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Late minoan III Larnakes in the National Archaeological Museum

Σύμμεικτα

• Μερούσης, Νίκος

In the summer of 1967, three chests and three lids of Late Minoan III larnakes were handed into the National Archaeological Museum, along with fragments of at least one more. The larnakes were published briefly in the first issue of Athens Annals of Archaeology of the following year, along with illustrations of two of them. Four decades later, the material as a whole was studied once more as part of an investigation into the workshops producing and decorating larnakes in West Crete, and is published in detail in this article.On the basis of iconographie evidence, the LM IIIB chest cat. no. 1 (EAM 12835) is assigned to the same artist who decorated the larnax from tomb 108 in the cemetery at Armenoi. The LM IIIB lid cat. no. 2 (EAM 12835), which does not belong to larnax cat. no. 1, appears from its morphology to come from a cemetery in the prefecture of Re- thymnon. The LM IIIB chest cat. no. 3 (EAM 12836), with representations of octopuses and Protreesresembling palms also comes from West Crete. The unpublished LM IIIB chest cat. no. 4 (EAM 12834) belongs together with a lid confiscated at the same time (EAM 12836), and they seem from their iconographie features to have been decorated by the same artist who painted a similar larnax from a tomb at Maroulas, Rethymnon. The unpublished lid cat. no. 5 (EAM 12833) also seems, on the basis of its morphology, to come from a tomb in West Crete. The group of LM III antiquities confiscated includes a number of small fragments of chests (EAM 12846) that seem to belong to more than one lamax. In the section of at least one fragment (cat. no. 6, EAM 12837), can be seen the two layers of clay slabs used by the craftsman to make the chest.The re-examination of the material demonstrated that the larnakes probably come from tombs in the LM III cemetery at Maroulas, Rethymnon, which was extensively robbed during the 1960s.

• History and Archaeology

• Αρχαιολογία

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