Vasilikos and Maroni valleys: re-survey and pilot excavations at small Iron Age sites

Catherine Kearns and Anna P. Georgiadou combined re-survey, pedestrian survey, geophysics and pilot test excavations at small Iron Age sites in the Vasilikos and Maroni valleys¹. Survey began in 2016 at Kalavasos-Vounaritashi and Maroni-Vournes, and in 2019 three trenches at Vounaritashi exposed parts of a stone building and associated features¹. The 2016 surface collection at Vounaritashi was roughly 240 pottery fragments, mostly Cypro-Archaic and Cypro-Classical¹. Kearns and Georgiadou suggest, tentatively, activity there from about the eighth to fourth centuries BCE, and conclude that the dating, function and occupants of the building remain conjectural¹. At Vournes the survey collected 990 pottery fragments, and test units in 2017 showed a complex history of soil engineering and agriculture; the features could not be securely dated, and some may relate to modern agricultural development¹. The results appeared in the Journal of Field Archaeology in 2021¹.