© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2013 DOI: ./-
L. Lavan, M. Mulryan (edd.)
Field Methods and Post-Excavation Techniques in Late Antique Archaeology
(Late Antique Archaeology 9 – 2012) (Leiden 2013), pp. 189–203
CENTRAL GREECE IN LATE ANTIQUITY:THE EVIDENCE FROM THE BOEOTIA PROJECT
John Bintlif
Abstract
One of the most original discoveries of the Boeotia Regional Survey Project,begun in 1978, was that the countryside not only revealed a remarkabledensity of rural settlement in Classical-Early Hellenistic times, but also asecond impressive ourishing of activity during the Late Roman period(ca. 400–600 A.D.). Equally interesting was that these eras were sepa-rated by a surprisingly severe demographic and agricultural decline inLate Hellenistic and Early Roman Imperial times. When the project turnedits attention to the region’s urban sites, more surprising results emerged:conforming to the rural trajectories, cities generally shrank or were evenabandoned in the Late Hellenistic-Early Roman period, but most failed torecover their Classical-Early Hellenistic extent in Late Roman times despitethe apparent recovery of the countryside around them. However, as to thefate of town and country in the twilight, or so-called ‘Dark Age’ centuries ofthe 7th to 9th c. A.D., that intervened between Late Antiquity and the fullemergence of medieval Byzantine civilisation in Greece, only hypothesesand a small amount of data have existed until the last few years. Now, newevidence has begun to cohere into a plausible historical scenario. In thispaper I shall review the archaeological and historical data for Boeotia inorder to build up a wider picture of Late Antiquity in the context of earlierand subsequent developments. The historical context and wider evidencefrom Greece for these eras have been presented in more detail in a recentmonograph
