URBAN CHANGE AND THE LATE ANTIQUE COUNTRYSIDEand at the village of Olympos in Attica, for instance, such re-use involved a
former baptistery.^36
The last two features, subdivision and ‘encroachment’ on the sites of former
grand buildings in urban centres, can be seen in different forms in many other
regions. Typically, the large houses, maintained in many areas into the sixth
century or even later, are divided into smaller rooms for multiple dwelling, of-
ten with mudbrick fl oors over or instead of the splendid mosaics which are so
characteristic of the fi ne houses. This can be vividly seen at Carthage, where a
large peristyle house (built round a courtyard in classical style) in the ‘Michigan
sector’ was subdivided into much poorer accommodation by the seventh cen-
tury, and where the same smaller divisions appear elsewhere in the city. At Apa-
mea, peristyle houses were restored after the capture of the city by the Persians
in 573, and apparently maintained until the Arab conquest. But elsewhere ‘en-
croachment’, either by poorer dwellings or, commonly, by small traders and ar-
tisans, frequently occurs over existing public spaces, such as the forum or, as at
Anemurium in southern Turkey, on the site of the palaestra. In the latter case this
change of use had started early, after the disruption to the city caused by Persian
invasion in the third century, and the artisanal activity in the area apparently
fl ourished; but by the late sixth and seventh centuries the other civic amenities
such as baths and aqueducts were no longer functioning. A particularly striking
example is found at Sbeitla in modern Tunisia, where an olive-press, perhaps
seventh-century, sits right on top of the former main street.
Figure 7.2 An olive-press astride a former main street, Sbeitla, Tunisia, probably
seventh century