Vergina
Vergina is a small Greek town located in the north, in the mountainous region of the Emathia peripheral unit, on the periphery of Central Macedonia, west of the Thermaic Gulf (or Gulf of Thessaloniki).. It belongs to the municipality of Véria. In 2011 the municipal unit of Vergina had 2,464 inhabitants while the town of Vergina had 1,242. In this town is the so-called archaeological site of Egas or Aigai, declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1996.
History
It is considered that from the Archaic Age of Ancient Greece there existed a city called Aegas (in classical Greek Αἰγαί, and in modern Greek Αιγές , whose meaning is "place of goats") and which was the primitive capital of Macedonia.
Tradition attributes the founding of the city of Egas to Perdicas, in the VII century B.C. C., advised by the oracle of Delphi, who told him that in Botiea, where he saw goats, he offered sacrifices to the gods and founded the capital of a State.
Sacrifices in honor of Olympian Zeus were held in the city since the time of Archelaus I. According to Flavio Arriano, Alexander the Great established athletic games in Egas similar to those held in Olympia.
When the Macedonian Empire was at its peak, sometime in the first half of the IV century B.C. C., the capital of the kingdom was transferred to the city of Pela.
Despite losing the capital of the kingdom, Egas continued to be important as well as the place where kings were buried. In the year 336 B.C. C. Filipo II organized the wedding of his daughter Cleopatra with Alexander I of Epirus in Egas where great celebrations were held but it was then that, in the city theater, Philip II was assassinated by one of his bodyguards. Years later, Philip III of Macedon and his wife Eurydice II of Macedon, who had died in 317 BC. C., they were buried in Egas by order of Cassander. On the other hand, according to Pausanias narrates, when Alexander the Great died, the Macedonians were preparing to transport his corpse to Egas as well, but Ptolemy persuaded the Macedonians to hand it over and buried it. in Memphis.
Aegas continued to be an important Macedonian city during the early phase of the Hellenistic period. In the year 274/273 B.C. C. the city was taken by Pirro de Epiro, who left a garrison of Gauls there who had been his allies. These Gauls dedicated themselves to looting the tombs of kings.
After the battle of Pydna in 168 B.C. C., Macedonia became a Roman province. Egas began to lose its importance and became a village, which continued to exist in the first centuries after the Christian era, as witnessed by its mention by Claudius Ptolemy and the discovery of an inscription at Leukopetra from the 3rd century century alluding to Aegas.
In the following centuries, Egas was forgotten although a settlement was created in a nearby place that was called Palatitsia in reference to the old palace, and from 1922 there was an important arrival of refugees who settled in the place that was named Vergina, a name reminiscent of a legendary queen of the 15th century who committed suicide to avoid being caught by the Turks.
Archaeology
In the 19th century ancient Aegas was believed to have been located on the site of the city of Edessa and even When the first excavations in Vergina began in 1861, carried out by the French archaeologist Leon Heuzey, the debate continued as to whether or not they corresponded to Egas, since some believed that it was the site of the ancient city of Vala. On that occasion Royal palaces and an underground vaulted tomb with a façade resembling a temple were discovered, which had been desecrated and has since been known as the Heuzey Tomb. Some of the finds from those years were taken to the Louvre Museum in Paris. Years later, in successive excavations directed from 1938 by Konstantinos Rhomaios and between 1958 and 1975 by Georgios Bakalakis, a large number of tombs were found, almost all with mound, and also attempted to excavate what was known as the Great Mound located in the heart of Vergina. But the great discovery was not achieved until 1977, carried out by Manolis Andrónicos, who continued to command the excavations, under the control of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and the Archaeological Society of Athens, until 1991, when the person in charge became Angeliki Kottaridi. Since 2001 Chrysoula Saatsoglou-Paliadeli has directed the excavations of Vergina. In addition to the tombs and palaces, sanctuaries, a theater and an agora have been excavated.
Necropolis
To the north of the wall, in an area between Vergina and Palatitsia, is a large necropolis that was used since the Iron Age, at the beginning of the first millennium BC. C. Most of the burials in this area belong to the early days before the classical period, although a few of those found in this place belong to later periods.
In the northwestern part of the wall there is an important group of tombs from the archaic and classical periods, where grave goods have been found, including ceramic pieces from various sources, metal utensils, toys, religious statuettes of clay and jewels that testify to the prosperity of the city and its commercial exchanges are southern Greece. Tombs from the Hellenistic period are scattered throughout the necropolis, some of which reuse much older tombs.
The most significant tombs at Vergina are the royal tombs from the IV century B.C. C. found in the Great Tumulus whose excavation and discovery was carried out by the Greek archaeologist Manolis Andrónicos in 1977 and 1978. In this place, two tombs were first excavated, which were covered by the great artificial mound. The first, known as Tomb I or Tomb of Persephone had a small rectangular structure; three of its walls were covered by paintings depicting the abduction of Persephone by Pluto. It is a cist tomb that had been looted in antiquity but contained the remains of a man, a woman and a child.
