The Macedonian Wars in Pelagonia Marshlands Paleoenvironmental Turn in the Understanding of the Early Roman Conquest of the Macedonian Kingdom

The archaeological site of Crnobuki in Pelagonia Vallet was traditionally associated with the historically famous battles of the Macedonian phalanxes with Rome. Yet, the reach archaeological material and necropoleis in the vicinity of the site suggested that it was not just an important military outpost of the last Macedonian kings, but also an important urban center of the archaic, classical and Hellenistic periods.
The abundance of ancient written sources and archaeological material related to this region contributed towards ignoring the important dynamics of development of this pre-Roman and Roman settlement in relation to the exploitation of its landscape and surrounding natural resources.
This paper presents the important new findings, hypothesis and interpretations of the symptoms of change related to the Roman conquest, which are results of the two seasons of field surveys, excavations and laboratory analyses of the international American-Macedonian team, focused on computational and paleoenvironmental approaches. The LIDAR data produced in the last two years, led towards a more precise modeling of topographic and geographical features of the site, which combined with archaeobotanical analyses, alphanumerical and geo-referenced cartographical reports and flood analysis with a focus on the flood zone between 570–600 m above sea level, revealed the complexity of the dynamics of the settlement in the pre-Roman and Roman times.
Analyzing the environmental changes caused by the modern landscape cultivation (huge drainage system), led towards an entirely new orientation of the site towards the mountain slopes to the north, instead of the ancient flood zone to the south-east. More importantly, the significant reduction of the agricultural and export activities of this urban center in Roman times, can no longer be associated exclusively with the early Roman suppressive policies, but also with new patterns of developing settlements within the critical zone predisposed to floods and excavation of minerals.