Ιf you wonder “how hard is the work in a quarry” , the clues as detailed below will give you the answer! Prisoners in many countries are the main working force in quarries as a harsh type of punishment in their penal system. For example, in ancient Rome, slaves and criminals were often forced to do the extremely difficult work of cutting stones in marble, granite, and limestone quarries.
The workers - always men because of the strength and the work conditions required - were working from dawn to dark into particularly difficult circumstances in order to mine severe amounts of limestone. The deafening noise from the excavations, the unstoppable digging, the huge weight of stones that had to carry in their handsor to push extremely weight carts, the unexpected weather conditions plus the high life risk from explosions were some reasons that prove the meaning of the phrase “hard labor”. Also, the blasting needed in extracting the rock and the producing dust are major forms of pollution.
Limestone is the main raw material for the concrete’s production. In 1910 the first Greek concrete’s plant named TITAN was established in Eleusina and it was the major manufacture of high quality cement and concrete mixes. Pantazis quarry was the nearest quarry out of many that supplied the limestone to the plant. The hill was few meters away from the factory and among the quarry, medieval antiquities have revealed. Nowadays, after the plant’s transportation in nearby Kamari, the quarry considered as a piece of city’s heritage, a modern monument that standing as a ghost into the urban building shells.