Tomb II, with a barrel vault, was found to the northwest of the tomb described above. It was intact, with all the grave goods and many other objects, in addition to the burials themselves. At present this tomb is considered the greatest treasure of antiquity after that of Tutankhamun and that of the Lord of Sipán. All the funerary objects are found in the original site of the tomb, converted into the Archaeological Museum of Vergina, about 80 km from Thessaloniki.
Archaeologists and historians immediately thought that it was the tomb of Philip II of Macedonia and his wife Cleopatra, although other scholars later suggested the possibility that it was actually the tomb of Philip III Arrhidaeus and his wife Eurydice. There is also another minority current of Greek historians and archaeologists who argues that it is the tomb of King Lysimachus of Thrace.
During excavations in 1978 another tomb was discovered, known as Tomb III or Prince's Tomb, equally intact and with a barrel vault. It was located northwest of tomb II. It is supposed to have belonged to a Macedonian prince. He had grave goods made up of silver and bronze vessels, a silver funerary urn and inside a gold crown adorned with oak leaves and acorns with ivory and gold reliefs. There was also a rather decayed wooden settee and the deceased's armor.
Other tombs of great artistic value found in Vergina are the so-called Tomb of Eurydice, discovered in 1987, which is attributed to the mother of Philip II, where there is a throne with a painting on the Its backing represents the abduction of Persephone and the Rhomaios Tomb, named after its discoverer, Konstantinos Rhomaios, which had two chambers, a throne and its approximate date is the year 300 B.C. C. Both tombs showed signs of having been looted.
The tomb of Eurydice belongs to a larger group of tombs, among which was found an unlooted one, from the early 1900s V a. C. containing the body of a woman known as the “Lady of Egas” with rich funerary equipment made up of abundant gold ornaments. It has been suggested that she could be the wife of Amyntas I. Next to her is another slightly later tomb where numerous terracotta figurines were found that could have belonged to one of the wives of Alexander I of Macedonia.
Also, in 1981-2, near the Heuzey Tomb was excavated what is known as the Tomb Beautiful, which has been dated to the III a. C. It is a burial mound that actually contains three Macedonian tombs that had been looted and a cist tomb that had not suffered looting where a gold crown was found among the grave goods. In tombs I and II of this burial mound, paintings have been preserved. Tomb I contains a marble throne.
Royal Palaces
These are two palatial buildings. The largest of them had a surface area on the ground floor of about 9,250 m², had two floors in most of the structure, and had a large central courtyard flanked by sixteen Doric columns on each side around which were articulated the various rooms. Some of the rooms had floors decorated with mosaics. It also had a water supply system. At first it was believed that it had been built by Antígono Gónatas (278-240 BC) for the summer residence of the royal family, but it was later dated by Manolis Andrónicos in the second half of the century. century IV a. c.
To the west was a smaller palace. An inscription proves that this building was used at least until the reign of Perseus of Macedonia. It is not clear, however, if this second palace was added to the first one later or if, instead, it is an older building that was preserved as part of the tradition of the past.
Other archaeological remains
Part of the walls belonging to the Hellenistic period were excavated from the XIX century. Its width reaches 2.80 m in some sectors and they were reinforced by various towers.
The theater was discovered in 1982 a few meters from the grand palace. The similar characteristics of both buildings suggest that they belonged to the same construction project.
To the north of the palace are the ruins of the agora and sanctuary of Euclea, with remains from the classical and Hellenistic periods, where a monumental statue offered by Eurydice I of Macedonia to this divinity was found. In 2008 it was found in In this place, a tomb where there was a bronze container that contained a smaller gold container inside and a gold crown in the shape of oak leaves inside, on top of some bone remains, which suggests that it was a tomb of someone belonging to royalty, who was perhaps Heracles of Macedonia, son of Alexander the Great and Barsine.
A sanctuary to the mother of the gods (Cibele) in the shape of a quadrilateral was found in 1990. It belongs to the Hellenistic period, although it was built on top of an older temple. It was destroyed by fire in the middle of the II century BC. C.
In 1980, in the southeastern part of the city, the remains of a large house from the Hellenistic period with numerous rooms were found, which was built on a natural terrace and destroyed in Roman times. The function of this building is not clear.
Excavations have also been carried out since 1982 in the acropolis, located on a hill to the south of the palace, where artisan workshops were established.
In addition, near the sanctuary of the mother of the gods, the remains of buildings belonging to the late phase of the city of Egas, between the I a. C. and the I century d. C. as well as numerous objects belonging to this period.
Consulted bibliography
- Ch. Seignobos. Universal History of the East and Greece Editorial Daniel Jorro, Madrid 1930
- Peter Levi. Greece cradle of the West of Editions Folio S.A. ISBN 84-226-2616-0
- History and its protagonists. Editions Dolmen 2000. ISBN 84-360-2551004-0