ST. JOHN ISLAND NEAR SOZOPOL (Oleg Alexandrov – oleg_alexandrov@abv.bg) A fortification wall was documented at c. 50 m to the north of St. John Prodromos Monastery. The wall was over 700 m long with numerous branches and several presumable gates or buttresses and it partitioned the island. The protected territory in the southern part of the island was c. 7 ha. A sector of the wall, 12 m long, was explored. The wall was 1.40 m wide with both faces built of ashlars and an emplectum of smaller stones bonded with mud. Fragments from tegulae and imbrices of the 4th – 3rd centuries BC were found and probably this is the date of the wall. In the Lighthouse Sector a sondage was carried out over a pile of earth 8 – 10 m in diameter where two branches of the fortification wall met. Fragments from amphorae, tegulae and imbrices of the 4th – 3rd centuries BC were found. Probably, these were the remains of the ancient lighthouse on the island. A coin of Apollonia of the 2nd century AD shows the lighthouse as a two-storey cylindrical building with a fire on its top. The fortification wall indicated that a settlement existed on the island and probably a small garrison was stationed as well.

ST. JOHN ISLAND (Oleg Alexandrov – oleg_alexandrov@abv.bg) The explorations of the wall that crossed the island continued. It was c. 1.40 m wide, built of roughly-cut stones bonded with mud and with a core of smaller stones. Fragments from tegulae, imbrices and amphorae of the 4th – 3rd centuries BC were found, while Mediaeval pottery is almost missing, which suggested that the wall is earlier than the monastery which existed from the 5th to 17th centuries. The wall was built during the Early Hellenistic period and most probably it served as a fortification. The explorations of the debris in Sector Lighthouse continued and most probably this was the place of the lighthouse that functioned during antiquity. Fragments from tegulae and imbrices, pottery and amphorae of the 4th – 3rd centuries BC were found.