We quickly understood why the village is called “beautiful view”! Pictured: Alisha Karim (L) and Karl Racine (R) at Kastro Kallithea.

During our first week of field school, we took a field trip up to Kastro Kallithea to see the site for ourselves. For most of us, the biggest challenges were the scorching sun and the vicious pounari thorns that cover the hilltop, but for some of us, the difficulties were a little longer lasting. On the way down from site, Alisha tripped, fell, and sprained her ankle. We made sure the damage wasn’t too serious (and the doctors let her keep the X-rays!), but the past few weeks have involved copious amounts of ibuprofen and icepacks. Walking up the hill to the Kastro Kallithea site certainly proved to be a challenge for many of us, so it’s hard to imagine doing it every day like the original occupants would have had to do.

Alisha’s ankle X-Ray (no breaks!)

Being anthropology students, we began thinking about how the walk up the hill might have impacted the lives of people and animals living on site. Although the people of Kastro Kallithea were probably used to going up and down the hill, it would still put a lot of strain on the body, especially if they had their animals grazing at the base of the hill – they would have had to climb up and down to move them. If there was any trade done in the area, which is highly plausible, they would be going up and down the hill frequently and most likely with fairly heavy loads. Studying bones can tell us a lot about the lifestyle that the inhabitants of Kastro Kallithea would have led; we can see what they ate, where they spent most of their lives, and even what sorts of activities they did on a daily basis. Climbing up the hill once gave us an insider view of what the inhabitants of Kastro Kallithea probably did every day.

Iliana Pappas (L) and Alisha Karim (R) learning about bones.