Archaeological Museum of Lavrion

Archaeological Museum of Lavrion

The Archaeological Museum of Lavrion is situated at the north entrance to the town, opposite the complex of the school buildings of the 1st Secondary and High School of the city. The building was constructed in the early 1970s and was used to house the findings of the area’s excavations. Since October 1999, an exhibition of the findings of the long-term research carried out in the particularly rich area of Lavrio has been presented in a part of the building.

Lavreotiki was continuously inhabited since the Late Neolithic period (5400-4500 BC). The continuous habitation and multifaceted activity that developed in this place, which became known mainly for its silver-rich subsoil, contributed to the disappearance of many of the remains of earlier periods. In particular, the activity of the mining companies during the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th, resulted in findings being scattered in private collections or lost. The aim of the exhibition is to show the continuity of habitation from the remotest antiquity to the first Christian times and to give a more complete picture of the findings from all the points of Lavreotiki, where the ancient municipalities of Sounio, Thoriko, Amfitrtopi and Anaflystos developed.

The first small room is dedicated to mining. Explanatory tables, findings and mining terms give an insight into the processing of the ore. In the atrium are exhibited marble works, tombstones and votive reliefs, statues of Artemis and Cybele and a hermaic steel, works found during the mining companies’ operations in the 19th century, but the exact location of the discovery is unknown. The eastern and southern sides of the atrium are occupied by the surviving relief panels of the frieze of the temple of Poseidon in Sounio with themes from the centaur battle and giant battle, the work of Cycladic artisans of the 5th century B.C.

In the room in the northeast corner of the atrium, findings from the geometric and classical cemeteries of Thoriko and Sounio are exhibited. A display case is dedicated to some of the objects from the collection of the mining engineer A. Kordella and to finds from the cave of Panos in Anavyssos, the Port of Passas, Dimoliaki (Visa) and Pusipelia. In the center of the atrium was placed the mosaic floor from the early Christian Basilica found in Lavrion.