Roman Villa in Mytilene

Between 1994 and 1996, during the technical and excavation works for the construction of the 3rd Kindergarten of Mytilene, at the junction of Agioritou Panselinou and Achilliou Streets in Mytilene, a luxurious private house/villa came to light that dates back to Roman times. The first important findings were revealed in 1996, during the rescue excavations in the courtyard of the 8th Primary School of Mytilene by the then Archaeological Service. More recent research, which supplemented and highlighted the archaeological data, was carried out between 2010 and 2015 by the Ephorate of Antiquities of Lesbos, within the framework of the project: “Unification of the Archaeological Sites of Mytilene” (NSRF 2007-2013).

In Archaic times, the location of the Roman villa corresponded to the opposite part of the mainland (i.e. opposite the island of the city of Mytilene), west of the bank of Euripos, in an area with a particularly sparse population, which at that time was extensively used as a cemetery. This fact is also confirmed by relevant findings of the category (anthropomorphic stone stelae as marks in funerary pyres, infant pot burials, burial of a teenager), which were found undisturbed in adjacent hollows of the natural rock, beneath the site where earlier settlement remains were uncovered.

The site where the Roman villa was found seems to have been shaped into a residential area since the early Hellenistic period, when the intensive expansion of the city outside the island and towards the opposite part of the mainland began. In order to level out the difference in altitude of the sloping ground, two large embankments were created, on which an early Roman settlement complex was built on the site of earlier settlement remains (1st c. BC – 1st c. AD), which took its final form in the 2nd – 3rd c. AD. However, the villa was in continuous use from the late Hellenistic (2nd – 1st c. BC) to the Roman period (2nd – 3rd c. AD), as the archaeological evidence indicates: preserved architectural remains in the area and, above all, a pseudo-isodomic retaining wall, which supported the higher of the two plateaus.

The structure is organised in two levels and it is not certain whether they were two separate, independent houses or parts of the same luxurious villa. The lower level consists of an enclosed courtyard, framed on three sides (south, east and west) by a row of rooms. The north wing would have a similar layout, but it is not preserved. The western side of the courtyard, where the ‘official rooms’ of the house were located, is laid out as a corridor, covered with a mosaic floor depicting intersecting circles with inscribed rhomboidal patterns inside them. The most important of the official rooms is located in the centre and is decorated with a mural imitating coloured marble slabs and a mosaic floor. The latter is organised in four metopes which are enclosed by rope-shaped braids, depicting Dionysus and three other figures of his circle: Pan, the goddess Artemis and Paposilinos. The south wing consists of two central rooms (one almost square and a second, elongated and rectangular), communicating with each other through an internal doorway. They share a common wall decoration, which originally depicted architectural designs and later linear geometric patterns (star-shaped motifs with black lines on a white background). Of particular interest is the room in the southwest corner, in which a recess was revealed for the use of fixing a staircase leading either to a second floor above the south wing or to the upper level of the house.

The building at the upper level seems to have been oriented on the E-W axis with a façade and entrance to the east, where part of an ancient road and a built conduit were found. As a whole, the fragmentarily preserved building consists of a wide, square, open courtyard with a pebbled floor, at the end of which an atrium and three adjoining north-facing rooms are situated. The atrium had a shallow paved basin (impluvium) in the middle, and its roof was supported by four Ionic marble columns, which were placed at the corners of the basin. On the four sides of the latter, there were corridors decorated with colourful mosaic flooring, depicting intersecting circles with inscribed rhomboidal patterns inside them. On a preserved section of a wall of the atrium, there is a decoration with linear motifs. All the rooms had mosaic floors with a variety of decorative themes: waterfowls enclosed in octagonal frames in the small rectangular room to the east, a black and white “shield” motif (also known as a “pine cone”) in the small square room to the west, a band of cross motifs and a reticulated grid of rhombuses in the larger rectangular room to the north.

Apart from the aforementioned architectural remains found in situ, archaeological research has brought to light a wealth of portable finds, which undoubtedly provide us with a better understanding in regards to aspects of everyday life during that period. Among them, some which stand out are a large number of intact and broken vessels and fragments of figurines and coins, confirming that the building dates back to Roman times.

At the western end of the archaeological site, the remains of the house of the famous local governor of Lesbos, the Ottoman Isma’il Pasha Kulaksızzade, were also uncovered, a representative example of the island’s contemporary history during the years of the Ottoman Rule. Today, the archaeological site is permanently open and accessible to the general public.

Location

Municipality: Mytilene

Municipal Section: Mytilene

Location: Nicomedia and Dikelis Streets, Epano Skala

Images

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