Eleutherna

At the site of the Cretan city-state of Eleutherna (Greek: polytonic|Ελεύθερνα), also called Apollonia(Greek: polytonic|Ἀπολλωνία), which lies 25 km southeast of Rethymno in Rethymno Prefecture, archaeologists have been excavating a town on a narrow northern spur of Mount Ida, the highest mountain in Crete; it flourished from the Dark Ages of Greece’s early history until Byzantine times. The site is in the municipality of Prines. [Barrington|60 & notes]

In the systematic Eleutherna project, a team of archaeologists from the University of Crete has been in charge since 1984. Surveys and systematic excavations have revealed the city's settlement patterns, sanctuaries and necropoleis, even stone quarries in the surroundings of the "Prines" hill.

During the ninth century BCE, in sub-Mycenaean times, in the Geometric Period of the later Greek Dark Ages, Dorians colonized the city on a steep, naturally fortified ridge. The city's location made it a natural crossroads, as it lay between Cydonia on the northwest coast and Knossos, and between the shore, where it controlled its ports, Stavromenos and Panormos, and the great sanctuary cave near the peak of Ida, Idaion Andron. The Dorian city evolved in the Archaic Period in a similar vein as did Lato and Dreros, its contemporaneous Dorian counterparts. [ [http://themodernantiquarian.com/site/10847/lato.html#fieldnotes C.Michael Hogan, "Lato Fieldnotes", "The Modern Antiquarian", Jan 10, 2008] ]

With the Roman conquest of Crete in 68/67 BCE, luxurious villas, baths, and other public buildings demonstrate that Eleutherna was a prosperous centre through the Imperial period, until the catastrophic earthquake of 365 CE. Eleutherna was the seat of a Christian bishop: bishop Euphratas constructed a large basilica in the mid-seventh century. The attacks of caliph Harun Al-Rashid in the later eighth century and Arab hegemony in Crete, together with another earthquake, in 796 led to the final abandonment of the site. A brief reoccupation under the Latin Empire grave rise to a Catholic diocese, still a Roman Catholic titular bishopric today. [ [http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/diocese/d2e20.html Eleutherna (Titular See)] ]

Public exhibitions in 1993 and 1994, and especially the comprehensive exhibition of 2004 at the Museum of Cycladic Art, Athens, have introduced the archaeological site to the general public. [ [http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/news/content.asp?aid=42055 "Ekathimerini", "The treasures of ancient Eleutherna on display"] ; [http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/news/civ_&xml/&aspKath/civ.asp?fdate=07/12/2004 "Cretan excavation sheds light on Dark Ages of Greek history"] ] On the last occasion the Louvre lent the seventh-century BCE "Lady of Auxerre", now given a definitive Cretan context with comparable finds at Eleutherna.

Notes

External links

* [http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~semitic/wl/digsites/Islands/Eleutherna_98/index.htm Eleutherna 1998 Overview]