HESPERIA
70
(200I)
Pages 285-347
THE
TOWERS
ANCIENT RESULTS
SURVEY,
OF
LEUKAS
OF A TOPOGRAPHIC
I99I-1992
ABSTRACT The authorreportson the resultsof a topographicsurveyin 1991 and 1992 of fifteen Classical tower sites on the Ionian island of Leukas. Plans, photographs,andelevationsof remainsvisibleafterthoroughcleaningarepresented, based on drawingsto scale in the field and both archivaland recent photographic documentation. A brief history of the explorationof Leukas introduces a summaryof the two seasons, with detailed description of each site. The date and function of the towers and adjacentstructuresare evaluatedin the context of currentresearchon ruralsettlement in classicalantiquity,defensive architecture,and the regionalhistory of the area.
HIIpyos jn96cs,(xoS SX(I 7crcx-U([k0xcx RODU HTORY ION:
INTRODUCTION: 1. Leukadianriddle (the answer: Kontomichis 1995, p. 441. to xocX6cdt): 2. Von Warsberg(1879, p. 407) describesit as "the Switzerlandof this archipelago";see Bornovas1964 for a modern description;Rontogiannis 1980, pp.5-23. 3. Rontogiannis 1980, pp. 30-33 (unpublishedfinds;cf. Sordinas1968); Souyoudzoglou-Haywood1999, p. 4; Runnels 1995, p. 707, fig. 1; Douzougli 1999. 4. Murray1982, pp. 224-265, "The Leukas Canal Area,"on the Inselfrage, history of the channel,and observations on underwaterstructures.DomingoForaste1988, pp. 6-48, on the foundation and colonial history of Leukas.
ADTOPOGR1
HISTORY AND TOPOGRAPHY
The island of Leukas (Lefkaida,in modern Greek) forms a near-peninsula off the northwest coast of Greece, joining Akarnania just south of the entrance to the Ambracian Gulf, below Aktaion (Actium) and Nikopolis (Fig. 1). In modern history it belongs to the Ionian islands or Ern-cavrqa ("SevenIslands")as the centralmember of the chain extending from Corfu (Kerkyra)to Zakynthos, and the most mountainous: three ranges rising over 1,000 masl dominate the island's295-km2 andmass.2Long linked to the mainland in nature and name (Strabo [10.2.8] calls it a Xeppo6vaoog; Homeric Nerikos is described as an "axr-(v) 7ircipoto"in Od. 24.378), it was a peninsula of the mainland as early as the Palaeolithic, traces of which appear on uplifted terraces of its western mass and in various caves and rock shelters.3 In historic times the narrow neck of land joining the northeast tip of the island to the mainland was severedby a channel kept open for seacraft, probably when the Kypselid dynasty of Corinth founded the colony of Leukas in the late 7th century B.C. (Strab. 7.7.6, 10.2.8).4 Its status as
American School of Classical Studies at Athens is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve, and extend access to Hesperia 速 www.jstor.org