The Sphinxes Guarding the Lion Tomb Entrance at Amphipolis

[agesilaos]

Broneer et al found a base with the remains of the lion close by and parts of the whole structure, pieces have been found at Kastas too the main part of the Lion was at Broneer's site, the association with Kastas does seem right but the foundations found by Broneer do suggest that the thing was, at least intended to be, re-erected there. Broneer is clear that his measurements are rough estimations and I can see nothing to improve their degree of accuracy, other than the mistaken magic of the bogus Deinokrates measure. Further the foundations and the parts of the superstructure found by Broneer do seem to adhere to the same measurment for a foot, viz 33.2 cm, indicating that they do belong together, does this 'foot' cohere with the measurements of the various features at Kastas? It does not relate to 15840. Maybe I'm just a grumpy old man but when theories are publish which contradict previous results it is customary to explain why the new supercedes the old; the presentation of this so-called data smacks of snake-oil patter. If there is real dating evidence it is about time it was presented, if there is not then the archaeologists should stop declaring that there is and we should all be asking them why not? Organic remains are there in the strata of the mound; Pretty pictures are all well and good, but where is the science? C14 dating does not take four months.

[Xenophon]

All good points, which reflect the frustration many are beginning to feel, I suspect.

C14 dating represents a very good way of determining approximately when the mound might have been constructed......whether before or contemporaneously with the tomb, or even subsequently.

Incidently, a 'foot' of 332 mm is not quite consistent with known Greek measures ( which were only accurate to plus or minus 1-2mm) viz Attic foot ca. 295 mm; Salamine ( or common) foot ca. 307 mm; and the Doric foot ( in use in Macedon, and which we would expect to find here) ca.327 mm. Since pretty well each state had its own measure, others are known, although unsurprisingly the Attic, Doric, and "common" foot were the most frequently used....

[amyntoros]

So I'm hesistant to agree with Alexias' summary. The mound may pre-date the Macedonian tomb, but I'm not seeing multiple archaic burials being done several metres down into a bronze age mound, if that makes sense? The mound does seem to be a later addition amidst a much older burial site to me.

I could very well be wrong. However, given that the mound is about 160 metres across and this tomb only appears to extend about 30 metres into the mound, as agesilaos says, there could well be much more in the mound. This stuff may nor may not be contemporary with the tomb being excavated.

Please excuse if this has been mentioned before (lengthy thread!) but there is also a later Hellenistic tomb in the mound. The following is from the blog, Archaeology Matters.

Macedonian Tomb 3

Yet another especially important tomb of the Macedonian type, which is situated on the "Kastas" Hill, which has lately come into the limelight. Despite all the interest however, few know that on this hill a second, albeit smaller, Macedonian tomb is to be found.

This tomb was discovered in 1960, during extensive research carried out by D. Lazaridis on the hill, but unfortunately it had been opened and partially destroyed. This tomb comprises of an antechaber and a funerary chhaber and is 9m long and 3.07 m wide. It is dated to the 3rd century BC.

It was carved into the lining rock and its walls are covered with limestone blocks, of which only the lower row is preserved. The lower parts of the walls are covered in plaster mimicking marble slabs.

It is interesting that the floor of the antechamber was covered with a mosaic decorated with multicolour lozenges, while the floor of the main chamber was separeted into three zones of deep red and yellow colour. On the northern part the floor had been broken to create a second tomb apart from the first tomb which was situated on the far wall of the main chamber. The walls of the two tombs were covered in brightly coloured plaster, such as red, yellow, black, white etc, while in one of them there was a decoration of flowers, plants, birds, vases etc. The mosaic and the wall-paintings were removed to be preserved.

Macedonian Tomb 4

It is worth noting the near this tomb yet another Macedonian type tomb was discovered, in which many pyxis were discovered, as well as two ceramic statuettes, various bronze and glass objects and a gold ring.

Best regards,

[agesilaos]

Very interesting, two third century tombs, one of a woman (pyxides are cylindrical containers for cosmetics; yes I did look it up!) looking good for an Antigonid Mausoleion, they had queens too. The Macedonian tombs found in Amphipolis all seem to date from the third century suggesting the elite moving with the court, Aigai went into decline in this period.

[Taphoi]

Here is a picture of the other Kastas Mound tomb. It is dated to the last quarter of the 4th century BC in the ref I took this from. Clearly the diamond mosaic tends to associate it with the main (and presumably original) tomb that is now being entered.

