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The Vix Burial

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Extract

One of the best known and most quoted finds in western Europe must be that of the ‘princess's burial’ of Vix discovered early in 1953 not far from Châtillon-sur-Seine below the Celtic stronghold of Mont Lassois (Latisco). The contents of the grave are such that classical no less than prehistoric archaeologists have had cause to add to the still increasing literature on the site [I].

Recently, discussion has ranged over two of the foremost problems concerning the Vix burial: first, the question of date and provenance for the great Krater or mixing bowl, at more than 5 feet tall the largest extant bronze vessel of the Greek Archaic period. Second is the matter of the route taken by Greek and Italic imports into Western Europe from their place of manufacture—whether via the Alps or through the entrepôt of Marseilles, founded as Massalia by Phocaian settlers in about 600 B.c.—a debate which has continued since first opened in these pages more than 35 years ago [2]. Ancillary to these two points is the question as to the reason why costly objects made their way into the heart of Celtdom, to what end, with what exchange in mind—what in fact was the status of those native nobles whose graves and settlements have produced the basic clues for such tantalizing investigations?

Information

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1966

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