Even smaller agricultural lands than at Karystos characterize the last type of communities with less than easy access to the sea. Halieis/Halike, for example, a community in the southern Argolid (in the bay of modern Portoheli), separated from the main plain of Argos by mountainous territory, was founded by exiled men from Tiryns in 479, when all better lands had already been occupied: it had only small plains and terraces, which could be used for producing grain and olives; the sea shore and the harbour, however, supported the production of sea-salt and fisheries, including the highly valued (because of its dye) purple snail; Halieis rose above mere subsistence mainly because of this luxury item, but only while the supply lasted; the place was apparently given up altogether soon after the Classical Age (cf. Pausanias 2.36.1).
With Karystos and Halieis, we have discussed coastal communities separated from the hinterland by mountains; rather than repeating similar observations for other marginal places of the Argolid like Hermione, Troizen and Methana, or similar ones in Aitolia or western Lokris, it must be stated that most of the smaller islands in the Aegean, and the smaller poleis on the Aegean islands (Keos had four of them, Lesbos four small ones in addition to Mytilene), fall into this category, usually surviving hardly beyond a subsistence level, unless fishing or transport (as for instance at Tenedos) generated some extra income. How fragile their subsistence remained is clearly shown by the fact that some of these settlements were simply abandoned during or soon after the Classical Age.
World History
