Valley Of Thracian Kings With More Than 1,500 Ancient Burial Mounds

A. Sutherland - AncientPages.com - The Valley of Thracian Kings is a very special place with numerous burial mounds (tumuli) containing tombs and graves of the Thracian rulers and high aristocrats.

The tumuli are located in the valley of the Central Bulgarian town of Kazanlak excavated by the late Bulgarian archaeologist Georgi Kitov, specializing in Ancient Thrace.

Kitov excavated most of the tombs in the Kazanlak Valley and named it the Valley of the Thracian Kings.

Approximately 300 burial mounds have been already excavated but archaeologists believe that over 1,500 of them have their location in the valley.

Thracian Tomb of Kazanlak - accidentally discovered in 1944 - dates from the Hellenistic period, around the end of the 4th century BC.

It is located near Seutopolis, the capital city of the Thracian king Seutes III, and is part of a large Thracian necropolis. The tholos has a narrow corridor and a round burial chamber, both decorated with murals representing Thracian burial rituals and culture.

Not unlike the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, the Valley of the Thracian Kings is where the Thracian rulers and high aristocrats were buried.

These paintings are Bulgaria’s best-preserved artistic masterpieces from the Hellenistic period. The Thracians were skilled goldsmiths and possessed advanced knowledge of metalworking and horsemanship. It is believed that the Thracians had no alphabet of their own and left no written records.

Left: Thracian Tomb at Kazanlak is one of the best-preserved in Bulgaria.; Right: A mural of a woman's face can be seen in the burial chamber in an Ostrusha tumulus that dated back the middle of the 4th century BC, near the central Bulgarian town of Kazanlak. Photo credit: AFP/Dimitar Dilkoff.

They believed in the afterlife and the immortality of the soul, and buried deceased rulers with their horses, dogs, weapons, drinking cups, and even playing dice.

The kings were considered sons of the great goddess Mother Earth and the burial rites were highly symbolic.

The ancient Thracians were an ethno-cultural group of Indo-European tribes that inhabited much of Southeast Europe (modern-day Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Greece, Turkey, Macedonia, Serbia) from about the middle of the second millennium BC to about the 6th century AD.

The Thracians believed that when the king ends his journey in this world, he must return to the womb of his mother. Therefore, these ancient people built the artificial mounds around their funeral structures, researchers believe.

In addition to the treasures, the bushy tumuli also conceal a variety of exquisite burial monuments. Built from huge granite blocks or bricks, they consist of a corridor and one or more chambers, with each revealing its own meticulous design and beautiful ornamentation.

There are many tombs but no two tombs are alike. Inside, a slim column helps support the vaulted ceiling of the burial chamber, the walls of which are adorned by seven half-columns. The Ostrusha tumulus nearby contained a sarcophagus-like chamber hewn from a single granite block thought to have weighed 60 tonnes.

The traces of civilized life indicate that the Thracians continued many of the traditions of the prehistoric people who inhabited the region in today’s Central Bulgaria. One of the most beautiful monuments of the Thracian civilization in the Valley of the Thracian Kings is the temple-tomb of Seuthes III, probably the richest Thracian king tomb that dates back to the 5th century BC.

Seuthes III was the ruler of the Odrysian kingdom of Thrace from c. 331 BC to c. 300 BC.
It was Seuthes III who moved the Odrysian Kingdom - with more than 40 Thracian tribes and 22 kingdoms - to central Thrace and built his capital city at Seuthopolis (Kazanlak), present-day Bulgaria.

His tomb is located near the Bulgarian town of Shipka, Kazanlak municipality. The temple was buried under the 20-meter (66 ft) high “Golyamata Kosmatka” mound.

Written by – A. Sutherland  - AncientPages.com Senior Staff Writer

Copyright © AncientPages.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or part without the express written permission of AncientPages.com

Expand for references