The Palace where Alexander the Great was born is being revealed and archaeologists estimate that the site will be able to receive visitors as of summer 2021. The palace is located in Pella, western Macedonia, northern Greece.
In this building, part of which was excavated in 1957, when no one knew it was the palace, the king of the Macedonians grew up, while in the arena located a short distance from the building, the heir played sports with the children of the aristocracy and exercised their bodies in the huge swimming tank.
Image provided by the Ephorate of Antiquities of Pella to amna news agency: This is the photorealistic image of the building 1 where banquets were held with the participation of the king, the central courtyard with an altar in the middle and arched platforms with a ritual character, the floor plan of building 1 of the monumental entrance and the east portico and the map of the area, in the context of the proposal to designate the palace.
“The palace had a public character and in it was the room where the banquets took place, the room of the throne, if I am allowed to use this expression in proportion” head of the Ephorate of Antiquities of Pella, Elisavet Tsigarida told state-run news agency amna.
She emphasizes that the works, funded by the EU, in the area are currently in full swing and notes that the site can be visited in the summer of 2021, if everything goes smoothly.
The visitor will see the floor plan of the palace, at the level of the foundation.
The goal of the Ephorate of Antiquities is to present a digital tour of the visitor reception center which is expected to be built in 2023.
There one can see the digital representation not only of the palace where the Macedonian king was born but of the building ensemble which consisted of seven huge buildings, with inner courtyards, corridors, staircases and galleries that were connected to each other.
“The total area of the building is around 70 acres. These dimensions can be understood if we take into account the fact that Pella was then the capital of the Macedonian Kingdom,” Tsigarida stressed.
The palace started smaller, but expanded after the campaign of Alexander the Great. The period from 320 to 250 BC was a time of great prosperity for Macedonia, while the wealth of the palace was also known. We do not forget that throughout the third and second BC century, Pella was the center of the Macedonian Kingdom, one of the most important states of the time ” Tsigarida underlined.
These were, after all, the reasons why the palace was looted by the Romans when the Macedonians were defeated in 168 BC they came straight to Pella.
According to the head of the Ephorate of Antiquities, “the Romans did not destroy the city but looted the palace, where of course, there were treasures. They even took the king and his family as slaves in Rome, showing their triumph. The fate of the royal family was very hard, while the palace was no longer in use. However, the city continued to exist during Roman times, as the Egnatia Highway, a road that connected East and West, passed through it.
“Coastal” Pella
Meanwhile, archaeologists from the Ephorate of Antiquities are on the trail of the coastline of the port of Pella, where the Macedonians decided to move their new capital, leaving Aegae.
Ttoday there may be no sea in Pella, but the sources mention its coastal character.
In the following years, the landscape changed in the area and due to the alluvium from the rivers that carried away material the protected gulf of Pella was transformed into a lagoon that later became the lake of Giannitsa that was dried up.
“We worked for two years and at the same time we do surface research. Archaeologists walk throughout the site see where we have a collection of findings, islets and other clues that give us evidence. It is a research that does not cost, but it provides us with valuable details. At the same time, we are collaborating with expert scientists who, with the necessary equipment, are proceeding with the geophysical survey,” Tsigarida added.
With this method, the machines scan the ground and can detect the existence of buried antiquities and the place where they are located.
Archaeologists have already located the coastline of the port of Pella and the island of Fakos that stood opposite it and had a wall.
Now they are trying to understand what was happening in the first years of the city’s founding at the beginning of the 5th century and the years in which it operated as a port.
The head of the Ephorate of Antiquities noted that the campaign of Alexander the Great may have started from the port of Amphipolis, but in the port of Pella many of the ships of the Macedonian fleet were built.
More information about the area of the “coastal” Pella, its urban fabric, its wall and monuments are expected to emerge from the research project that is expected to begin in early 2021, news agency amna reports citing the head of the Ephorate of Antiquities Eleni Tsigarida.
