The North Agora: the building site and the provenance of marbles

the North Agora, built in the Hadrianic-Antonine age, constitutes a unique context in the panorama of the ancient building sites of Hierapolis, given its very huge dimensions, its architectural layout and the extensive use of white marbles. the focus of this paper is the strategies adopted for the procurement of marble by the building sites of both the lateral stoai and the stoa-basilica. the systematic sampling showed different criteria guiding the selection of stone materials used in the buildings surrounding the square. the paper discusses the factors which conditioned the selection of particular varieties of local marbles during the construction.