The position of the Hellenistic town wall and the results of the architectural and intensive surface survey suggest that the western residential area must have held the original living quarters of Sagalassos. After the investigation of the chronological development and planning of the eastern residential area through a programme of test soundings (1999-2008), geophysical survey and the mapping of surface architecture in the western residential area also indicated the potential of this zone to be explored through a similar approach.
In order to establish the building chronology of the western residential area, to verify the hypothesis that this was the original domestic area of the town and to initiate the research on the building typology, technology and scale of the housing complexes it is proposed to excavate few small-scale trenches on well-selected locations within in the area where a detailed mapping of surface architecture was carried out in 2008 and where this surface architecture as well as the results of the geophysical and archaeological surveys suggest the presence of houses. By combining the results of the various non-destructive research approaches which have been carried out in the area with the data generated by the few proposed small scale test soundings, a solid first insight should be offered into the planning and chronology of the occupation of the western residential area.
A re-study of the pottery collected during the urban survey in the western residential zone also revealed the presence at the surface of small quantities of Late Bronze Age to Hellenistic wares. The test soundings planned in the marked zones may also shed more light on these pre-Roman phases of the settlement evolution at the site.
