Pera-Frangissa • Season 2024

When the Ger­man archaeo­lo­gist Max Ohne­falsch-Rich­ter acci­den­tal­ly stumb­led upon frag­ments of sta­tu­es in the vici­ni­ty of the anci­ent roy­al city of Tam­assos in 1885, he could not have ima­gi­ned that this would beco­me one of the most spec­ta­cu­lar dis­co­veries of his time. Within just two weeks, he unear­thed a rich­ly ador­ned sanc­tua­ry dedi­ca­ted to Apol­lo, fil­led with an abun­dance of voti­ve sta­tu­es. Sin­ce the rural sanctuary’s area, inclu­ding the sta­tue bases and walls docu­men­ted only in a sketch, was com­ple­te­ly back­fil­led after the excava­ti­on, its loca­ti­on faded from memory.

Now, almost 140 years later, the sanc­tua­ry is once again expo­sed and available for modern archaeo­lo­gi­cal rese­arch. With the sup­port of AMRICHA, a team of Ger­man archaeo­lo­gists from the Uni­ver­si­ties of Frank­furt and Kiel/Würzburg has resu­med excava­tions at Fran­gis­sa. Fol­lo­wing the loca­liza­ti­on of the old excava­ti­on site through two limi­t­ed test tren­ches last year [as detail­ed in the lin­ked 2023 report], the sanc­tua­ry was exten­si­ve­ly excava­ted in 2024. The near­ly 2‑me­ter-high fill of soil and stones was remo­ved by hand and careful­ly sifted. It beca­me evi­dent that this fill con­sis­ted of the spoil heap from the 1885 excava­ti­on, pos­si­bly con­tai­ning anci­ent arti­facts that were over­loo­ked or dee­med unim­portant at the time.

During the labor-inten­si­ve work, the sur­roun­ding wall of the voti­ve gift cour­ty­ard and over 100 sta­tue bases of vary­ing, some­ti­mes colos­sal, sizes were unco­ver­ed. Remar­kab­ly, the 19th-cen­tu­ry back­fill not only con­tai­ned the bases for voti­ve sta­tu­es indi­ca­ted in the plan but also a vast quan­ti­ty of sta­tue frag­ments, many of signi­fi­cant size and extra­or­di­na­ry qua­li­ty. The new finds from 2024 have pro­found­ly expan­ded our under­stan­ding of this sacred site. Not only can many of the sta­tu­es dis­co­ver­ed in 1885, housed in muse­ums in Nico­sia and Toron­to, now be com­ple­ted with new­ly found frag­ments to res­to­re their ori­gi­nal appearance, but enti­re­ly new sta­tue types pre­vious­ly unknown in Fran­gis­sa have also been docu­men­ted. For exam­p­le, the dis­co­very of over­si­zed feet in a wal­king stance has con­firm­ed the exis­tence of colos­sal male lime­s­tone figu­res from the Archaic peri­od (7th–6th cen­tu­ries BCE). Until now, such life-sized figu­res in Fran­gis­sa were only known in ter­ra­cot­ta, such as the famous “Colos­sus of Tam­assos” dis­play­ed in the Cyprus Muse­um. Addi­tio­nal­ly, evi­dence of other voti­ve offe­rings not pre­vious­ly docu­men­ted has emer­ged, inclu­ding marb­led glass beads and Egyp­ti­an fai­ence amulets.

A par­ti­cu­lar­ly spec­ta­cu­lar dis­co­very was the uneart­hing of two inscri­bed bases. One fea­tures seve­ral local Cypri­ot syl­la­bic script cha­rac­ters, while the other is ador­ned with a deli­ca­te Greek alpha­be­tic inscrip­ti­on refer­ring to the Pto­le­mies, the Hel­le­ni­stic rulers of Egypt who con­trol­led Cyprus from the ear­ly 3rd cen­tu­ry BCE. This dedi­ca­ti­on demons­tra­tes that the sanc­tua­ry play­ed an important role not only in the Archaic and Clas­si­cal peri­ods (7th/6th and 5th/4th cen­tu­ries BCE) but also after the end of the so-cal­led roy­al era.

