This article was originally featured on Hakai Magazine, an online publication about science and society in coastal ecosystems. Read more stories like this at hakaimagazine.com.
In the ancient Mediterranean, Corinth was an economic powerhouse. Built on a narrow isthmus—a natural choke point between north and south—the city controlled trade between northern Greece and the Peloponnese peninsula. Bound on either side by naturally protected bays, Corinth was also a convenient bridge between the Aegean and Ionian Seas.
The city’s main harbor, located along the Gulf of Corinth, was the largest port in ancient Greece. In previous work, archaeologists examining gravesites and historical documents revealed that merchants sailed from the port, known as Lechaion, more than 2,600 years ago, in the 7th century BCE. They did so in ships likely loaded with pottery, perfume, food, and fabrics to trade across the region.
But a recent discovery—five lumps of brown coal and a helping of ancient lead pollution—has pushed the history of this pivotal port back by at least 500 years, making it one of the earliest active ports in Europe. The revised history stems from an international research effort that’s been surveying the ancient harbor since 2013.
Using hand augers and mechanical drills, French geoarchaeologist Antoine Chabrol of Sorbonne University in France and his colleagues carefully collected cylinders of sediment from the inner harbor, where boats would have pulled upriver to anchor. Analyzing the mud cores, they found a sudden spike in lead levels less than three meters deep. The shift is so sharp and sustained that it could only have been caused by human activity on the riverbanks, says Chabrol.
Lead pollution comes from smelting, mining, and metalwork, and the scientists dated the pollution in the port to as early as 1381 BCE—3,405 years ago—during the Bronze Age.
The five chunks of brown coal, each no bigger than a…
Read the full article here