Sellopoulo Tombs 3 and 4, Two Late Minoan Graves near Knossos

Abstract

Sellopoulo is a small village, on the east bank of the river Kairetos, less than 2 kilometres north of Knossos. The fields immediately bordering the stream are fairly flat but the land soon rises in a series of step-like hills. Here surface soil is thin and the rock immediately underlying it is mostly the local kouskouras, a soft limestone easily cut. The geology of the region is, then, very suitable for chamber tombs. Indeed, the extensive Zafer Papoura cemetery, excavated by Evans, is on the west slope above the river, almost exactly opposite the tombs we shall be considering. Hogarth was the first to excavate at Sellopoulo. In 1900, in low-lying ground on the southwest edge of the village, he found what he describes as a ‘tholus tomb built of small stones’ in which were ‘three rudely painted chest urns standing side by side, all rifled in antiquity’. This tomb can no longer be seen.