Archaeologists recently uncovered the remains of a lost city in North Macedonia, believed to be the capital of the Kingdom of Lyncestis, which was previously dismissed as a military outpost. The excavation took place at Gradishte, an archaeological site near the village of Crnobuki, which experts have known about since 1966.
According to Fox News, the team utilized the remote-sensing technology LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) to peer beneath the ground. The archaeologists discovered a variety of artifacts at the site, including pottery, coins, game pieces, and a clay theater ticket, along with ancient tools like axes and shards of ceramic vessels.
"Every indication is pointing toward this being the city of Lyncus, within Lyncestis," said Nick Angeloff, an anthropology professor and archaeologist at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, according to Fox News. "There's only one city that she could have come from, and we may have found it." Angeloff referred to Eurydice I of Macedonia, the grandmother of Alexander the Great, who was likely born in Lyncus. Historical accounts suggest her influence in the region's power dynamics.
The Kingdom of Lyncestis was a settlement established in the 7th century BCE. It was integrated into the Kingdom of Macedonia under King Philip II, who reigned from 359 to 336 BCE. Until now, researchers thought that the city was built long after Alexander the Great's death, during the reign of Philip V, spanning from 221 to 179 BCE. However, a coin minted between 325 and 323 BCE. indicates that the city was in use during Alexander the Great's lifetime, pushing the dating of the site back to the 4th century BCE.
"It has become very clear, using technology, that the fortress [we found] was designed to hold a city," Angeloff explained. The site possesses an acropolis of at least 2.8 hectares (7 acres) in size, which was intended to accommodate a city within its fortress walls during times of attack. "And we see the array of infrastructure required to hold a city inside fortress walls during an attack by Rome in particular in this case," he continued.
One of the curious artifacts unearthed was a clay theater ticket. "Typically, theater tickets [were] made of a metal, whether bronze or iron, but they're always reused," Angeloff noted. "There's never been a location in North Macedonia with a theater ticket that has been found that did not have a theater." He added, "Using our LiDAR, we think we may have located the theater, and it looks, for all intents and purposes, like a Macedonian theater, not a Roman theater."
The use of LiDAR technology revealed the site's infrastructure. "We were able to overlay and see what was underneath the ground. And the acropolis that it sits on, which is basically a flat hilltop, has enough rooms and infrastructure to hold a city inside the fortress walls," Angeloff said.
He emphasized the potential of the discovery. "The potential for archaeology across North Macedonia to inform our understanding of the classical [eras], as well as the Roman era, is highly significant," Angeloff stated. "So we have an opportunity here to expand our knowledge of the times of Alexander the Great, [and] the times of the Roman Empire, exponentially, through our work in Macedonia."
Angeloff mentioned that future excavations are likely to yield more accurate information.
The article was written with the assistance of a news analysis system.