Karystos
At modern Palaiochora under Castel Rosso hill, over a km inland from the N shore of the great bay. Sparse Neolithic and Early Helladic finds occur at half a dozen nearby spots. The Dryopian town probably dates from the Dark Ages. It stood Persian siege in 490 B.C. (the alleged traces of city walls are uncertain), but in 480 contributed to Xerxes' fleet, and so was ravaged by the Greeks. Karystos entered the Delian League after war with Athens, and revolted with the other Euboians in 411. The only Classical remains are the walls at Platanisto. In 411 or after the Lamian War the town probably lost territory to Eretria and by ca. 290 joined the Euboian League. Later 3d c. coins show a pro-Macedonian tyrant and in 196 B.C. Karystos shared Eretria's fall to Rome.
The vogue at Rome for greenish Karystian marble, begun possibly by Mamurra, revivified the area, its prosperity rising to a peak under Hadrian. Dozens of quarries are known, though mostly for local stone, especially NW of Marmari (Strabo's Marmarion) and above Karystos where unfinished columns 13 m long may still be seen near Myloi. Monumental buildings spread now if not before to the coast. A four-stepped heptastyle peripteral Ionic temple of the 2d c. has been excavated there. Many marble and poros blocks, including a battered Roman pedimental relief, were built into the 14th c. Venetian coastal fort, the Bourtzi.
The port of Geraistos to the E, with its Sanctuary of Poseidon, was on the main route from the Euripos SE and from Athens NE, and probably had an Athenian clerouchy. It is referred to from Homer to Procopios, and finds continue to be made.
The region's most dramatic monument is the megalithic place of worship atop Mount Ocha, the Dragon House, where the excavators found sherds inscribed in archaic Chalkidian script outside, and Classical and Hellenistic pottery inside. The building is a rectangle ca. 10 x 5 m, interior dimensions, with a door and two windows in the S side. The roughly isodomic walls are ca. one m thick. In the interior the blocks are smoothed; on the exterior many show a curious rustication. The roof consists of four superimposed layers of great blocks corbeled inward, but not meeting, at least today, in the center. (Cf. Styra.)
Other, comparatively undatable, remains have been found at Philagra and at Archampolis (perhaps associated with iron mining), and on promontories in the Karystos and Geraistos bays. Late Roman columnar members are found in churches near Marmari, Metochi, and Zacharia.
BIBLIOGRAPHYF. Geyer, Topographie und Geschichte der Insel Euboias (1903); G. A. Papabasileiou, “Anaskaphai en Euboiai,” Praktika (1908) 101-13, cf. 64; F. Johnson, “The Dragon-Houses of Southern Euboea,” AJA 29 (1925) 398-412I; K. A. Gounaropoulos, Historia tes Nesou Euboias (n.d.); W. P. Wallace, “The Euboian League and its Coinage,” NNM 134 (1956); N. K. Moutsopoulos, “To Drakospito tes Oches,” To Bouno 217 (1960) 147-63I; V. Hankey, “A Marble Quarry at Karystos,” BMBeyrouth 18 (1965) 53ff; L. H. Sackett et al., “Prehistoric Euboia . . . ,” BSA 61 (1966) 33-110MP; W. P. Wallace, “A Tyrant of Karystos,” Essays in Greek Coinage (ed. C. M. Kraay & G. K. Jenkins, 1968) 201-209; H. I. Mason & M. B. Wallace, “Appius Claudius Pulcher and the Hollows of Euboia,” Hesperia 41 (1972) 128-40; D. Knoepfier, “Carystos et les Artemisia d'Amarynthos,” BCH 96 (1972) 283-301; A. Choremes, “Eideseis ex Euboias,” AAA 7 (1974) 27-34.
Hom. Il. 2.539, Od. 3.174-79; Hdt. 4.33, 6.99, 8.7, 66, 112, 121, 9.105; Thuc. 1.98, 3.3, 4.42-43, 7.57, 8.69, 95; Strab. 444-46; Livy 31.45, 32.16-17; Diod. 4.37, 18.11, 19.78; Plin. HN 4.51, 63-65, 36.48; Dio Chrys. Or. 7; Ptol. 3.15.25; Arr. Anab. 2.1.2; Procop. Goth. 4.22.27.
M. B. WALLACE- Paus. 1.32.3, Hdt. 4.33
- subdued by Persians: Hdt. 6.99
- in Xerxes' army: Hdt. 8.66
- attacked by Greeks: Hdt. 8.112, Hdt. 8.121
- war between Athens and Carystus: Hdt. 9.I05