Xerxes Canal

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Xerxes Canal (Διώρυγα του Ξέρξη)
location Greece , Chalkidiki , Athos
length approx. 2200 m
Built 483-480 BC Chr.
Beginning 40 ° 22 '52.8 "  N , 23 ° 55' 43.2"  E
The End 40 ° 21 '54 .2 "  N , 23 ° 54' 53.9"  E
Descent structures no
Ports no
silted up
Xerxeskanal.jpg
Ancient Halkidiki (Xerxes Canal highlighted)

The Xerxes Canal ( Greek Διώρυγα του Ξέρξη, cf. Old Greek ἡ τοῦ Ξέρξου διῶρυξ) was a navigable canal built by the Persian Great King and Pharaoh Xerxes I on the Chalkidiki peninsula of today's Greek administrative region of Central Macedonia . Today the canal is silted up, its location is barely on the ground, but it is easy to see on satellite images.

geography

The canal led to the isthmus of the Athos peninsula immediately east of the present-day village of Nea Roda from the Gulf of Ierissos in the north to the Singitian Gulf in the south, immediately west of the village of Trypiti . He separated the Athos peninsula ( 3rd "finger" ) from the rest of the Chalkidiki peninsula ("palm"). The canal was about 2200 meters long and about 30 meters wide.

→ See also: Canal of Potidea , on the 1st “finger” of Chalkidikis

history

Herodotus describes in his histories about the Persian Wars that the Persian general Mardonios , who served under Darius I, lost a large part of his fleet in a storm during his campaign against Thrace and Macedonia (492 BC) while circumnavigating Mount Athos.

In preparation for his campaign against the Greeks (480 BC), Xerxes I therefore ordered the construction of a canal through the isthmus of Athos to avoid a repetition of this catastrophe. The construction work under Bubares and Artachaies lasted three years. The workforce was forcibly recruited from various peoples and from the area around Mount Athos . First, the canal work began along a line drawn across the isthmus, with the excavation being carried up by the workers at the bottom of the trench in a kind of bucket chain to other workers. Since almost vertical embankments were initially built, the earth often slipped so that the excavation had to start all over again. Only the Phoenicians who were involved in the construction found the right method by starting the excavation at twice the width of the canal and narrowing it with increasing depth. The width of 30 m was chosen to enable two triremes to travel side by side.

Herodotus said that by building the canal, Xerxes wanted to demonstrate his power and greatness and set a monument for himself, since the ships could just as easily have been dragged across land.

Archaeological research

Investigations by British and Greek archaeologists and geophysicists between 1991 and 2001 provided evidence of the canal's existence, which had long been in doubt. The canal was therefore completed, but probably no longer used after the campaign and therefore fell into disrepair soon afterwards.

literature

  • Y. Bhattacharjee: Persian Canal Discovery Is Testament to Ancient Engineering Skills. New York Times, November 13, 2001.
  • BSJ Isserlin: The Canal of Xerxes: facts and problems . Annual of the British School at Athens 86 (1991), pp. 83-91.
  • BSJ Isserlin, RE Jones, SP Papamarinopoulos, J. Uren: The Canal of Xerxes: preliminary investigations in 1991 and 1992 . Annual of the British School at Athens 89 (1994), pp. 277-284.
  • BSJ Isserlin, RE Jones, SP Papamarinopoulos, GE Syrides, Y. Maniatis, Y. Facorellis, J. Uren: The Canal of Xerxes: investigations in 1993-1994 . Annual of the British School at Athens 91 (1996), pp. 329-340.
  • RE Jones, BSJ Isserlin, VK Karastathis, SP Papamarinopoulos, GE Syrides, J. Uren, I. Balatsas, Ch. Kapopoulos, Y. Maniatis, Y. Facorellis: Exploration of the Canal of Xerxes, Northern Greece: the role of geophysical and other techniques . Archaeological Prospection 7 (2000), pp. 147-170 ( doi : 10.1002 / 1099-0763 (200009) 7: 3 <147 :: AID-ARP132> 3.0.CO; 2-2 ).
  • VK Karastathis, SP Papamarinopoulos: Preliminary results of the implementation of the shallow seismic techniques in order to detect the King Xerxes' Canal . Extended abstract. Newsletter (European Geophysical Society) 53 (1994), pp. 8-9.
  • VK Karastathis, SP Papamarinopoulos: The detection of the Xerxes Canal by the use of shallow reflection and refraction seismics - preliminary results . Geophysical Prospecting 45 (1997), pp. 389-401 ( doi: 10.1046 / j.1365-2478.1997.3410266.x ).
  • VK Karastathis, SP Papamarinopoulos, RE Jones: 2-D Velocity Structure of the Buried Ancient Canal of Xerxes: An Application of Seismic Methods in Archeology . Journal of Applied Geophysics 47 (2001), pp. 29-43.
  • Jan Zacharias van Rookhuijzen: Herodotus and the Topography of Xerxes' Invasion. Place and Memory in Greece and Anatolia. de Gruyter, Berlin / Boston 2019, ISBN 978-3-11-061020-8 , pp. 101-105.

Web links

Commons : Xerxes Channel  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Strabo VII frg. 33.
  2. View on Google Maps
  3. Path measurement on Google Earth
  4. Herodotus 6.44; Mardonios is said to have lost 300 ships.
  5. Herodotus 7:22
  6. Herodotus 7:23
  7. ↑ It remains to be seen how credible this deprecation of the competence of the Persians is.
  8. Herodotus 7:24. The Bubastis Canal in Egypt is also said to have allowed two triremes to travel side by side (H 2.158).
  9. Herodotus 7:25
  10. ^ The Canal of Xerxes in Northern Greece: Explorations 1991–2001 ( Memento from January 15, 2006 in the Internet Archive )