News - Weeks 1 and 2: The veterans returns to Zea

Equipment check

Day Three - the site is up and running and we also found time to present our work to a group of students from the British School at Athens

Author: Bjoern Loven

Following a very hot summer on land we kick-started the 2009 underwater excavation of the shipsheds at Zea two weeks ago and it feels good to return to our right element - the Sea.

As always the first couple of days were hectic, but this year we start of with a team of hardened Zea veterans, which meant we were able to get the first diver in the water already on our second work day. Everyone has put in extra work to set their piece of the ‘site set-up puzzle’ in its right place. The tasks were manyfold, and while some worked on the heavy-duty machinery such as the water pumps others tended to the delicate survey equipment. All important is of course the actual diving equipment, which needs to be in excellent working condition because of the contaminated environment that we work in.

This year excavations continue in Area 2, which lies at the critical junction of the shipsheds of Groups 1 and 2. During our 2005, 2007-2008 excavation campaigns in this area we have identified the remains of six shipsheds and a number of slipways, some of which overlap. Evidence of three building phases have been identified, as well as a wedge-shaped area paved with large ashlar blocks between shipshed Groups 1 and 2. This area was in all probability intended as a passageway to the shipsheds, but may have served multiple functions, such an assembly area for trireme crews, or a working area associated with the ships and their equipment.

Our investigations at Zea are aimed at answering the question that historical sources have failed to elucidate—precisely when in the 5th century BC the first naval installations in the Piraeus were built. The question is an important one, especially as the navy and its bases in the Piraeus served as one of the prime movers of the Athenian democracy and comprised Athens’ largest public institution in the 5th and 4th centuries BC in terms of sheer size, cost and administration, as well as political and military influence.