Imathia Attractions

Macedonian Grave Both the palace and the chamber tomb at Veryína date from the first half of the third century B.C. In the autumn of 1977, however, archeologist Manolis Andronikos discovered a completely intact royal tomb which was dated by the coins and pottery it contained to the fourth century (350-320 B.C.).

Under a burial mound 12m/39ft high and 100m/330ft in diameter was found a stone-built tomb chamber with a sealed marble door, over which was a painting of a lion-hunt (5.5m/18ft by 1.2m/4ft) - the first original Greek painting of this period so far discovered. In the antechamber was a marble sarcophagus, within which was a casket of solid gold weighing 8.5kg/19lb containing human remains and fragments of a cloak of deep blue material embroidered with gold. In the main chamber was a larger casket (11kg/24lb) with the Macedonian royal emblem of a 16-pointed star on the lid, containing human remains, a diadem and sceptre, and parts of a costly suit of armor.

The excavator concluded from the contents of the tomb that it was the tomb of King Philip II of Macedon (383-336 B.C.), father of Alexander the Great. The armor found in the main tomb chamber included two graves of unequal length, and it is known from the literary sources that Philip had a limp. Five small ivory heads found in the tomb were identified by Andronikos as Philip, his parents, his last wife Kleopatra and his son Alexander. All this suggests that the Macedonian capital of Aigai, where members of the royal family would be buried, lay not at Édessa, as had been supposed, but at Vergína. At any rate it is certain that the tomb was a royal one, and its furnishings - first shown to the public at Salonica in 1978 and now among the principal treasures of the Archeological Museum there - were of astonishing quality.

In August 1978 Andronikos found a second richly furnished tomb, also intact, in the same mound, only a few meters away from the first. Further finds and further additions to knowledge are to be anticipated.

There are plans to build a museum on site to exhibit the finds from the excavation site.

Palace From the east end of the palace at Vergina, which is rectangular in plan, an entrance corridor 10m/33ft wide leads into a large central courtyard, 44.8m/147ft square, surrounded by four colonnades of 16 columns each, off which the various rooms of the palace open. A circular room on the left, beyond the entrance corridor, was probably a heroon for the cult of ancestors. At a subsidiary entrance on the south side are two rooms with mosaic pavements, probably used for the reception of guests. At the west end are large banqueting rooms, on the north side a hall 104m/341ft long. The living quarters were no doubt on the upper floor, of which no trace remains.

Royal Chamber Tomb Palátitsa, situated on a terrace above the river Aliakmón, was settled about 1000 B.C., but its rise to importance did not begin until the fourth century. The discovery of a domed tomb of the Hellenistic period in 1855 was followed after a long interval by the excavation in 1939 of a chamber tomb with four Ionic half-columns and a temple-like pediment on the facade and a marble throne in the tomb chamber (ca. 250 B.C.). The tomb lies 500m/550yd from the east end of Vergína, on the right of the road. The occupant of this tomb must have been a member of the same aristocratic caste to which the palace situated above the village must be ascribed.