Reading landscape as a palimpsest: archaeological routes in the Souriza Valley at Lavrion (ΔΙΑΒΑΖΟΝΤΑΣ ΤΟ ΤΟΠΙΟ ΩΣ ΠΑΛΙΜΨΗΣΤΟ: ΑΡΧΑΙΟΛΟΓΙΚΕΣ ΔΙΑΔΡΟΜΕΣ ΣΤΗΝ ΚΟΙΛΑΔΑ ΤΗΣ ΣΟΥΡΙΖΑΣ ΤΟΥ ΛΑΥΡΙΟΥ)

The paper proposes a way of reading landscape as a palimpsest composed by various interconnected fields which are structured around the historicity emerging from within the flow of the relationship between space and time. The case study employed refers to an area of a network of branching valleys at Agia Triada Souriza, near Lavrion, Attica. Dense remnants of extensive mining and metallurgical activities cover the valleys, entangled with residential, political and ritual dimensions of the landscape, dated from antiquity to the end of the 20th century. In such a landscape, sensitive in registering changes, long term abandonment and anthropogenic destruction, dense vegetation and α uniquely complex geological substratum, are all factors that further intensify the landscape’s chaotic character, resembling a labyrinth. The authors, in collaboration with the 2nd Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities (renamed as EFAANAtt), implemented a preliminary study to model a network of visitor routes, with two targets in mind 1. The decoding of this labyrinth by non expert visitors through the physical embodied movement in the landscape 2. The provision of a tangible thread securing the exit from the labyrinth, that is, a comprehensive signage system that can clearly guide the visitor back to the starting point. Aiming at a minimum impact in the landscape, the study established a methodology of intervention, that, while not exhaustive, pertains to all of the spatial scales continuum: from the large scale of Lavrion region for which it proposes a certain overall system of routes, down to the microscales of designing routes, enhancing bridge structures, seating, and signage.