The discovery of the ancient Greek city of Tenea
发现希腊古城泰涅亚

It was a baking hot summer’s day and I was in a car driving through the dramatic hills and lush vegetation of the Peloponnese in Greece. “Look at this whole plain,” my driver, Eleni Korka, said, gesturing out the window. To our left was a huge, flat area, covered in olive trees and scrub bushes. Where it ended, the earth transformed sharply into forested mountains.

那是一个炎热的夏日，我坐在一辆汽车里，穿过希腊伯罗奔尼撒半岛（Peloponnese）上引人注目的山丘和茂密的植被。“看看这整座平原，”开车的科尔卡（Eleni Korka）指着窗外说。在我们的左边是一大片平坦的区域，被橄榄树和灌木丛覆盖着。平地的尽头是森林覆盖的山脉。

“The city of Tenea covered this whole place,” she told me. “It’s above sea level and there’s a cool breeze, so the summer palace would probably have been built here.” She pointed to a traditional restaurant tucked under a distinctive, almost square-shaped hill. “And this taverna is built under a watermill,” she said.

“泰涅亚城（Tenea）就埋在这底下，”她告诉我。那时的古城建筑高于海平面，有凉爽的微风，所以度夏的行宫很可能建在这里。她指了指一家坐落在独特的、几乎是方形山脚下的传统餐厅。“这个餐厅的位置当时就是个水磨，”她说。

Korka is one of the country’s top archaeologists. A Greek American, she recently made the biggest discovery of her 40-year career. The lost city of Tenea, which is mentioned in multiple Greek myths and historical texts, such as the ancient legend of Oedipus, the mythical king of Thebes who unwittingly killed his father and married his mother, was uncovered by her and her team last October, buried under the fields we’re now driving past.

科尔卡是希腊裔美国人，也是顶尖的考古学家。她最近公布了她40年职业生涯中最大的发现。泰涅亚这座失落之城，在许多希腊神话和历史文献中被提到，比如俄狄浦斯（Oedipus）的古老传说。传说中这位底比斯（Thebes）国王无意中杀死了他的父亲，娶了他的母亲。如今这座古城遗址在去年十月被科尔卡团队发现，就在我们开车经过的这片土地之下。

According to myth, the city was founded by the Trojans sometime around 1100BC and built by prisoners of war. They chose this spot because it was on the road between Corinth and the ancient settlement of Mycenae. Oedipus was said to have been raised here after being sent away as a baby. And it was one of the largest and most prosperous cities in the ancient region of Corinthia in the northern Peloponnese. Until now, however, no-one could work out exactly where it was – or why it disappeared.

根据传说，这座城市大约在公元前1100年由特洛伊战俘建造。选择在这个地方建城，是因为它在连接科林斯（Corinth）和迈锡尼（Mycenae）这两座古代城池的公路上。据说俄狄浦斯是在婴儿时期被带离家乡后，在这里长大的。它是伯罗奔尼撒半岛北部古科林西亚地区（Corinthia）最大、最繁荣的城市之一。然而，直到现在，还没有人能确切地知道它在哪里——或者它为什么消失了。

The search for Tenea began in 1984. Korka was just five years into her career when she received a call from some local villagers digging a water channel. They had hit an ancient sarcophagus and broken it in half. Korka went to look. “The minute I saw it, I understood it was something unique,” she said. “Sometimes, a find connects with someone. It’s almost spiritual.” The vase-shaped coffin had delicate paintings of lions on the interior and contained a skeleton and offerings to the deceased. “We don’t have another one with drawings like that,” she explained. “We also do not know what ancient paintings looked like… We have no other sample from the Archaic period.”

