Potamus (Potamos or Potamoi), the name of two demi, as appears from an inscription quoted by Ross (p. 92), though apparently only one place. It lay on the east coast north of Thoricus, and was once a populous place: it was celebrated as containing the sepulchre of Ion. (Strab. ix. pp, 398, 399; Paus. i. 31. § 2, vii. i. § 2; Plin. iv. 7. s. 11; Suid.; Harpocr.) Its harbour was probably the modern Dhaskalio; and the demus itself is placed by Leake at the ruins named Paleokastro or Evreokastro, situated on a height surrounded by torrents two miles to the south-west of Dhaskalio, a little to the south of the village Dardheza. The port Dhaskalio was probably, as Leake observes, the one which received the Peloponnesian fleet in B.C. 411. (Thuc. viii. 95.)
VISSA (Ancient demos) LAVREOTIKI
Besa, situated in the mining district, midway between Anaphlystus and Thoricus (Xen. Vect. 4. 43, 44), and 300 stadia from Athens. (Isaeus, de Pyrrh. Her., Steph.). Xenophon recommended the erection of a fortress at Besa, which would thus connect the two fortresses situated respectively at Anaphlystus and Thoricus. Strabo (ix.) says that the name of this demus was written with one s, which is confirmed by inscriptions.
LAVRION (Ancient city) ATTIKI
(Laurion and Laureion). A mountain in the south of Attica, a little north of the promontory Sunium, celebrated for its silver mines, which in early times were very productive, so that each Athenian citizen received ten drachmae ($1.60) annually; but in the time of Augustus they yielded nothing.
Laurion. In antiquity, even as now, Laurion was understood as Attica's SE corner,
the place of the silver mines, a clearly identified system of low hills stretching
N from Cape Sounion for a distance of ca. 17 km. For most of this length, Laurion
has a single backbone marked by a succession of peaks, the highest of which, Vigla
Rimbari, located near the chain's midpoint, has a height of 372 m; but to the
S, where it reaches a maximum width of 10 km, the system is divided by the Legraina
valley. Along the E coast, other cultivatable valleys penetrate the hills, especially
at Thorikos, where the low, flat land is large enough to constitute a small plain
and, for millennia, to have helped support a settled community. Otherwise, most
of Laurion's 200 sq. km is rugged and waterless, and would have given little to
Athenian economy had it not been for the early discovery, particularly in the
hills on its E side, of rich deposits of ore--mixed sulphides of lead, zinc, and
iron--from the first of which silver could be profitably extracted.
Exploitation of this mineral wealth may have begun as early as the
Middle Helladic period, but the evidence admits of no assessment of the extent,
or continuity, of the industry in the Bronze and Early Iron Ages. By the archaic
period, however, from the time of Peisistratos' tyranny (Hdt. 1.64) and with the
issuance of Athens' silver coinage, the mines of Laurion had assumed political
as well as economic significance. And in the 5th c. B.C. this importance increased
with deeper mining and the discovery of the ore bodies of the "third contact"
(Arist. Ath.Pol. 22.7). But progress was halted by the placing of the Spartan
fort at Dekeleia in 413 B.C. (Thuc. 6.91 & 7.27), and recovery may have been slow,
for Xenophon (Vect. 4) makes clear that even in the middle of the 4th c. the industry
still needed encouragement. Despite this setback, the Classical period marks the
heyday of the Laurion mines. Thereafter the story is one of decline, accompanied
by a slave revolt (Ath. 6.272), and by Strabo's time men had ceased to go underground
but were now reworking the slag-heaps (9.1.23). Even this activity is missing
from Pausanias' description of the place as one where "the Athenians once
had silver mines" (1.1.1).
Of this ancient and extensive industry, particularly from the Classical
period, the remains that survive throughout Laurion are almost beyond count, many
still to be properly cleared and studied. A fair sample of them may be seen alongside
any of the roads that serve the mining area: the mines themselves, some nothing
more than a rudely hacked horizontal passage, others a complex system of deep
galleries linked to the surface by well-cut shafts as much as 100 m deep; milling
and washing establishments, the latter with nearby cisterns for the storage of
water; furnaces (the excavation of a heavy-walled building containing a bank of
them was begun in 1971 near Megala Peuka); slag and other waste; living quarters
and cemeteries; roads and culverts. But to some Laurion did not mean only mining:
there are also, in some less accessible places, instructive examples of farmhouses
and marble quarries, in one of which one can see where column drums were removed.
Finally, at the top of Vigla Rimbari there is a rubble enclosure wall, perhaps
a direct answer to Xenophon's suggestion (Vect. 4.43-44) that the area needed
a third stronghold, in addition to those at Anaphlystos and Thorikos, to protect
in war one of the city-state's most valuable assets.
C.W.J. Eliot, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Nov 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains 21 image(s), bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
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