Aspros Pyrgos (Siphnos) Platys Gialos
Aspros Pyrgos, large Classical (?) tower and cistern E of Platys Gialos, Siphnos, Cyclades
Works:
Latitude: 36.932600
Longitude: 24.738000
Confidence: High
Time period: C
Region: Cyclades
Country: Greece
Department: Milos/Siphnos
Mod: Platys Gialos
- IDAI gazetteer ID
The construction has many refinements and unusual features: the drafting and chiseling of the blocks of the outer face; an inner lining in smaller stones; a corbelled staircase, with ten steps still surviving, in the interior; a substantial cistern recessed beneath the floor. A carefully crafted, stone olive-press block, with channels for the liquid, and other pieces clearly related to mechanical machinery, suggest an agricultural use for the tower, perhaps in a later (Hellenistic) phase. In fact the inner walls, which divide the interior into three areas could possibly be a later addition, though still antique. Of particular note is the doorway on the south east side, which has been cut and shaped for the fitting and locking of the door: it conserves two large, protruding, vertical stone rings, integral with the wall, on the inside to hold a transom for blocking the door. The curved walls of the interior must have meant that the ‘travel' distance of the transom was limited, however, suggesting that it may have been of metal.
Info: McGilchrist's Greek Islands
(From McGilchrist’s Greek Islands, © Nigel McGilchrist 2010, excerpted with his gracious permission. Click for the books)
Author, Title | Text | Type | Date | Full | Category | Language |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Author, Title | Text | Type | Date | Full | Category | Language |