The Latest Quaternary Evolution of the Peneiada Valley, Central Greece, and its Effects on Neolithic and Historical Settlement Distribution

The major questions posed at the beginning of the present research which we attempted to answer were the following: firstly, explaining the Late Quaternary evolution of the Peneios River, especially along the reach interposed between the Karditsa and Larissa plains. In this regard, a major target was unravelling the crucial role played by the Peneiada Valley in the framework of the central Greece hydrographic network, and hence understanding the important geographic and environmental changes that occurred within the broader area up to historical times. Second was the tentative reconstruction of the latest Pleistocene–Holocene palaeogeographic and palaeomorphological setting of the area, where several Neolithic communities were established including, above all, the PMZ settlement, the major and best-known archaeological site of its kind. In order to shed some light on the above issues, we investigated a much broader area, as the evolution of the PMZ site certainly depends on larger-scale natural phenomena mainly governed by the regional hydrographic network in all its aspects, for example the number, the dimension and the stability of the water courses; their water discharge and its seasonal variability; the occurrence and frequency of flooding events; and the extent of their effects on the surrounding plains, etc.