Other smaller Kastas Mound tomb

KastasPin40.jpg (99.31 KiB) Viewed 3133 times

There is some evidence from dimensions of the newly discovered chambers that the Kastas Mound monument was built with a foot a little over 30cm as its small scale length unit (6m=20ft and 4.5m=15ft are dimensions being mentioned and they have just given 7.53m=25ft for a dimension of the third chamber - its depth.) But the overall diameter seems to have been designed to be a stade.
It has always been likely that the tomb would descend into the subsoil at some point, because it is standard for high status Macedonian tombs of the period to comprise chambers cut into the subsoil then covered with a mound above the subsoil. Chambers 1 to 3 appear to have floors at or close to the ground level before the mound was built. The photo below shows that their floors are approximately at the same level as the base of the peribolos (enclosure) wall.
Looks like we will have a burial now, even if some of the richer grave goods are missing! Even if the "robber holes" were made by robbers and were not part of the closure scheme (and in fact they may well have been needed to complete the sand filling), there is no hint that they got through the sealing floor of the third chamber and past that embedded door leaf. It remains very unlikely that the tomb sealer put in three (or more) sealing layers of stone and thousands of tonnes of riverbed sand if the tomb is empty.
Best wishes,
Andrew

The relative levels of the main entrance and the peribolos wall

Entrance.jpg (147.21 KiB) Viewed 3133 times

[agesilaos]

Care to let us know which reference gives the 'last quarter of the Fourth century' date? There is more than enough secrecy around this site Are you sure that they are not just converting metres to feet roughly? If they are saying that the ancient 'foot' being used was 312 mm then that is close to the Attic standard (308 mm) whereas the LIon monument was using 332mm, closest to the Aeginatan foot of 333 mm, neither of thes fit with the diameter being a stade, 600 podes (feet) even the Attic gives 185m, too far out from the 158.4 m of the monument (which would mean a foot of 264 mm which does not accord with any known measure).

edited to correct to Aeginatan feet rther than babylonian, research eh?

[Taphoi]

Care to let us know which reference gives the 'last quarter of the Fourth century' date? There is more than enough secrecy around this site Are you sure that they are not just converting metres to feet roughly? If they are saying that the ancient 'foot' being used was 312 mm then that is close to the Attic standard (308 mm) whereas the LIon monument was using 332mm, closest to the Aeginatan foot of 333 mm, neither of thes fit with the diameter being a stade, 600 podes (feet) even the Attic gives 185m, too far out from the 158.4 m of the monument (which would mean a foot of 264 mm which does not accord with any known measure).

Stades varied a lot from place to place. The Attic standard of 185m is about the longest used by the Greeks. In Alexandria it was only 165m. For journey distances (e.g. The Stathmoi of Alexander) a stade of about 157m seems to have been used. The Amphipolis mound diameter It is too close to a journey stade for it not to have been likely to be deliberate.

I would suggest that people are trying to be a bit too accurate in interpreting a foot here - the monument has been distorted by subsidence on the scale of accuracy that would be needed to distinguish between different standards (a percent or so).

The ref is not a secret: Nektarios M. Poulakakis, MOSAIC FLOORS IN MACEDONIA DURING THE CLASSICAL AND HELLENISTIC AGE, Volume 1 (2009), p47. Image below.

Best wishes,

Andrew

Other Kastas Mound tomb date to last quarter of 4th century BC

PoulakakisP47.jpg (104.9 KiB) Viewed 3119 times

[agesilaos]

Only suggested secrecy since you had not given the reference, but just to be a pain, could you post what note 86 says, as that is his reference and poosibly argumentation; have to say that Archaeologymatters did not post a source either for his 3rd century date,I also have to say that the split between these periods is totally imaginary in the absence of firm dating evidence like dated epigraphy or coins ; no Greek woke up at the end of 300 BC and thought '299 new century!' styles persist for decades rather than years, which does cut both ways of course.

I think the 'itinerary stade ' is a modern construct but if you can point to an ancient reference or modern discussion suggesting otherwise I will be happily corrected (I would do the graft myself but have alot on pro tem)

[Efstathios]

Note 86 doesn't give any reference for the dating. Also, i cannot find any reference aside the one Amyntoros posted if this tomb is on Kasta mound or next to it.

[agesilaos]

The plot thickens...but what does note 86 say?.. and what is pin.40 ?

[Efstathios]

This is the link: https://html1-f.scribdassets.com/3s5y1v ... 506753.jpg
Page 47 for the note. "Πιν" is short for "πίνακας" which in this case is a photo like the one Andrew posted. The text of n86 says: A big portion of the mosaic floor of the room has been destroyed by later burials.

