Farmer unearths ancient city

ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- A farmer's plow has unearthed a rare opportunity: insights into 1,000 years of life at a previously undiscovered ancient city, archeologists said.

The ancient town, still known today by the name of Apollonia, was found under a series of fields last month after a farmer discovered a golden wreath buried in the ground.

Located about 46 km (29 miles) east of the northern port city of Thessaloniki, archaeologists said the town has already turned up some significant and well-preserved finds in just over a month of digging.

"A city is important from its walls. When it has such well-built walls and such a big expanse, it means it is a very important city," Polyxeni Veleni, the head archaeologist at the ancient city's excavation, said.

It was inhabited from 400 B.C. to the 8th century, she said, and provides a slice of life from an era dating back to the Peloponnesian wars and Periclean Athens, to the middle years of the Byzantine empire.

Apollonia itself has not been excavated yet, Veleni said, but "it's a huge city for that period."

She said the city could have housed up to "10,000 people. To understand what I am saying, classical Athens had 10,000 people. Its a kind of measurement to understand the importance of the city."

Veleni said its first Apollonian inhabitants apparently were refugees from the nearby Chalkidiki peninsula, who fled the area when they were threatened by Athenian warships fighting skirmishes during the Peloponnesian war.

It flourished during the reign of Philip II, the father of Alexander the Great, and later because of its proximity to the Egnatia Way -- an 800 km (500 miles)-long road that ran from modern-day Albania to Turkey. Built by the Romans in the 2nd century B.C., the Egnatia was an extension of the Appian Way.

It was not yet known why the ancient city died out.

So far a portion of the east and north fortifying walls of the city have been excavated along with four towers that date to the 5th century B.C., while a fifth tower was found and will soon be dug up.

"It is very important to find walls of the 5th century in Macedonia ... It's from the time of Philip II," Veleni said, adding similar structures had been found in Macedonia "only in two other occasions."

Veleni and her crew have also found 16 cist graves -- or graves made of stone slabs -- and a Macedonian grave. Also uncovered were two 5th century B.C. kilns, where pottery and terracotta where produced.

Archaeologists began excavations after farmer Andreas Gaitatzis found a 2,350-year-old solid gold wreath while plowing his field.

The third of its kind ever unearthed in Greece, the ornament had a diameter of 18.5 cm (7.3 inches).

It consisted of 30 individual leaves of ivy and two bunches of berries weighing a total of more than half a kilogram (one pound). Wreaths depicting ivy or vine leaves were often used in ceremonies honouring the god Dionysus, experts say. While many paintings and decorations depict such wreaths, few have been found.

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