ATHENS – The archaeological exhibition “From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age” will be be inaugurated on at 20:00 on Monday at the new Benaki Museum building at 138 Pireos Street in Athens.

A total of 151 artifacts will be be dispayed, together revealing a complete picture of the Mycenaean civilisation in the Cyclades archipelago.

Central place is given to finds from the Mycenaean tholos tomb at Agia Thekla on the island of Tinos, a rare funerary monument in the entire Aegean, which was excavated by Georgios Despinis in 1979. The relatively diminutive monument was unearthed during works to build a road. It is one of only three such Mycenaean tombs known in the Cyclades and constitutes the only, until today, confirmed Mycenaean presence on the island. The burial place of an aristocratic clan, the tomb of Aghia Thekla (13th-12th century BC) was used for multiple burials.

Besides Tinos, the exhibition displays finds from other prehistoric sites in the Aegean and specifically from the islands of Naxos, Delos, Paros, Milos, Sifnos and Kea.

Among them, the “Kyra of Fylakopi” (approximately mid-14th century BC), one of the masterpieces of Mycenaean figurine sculpture found at the sanctuary of Fylakopi on the island of Milos.

The exhibition, organised by the Antiquities Ephorate of Cyclades, the Cultural Institute of Piraeus Group and Benaki Museum, was initally presented in the summer of 2019 in Tinos at the Marblework Museum of the Cultural Institute of Piraeus Group, attracting 23,000 Greek and foreign visitors.

“From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age.” (Photo by Eurokinissi)

“From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age.” (Photo by Eurokinissi)

“From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age.” (Photo by Eurokinissi)

“From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age.” (Photo by Eurokinissi)

“From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age.” (Photo by Eurokinissi)

“From Homer’s World: Tenos and the Cyclades in the Mycenaean Age.” (Photo by Eurokinissi)