搜寻泰涅亚的工作始于1984年。那时科尔卡刚刚工作五年。她接到当地村民打来的电话，说开挖水道时碰到一具古老的石棺，把它砸成了两半。科尔卡去看了看，“当我看到它的那一刻，我就明白它的独特，”她说。“有时候，某人有一个发现，几乎是天意。棺材呈花瓶状，内部绘有精美的狮子图案，里面有一具骨架和祭品”。她解释说：“我们此前未曾见过这样的图案”，“我们也不知道古代绘画是什么样子的……我们没有其它来自古代的样本”。

Korka knew Tenea was thought to be in the area, based on ancient historians’ writings, which stated it was somewhere between Corinth and Mycenae. But her young age, inexperience and a lack of further evidence made it impossible for her to get a licence for excavation. “I did not have the confidence or ability to argue why this was so important – it was more intuition-lead,” she said.

但科尔卡根据古代历史学家的记载，知道泰涅亚就在这个地区，它位于科林斯和迈锡尼之间。但由于她年轻，缺乏经验，又缺乏进一步的证据，她不可能获得许可继续挖掘。她说：“我没有信心和能力去解释为什么这一点如此重要——那就是一种直觉吧。”

However, illicit antiquities smugglers had known about the site for years, and would often pay local farmers for vases and coins they came across. In 2010, Korka worked alongside the police and informants to intercept the illegal sale of two statues that had been looted nearby. “The statues proved Tenea was a very prominent city with high levels of art,” she said. She finally obtained permission to dig in the area, and in 2013 the excavation began.

然而，文物贩子多年前就知道了这个地方，他们经常花钱向当地农民收购古代花瓶和硬币。2010年，科尔卡与警方通过线人，截获了附近被盗卖的两尊雕像。她说：“这些雕像证明泰涅亚曾是一座名城，艺术水平很高。”她最终获得了在该地区考古挖掘的许可，并于2013年开始挖掘。

We stopped in the nearby village of Chiliomodi for coffee and pastries. The oldest houses here were built here around 200 years ago, and Korka explained that many of them used ancient rocks, likely from Tenea ruins, that were lying around. The local church has a carving of the Ancient Greek god of winemaking and theatre, Dionysus, embedded in the wall. “We think it was part of an ancient theatre, which we’re still searching for,” she said.

我们在附近的契里奥莫迪（Chiliomodi）村停下来喝咖啡，吃点心。这里最古老的房子有大约200年历史。科尔卡解释说，其中许多房子使用的古老岩石，很可能来自于旁边的泰涅亚遗址。当地教堂的墙上镶嵌着古希腊酿酒和戏剧之神狄俄尼索斯（Dionysus）的雕像。“我们认为这是古老剧院的一部分，我们仍在研究，”她说。

Chiliomodi is a peaceful, pretty place, largely untouched by tourism. The discovery of the ancient city nearby has brought energy and excitement to the community. In the bakery I noticed bottles of local olive oil named “Tenea”, and there’s a shop of the same name due to open nearby.

契里奥莫迪是一个宁静、美丽的地方，基本上没有受到旅游业的影响。附近发现古城，给社区带来了活力。在面包房里，我注意到几瓶当地产的橄榄油，名字就叫泰涅亚（Tenea），附近还有一家以此命名的商店即将开业。

Korka and her colleagues Konstantinos Lagos and Antonio Corso, who were driving with us, told me that the project didn’t go exactly to plan to start with. “We had a small team and very little funding,” they said.

科尔卡和她的同事拉各斯（Konstantinos Lagos）以及科索（Antonio Corso）跟我们同一辆车，他们告诉我，这个项目并没有按照计划完全展开。“我们的团队很小，资金也很少，”他们说。

A geophysical survey of the area was carried out by a third party using technology. But when they started to dig, they found nothing – the shapes seen during the survey had been created by the limestone soil. “So we went back to where the first sarcophagus was found,” she said. “Nearby we found about 40 others… they just kept coming out of the ground one after the other. It was like [the folk tale of] Ali Baba.”