Inde­ed, the cult site under­went signi­fi­cant expan­si­on during this later peri­od, as evi­den­ced by its archi­tec­tu­re. During this time, a lar­ge peristyle cour­ty­ard, likely used for cere­mo­ni­al ban­quets, was con­s­truc­ted adja­cent to the voti­ve gift room. In Ohnefalsch-Richter’s excava­tions, only an outer wall of this four-sided colon­na­ded struc­tu­re was reve­a­led, and it was not reco­gni­zed as part of a lar­ger buil­ding com­plex. As a result, the area of this buil­ding has remain­ed undis­tur­bed by modern inter­ven­ti­ons, offe­ring a rare oppor­tu­ni­ty to exami­ne undis­tur­bed stra­ti­gra­phic lay­ers and gain direct insights into the building’s use. In the 2024 cam­paign, the dimen­si­ons of a nor­t­hern-facing ent­rance, par­ti­al­ly iden­ti­fied in 2021, were cla­ri­fied. Moreo­ver, the com­plex appar­ent­ly included two addi­tio­nal doors on the west side, which were pre­vious­ly unknown. Alt­hough this buil­ding was not exten­si­ve­ly excava­ted, tar­ge­ted test tren­ches have now allo­wed its struc­tu­re to be ful­ly docu­men­ted. The unex­ami­ned are­as are being pre­ser­ved as a kind of archi­ve, in line with modern excava­ti­on prac­ti­ces, allo­wing future gene­ra­ti­ons to con­duct fur­ther inves­ti­ga­ti­ons using new methods.

The 2024 excava­tions at Pera-Fran­gis­sa gar­ne­red signi­fi­cant atten­ti­on, attrac­ting num­e­rous visi­tors from poli­tics, aca­de­mia, and the church. Nota­ble guests included Cyprus’s Minis­ter of Cul­tu­re, Dr. V. Kas­sia­ni­dou, the Direc­tor of the Depart­ment of Anti­qui­ties, Dr. G. Geor­giou, the Ger­man Ambassa­dor to Cyprus, Dr. A. Schlimm, Bishop Por­phy­ri­os, and repre­sen­ta­ti­ves of Cypri­ot and inter­na­tio­nal uni­ver­si­ties. Alex­an­der Mali­os, chair­man of AMRICHA, also visi­ted the excava­tions and the excava­ti­on house.

The cam­paign, led by Dr. Mat­thi­as Recke (Uni­ver­si­ty of Frank­furt) and Prof. Dr. Phil­ipp Kobusch (Uni­ver­si­ty of Kiel), las­ted from Sep­tem­ber 5 to Octo­ber 14, 2024. Par­ti­ci­pan­ts included stu­dents from the uni­ver­si­ties of Frank­furt, Kiel, Colo­gne, and Stutt­gart, as well as stu­dents from Cyprus Uni­ver­si­ty in Nico­sia. The ana­ly­sis of ani­mal bones was con­duc­ted by Dr. Ange­los Had­ji­ko­u­mis (Cyprus Insti­tu­te), and cera­mic ana­ly­sis by Dr. Anna Geor­gi­a­dou (Uni­ver­si­ty of Cyprus). A new team mem­ber, Lau­ra Lipcs­ei, a con­ser­va­tor from the Roy­al Onta­rio Muse­um in Toron­to (Cana­da), over­saw the pro­fes­sio­nal con­ser­va­ti­on and res­to­ra­ti­on of this year’s excava­ti­on finds. With her exten­si­ve expe­ri­ence working on the Fran­gis­sa finds in Toron­to from 1885, she brought inva­luable exper­ti­se to the pro­ject. Heart­felt thanks go to all participants.

Excava­tions at Fran­gis­sa are plan­ned to con­ti­nue in 2025. Future inves­ti­ga­ti­ons pro­mi­se to yield important new fin­dings and insights that will revi­ve the ritu­al prac­ti­ces of past eras. The lar­ge-sca­le stu­dies of the sanc­tua­ry initia­ted this year will allow the cult site to be unders­tood within its ori­gi­nal spa­ti­al con­text. Rese­arch at Fran­gis­sa is thus of immense signi­fi­can­ce not only for the spe­ci­fic site but also for the enti­re anci­ent Cypri­ot land­scape and our con­tem­po­ra­ry under­stan­ding of anci­ent cult practices.