Southern Area of the Greek Agora in Kos. Archaeological park project.

Abstract

The project, included in a degree thesis held at the Polytechnic of Bari, is a plan for an archaeological park set in the area of the Hellenistic agora of Kos (Greece). The proposal is based on a preliminary historical research, in these years carried out by prof. G. Rocco e M. Livadiotti, focused on the reconstruction of the ancient form of the large agora (IV-II cent. B.C.). The study analyses the remains of building structures and architectural fragments discovered in six different diggings. Our project goals are: 1) to allow visitors to understand the original plan of the city, although the deep contrast with the current urban tissue; 2) to redevelop the six archaeological sites analysed in order to make the remains of the ancient agora accessible to the public and, moreover, to allow to consider them as elements of a single monument. The planning is developed at urban scale and involves enlargement and redefinition of the excavated portions, creation of accesses and footbridges and eventually anastylosis in situ of some remains. Other relevant features of the project are: 1) the building of retaining walls made of concrete covered with a earth mixture which makes wall surface similar to the ground; 2) the insertion of 246-2 vegetation in some specific areas which, on one hand, functions as enclosure and visual barrier to modern city and, on the other, it works as instrument to highlight the most important streets of the ancient city. Since it’s not allowed to build in archaeological sites, it’s chosen to use green-system to configure three dimensional space. Therefore, control and knowledge of the specific form of woody species play an important role in the project.