88-101

Middle helladic grave of a warrior from Thebes

• Κασίμη-Σούτου, Μαρία

A rescue excavation carried out in the summer of 1982, in the Tamviskos property at Oidi- podos Street, Thebes, brought to light a grave of the lined pit type.The building-plot is located in the SE part of the Cadmeia, where an extensive Middle Helladic cemetery is known to exist.The grave measured 2.15x1.37 m. and had an E-W orientation. It lay under a two-stepped krepis of the Classical period, at a depth of 1.60 m., and contained the well preserved bones of a dead in the customary contracted position. The dead had been honoured with rich funerary gifts and had been placed lying on his left side with his face turned north, so that he could «see» the offerings. These comprised: a bronze sword of type A, a bronze knife of the Leukas type, a bronze spear of the Sesklo type, five arrowheads of obsidian and flint, and a considerable number of boar’s tusks probably from his boar’s tusks helmet. The great care with which the furnishings had been arranged is quite impressive. The discovery of bronze weapons is of special significance, because the only bronze objects found so far in Thebes are pieces of jewellery.A two-handled pithos-shaped stamnos was found at the edge of the grave. The burial must have been that of a specially honoured dead warrior. The larger dimensions of the grave, the relatively easy position of the body and the typology of the furnishings, in association with the evidence known so far, suggest a dating of this grave at the close of the Middle Helladic period.

• History and Archaeology

• Αρχαιολογία
• Excavations (Archaeology)

Η αρθρογράφος από τη θέση αυτή εκφράζει τις ευχαριστίες της στο εργατοτεχνικό προσωπικό της Θ' Εφορείας για την προσπάθεια που κατέβαλε προκειμένου να ολοκληρωθεί η ανασκαφή παρά τις αντίξοες συνθήκες., Περιέχει 7 σχέδια. Πίνακες 28-30 βλέπε τέλος τεύχους, Το άρθρο περιέχεται στο τεύχος: Μέρος Α'-Μελέτες