Het ‘Oostelijke Suburbium’ proasteion van Sagalassos. Een chronologische, functionele en socio-economische studie van een bijna onbekend antiek stedelijk fenomeen

Sagalassos is an ancient Pisidian city, located on a south-facing mountain slope of the Western Taurus mountains in Southwest Anatolia. The city has been inhabited from Classical to Mid Byzantine times, with Late Hellenistic to Early Byzantine times (2nd century BC until the 7th century AD) representing its most intensive period of occupation. Sagalassos has been the subject of ongoing archaeology-driven research since 1986, first as part of the Pisidia Survey Project and from 1989 onwards as subject of the Sagalassos Archaeological Research Project (SARP). Professor Marc Waelkens directed the project between 1989 and 2013; professor Jeroen Poblome from 2014 onwards. The past decades have provided a treasure of information on the history and layout of Sagalassos and its territory, among which the so-called Potters’ Quarter (now referred to as Eastern Suburbium) northeast of the town. In 2010, professors Jeroen Poblome and Patrick Degryse jointly devised a new research project on the Eastern Suburbium of Sagalassos, a topographically, historically and functionally distinctive suburban development in the immediate periphery of the town of Sagalassos. They envisaged an interdisciplinary research programme that would allow us to map the origins of this ‘peri-urban phenomenon’ and its emerging and decreasing functionalities, to unravel its developing social complexity and to approach the general study area of ancient urbanism from a ‘suburban point of view’. Since the study area also harboured the main artisanal quarter of the city, it was expected to hold potential for the documentation of the area’s importance within the regional economy. The main modules for this thesis consisted of the various, mostly unpublished, excavation and survey data from previous campaigns, augmented with new research data (2011-2014) collected within the area aimed at answering specific (open) research questions. Because of its location on a high plateau northeast of the city, the Eastern Suburbium is an area that is topographically segregated from both the rest of the town as well as from its surrounding territory. The suburban setting and topographical characteristics of the area resulted into the formation of a suburban texture that is clearly distinguishable in its historical development, layout and attested functionalities. A quarter century of research had yielded a lot of information on this site, but a thorough study of its many facets was still lacking. This project therefore aimed at gathering all available data, filling the remaining knowledge gaps with additional field work, identifying the nature of this suburban ‘phenomenon’ and presenting the data of all previous, current and ongoing research in an integrated, exhaustive and accessible manner. Even though the expertise on the Eastern Suburbium was already considerable due to the varied results from previous campaigns, the first major task consisted of combining all available, but fragmented, old and new data into a comprehensive history of the study area. This approach also led to a reassessment and ultimately to a reinterpretation of our knowledge on all historical and functional aspects of the various sites throughout the Eastern Suburbium. From Hellenistic times onwards the area overlaps to a large extent with the Eastern Necropolis, but the burial practices are mainly concentrated along the steeper, rocky slopes surrounding the area. The central part of the area would develop, from Augustan times onwards, into the main artisanal quarter of the city. Until now only pottery production activities have been conclusively attested within the Eastern Suburbium, but the presence of other crafts (glass working, metallurgy, textile dying, etc.) has been suggested. Specific zones within and in the immediate surroundings of the study area were also used for clay quarrying (the Central Depression), for stone quarrying (the largest eastern quarry is located in the southeast of the Eastern Suburbium) and sarcophagus carving (immediately south of the Central Depression). Finally, the southwestern quarter of the area was taken up between c. 50 AD and c. 350 AD by a series of (semi-)public structures and complexes. Communal dining has been attested at the PQ 2 site, which is tentatively identified as a schola, and we hypothesise the identification of the site G complex as a multi-purpose suburban campus, where for example cattle markets and festivals could be organised. Even though the area covers a geographically distinguishable terrain, the area forms part of the continentia aedificia (the continuously built-up sprawl outside the city walls). In a more broad sense we can refer to the study region as a proasteion (mainly used in the Greek East) or suburbium (mainly used in the Latin West). The problem with these terms is that both also refer to the wider area surrounding an ancient city, including the part of the countryside defined by (elite) villae and suburban farms. This study further recognises a complex framework of different interacting ‘levels of urbanisation’, ranging from the monumental city centre to the desolate mountain slopes, with many different, though partially permeable, levels in between. While the boundaries between these zones were never definite, they appear to increasingly dissolve from Late Roman times onwards. The 7th century AD earthquake would signify a breaking point for the urban texture in the centre of the city, but it appears that the Eastern Suburbium was already to a large extent abandoned in the preceding century. The demise of the quarter was the end station of a longer process, which included, consecutively, the gradual accumulation of waste, the abandonment of the (semi-)public southwestern quarter, the usurpation of older burial monuments, the dismantlement of derelict structures, the return of agricultural and pastoral activities in the area and the removal of the potting activities to a yet unknown location in the countryside. The final major intervention within the proasteion was the erection of an Early Byzantine church on the top of the eastern ridge, but also this building appears to have been emptied before it eventually collapsed in the 7th century AD. The history of this quarter could be reconstructed in some detail from Classical/Hellenistic times to the so-called ‘Dark Ages’, thus covering a period of more than 1,000 years. This study will hopefully serve as the onset for future research, as some (socio-economic) aspects deserve a more thorough approach.

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