3. April 2019
13:15 Uhr - 14:15 Uhr

Dr. Elena Korka,

Honorary General Director of the General Directorate of
Antiquities and Cultural Heritage in the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and
Sports

Where Oedipus meets Agamemnon. Discovery of the city of ancient Tenea

Tenea is situated in a strategic location controlling the pathway from Argos to ancient Corinth and Kenchreai and which was very active in the 8th century BC due to its participation in the colonization of Syracuse. Pausanias informs us that residents of Tenea were Trojan prisoners transferred from Tenedos under the command of Agamemnon. The historian Strabo mentions that Tenea was the place where the Corinthian king Polybus nursed Oedipus. Moreover, Strabo mentions that Tenea was not destroyed during the Roman invasion, as the Teneans were considered to have a common descent with the Romans, as they too descended from Troy. The first systematic excavation in the area started in 2013. Initially, a rich archaic cemetery was
excavated with unique finds worthy of the importance of the city of Tenea during the archaic period. During the excavations of 2016 and 2017, a magnificent funerary monument of the Roman times was revealed, with a unique lay-out for the Corinthia. Beneath it structures of the Hellenistic period were discovered with a cistern dedicated to ritual purposes. A very rich cemetery surrounds the Roman mausoleum, with burials from the Hellenistic and Roman periods, offering important knowledge in regard to the society, which inhabited the city.