Agios Vasileios (also spelled Ayios Vasileios or Ayios Vasilios; Greek: Άγιος Βασίλειος) is the site of a Mycenaean palace, located near the village of Xerokambi in

Laconia Laconia or Lakonia (, , ) is a historical and Administrative regions of Greece, administrative region of Greece located on the southeastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. Its administrative capital is Sparti (municipality), Sparta. The word ...

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

. It was west of the Eurotas River commanding the plain, some 10 km south of Sparta.

History

Ayios Vasileios was inhabited during the Early Helladic, perhaps the Middle Helladic, and the Late Helladic (20 ha).

Late Bronze Age

This palace was first constructed in the 17th-16th BCE, destroyed by fire in the late 15th-early 14th century BCE, rebuilt, and finally destroyed again in the late 14th or early 13th century BCE. Finds include an archive of Linear B tablets, kept in a room adjacent to the colonnade; cult objects such as figurines made of clay and ivory; a collection of twenty bronze swords; and fragments of wall frescoes. *Mycenaean Palace *Mycenaean North Cemetery

Late Helladic II

The first palace was built and later destroyed.

Late Helladic III

The second palace was rebuilt in LH III. Ceramics dates throughout LH IIIA-C. There is litte material from LH IIIA1. In LH IIIA2 (early) has material represented in several areas of the palace. The buildings around the large court were destroyed by fire at the end of LH IIIB. In LHIIIB2 scattered rebuilding and abandoned in late LH IIIB2 or early LH IIIC.

Excavations

It was discovered after a Linear B tablet was found accidentally on the slope of a hill, near the Byzantine chapel of Agios Vasileios ( St. Basil), in 2008; two more tablet fragments were found in a survey conducted the same year. Excavations, carried out by the

Archaeological Society of Athens The Archaeological Society of Athens () is an independent learned society. Also termed the Greek Archaeological Society, it was founded in 1837 by Konstantinos Bellios, just a few years after the establishment of the modern Greek State, with the ...

and directed by archaeologist

Adamantia Vasilogamvrou Adamantia Vasilogamvrou (Greek: Αδαμαντία Βασιλογάμβρου) is a Greek archaeologist. She studied at the universities of Athens and the Sorbonne and worked as an archaeologist for the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports for ...

, began in 2009 and have brought to light a palace complex with a large central courtyard with colonnaded porticos along the sides. More Linear B inscriptions were found in subsequent excavations. The discovery of Agios Vasileios was chosen by the 2013 Shanghai Archaeology Forum as one of its 10 most important archaeological discoveries worldwide.

References

{{reflist Bronze Age sites in Greece Mycenaean sites in the Peloponnese (region) 2008 archaeological discoveries