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Some unpublished Mycenaean Objects from Vrysarion (Kato Goumenitsa) in Achaea

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2013

Extract

While engaged early in 1977 in the study of Mycenaean material in the storerooms of the Patras Museum, I discovered one box containing some unpublished Mycenaean objects coming from Professor Yialouris' excavations of three LH chamber tombs found by chance at Vrysarion (Kato Goumenitsa) in the Kalavryta region of Achaea in 1959–60. These tombs belong to the large Mycenaean cemetery, at the locality ‘Ayia Paraskevi’, partly excavated by Kyparisses before the war.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1978

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References

1 There have been brief notices of these finds: ADelt 16B (1960) 138; AR (1959–60) 12;(1961–2) 12; BCH 85 (1961) 682; OpAth 5 (1965) 104. I am very grateful to Professor N. Yialouris for permission to publish these objects and to my wife, Dr. Litsa Kontorli-Papadopoulos, who made and prepared all the drawings and discussed with me the subject. The photographs are by the author.

ABBREVIATIONS ADDITIONAL TO THOSE IN STANDARD USE

Aigion Papadopoulos, A. J., Excavations at Aigion–1970, SIMA, vol. XLVI, Göteborg, 1976.Google Scholar

Athenian Agora Immerwahr, S. A., The Athenian Agora, vol. XIII, The Neolithic and Bronze Ages, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971.Google Scholar

Attica Stubbings, F. H., ‘The Mycenaean Pottery of Attica’ in BSA 42 (1947) 175.Google Scholar

CBMW Catling, H. W., Cypriot Bronzework in the Mycenaean World, Oxford, 1964.Google Scholar

ChT Wace, A. J., ‘Chamber Tombs at Mycenae’ in Archaeologia 82 (1932).Google Scholar

Circle B Mylonas, G. E., O Taphikos Kuklos B ton Mukenon, Athens, 1972.Google Scholar

CVA.D Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum, Danemark (fasc. 1,2).

Deiras Deshayes, J., Argos, Les fouilles de la Deiras, études Péloponnésiennes IV, Paris, 1966.Google Scholar

ΔΝΕ Mylonas, G. E., To Dytikon Nekrotapheion tis Eleusinos, vols. Α–Γ, Athens, 1975.Google Scholar

DPK Popham, M., The Destruction of the Palace at Knossos, SIMA, vol. XII, Göteborg, 1970.Google Scholar

EMF Ålin, P., Das Ende der mykenischen Fundstätten auf dem Griechischen Festland, SIMA, vol. II, Lund 1962.Google Scholar

FM Furumark Motive Number: A. Furumark, The Mycenaean Pottery.

FS Furumark Shape Number: ibid.

GAMS Hope-Simpson, R., A Gazetteer and Atlas of Mycenaean Sites, BICS, no. 16, London, 1965.Google Scholar

Khalkis Hankey, V., ‘Late Helladic Tombs at Khalkis’ in BSA 47 (1952) 4995.Google Scholar

Les Outils Deshayes, J., Les Outils de Bronze de l'Indus au Danube (IV au II millenaire), Paris, 1960.Google Scholar

Levant Stubbings, F. H., Mycenaean Pottery from the Levant, Cambridge, 1951.Google Scholar

LMTS Desborough, V. R. d'A., The Last Mycenaeans and their Successors, Oxford, 1964.Google Scholar

MPI Taylour, Lord W., Mycenaean Pottery in Italy and Adjacent Areas, Cambridge, 1958.Google Scholar

Mycenaean Achaea Papadopoulos, A. J., The Archaeology of the Mycenaean Achaea (MS), Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1972.Google Scholar SIMA, forthcoming.

NTD Persson, A. W., New Tombs at Dendra near Midea, Lund, 1942.Google Scholar

Perati Iakovides, S., Perati, To Nekrotapheion. i: Oi taphoi kai ta euremata, ii: Genikai paratereseis, iii: Pinakes. Athens, 1969–70.Google Scholar

PN III Biegen, C. W., Rawson, M., Taylour, W., Donovan, W. P., The Palace of Nestor at Pylos in Western Messenia, vol. III (Acropolis and Lower Town, Tholoi and Grave Circle, Chamber Tombs, Discoveries Outside the Citadel), Princeton, 1973.Google Scholar

PTK Evans, A., ‘Prehistoric Tombs at Knossos’ in Archaeologia 59 (1906).Google Scholar

ΥΕθ Spyropoulos, Th. G., Tsteromykenaikoi Elladikoi Thesauroi, Athens, 1972.Google Scholar

2 Cf. ADelt 9 (1924–5) Parartema, 14–18; PAE (1925) 43–7;(1926) 130–1; (1927) 52.

3 See the very valuable paper of Professor Åström in OpAth 5 (1965) 89–110, where finds of early LHIII date from the collection of Aigion and the Berlin Museums are published. Cf. also my recent publication, Excavations at Aigion—1970. SIMA, vol. 46 (1976).

