495-509

Aiane and Spilla 2005

• Καραμήτρου-Μεντεσίδη, Γεωργία

The year 2005, the second year of the existence of the 30th Inspectorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities, saw the start of the second phase of the major salvage excavations which were necessitated by numerous and diverse public works, such as road building, the Public Electricity Company’s lignite mines and dams, and pipelines for water and gas, and necessitated 12 salvage excavations this year. In years to come these will increase in number and extent.AianeDisplayThe display in the Aiane Archaeological Museum has occupied two galleries with an area of 242 sq.m since October 2002, and in 2003 a standard guided tour began to operate, as also an educational programme for schoolchildren. The work of expanding the display into the museum’s other five galleries recommenced, poorly funded, in 2004, and slowly continued this year in Gallery 3 (250 sq.m) with finds in thematic units relating to public and private life.East cemeteryA small section of the cemetery, with 80 graves dating to between the 4th and the 2nd-1st cc. BC, was investigated in 1985 and 1986. A brief investigation recommenced this year in the form of a salvage excavation after it was realised that burials were disintegrating, and 15 pits were uncovered with burials that had been looted in the ancient period. There were two cremations, and the rest were inhumation burials on wooden litters with some interesting grave goods remaining, such as 15 clay vessels and remnants of bronze wares, 3 iron strigils, 1 iron spearhead and 1 arrowhead, 1 knife, and 2 smaller knives. The continuing excavation and study of the east cemetery will make it possible to produce a complete diachronic account of this local workshop, given that its products date to a period from the 4th to the 2nd-1st c. BC, thus confirming the pioneering tradition of the Aiane workshops and their continuity from the Bronze Age to the Roman period, in pottery, koroplastics, and metalwork.SpiliaThe little village of Spilia is in the municipality of Ayia Paraskevi, where we have carried out systematic investigations, drawn the archaeological map, collected, recorded, and photographed the portable finds, written an archaeological guide, and produced a development study with signposts and routes linking the sites. To the east of the Macedonian tomb that was excavated in 1987 and is one of the most important of its kind, we excavated the rock-cut chamber tomb, which has the same N-S alignment and most of the associated finds date to the 2nd c. BC. It is a single chamber measuring 3x3.30 m, the first of its kind to have been found and systematically excavated in Kozani prefecture; and, most importantly, it was unlooted and had not been disturbed, like the Macedonian tomb. It contained a table for offerings, but no kline, and had been used for 4 cremation burials. The grave goods were 30 unguentaria, 9 plates, 6 Macedonian amphoras, 4 lamps, 2 small skyphoi, 1 kantharos, and 1 salt cellar. The collection included six female figurines, 2 cupid figurines, a bronze crossbow fibula, an iron strigil with a suspension loop, a rhomboid gold mouthpiece, 255 hockbones from various parts of the chamber, and remnants of a wreath with bronze tubular pieces, gilded clay beads, and gold laurel leaves; while two bronze coins, one Neapolitan from Lower Italy (250-225 BC) and the other from Pella (187-161 BC), offer a context for dating the burials.

• History and Archaeology

• Ανασκαφές (Αρχαιολογία)

τάφοι, Κοζάνη, συνέδρια

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