Ανασκαφική έρευνα στην περιοχή του Φάκου της Πέλλας

Part of : Το Αρχαιολογικό Έργο στη Μακεδονία και στη Θράκη ; Vol.17, No.1, 2003, pages 465-483

Issue:
Pages:
465-483
Parallel Title:
Excavation in the area of Fakos at Pella prefecture
Author:
Abstract:
A rescue excavation was carried out in 2002 and 2003 in a plot of land in the area of Fakos, Pella prefecture, approximately 1,100 m south of the Thessaloniki-Edessa highway. In the ancient period Fakos was a walled islet in the lagoon south of Pella and the written sources tell us that it was linked to the city by a timber bridge. The excavation uncovered building remains from three construction phases, together with a large quantity of prehistoric pottery dating to the Late Neolithic and the Bronze Age and also pottery of the Iron Age. This proves that there was a coastal residential settlement in the area long before the capital of the kingdom of Macedon was transferred to the same site.The latest construction phase dates to the late 2nd and the first half of the 1st century BC and consists mainly of workshop facilities which were set up there probably after the city had been destroyed and gradually abandoned at the beginning of the 1st century BC. The same purposes were probably served by the building of the second, 2nd-century BC, construction phase, which was erected on top of an earlier building of the 4th century BC, 23 m wide and, so far, 27 m long (it has not yet been fully excavated). This last building was constructed on pottery-rich fill both of the prehistoric period and of the 5th and early 4th century BC and must have been a public building, though it is still much too early to identify any of the structures we have uncovered with those attested in the written sources, such as the city’s treasury or the building in which the local archons met after the Roman conquest in 168 BC.Especially interesting is the discovery, in the destruction fill of the 2nd-century BC building, of an inscribed cylindrical marble pedestal, which would have supported a votive offering to Hermes Agoraos, patron of the activities of the agora, according to its votive inscription of the early 1st century BC, which is also the earliest epigraphical evidence of the cult of Hermes Agoraios at Pella in the pre- Christian era. The votive offering was dedicated by Aulus Fictorius, son of Gaius, a scion of a prominent Roman family, probably the family to which belonged the duovirus quinquennalis of 25/24 BC of the Roman province of Pella (on the site of modern Nea Pella). The dedicator, who was also known as Alexander, assuming the prestige of the name of the Macedonian military commander, belonged to the first or second generation of Romans who settled in Pella after the Roman conquest of 168 BC, who used the Greek language, dedicated votive offerings to the Greek gods, and also engaged in other occupations apart from military activities, such as trade, for instance, as this epigraphical find is the first to attest.
Subject:
Subject (LC):
Keywords:
Πέλλα, συνέδρια
Notes:
Περιέχει εικόνες και χάρτες