Agrilia (Pano Koufonisi)

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Coordinates: 36 ° 56 ′ 27.7 "  N , 25 ° 36 ′ 22.1"  E

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Agrilia (Pano Koufonisi)​
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The site of Agrilia ( Greek ιγριλιά ) is one of three grave fields of the Bronze Age Cycladic culture on the Greek island of Pano Koufonisi . After Chaliandrani on Syros, Agrilia is one of the largest known cemeteries of the Early Bronze Age on the Cyclades .

The archaeological excavation in 1969 produced a large number of finds with characteristic ceramics as well as a form of burial that is native to Pano Koufonisi. The cemetery, with a relatively short period of use of just over 100 years, is regarded as the most important site for the delimitation of the Kampos group . This is used within the early Cycladic period as a transition phase of the late stage from FK I to FK II around 3000 BC. Dated and thus classified as a link between the Grotta-Pelos culture and the beginnings of the Keros-Syros culture . There is a strong correspondence in the grave architecture and grave goods with the necropolis of Agia Photia on the north coast of Crete .

Selected finds are presented in two showcases in the Archaeological Museum Naxos . The excavation results and individual finds have so far been published in preliminary reports; a final publication is planned.

location

Pano Koufonisi is an island in the Lesser Cyclades, southeast of Naxos . Despite their small size, the islands were important in the Early Bronze Age due to their central location on the sea route between the trading centers of Poliochni on Limnos in the northeastern Aegean, the metal deposits of the western Cyclades and Attica and the locations on the central and northeast coast of Crete . The flat, hilly island of Pano Koufonisi is sheltered between the mountainous island of Naxos in the north and the larger island of Keros in the southeast; deep bays and small harbors offer protection from the strong winds of the central Aegean that blow over a longer period of the year . The name koufó nisí ( κουφό νησί ) probably comes from ancient Greek κωφός kophós in the nautical meaning 'closed' for a safe haven.

Until the second half of the 20th century, the sea area from Donousa in the northeast to Iraklia in the southwest was one of the richest fishing grounds in the central Aegean. Due to poor soil fertility and a lack of rainfall, agricultural activities and livestock have always been of minor importance to the islanders. In the past the illegal search for antiques was carried out.

Archaeological excavations

The excavations in 1969 and 1970 on Pano Koufonisi were headed by Fotini Zapfiropoulou of the 21st Ephory for Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities ( ΚΑʹ Εφορεία Προϊστορικών και Κλασικών Αρχαιοτήτων ). Grave fields were examined in three places. Agrilia, the largest of the burial grounds , is located in the center of the island about 600 m northeast of the main town on the Simidalas site . The two burial fields Alonistria Chousouri ( Skopelitis field ) and Potamia ( Tzavaris field ) in the southwest of the island were mostly destroyed by robbery excavations.

Grave field and grave architecture

The original extent of the cemetery can no longer be determined due to looting on the entire site. 72 untouched graves were examined on an area of ​​50 x 75 m, another 20 graves showed damage from illegal excavations. The almost regular arrangement of a large part of the graves in two rows suggests a planned installation and required a corresponding organization of the society at the time. Noteworthy are the uniformly built graves without any skeletal remains or grave goods. The useful life of the necropolis of three to four generations or more than 100 years is exceptionally short compared to other large cemeteries and, in connection with the high number of graves, suggests a relatively large society.

In contrast to the typical early Cycladic stone boxes , the chamber tombs of Agrilia have a different and novel construction, which is probably due to the soft, rocky subsoil. The pits carved into the soft limestone rock consist of two chambers, an outer antechamber for additions and a cave-like lateral burial chamber for the actual burial. The outer, sunken antechamber ( προθάλαμος prothálamos ), with a trapezoidal or semi-elliptical floor plan, is bordered on its northern side by a large upright stone slab. This slab, known as sema ( Greek σήμα síma ), in some cases protruded above the natural ground level and blocked the entrance to the covered inner main burial chamber ( θάλαμος thálamos ). It may have served as a kind of grave marker.

Compared to other Cycladic burial grounds, the Agrilia tombs are large, with antechambers 1 to 1.60 m long and between 0.65 and 1.50 m wide, with a depth of 0.5 to 0.7 m. The smaller main burial chambers with lengths between 0.75 and 1.3 - in rare cases up to 1.5 m - and about 0.4 to 0.9 m in width were also flatter overall at 0.3 to 0.6 m. The graves do not show a uniform orientation, they are oriented in their longitudinal axis mainly to the north or northwest. The horizontal floor slab in the antechamber of grave 29 is comparable to the paved entrance areas of many graves of Agia Photia in Crete . In grave 29, a 15 to 18 cm thick layer with pieces of charcoal and obsidian, sea pebbles and some shards were found on a floor slab under a layer of ash. The side walls of this antechamber were blackened by traces of fire. In the burial chamber, a deep bowl with loop handles was placed on the body. Given the small size of the grave, no multiple burials were probably carried out.