[Taphoi]

The whole thing is

86 D. Salzmann, Untersuchungen zu den antiken Kieselmosaiken, Berlin 1982, αρ.10, 31, 83, πίν. 44. Μεγάλο μέρος του ψηφιδωτού δαπέδου του θαλάμου έχει καταστραφεί από μεταγενέστερες ταφές.

[Xenophon]

Minor correction:
Agesilaos wrote:

If they are saying that the ancient 'foot' being used was 312 mm then that is close to the Attic standard (308 mm)

The Attic foot was 295mm aprox. The Salamine, or "common" foot was 307 mm aprox.

Taphoi wrote:

I would suggest that people are trying to be a bit too accurate in interpreting a foot here - the monument has been distorted by subsidence on the scale of accuracy that would be needed to distinguish between different standards (a percent or so).

"too accurate"? The measurements I gave are only accurate to within a millimetre or two, as I said. Nevertheless within this tolerance the measures are well known, and widely accepted, on the basis of several metrological ( measuring standard) reliefs, particularly the one from Salamis. There is no room for ''interpretation', and, for example, no mistaking an Attic foot for a Doric one (incidently, both were used simultaneously in Athens. ) Whilst the original room measurements might be distorted by seismic and subsidence movements, the measurements of individual stone blocks would not be and tell us which linear measurements were used in the construction of any particular structure or monument.

Taphoi wrote:

Clearly the diamond mosaic tends to associate it with the main (and presumably original) tomb that is now being entered.

Perhaps, but not necessarily. A geometric surround or "frame" was a very common feature on floor mosaics of all eras, whether Greek, Hellenistic or Roman, and thus is not particularly 'associated' with anything.

The existence of several tombs, especially if 3 C BC, does indeed suggest an Antigonid mausoleum.....
If these too are close to the perimeter, as seems the case, then this is further evidence that suggests a possibly pre-existing mound. It would be good to definitively decide this issue....

[amyntoros]

Note 86 doesn't give any reference for the dating. Also, i cannot find any reference aside the one Amyntoros posted if this tomb is on Kasta mound or next to it.

I can't help verify the credibility of my reference. The owner of the blog happened to be someone who posted a rather nasty rant against Dorothy King on her own blog, ending with a snide remark about 'internet archaeologists'. Out of curiosity I clicked on the link in his name and up came the blog and the reference. Apparently the book Andrew owns agrees that the tomb is in the Kasta mound as Taphoi begins his post with "Here is a picture of the other Kastas Mound tomb." You seem to have known about other tombs in the mound before anyone else here, Andrew!

Best regards.

[amyntoros]

And here I am again, just throwing things out for consideration. Here's a quote from open edition books: Monumental Tombs and Hero Cults in Thrace during the 5th-3rd centuries B.C.

The next quite eloquent piece of evidence concerns Rhesos, the mythical king of the Thracian Edonoi18. According to (Ps.-)Euripides19, the deceased king Rhesos would not enter in the dark earth, but hidden in the caves of Pangaion mountain would lie like an anthropodaimon looking at the sunlight, in the same way as Orpheus (?), the prophet of Bacchus, had inhabited Pangaion and was worshipped by the initiated. Once again in this case the association between the cave and the king’s tomb is well evident, while Pangaion could be compared to a tumulus as a symbol of the sacred mountain. Another piece of later evidence is also important, as it clearly testifies to the cult of the heroized Edonian king. According to Polyaenus20, in 437/436 B.C. the Athenian leader Hagnon, based on a Delphic prophecy, ordered the grave of Rhesos at Troy to be opened during the night and the mortal remains of the king to be removed and buried again near Strymon, on the place where Amphipolis was established. In this context, most interesting is a scholion21 to the already cited tragedy Rhesos by (Ps.)-Euripides: in his Macedonian Histories Marsyas said that in Amphipolis there was a sanctuary of Kleio built against the tomb of Rhesos, located in some hill (i.e. in a mound?). Moreover, there is an enormous tumulus called Kastas, 21 m in height and 165 m in diameter and partially (?) surrounded by krepis, located near Amphipolis just below Hill 133, where the Edonian stronghold Ennea Hodoi could be localized22. More than 50 burials from the 8th to the 5th centuries B.C. were discovered during initial excavations of the mound and a destroyed Early Hellenistic tomb was found as well. So, is it possible to suppose that the tomb of the mythical king Rhesos was built exactly in Kastas tumulus? Concerning the cult of Rhesos, there is also important information by Philostratus23, who said that there was a sanctuary of Rhesos in the Rhodope mountains, where the dead king was worshipped as a heros by the Thracians and animal sacrifices were performed on his altar.

"... and a destroyed Early Hellenistic tomb was found as well." This information was published somewhere, although seemingly not on the internet.

Best regards,