Aliki: A large part of the Aliki Peninsula has disappeared due to ancient marble quarrying. The quarry floor is under sea level, because of earthquake activities. Photo by Per Storemyr.
An impressive ancient quarry partially submerged in the sea: The Aliki quarry on the southern shores of the island of Thassos (Greece) symbolises ancient stone work and trade, with the Mediterranean as the connecting link since time immemorial. It also symbolises how quarrying may shape the landscape over the centuries. A coarse-grained, white calcitic marble, Aliki was a highly prized stone in Antiquity, exported throughout the Eastern Mediterranean to places such as Thessalonica, Delphi, Ostia, Rome, Ephesos, Antioch and Cyrenaica. Extraction may have started in the 6th Century BC, and it ceased more than a thousand years later in the early 7th Century, perhaps due to an earthquake.
Text by Per Storemyr
Location map
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NEWS
December 2009 New book: a special volume with papers from the QuarryScapes project soon printed.
November 2008 Final workshop: the third QuarryScapes workshop was held in Aswan 12. - 15. October
March 2007 QuarryScapes fieldwork in Egypt: The final season of survey at the Aswan silicified sandstone quarries revealed previously undocumented ancient paved roads
December 2006 Second Aswan field season The second QuarryScapes fieldwork season in Aswan took place through November 2006.
November 2006 First symposium
The first QuarryScapes symposium took place at Divan Talya hotel in Antalya (Turkey) 15-17 October 2006.