Our research objectives in brief

Priniatikos Pyrgos is a rare example of a single site which has clear evidence for activity over an exceptional stretch of time, from the first widespread settlement of the island over 5000 years ago in the Final Neolithic through the Minoan periods and Iron Age into Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine and Venetian times with modern agricultural exploitation to this day. Our research strategy takes full advantage of this great duration of use as we seek to provide a unique window into the exploitation of a specific space in relation to its setting in an ever changing landscape from the time of earliest widespread settlement in Crete to the present day.

The available evidence suggests that Priniatikos Pyrgos was never a central focus for high-status settlements, rather it represents the archaeology of the daily lives of the inhabitants of past societies of this region in Crete. In this context, one of the primary research objectives will be to investigate the varying regional functions and importance of Priniatikos Pyrgos throughout prehistoric and historic times in relation to exchange networks, settlement systems and manufacturing industries. The varying fortunes of this site through time thus provide an exciting window into human interactions with changing land and sea-scapes, natural resources, environmental conditions and ultimately, with each other.

The site and the sea

The site of Priniatikos Pyrgos today is a limestone headland jutting out into a small bay in the Gulf of Mirabello, flanked by beaches to the east and west. Sea-level changes over the millenia mean that the aspect of the site we see today is not the way things have always been, as throughout much of prehistory the coastline was further out past the tip of the modern headland, revealing the site as a hillock just inland from the sea. This revelation, along with further work of the Istron Geoarchaeological Project tells us that the site we look at today has seen great environmental change since the first humans arrived in this area. By late antiquity, rising sea-levels had left Priniatikos Pyrgos exposed as the headland we see today, and the remains of walls of long since collapsed buildings can be seen in the seas all around the site.