Grave goods

Of the 72 graves examined, 50 contained graves, some of which were particularly well equipped. 19 graves were found without any finds, another 3 were simple pits or possibly completely destroyed by robbery excavations.

  • Grave finds in the Archaeological Museum Naxos

  • Pano Koufonisi, showcase 12

  • Kato and Pano Koufonisi, showcase 10

Less valuable, but more numerous grave goods were deposited in the antechamber and covered by a layer of earth and up to two layers of field stone, on the top layer of which a broken vessel was placed. The majority of the grave goods were simple objects of daily use such as clay vessels. The second chamber contained, in addition to the corpses lying down with their heads facing the entrance, either no or only a few, but more valuable accessories, such as obsidian blades, copper daggers and needles, stone pendants, occasionally a conch shell and almost always the lid of a clay pyxis. Only two graves contained intact marble vessels.

Obsidian

In the Cycladic Early Bronze Age, obsidian was one of the most common grave goods. Obsidian blades were thought to be used for shaving, tattooing and scarifying , while obsidian kernels were used as pestles for crushing paint and mixing pigments with water, oil or animal fat. Investigations have shown several places of origin of the obsidian finds from Agrilia and also made a comparison with other sites possible. For the most part, the Sta Nychia and Demenegaki deposits on the island of Milos have been identified; The places of origin of an unprocessed tuber are the islands of Andiparos and the Dodecanese island of Gyali, as well as a fragmented blade from the Central Anatolian Göllü Dağ deposit . In terms of size and shape, the blades of Agrilia essentially correspond to well-known examples of contemporary settlement contexts of the Early Cycladic I level, but are often unused and particularly evenly crafted individual copies. This practice changed at the end of Early Cycladic I due to the increased addition of "blade sets" and significantly increased blade length compared to early Cycladic I graves. For the first time, used blades and blade cores were also included. Most of Agrilia's 32 graves with obsidian additions contained between 2 and 13 blades, rarely 20 or more. Obviously the “blade sets” were made from the same core, the longest come from the richest individual graves; longer blades are only known from Panagia on Paros and Aplomata on Naxos.

Marble and stone objects

Stone vessels have been known since the Neolithic. Their production suggests specialized craftsmen. Stone vessels are rare grave goods in the graves of the Kampos group. The excavations of Agrilia yielded only two objects with a conical neck vessel made of marble called Kandili or Kandila and a flat rectangular marble pallet with four perforated corners, the typical shapes of which refer to the era FK I.

Cycladic idols are also very rarely found as additions in the graves of the Kampos group, schematic idols are so far unknown. Two graves in Agrilia contained marble idols. In addition to the unique plaque with a relief figure , the head and neck of a broken figurine was found. Both finds are very similar to two idols from the grave find of Louros Athalassou on Naxos and can be assigned to the so-called Louros type .

metal

Comparable daggers in the Archaeological Museum Apiranthos , origin presumably South Naxos or Koufonisia

Metalworking has been practiced in the Aegean Islands since the end of the Neolithic. Only at the end of Early Cycladic I are metal objects found as grave goods. Few metal finds have been published for the Kampos group. In Agrilia, needles and daggers made of copper were found in some tombs. Compared to other weapons, long daggers with a strong central rib and blade lengths of up to 30 cm appear later. The examples from Agrilia are the earliest known long daggers in the Cyclades. In the Eastern Cyclades they seem to have been of great importance as close combat weapons. As grave goods, they were often deliberately destroyed by bending.

