Glossary Tombs and burial
Grave goods
Also called: grave offerings, funerary offerings
Objects placed with the dead at burial, such as pots, tools, weapons, jewellery and food.
Grave goods are the main reason so much Cypriot material survives complete. Neolithic and Chalcolithic burials have few, but from the Early Bronze Age the tombs of Vounous and Lapithos were filled with Red Polished vessels, some of them made only for the grave. What the goods meant is debated: provisions for the dead, gifts from mourners, the remains of a funeral feast, or a display of a family's standing. Mortuary practices follows the changes over time.
Related terms
- Funerary feasting
Eating and drinking by mourners at a funeral, known from animal bones and serving vessels left in or beside tombs.
- Collective burial
The use of one tomb for many burials made over years or generations, typically by a family or kin group.
- Necropolis
A large cemetery, especially the burial ground of an ancient town, usually set apart from the settlement itself.
Where it appears
- Society, Ritual, and Identity in Ancient Cypriot Mortuary Practice
- Plank Figures
- Bottles
- Glass in Ancient Cyprus
- Horse and Rider Figurines
- Jars (Amphora)
- Neolithic and Chalcolithic Burial in Cyprus
- Village Life in Early Bronze Age Cyprus
- White Slip Ware
- Bowls
- Cruciform Figurines
- Early Bronze Age Cyprus
and 12 more compendium pages