Grecità lagunare e dintorni

In this paper, I intend to focus on aspects of the Greek presence in the northern Adriatic, in the light of both fragments of ancient tradition and more recent insights into Mediterranean mobility, the notion of the periphery, and the ancient landscape. The rigid image of a clear-cut partition between the city center, cultivated land, and unproductive margins have now been replaced by a more articulated landscape with forests, marshes, and lagoons contributing to the economic and cultural life of the ancient communities. The following review of ancient sources highlights the geographic and human network connecting the lagoon (of actual Venice) and the wide area of the Delta. The more important greek community in this region lived in Adria, a crucial center for greek commerce, particularly between the 6th and the first half of the 5th century. The Greeks didn’t abandon the North Adriatic region even when their presence in Adria seems to have become rarefied. Ancient traditions on the Adriatic colonies of Dionysius of Syracuse, on the so-called fossa Philistina, and the Spartan Cleimonus are fragmentary and difficult to explain, but they allow us to retrace ancient trade routes and political interests. In sum, the Lagoon and the Delta represented an ideal and concrete connection