International congress of byzantine studies belgrade, 22 27 august 2016

VARIA ARCHAEOLOGICA
Chairs: 
Vesna Bikić, Özgü Çömezoğlu Uzbek
Dejan Gorgievski
, 
Living among the Ruins: 
Medieval Settlements and Late Roman Towns in the Area of Vardar and Bregalnica
Olga Dimitriou
, 
Συνθήκες υγιεινής στην ιδιωτική κατοικία του Μυστρά (13ος -14ος αι. μ.Χ.)
Ljubinka Džidrova
, 
A New Personality in the Prosopography of Late Medieval Skopje
Özgü Çömezoğlu Uzbek
, 
Byzantine Finds from Adramytteion, on the North Aegean Coast of Turkey
Alex M. Feldman
, 
Some Remarks on the Archaeology of Judaism in Khazaria
Stamatios Th. Chondrogiannis, 
The Rotonda of Thessaloniki: 
Completion of Restoration and Enhancement Works of a Unique Monument
Alessandra Ricci
,
 
Bridging Local Institutions, Communities and Archaeology: 
The Küçükyalı ArkeoPark in Istanbul
Krassimira Magdalino
, 
Attention : « Site archéologique en construction » ! Un passé restauré ou réinventé ?

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Dejan Gorgievski
Kumanovo, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia; 
[e-mail]
Living among the Ruins: 
Medieval Settlements and Late Roman Towns in the Area of Vardar and Bregalnica
The continuity of the habitations of the late roman cities in the medieval period on the Central 
Balkans (today`s Republic of Macedonia) has long been neglected for several reasons. Surprisingly, 
although there were several indicators of medieval settlements build on the late antique remains, their 
modest appearance, compared with antique luxury below them, often resulted with “archaeological 
destruction” during the process of their excavation in the first half of the XX century. Another 
problem was to define the typical features of the medieval everyday life and how to recognize 
them. For instance, one of the “authentic” remains of early medieval period (connected with the 
Bulgar religious practice) are the so-called amulets with mask on horseback, although the newest 
findings are indicating a different date. However, in the meantime, some of the medieval artifacts 
were wrongly been attributed to late antique period, and therefore, the whole contexts have been 
negligible. In this paper, we will look at the most important settlement in the area bordered by 
two important rivers – Vardar (Upper Vardar) and Bregalnica. The latest research clearly indicates 
that if the towns weren’t completely destroyed in the roman period, most of them were used in the 
medieval ages. Although only the scattered traces survived, they witnessed of continuity of the 
cities, while their fate was mostly depending on internal factors rather than the migrations.