Remains of “princess ” found near Rome

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33514, 20 April 1974, Page 18

Remains of “princess ” found near Rome

(By PAUL HOFMANN)

ROME. ’ The remains of a woman with rich ornaments of gold, silver, small pearls and large amber beads, found in a seventh-century B.C. tomb near Rome, is intriguing experts at the Government’s Superintendency of Antiquities,! who speak of a “Latin princess” of the era of Rome's founding. The discovery was made’ recently in a burial site.' near Caste! di Decima, 10 miles south of Rome’s; centre. More than 100 tombs, dating from the eighth to the end of the seventh century B.C. have been unearthed,: and the grave of the nameless “princess” is one of the: most important finds so far. What has come to light from the tomb shows a sophisticated civilisation in the area of Rome almost 27 centuries ago. The unusual quantity of amber indicates flourishing long-distance trading at that time. Amber, a yellow or brown fossilised resin, had been eagerly bought by Greeks and other Mediterranean peoples from the Barbarians of the Baltic coast since the Bronze Age. Funeral chariots The tomb of the “prin-

cess” was one of four found to have been equipped with funeral chariots, regarded as a sign of noble rank. The other three tombs contained the remains of men, the “princes”, as the excavators call them. The wood of the chariots has long disintegrated, but the iron wheels and bronze embellisyments have remained. The vehicle in the tombe of the ' princess" was about nine feet long with wheels of two feet and a jhalf in diameter. The unidentified noblewoman who w’as buried in rhe tomb was approximately sft 4in tall. Th? position of ‘two clasps of gold filigree

■suggests that she wore her: ■hair in two long tresses. i She was buried with f almost the length of her i :body covered with a stole of : ; silver thread studded with 1 amber beads. The silver has t become dark with oxidation, i but the amber has not ■ changed. 1 A Government archae- t ologist who supervised the if exploration of the tomb. Alessandro Bedini, said that t the gold and silver orna- t ments that were contained j in it “are among the finest-f found in all Italy.” t i |i Lost city Another Government ex- < pert, Professor Fausto Zevi.ii [said that the burial site be- 1 • longed to a still-unidentified I •settlement of the Latins, the t people who lived between < the Tiber and the Alban hills i •during the beginnings of Rome. According to one the- 1 iory, Professor Zevi re- ; marked, the burial area may ; mark the site of the lost 1! Latin city of Politorium. According to Roman histo- i rians, Politorium was conquered and razed by Ancus I Marcius, the fourth king of Rome, who was said to have : ruled from 640 to 616 B.C. The king is believed to ; have been a chief of the Sabines, the tribe that rivalled ; ■ the Latins and Etruscans for supremacy in the area between the Apennine Mountains and the Tyrrhenian i Sea.

Professor Zevi said that! •pieces of an ancient wail found recently near the burial site strengthened the assumption that it had belonged to a city. He said that thousands of tombs maybe tens of thousands” were still to be unearthed, but that digging had temporarily been stopped because funds had run out. Most of the tombs, discovered when a new road was built in the area 20 years ago, are only a few; feet under the surface. Systematic excavations started [in 1971. ; Like other graves at the • site, that of the “princess”: was covered with blocks of tufa, the porous rock that is! 'found in great quantity in: many places around Rome. •To prevent decay, the remains of the “princess’s”: skeleton and the objects !found in her tomb were' sealed in plastic material and taken to Florence for •tests and restoration. Professor Giuseppe Domato, of the National Research Council in Rome, said that the amber beads found in the tomb would be analysed by Italian and Polish scientists to try to pinpoint their origin. Such a joint Italian-Polish scientific project would shed newlight on trans-European trade routes at the time of Rome’s origins, he said. — (Copyright, “New York Times” news service).