Tales Told by Old Foundains of Thessaloniki

By Ioannis G Artopoulos

Public fountains located in historic neighbourhoods were among the most beautiful structures decorating Thessaloniki. Such fountains, from which the citizens collected water since ancient times, were found during excavations in the vicinity of ancient Agora. A fountain from the roman era still stands in front of Bey Hamami, or Paradisos Baths. Public fountains survived in the city through the Byzantine era. During the Ottoman occupation only the houses of the wealthy elite had running water, thus the rest of the citizens had to transport water from the public fountains. Despite the historical importance of these fountains for the city and its identity, over time they eventually drained out and year after year they were destroyed by human activities or contempt, collapsing under the lack of maintenance and conservation. This unfortunate history of such an important common resource for the operation of the city raises some questions; how many fountains, springs, baths and wells existed in Thessaloniki? How many of these have survived? How many only live in photographic documents to remind us the constant need of the city for fresh, cold water? Many of these structures were destroyed before they were ever photographed and so their history has been forever lost. However, several have been documented and thus survive in books, postcards and private document collections.This book presents those fountains which survive today either within the urban space of Thessaloniki or through pictures - 360 photographs in total. Specifically the book documents the history of 85 fountains, 18 cisterns (water reservoirs), 10 fiales (fountains in a church or mosque), a few baths, wells and agiasma (fountain with holly water. Stories from the history of Thessaloniki interconnected with some of these water resources are also presented in this book.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: Greek
• ISBN: 1539976866
• ISBN13: 9781539976868
• Release Date: November 2016
• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Length: 278 Pages
• Weight: 1.23 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.7" x 0.6" x 7.4"