How a Greek farmer discovered a 3,400-year-old tomb
(ORDO NEWS) — During a country trip, a farmer from Greece accidentally stumbled upon a strange hole in the ground, which turned out to be the entrance to a 3400-year-old tomb…
In 2018, Cretapost published a funny story. A Greek farmer who decided to park in the shade of an olive tree suddenly noticed that the car was literally sinking into the ground.
According to him, a hole with a diameter of about 1.2 meters suddenly opened up under the wheels. When he looked into the resulting cavern, he immediately realized that he had stumbled upon something interesting.
Suspecting that the strange crack in the ground might have something to do with the historic ruins, the farmer turned to Lassithi Ephorate of Antiquities , a local organization responsible for finding and preserving ancient heritage in the region.
Arriving at the site, a team of archaeologists confirmed the assumptions of the landowner. Indeed, he accidentally brought down a layer of earth on the tomb, which experts attribute to the “post-palace” stage of the period of the Minoan civilization.
Inside, a pair of coffins were found, in each of which the researchers found one skeleton. In addition, two dozen clay pots with colorful decorations and posthumous offerings were found in the tomb, which served as a kind of marker for historians.
“In accordance with the typology of ceramics, it can be argued that the tomb belongs to the Minoan IIIA-B period, that is, it was built around 1400-1200 BC,” the organization’s experts explain in a press release.
The grave itself is located near the village of Kentri, in the southeast of Crete. As it turned out, the pipe of the irrigation system and the water flowing through it washed away the soil, which led to a collapse.
Archaeologists also say that the tomb consists of three sections, separated by limestone slabs. Surprisingly, the burial, located at a depth of only 2.5 meters below the surface of the earth, has never been disturbed by marauders for 3,400 years.
The masonry sealing the entrance remained airtight all these years, which explains the good preservation of the contents of the tomb.
Sarcophagi are also of particular value. These are the so-called larnaxes – closed coffins, characteristic of the Minoan culture, in which the body of the deceased or the ashes left after cremation were placed.
They are made of ceramics and outwardly resemble wooden caskets. Larnaxes are usually much shorter than the body of the deceased, as it was customary for the bodies to be placed inside in the fetal position.
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