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Modern Description: The archaeological site of Doliani, an area of about 55 acres, occupies an isolated limestone hill west of the modern village of Geroplatanos, within the limits of the municipality of Igoumenitsa, Thesprotia. It is fortified with a double defensive wall settlement, which corresponds to ancient Phanota, center of the ancient Thesprotian tribe of Fanotians believed to have occupied the area between the Mourgana mountain and midstream Kalamas river. Reference to Fanoti is made by the Roman historian Livy, who claims the city effectively repelled the siege of the Roman troops in 170/169 BC, only to be surrendered to the Roman general L. Anicius the following year, first of all the cities of Epirus.
Based on archaeological evidence, the fortified settlement was established in the second half of the 4th century. BC, a time when the other major cities of Thesprotia, i.e. Elea, Gitana and Elina (Dimokastro) also settle together, and flourished during the Hellenistic period. After the Roman conquest, the settlement initially followed the fate of the other cities of Epirus. The walls suffered extensive damage and the town for the most part was deserted but not abandoned. The occupation continued for a long time within the citadel (Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman period). In the middle Byzantine period a Christian church was constructed on the western tower of the outer enclosure gate. Besides the church, a settlement should have existed in the region, as suggested by the existence of a large cemetery, parts of which are located around the Christian church and the slopes of the opposite hill, in the same location as the cemetery of the ancient city. During the Byzantine period the inner fortification wall was thoroughly repaired and a square tower was built at the highest point of the citadel. The inhabitance of the citadel is again ascertained during the Ottoman period and continues until more recent years, when the settlement was finally abandoned.
In 1995, after illegal excavations, a small-scale excavation was conducted in the northeastern part of the citadel, which partially investigated an ancient building, probably a large house of the Hellenistic period reused during the Roman and post-Byzantine period. Mobile research findings that building covering a wide chronological range from the era of the Common of Epirus (233-167 BC) to the Ottoman period. In 2000, during the construction of the road from Geroplatanos to the new Kalamas bridge, a total of eleven Byzantine cist graves with few findings, mainly copper and silver jewelery, were excavated at the foot of the hill northeast of the settlement, where S. Dakaris locates its cemetery. In 2001 a Hellenistic cist grave was discovered and excavated, a few hundred meters north of the graves of the Byzantine period.
The settlement of Doliani develops on a hill, which engulfs the Kalamas river from the west and partly the south. The position is naturally protected given that the west and south slopes are rocky, very steep and not accessible. To protect the most accessible north and east side double fortification walls were constructed, contemporary with the foundation of the city in the second half of the 4th century B.C. The accessible southwestern part of the citadel were also reinforced with a wall. The fortification consists of two successive enclosures. The inner fortification wall underwent many repairs and thus kept in a very good condition. A second wall enclosed the rest of the settlement that lies on the gentle slopes of the hill. The double fortification wall was reinforced by the existence of towers and frontal retrenchments. Both the inner and outer enclosure are constructed in pseudo-isodomic masonry and their width varies between 3.50 and 4.50 m The construction was made using local limestone. The stone blocks are positioned so as to form two fronts, the gap between them being filled with smaller rubble. The fortification had a monumental arched gate on the external wall and at least four more gates in the interior wall, with the possibility of existence and a fifth one.
Due to the continuous habitation inside the citadel, later embankments have completely covered the oldest buildings, of which only two have been investigated: a large rectangular building, probably a Hellenistic house, located in the northeastern part of the citadel, near the fortification, and its successive building to the north, which dates in the same period but bears later alterations and additions. At the highest point of the citadel in the northwest dominates a square tower, which by its masonry can be dated to the late Byzantine period. A partially preserved building with arched openings built on the south tower of the inner fortification dates probably in the Post Byzantine period.
All over the citadel the remains of later era buildings are visible today, mostly houses of agricultural character. The buildings are connected by precincts of dry stone masonry and communicate through paths, while in the center of the village there was a stone-built threshing floor.
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phanote
Wikidata ID: Q7180494
DARE: 31535

Info: YP

(Dr. Yannis Papadopoulos, with the support of the Laskaridis Foundation.)

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