Paliohora -THE AUSTRALIAN PALIOCHORA-KYTHERA ARCHAEOLOGICAL SURVEY - The Relevance of Paliohora

THE RELEVANCE OF PALIOCHORA

Paliochora is of great relevance on many levels. Some aspects of its significance are outlined below

Research Significance

At the local level, the project will produce information that will help to elucidate one of the most perplexing problems in the history of Kythera: why the area of Paliochora was not settled until ca. 1000 AD, and why it was abandoned some time after the sack, and why it remained abandoned thereafter.

At a broader level, the project will help to illuminate the history not only of Paliochora but also of similarly-located sites throughout the Aegean and elsewhere in the world. The project will make a contribution through exploring theoretical models for settlements in moderately adverse environments in middle range cultural settings, and provide an explanatory model for the utilisation of marginal niches for periods of time. This will contribute to discussion of the role such settlements have in their broader cultural setting.

Significance to the Kytherian Community

Though Kythera can boast sites of greater antiquity, none are more relevant to the modem Kytherian community than that of Paliochora. Many family names from the island can be traced back to the time of the existence of Paliochora as a thriving centre. The Australian Paliochora Archaeological Survey therefore will be of considerable significance to the large Australian-Greek community, and the links with Kythera are stronger than with any other part of Greece. Several of the villages in the vicinity of Paliochora (e.g., Zaglanikianika, Melitianika, Trifyllianika) are completely depopulated today, since all their inhabitants have moved to Australia. Nevertheless, Australian Kytherians have maintained their connections among themselves and with their island ancestry.

Australian Kytherians have formed several associations [Kytherian Brotherhood of Australia (Sydney, 1922), Kytherian Brotherhood of Queensland (1944), Kytherian Brotherhood of Canberra (1987)] and, in the words of a recent study, " have been among the most progressive migrants, assimilating well into the Australian community, without neglecting to carry on some of the fine traditions of the old country." The Paliochora Archaeological Survey will be of particular significance for all Australian Greeks, but especially to the Australian Kytherians, for whom the story of Paliochora and its tragic demise is a particularly significant part of their cultural tradition.

Three of the Associate Investigators of the project are Australian Kytherians, who will provide an invaluable link between the scholarly focus of the survey and the Kytherian community in Australia and in Greece.

A Rare and Well-Preserved Example of a Byzantine Site

Paliochora is one of just a handful of Byzantine monuments remaining in Greece which are essentially unaffected by recent development. The site and its environs can be considered to have remained untouched since the days of Barbarossa. In effect, Paliochora, and the surrounding landscape, can be seen as a time capsule. The site has the potential to yield important and untainted knowledge on Greece's Byzantine Age.

Human interaction with the environment

There is reasonable evidence to show that the area around Paliochora was once more fertile and productive than it is today. The changing richness and poverty of the soil may be linked to the questions of why Paliochora was settled and then abandoned. The overexploitation of the environment is a phenomenon not confined only to Kythera and is of great relevance for us today. The study of Paliochora and its environs may provide some understanding of the processes and repercussions that result from the overexploitation of the environment.


Thanks to Professor Timothy Gregory, his team, and associates, for permission to re-publish the relevance of Paliohora.

For further information, go to,

http://acl.arts.usyd.edu.au/research/kythera/relevance.htm