Archaeologists have discovered in Armenia gold ornaments, a bronze dagger and a silver coin from the time of Octavian Augustus, the first emperor of Rome. The finds at the ancient settlement of Metsamor in the Armavir Province were reported by Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport Zhanna Andreasyan.
The coin, bearing the image of Augustus, who ruled from 27 BCE to 14 CE, and the gold ornaments lay in a burial from the first century CE. It was located in the upper layer of the tomb, which scientists have been studying for several years.
Excavations on a private plot next to the Metsamor museum-reserve began two years ago. At the center of the plot stands a stone mausoleum, inside which is a stone tomb roughly six by four meters in size. The mausoleum is surrounded by a cromlech, a ring of upright stones about 20 meters in diameter. Judging by the different layers, the tomb was used for many centuries.
The main burial, at the very floor of the chamber, dates to the Late Bronze Age, to the 14th–13th centuries BCE. In it were found a dagger of the Lchashen type, a large quantity of pottery, horse bones, fragments of a belt, bronze objects and bell-shaped pendants. A separate Iron Age layer contained the remains of one person with grave goods and pottery.
Metsamor, located on the Ararat Plain 35 kilometers west of Yerevan, was founded at the turn of the 5th and 4th millennia BCE and existed intermittently until the Middle Ages. At the height of its prosperity, in the late Bronze and early Iron Age, the city covered almost 100 hectares. In the 8th century BCE, the Urartian king Argishti I, founder of the fortress of Erebuni, campaigned into the Ararat Valley, and after that Metsamor lost its former greatness.
The Roman coin of the 1st century CE recalls a period of close ties between Armenia and Rome. In 20 BCE, Emperor Augustus established a Roman protectorate over the Armenian kingdom. The find confirms that Metsamor was for a long time on the trade routes linking east and west. Excavations at the site are continuing.
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