Amathus: Department necropolis rescue and east necropolis excavation, 1980–1986 (Ino Nicolaou)

In 1980 the Department of Antiquities recorded 153 tombs in the necropolis of Amathus, excavated in emergency work as construction levelled the ground.¹ The report describes rescue as the Department's only means of recovering tomb material when expropriating the land was beyond its budget, and cautions that the excavations could not be considered fully satisfactory scientifically.¹ The tombs were mostly Cypro-Archaic, some first used in the Cypro-Geometric period and reused in Hellenistic or Roman times. Tomb 256 was a built tomb with a white marble sarcophagus with an anthropoid lid, whose latest burials were Hellenistic and Roman. Grave goods included terracottas, gold and silver jewellery, scarabs, seals, Greek imports, local Amathus-style vessels and Phoenician imports.¹

Symons reports that Ino Nicolaou directed much of the Department's east and west necropolis tomb excavation in 1981 to 1985, and that the tombs spanned Cypro-Geometric I to Roman and were often reused at widely differing dates.² The Limassol museum report for 1981 describes Tombs 329 to 331 as family tombs used repeatedly over long periods. Tomb 329 was partly rock-cut and partly built, first used in Cypro-Geometric I-II and reused in Cypro-Archaic II, with bronze bowls and iron weapons among its goods.³ The same report says the Limassol District Museum was enriched that year with considerable material from the necropolis.³

The second East Necropolis season, in 1984, was directed by I. Nicolaou and found five tombs and two rock-cut pits. The chambers were roughly circular or horseshoe-shaped, vaulted, and reached by ramp-like dromoi; their first use was placed at the end of the Classical period. Only Tombs 1 and 3 were unlooted. Tomb 3 was empty apart from fourteen objects in a niche, while Tomb 1 held human remains, sixteen offerings on the bench and 136 objects on the chamber floor, including a terracotta female figurine.⁴ For 1986, Symons cites work in the west necropolis, with a terracotta warship model from Tomb 429, a cremation in an amphora from Tomb 431 and a local-ware Janiform aryballos showing helmeted warriors' heads from Tomb 436.²