logo
  • Medieval Cemetery at Rrëmbec
  • Rrumbullaku, Rrëmbec
  •  
  • Albania
  • Korçë County
  • Bashkia Maliq
  • Komuna e Pojanit

Credits

  • failed to get markup 'credits_'
  • AIAC_logo logo

Monuments

Periods

  • No period data has been added yet

Chronology

  • 700 AD - 1099 AD

Season

    • From 2 to 9th November 2003 the Albanian Rescue Archaeological Unit, in collaboration with the Institute of Archaeology and the Archaeological Museum of Korça, organized a rescue excavation at the medieval cemetery at Rrëmbec, discovered by chance by the landowners while extracting sand for building purposes. During the excavations were discovered 11 graves, not to mention many others destroyed before the excavations by the landowners. All the graves consisted in simple rectangular pits, with dimensions varying from 0.90m to 2m length and from 0.50m to 0.60m width, with no construction at all. The only burial type practiced was inhumation. The orientation of the disposal was East-West with slight deviations which perhaps can be explained with burials in different seasons of the year. In general the grave inventory was poor. Only 4 graves had finds. Other finds came to light from the destroyed graves. The most common group of finds was made by 20 complete and 4 fragmented ceramic vessels: two-handled vessels, vessels without handles, oinochoai, and cups. The inventory also included ornaments, mainly coming from destroyed graves, like earrings, finger rings, beads and head ornaments, mainly made of bronze, bronze and silver or pasta vitrea. The comparison between the finds of this cemetery with finds from other Early Medieval cemeteries from north and south Albania made possible to establish that this group was very close to the materials discovered in the tumuli of Rehovë, Piskovë and Dukat. It seems that the Cemetery at Rrembec was used for a long period of time starting from Late Antiquity and continuing in the two first phases of the Early Medieval period in the VIII-IX and IX-XI centuries A.D.
    • In May 2004 the Albanian Rescue Archaeological Unit in collaboration with the Institute of Archaeology and the Archaeological Museum of Korça, organized the second season of excavations at the Mediaeval cemetery at Rrëmbec. This season was the continuation of the first season organized in November 2003. Besides carrying on the same goals of the first season, in this season another goal was to be reached, that of the anthropological study of the skeletons. During this year 28 graves were discovered. They all consisted in rectangular pits with dimensions varying from 2.10m to 0.55m length and from 0.60m to 0.35m width. The burial type practiced was inhumation, individuals mostly were supine with extended legs and folded or extended arms. The orientation of the disposals was Northwest-Southeast. In this season as well, the inventory was not very rich. From 28 graves only 8 of them had inventory. The most common group of finds was composed by ceramic vessels such as vessels without handles and two-handled vessels. The inventory also included ornaments like bronze earrings and glass beads, a clay object identified as a spindle whorl, a couple of small iron knifes and an iron buckle. All the materials were dated to the VIII-IX centuries A.D. The anthropologists studied 41 well preserved skeletons. 15 of them were adult males aged from 25 to over 40 years old, 9 were adult females aged from 25 to over 40 years old and 17 were children and sub-adults from 0 to 15 years old. The length of the individuals varied from 170 to 177cm for males and from 153 to 161cm for females. Morphological analyses showed that some of the individuals had great morphological similarity, which is an evidence for the presence of family burial areas at Rrëmbec.

Bibliography

    • L. Bejko, S. Aliu, S. Lela, 2004, Varreza mesjetare në Rëmbec të Korçës, in Candavia 1: 211–243.
    • L. Bejko, M.G. Amore, S. Aliu, 2005, Varreza mesjetare në Rrëmbec të Korçës (gërmime të vitit 2004), Candavia 2: 327-348.