Archaeologists discover 2,500 year old naval base near Athens

A team of archeologists from Greece and Denmark have discovered a 2,500 year old naval base at the port of Piraeus, near Athens, which was one of the largest defense structures of its kind in the ancient world, according to a press release issued late last week.

The base was established in 493 BCE, and was difficult to find because it had been buried under the waters of the Mounichia fishing and yachting harbor for thousands of years, the authors said. It had massive harbor fortifications, they added, and room for hundreds of triremes – galleys that had three rows of oars and were used as warships by the ancient Greeks.

“Some days, underwater visibility in the harbor was as low as 20 centimeters so we have had extremely poor working conditions,” said University of Copenhagen archaeologist Bjørn Lovén, who led the expedition as part of the Zea Harbour Project, an extensive excavation of Athenian navel facilities in the Piraeus area from 2001 through 2012.

“However, we did finally locate the remains and excavated six ship-sheds that were used to protect the Greek ships from shipworm and from drying when they were not needed on the sea,” he added. “And the sheds were monumental: the foundations under the columns were 1.4 by 1.4 meters, and the sheds themselves were 7-8 meters tall and 50 meters long.”

Newfound base played a key role in the Battle of Salamis

The newfound naval base would have played a key role in defending ancient Greece, the study authors explained. For example, it likely provided about two-thirds of the ships that participated in the Battle of Salamis, a naval conflict which pitted an alliance of Greek city-states against the Persian Empire in 480 BC and which resulted in a decisive win for the Greeks.

“Based on pottery and carbon-14 dating from a worked piece of wood found inside the foundations of a colonnade, we dated the ship-sheds to around 520-480 BCE, or shortly thereafter,” Lovén said. “This means that these sheds probably housed the ships which were deployed to fight the Persian invasion forces during the famous Battle of Salamis 480 BCE.”

“This naval battle was a pivotal event in Greek history; it is difficult to predict what would have happened if the Greek fleet had lost at Salamis, but it is clear that a Persian victory would have had immense consequences for subsequent cultural and social developments in Europe,” he added. “The victory at Salamis rightly echoes through history and awakens awe and inspiration around the world today.”

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Image credit: University of Copenhagen

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