Jewelery
Most of the jewelry found at Mochlos comes from the Prepalatial house tombs excavated in 1908 and cleaned in the early 1970s or from the Mycenaean chamber tombs in the Limenaria cemetery excavated in the 1990s. By contrast most of the houses in the main settlement area preserved very little. With the exception of the beads from House A.2, the House of the Lady with the Ivory Pyxis (Soles 2016), and the LM I jewelry from House Tomb 22, uncovered by Seager (1912), Neopalatial jewelry was relatively rare and quite modest, consisting mostly of stray beads scattered among various houses. Jewelry was easily transported, however, and least likely to be left behind when the town was abandoned at the end of the Neopalatial period. The jewelry from the pyxis and Tomb 22 suggests that there was once much more in the Minoan town.
Gold Diadem
This diadem was found in 1972 during the cleaning of the tombs in the Prepalatial cemetery. It was folded into a silver vessel and deposited in the eastern chamber of Tomb IV,V, VI. It is a symbol of authority that was worn in life by an important member of the Early Minoan community, probably a chief who also had a religious role in the community. Made of gold sheet metal that was hammered flat and decorated with lines of dot repousse and three agrimia, Cretan wild goats. Tie holes on either end of the diadem indicate that it was once worn around the forehead. The bottom part of the diadem was cut and removed before it was deposited in the tomb. For details see Davaras 1975; Hickman 2011.
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This necklace, which was found in a bronze bowl in Tomb 10 of the Limenaria cemetery, consists of 28 intact mold-made, light blue faience beads in the shape of heart-shaped ivy leaves that accompanied a single gold bead. They preserve two piercings on each end by which they were strung on the necklace. This is another example of the splendor found within the Mycenaean cemetery at Mochlos. The faience beads were composed of silicon, copper, iron, and calcium with trace amounts of magnesium, cobalt, nickel, and zinc. For details see Mochlos IIA, pp. 144-148; Mochlos IIC, p. 40.
Necklace
Gold Bead
This bead was found in the bowl with the faience necklace from Tomb 10. The bead had only a single perforation which implies that it was the centerpiece of the necklace. It was cast with a core and “painted” on one side with rose gold which preserves a rosy purplish patina. This technique was Egyptian in origin and was also found on the gold buckles in the tomb of King Tutankhamen. The bead itself is pure gold while its patina is a a gold alloy with 8% silver, 3% copper, and traces of 1% iron, and 0.8% arsenic which is what produces this purplish hue. For details see Mochlos IIC, pp. 42, 169-170; Giumlia-Mair and Soles 2013; Soles 2019.
Gold Ring
This gold-plated copper ring was also found in Tomb 10 in the Limenaria cemetery, and though the contents of the bezel were lost, it is still a magnificent example of the jewelry found within the tombs during this period. Whatever was set in the ring, most likely shell, ivory, or semiprecious stone, was likely removed from the ring before it was deposited, as no object of the same ovoid shape was found within the unplundered tomb. (For details, see Mochlos IIC, pp. 44, 46.