4 In the excavation report in ADelt many more finds are summarily recorded, which remain unrecognized so far. The finds presented here (labelled ‘Kato Goumenitsa-1959–60’) were discovered too late for me to incorporate them into my forthcoming publication of Mycenaean Achaea.

5 This razor comes from Kyparisses' excavations at the same site (Vrysarion). See PAE(1925) 46, fig. 2 (second from right) and Mycenaean Achaea, 436–7.

6 Cf. BSA 53–4 (1958–9) 245 (1.7) (Upper Gypsades) and Mycenaean Achaea, pl. 161 b–c; PAE (1964) pl. 68a (PAX.76, 156, 328, from Mitopolis, Teichos Dymaion, and Chalandritsa respectively).

7 Cf. AE (1888) 171–2 and MMΠ 60; PTK, 115–17; Prosymna, 347; BSA 51 (1956) 96–7; 53–4 (1958–9) 234–5; Hesperia 24 (1955) 215–16; CBMW, 106–7 and BSA 69 (1974) 245; Les Outils, 330–4; Perati B, 281–3; ΥΕΘ, 103–10; A Delt 9 (1924–5) 71–2; ΔΝΕ, 247; Athenian Agora, 106.

8 Mycenaean Achaea, 438–40.

9 BSA 53–4 ( 1958–9) 235.

10 See above, p. 174.

11 BSA, op. cit.

12 PTK, 23.

13 Since the possibility that these examples and the fragmentary leaf-shaped PMX.1272 belonged to the same burial cannot be ruled out (the excavation report is very brief and riot informative).

14 BSA 63 (1968) 107.

15 PTK, 117.

16 ADelt 3 (1917) 140–1.

17 The example cited by Keramopoullos was found together with a whetstone (op. cit. fig. 103). Cf. also NTD, 45, where Persson inlines to accept them as razors on the ground that to judge from the monuments, the people of the mainland shaved their moustaches after the Shaft-Grave period.

18 Hood, , BSA 47 (1952) 262Google Scholar; 51 (1956) 96; Sandars, , BSA 53–4 (19581959) 235Google Scholar; Desborough, LMTS, 59; Catling, CBMW, 230; Vermeule, E., Hesperia 24 (1955) 215–16Google Scholar; Immerwahr, , Athenian Agora, 106, 176.Google Scholar

19 Cf. Sandars, op. cit. ‘The leaf razor does not appear to survive LM and LHIIIA’ and Desborough, LMTS, 59 ‘leaf-shape is not found after LHIIIA.’

20 Cf. Perati B, 281–3.

21 Cf. BSA 69 (1974) 245.

22 ‘The antiquity of the one-edged bronze knife in the Aegean’ PPS 21 (1955) 174–97. For class la, ibid. 175–7, fig. 1 and 188–190 (lists).

23 Les Outils, 313–16.

24 Cf. MP, 39; BSA 62 (1967) 137; ChT, 150; Perati B, 209; ΔΝΕ, 237.

25 See Mycenaean Achaea, 249. In most other sites (e.g. Mycenae, Khalkis) the shape hardly survives the LHIIIB period.

26 See Mycenaean Achaea, 241, 249 (it outnumbers all other patterns). For the distinction between LHI-II (wheel) and LHIII (concentric circles) alabastra suggested by Wace for the Mycenae examples see ChT, 154, 171. Cf. also Khalkis, 57; ΔΝΕ, 237.

27 e.g. in Thebes. Cf. also Khalkis, 65.

28 Cf. MP, 43; Prosymna, 420.

29 Mycenaean Achaea, 260 (almost equal in number to the rounded alabastra).

30 Op. cit. 262.

31 Op. cit.

32 Cf. e.g. Attica, pl. 11 19, 13; Prosymna, figs. 357: 771; 472: 931.

33 Mycenaean Achaca, 269. For the origin of the type from metal prototypes and the LHIIB (Ephyraean) style of the Argolid see Attica, 49, and Athenian Agora, 133.

34 OpAA 5 (1965) 99; Mycenaean Achaea, 267.

35 Cf. e.g. Prosymna, 439–40, fig. 358: 1105 (only one example); Athenian Agora, 134 (three examples).

36 PAE (1925) 43–7; (1926) 130–1; (1927) 52 and Mycenaean Achaea.

37 Mycenaean Achaea, 504 and Map 17.

38 Cf. Vermeule, E., AJA 64 (1960) 18Google Scholar ‘extensive Mycenaean penetration of Achaea is a phenomenon of the post-Trojan war period’; Desborough, , LMTS, 9, 31, 100Google Scholar ‘an influx of Mycenaeans took place when LHIIIC had started to take over from LHIIIB’; Ålin, EMF, 68, ‘ein paar Fällen mit Funden aus IIIA and IIIB, wie Vrachneika und K. Goumenitsa bisher gefunden wurden’.

39 BCH 70 (1946) 631.

40 OpAth 5 (1965) 96, 110.

41 GAMS, 86.

42 Mycenaean Achaea, 529; Aigion, 46.