第三方利用科技仪器对该地区进行了地球物理探查。但当他们开始挖掘时，却什么也没发现。探查仪器中看到的有形状的物体实际石灰岩土壤。“所以我们回到发现第一个石棺的地方，”她说，“在附近我们还发现了大约40只石棺，一个接一个从地下冒出来。就像阿里巴巴的故事里描述的一样。”

Next, they discovered part of an ancient road, which lead the team to a Roman mausoleum from around 100BC in which several generations of a family were buried, plus a cistern that would have been used for rituals and sacrifices: “We knew this was outside of the city, so we decided to dig north instead.” Last October, houses were discovered, and the team realised they had finally found the city itself. “Most of the surface level findings had already been taken by looters,” Lagos said. “But most of the actual city is 2m or 3m below ground.”

接下来，他们发现了一个古老的道路的一部分。沿着这条道路，团队发现了大约公元前100年的一座罗马陵墓，那里埋葬了一个家族的几代人。团队还挖掘出一个蓄水池，可能是用于仪式和献祭：“我们知道这是在城市以外，所以我们决定在北部继续挖掘。去年10月，团队开挖出一些房屋，意识到终于找到了这座城市”。拉各斯说：“大部分地表遗迹已经被抢劫者拿走了”，“但城市的大部分被埋在地下2米至3米处。”

We stopped at a house in Chiliomodi that is being used as the conservation centre. The team excavates during September and October and spends the rest of year analysing artefacts and studying historical texts. Lagos told me that a huge number of coins have been found on the site, proving Tenea was a very wealthy place. “We’ve found around 200 – you normally only get these kinds of numbers after many years of excavations,” he said. He showed me gold leaf imitation coins that would have been buried with the deceased as a gift for the boatman in the underworld. “Most people [at the time] were buried with pennies,” he said. “But in Tenea they used gold.”

我们在契里奥莫迪的一所房子前停了下来，这所房子被改建成了保护中心。该团队在9月和10月进行挖掘，接下来就是分析文物和研究历史文献。拉各斯告诉我，在这个遗址中发现了大量的硬币，证明泰涅亚曾经非常富有。他说：“我们发现了大约200枚硬币，通常情况下，只有在多年的考古挖掘之后才能获得这么多。”他给我看了一些叶子形状的金币，这些金币和死者一起埋入地下，作为给阴间接引者的礼物。他说：“（当时）大多数人下葬时都有硬币陪葬”，“但在特尼厄他们使用金子”。

Other finds include exquisitely painted vases, engraved lanterns and metal tools used by athletes (to scrape off the oil they cleansed their bodies with), leading the team to believe there is a stadium they have yet to find.

其它发现还包括精美的彩绘花瓶、雕刻的灯和运动员使用的金属工具（用来刮去他们用来清洁身体的油），这让团队相信他们还有一座体育场尚未找到。

“Almost everything in Tenea is unique,” Korka said.

科尔卡说：“在泰涅亚，几乎所有的东西都是独一无二的。”

This backs up what the team knew about the society from historical texts: “The people here were different – they were Trojans. They had their own identity,” said Korka. As well as being from a different place – the city of Troy was located in what is now Turkey, around 600km – the finds so far show they used different styles of ceramics and had different burial tradition to those living in nearby Corinth and Mycanae, such as placing the coin on the chest rather than in the mouth, as was common elsewhere in Ancient Greece.

这支持了研究小组从历史文献中了解到的关于这个社会的情况：“这里的人是不同的——他们是特洛伊人，有自己的文化特征。”特洛伊城位于现今的土耳其境内，距此约600公里。除了来自不同的地方，目前的发现还包括——与住在附近的科林斯和迈锡尼的居民不同，特洛伊人使用不同风格的陶瓷；特洛伊人有不同的葬礼传统，比如把硬币放在胸部而不是嘴里，后者是古希腊很常见的丧葬习俗。

But one of the biggest mysteries surrounding Tenea is why it disappeared. Most other major ancient Greek cities, such as Sparta, Athens and Corinth, remain inhabited to this day. It was unusual for a city as large as Tenea – there were probably around 100,000 inhabitants – to be completely abandoned, and no historical texts give a clue as to why.

