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The silver ore-processing workshops of the Lavrion region1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2013

Evangelos Kakavoyannis
Evangelos Kakavoyannis
Affiliation:
Ministry of Culture, Athens
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Abstract

The development in the Classical period of washeries where the crude ores were processed for smelting marked a big step forward in Athenian silver production, since they made it possible to exploit the hitherto unusable poorest argentiferous deposits. The discovery and excavation of the washeries and ergasteria have illuminated the technological advance from the pre-Classical two-phase to the Classical three-phase system. The earliest washeries were located perforce close to natural water sources, but when these became inadequate for the growing needs of the industry, ergasteria were built which, in addition to a washery, had a cistern to collect recyclable rainwater, and could thus be located close to the ore sources. Small communities in which the personnel lived and died grew up around them.

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Articles
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 96 , November 2001 , pp. 365 - 380
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 2001

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References

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19 The existence in the Lavrion region of geological folds in which there was permanent flowing water is also indirectly attested by what are called Poletai Inscriptions. They contain lists of mines, which the Demos leased out to entrepreneurs to exploit, and in one of them the boundary of the mine being leased is given as ‘…the flume flowing from Nape …’ (see Langdon, M. L., ‘Poletai records’, in The Athenian Agora, xix (Princeton, NJ, 1991), 123Google Scholar, no. P29, line 10.

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27 Their permanent presence at the ergasteria is confirmed by excavations, which have revealed pyxides, childrens' toys, and other things. There are also women's graves in the cemeteries that were close to the ergasteria and clearly belonged to them.

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