literature

  • Photeini Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Kampos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. In: NJ Brodie, J. Doole, G. Gavalas, C. Renfrew (Eds.): Horizon - a colloquium on the prehistory of the Cyclades . McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, 2008, ISBN 978-1-902937-36-6 , pp. 183-194.
  • Jörg Rambach: Cyclades I. The early Bronze Age. Grave and settlement findings. Edited by the German Archaeological Institute. Dr. Rudolf Habelt, Bonn 2000, ISBN 978-3-7749-2831-2 , pp. 165-173 (chapter "The graves uncovered by Zapheiropoulou on the Kouphonisia and the grave find of Nero. The cemetery of Agrilia on Ano Kouphonisi") and p 236 (also dissertation, University of Heidelberg 1990).
  • Jörg Rambach: Cyclades II. The early bronze age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. Edited by the German Archaeological Institute. Dr. Rudolf Habelt, Bonn 2000, ISBN 978-3-7749-2831-2 , p. 472 (also dissertation, University of Heidelberg 1990).
  • Eva Alram-Stern (ed.): The Aegean Early Period. 2nd series. Research report 1975-2004. The Early Bronze Age in Greece with the exception of Crete. 2 volumes, publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-7001-3268-4 , p. 1372.
  • Cyprian Broodbank: An Island Archeology of the Early Cyclades. Cambridge University Press, 2002, ISBN 0-521-78272-4 , p. 414.
  • Tristan B. Carter: Through a glass darkly ': Obsidian and society in the southern Aegean Early Bronze Age. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of London 1999, pp. 156-159.
  • Giorgos Gavalas: Marble figurines from sites on Epano and Kato Kouphonisi. In: Marisa Marthari, Colin Renfrew, Michael Boyd (Eds.): Early Cycladic Sculpture in Context. Oxbow Books, Oxford & Philadelphia 2017, ISBN 978-1-78570-195-5 , pp. 272-296.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Alram Star: The Aegean Early Period. 2nd series. Research report 1975-2004. The Early Bronze Age in Greece with the exception of Crete . 2004, p. 492.
  2. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 192.
  3. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 192.
  4. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, pp. 188-191.
  5. ↑ Broodbank: An Island Archeology of the Early Cyclades. 2002, p. 221.
  6. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 183.
  7. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 193 f.
  8. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 194.
  9. ↑ Broodbank: An Island Archeology of the Early Cyclades. 2002, p. 221.
  10. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 194.
  11. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 183 f.
  12. ↑ Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, p. 183.
  13. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 188.
  14. ↑ Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, p. 81.
  15. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 184 f.
  16. ↑ Zapheiropoulou: Early Bronze Age Cemeteries of the Campos Group on Ano Kouphonisi. 2008, p. 183 f .; Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, p. 81.
  17. ↑ Alram-Stern (ed.): The Aegean Early Period. 2nd series. Research report 1975-2004. P. 306, p. 332, p. 340, p. 387.
  18. ^ Tristan Carter, Daniel A. Contreras: The character and use of the Soros Hill Obsidian source, Antiparos (Greece). In: Académie des sciences. (Ed.): Comptes Rendus Palevol. Volume 11, Issue 8, 2012, ISSN 1631-0683, p. 601. Online
  19. ↑ Jessica Anne Morgan: Obsidian Source Selection in the Early Bronze Age Cyclades. University of South Florida, 2015, pp. 60, p. 72. PDF Online
  20. ↑ Carter: Through a glass darkly ': Obsidian and society in the southern Aegean Early Bronze Age. 1998, Volume 1, pp. 156-159 .; Tristan Carter: The Theatrics of Technology: Consuming Obsidian in the Early Cycladic Burial Arena. Archeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association, Volume 17, Number 1, 2007, p. 91. Online
  21. ↑ Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, pp. 163-166.
  22. ↑ Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, p. 184, p. 212 f .; Gavalas: Marble figurines from sites on Epano and Kato Kouphonisi. 2017, p. 293; Alram-Stern (Ed.): The Aegean Early Period. 2nd series. Research report 1975-2004. Pp. 338-340.
  23. ↑ Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, p. 214; Gavalas: Marble figurines from sites on Epano and Kato Kouphonisi. 2017, p. 274 f .; P. 291; P. 293.
  24. ↑ Broodbank: An Island Archeology of the Early Cyclades. 2002, p. 268.
  25. ^ Carter, The Theatrics of Technology: Consuming Obsidian in the Early Cycladic Burial Arena. 2007, p. 91.
  26. ↑ Fotini Zafiropoulou [Φωτεινή Ζαφειροπούλου]: Αρχαιότητες και μνημεία Κυκλάδων. Κουφονήσι. 2. Αγρός Μοσχ. Σιμιδαλά. In: Archeologikon Deltion. [Αρχαιολογικὸν Δελτίον], Volume 25, B2, 1970, p. 429; Fotini Zafiropoulou [Φωτεινή Ζαφειροπούλου]: Πρωτοκυκλαδικά ευρήματα εκ Κουφονησίου. In: Athens Annals of Archeology. [Αρχαιολογικά Ανάλεκτα εξ Αθηνών], Volume III, Number 1 (1970), Athens 1969, p. 49; Rambach: Cyclades II. The early Bronze Age. Early Bronze Age additional customs circles on the Cyclades, relative chronology and distribution. 2000, p. 217 f.
  27. ↑ Mariya Ivanova: Fortified settlements in the Balkans, in the Aegean Sea and in Western Anatolia, approx. 5000–2000 BC. Chr. Waxmann Verlag, 2008, ISBN 978-3-8309-1937-7 , p. 74.
  28. ↑ Ivanova: Fortified settlements in the Balkans, in the Aegean Sea and in Western Anatolia, approx. 5000–2000 BC. Chr. 2008, p. 184.
  29. ↑ Broodbank: An Island Archeology of the Early Cyclades. 2002, p. 268.