关于泰涅亚最大的谜团是它为什么会消失。大多数其它的主要古希腊城市，如斯巴达、雅典和科林斯，至今仍有人定居。像泰涅亚这样有大约10万居民的大城市，被完全废弃是很不寻常的，而且没有任何历史文献可以提供线索，解释原因。

We headed back to the car and drove up towards the mountains, as Lagos began to explain the team’s theory. “We know Alaric, who was king of the Visigoths, raided Greece in 397AD,” he said. Historians believe he destroyed cities partly to gain wealth, but also to spread Christianity. “We discovered a coin that was issued by Alaric’s people.”

我们回到车上，朝山上开去，此时拉各斯开始解释他们团队的理论，“我们知道西哥特人（Visigoths）的国王阿拉里克（Alaric）在公元397年对希腊发动了突然袭击”。历史学家认为，他摧毁城市的部分原因是为了获得财富，但也为了传播基督教。“我们发现了一枚阿拉里克的族人发行的硬币。我们还发现了一所房子，大约在那一年被炮弹摧毁。”

However, that wasn’t the end of the story for Tenea. “We have found evidence of inhabitation from 200 years later, but it appears Tenea had lost a lot of its wealth,” he continued, explaining that the finds from this period were not as grand or valuable as the earlier ones. “But after that, there’s nothing.”

然而，这并不是泰涅亚故事的结局。“我们已经发现了在这场袭击发生之后200年有人在那里居住的证据，但看起来泰涅亚已经失去了很多财富，” 拉各斯继续说，对那一时期的考古发现并不像最辉煌时期那么宏伟或有价值。“但在那一时期之后，就什么都没有了。”

The car climbed up a winding road, giving us spectacular views over the mountains and the plain under which Tenea rests. We stopped at a beautiful, crumbling Byzantine-era monastery. “We know the Slavs invaded this area around that time. We believe the people of Tenea abandoned the city and fled to these hills here,” he said, gesturing around us. The Slavic tribes are known to have raided the area and violently clashed with local communities, so it seems Tenea’s residents judged the hills to be safer. There were many streams around the city, and with no-one to attend to them they covered the city in silt, which eventually turned to earth and covered the city.

汽车沿着一条蜿蜒的道路爬升，我们看到了山脉和平原，景色壮丽，它们的下面就掩埋着泰涅亚古城。我们在一座美丽却摇摇欲坠的拜占庭时代的修道院停了下来。“我们知道斯拉夫人（Slavs）大约在那个时代入侵了这里。我们相信泰涅亚人抛弃了城市，逃到这附近的山上，”拉各斯指着周边对我们说。就我们所知，斯拉夫部落袭击了这个地区，并与当地人发生暴力战争，所以泰涅亚的居民认为山区更安全。泰涅亚城周围有很多河流，没有人治理，于是淤泥冲进城市，变成泥土，最终淹没了城市。

Tenea’s discovery has answered many mysteries already, such as where the city was located and perhaps why it was abandoned. But for the team, the most exciting thing is what it still may hold. They are expecting to find more houses, temples, a theatre and a marketplace – known in Ancient Greek as an agora – over the coming years. “It’s like an iceberg and we’re just hitting the tip,” Lagos said. “It’s going to keep giving interesting findings for the next 100 years.”

泰涅亚的发现已经解开了许多谜团，比如这座城市位于何处，以及为何被遗弃。但对科尔卡团队来说，最兴奋的莫过于古城还留下了什么。他们希望在未来几年能找到更多的房屋、寺庙、剧院和古希腊语称之为“阿果拉”（agora）的城市广场。“这就像一座冰山，我们刚刚触碰到一角，”拉各斯说，“在未来的100年里，关于古城将继续会有有趣的发现”。