The oldest signs of lead pollution are found in the Aegean Sea region of Greece, dating back to the ancient times and coinciding with Greece’s conquest by the Romans, a new study reveals.
The report, published Thursday, January 30 in the journal Communications Earth and Science, says that researchers studied sediment cores taken from both mainland Greece and the Aegean Sea and found evidence of lead pollution dating back to around 5,200 years ago.
The findings suggest that lead pollution due to human activities begun approximately 1,200 years earlier than previously thought. The previous earliest recorded lead pollution had been found in a peatbog in Serbia.
The study further suggests that the expansion of the Roman Empire across the Aegean region led to a significant increase in lead pollution in the region 2,150 years ago.
Dr. Andreas Koutsodendris, who was among the research team led by geoscientists from Heidelberg University in Germany, analyzed the lead content of marine sediment cores taken from across the Aegean Sea and a sediment core taken from the Tenaghi Phillippon peatland, located in northeastern Greece. The team then studied the pollen and spore content of several of the cores, combining this with similar existing data from the region and the lead content data, to investigate how the region’s ecosystems were affected by the social and cultural changes of the time.
The Roman conquest of ancient Greece led to an increase of lead pollution
Researchers found that levels of lead contamination remained fairly low and localized in ancient Greece.
Lead concentration rose significantly about 2,150 years ago, accompanied by intense deforestation and increasing agricultural use. Starting then, lead contamination is also evident in sediment from the floor of the Aegean Sea—the earliest record worldwide of human-caused lead pollution in the ocean, emphasizes Dr Koutsodendris, a member of the Palynology and Paleoenvironmental Dynamics research group of Professor Dr. Jorg Pross at Heidelberg University’s Institute of Earth Sciences.
“The changes coincide with the conquest of Hellenistic Greece by the Romans, who subsequently claimed for themselves the region’s wealth of resources,” explains Prof. Dr. Joseph Maran, a Heidelberg archeologist. This means that the Roman conquerors promoted the mining of gold, silver and other metals with ore extraction and smelting (which releases lead), which requires wood.
“Because lead was released during the production of silver, among other things, proof of increasing lead concentrations in the environment is, at the same time, an important indicator of socioeconomic change,” says Dr. Koutsodendris.
It was around 146 BC, when the Roman army conquered the Greek peninsula, transforming the region’s society and economy. As Roman trade, colonies and shipping expanded across the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea, demand for silver coins grew rapidly. Later the Roman Empire used lead for tableware and for construction, including pipes.
Previous research, including an analysis of ice cores in Greenland, had detected high levels of lead across much of the Northern Hemisphere during Roman times.
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