Thracian dolmens Elhovo city

Overview

The most significant finds from the time of Ancient Thrace in the Elhovo region are definitely the two dolmens preserved south of the border village of Golyam Dervent. They were studied in 2005 and 2007 by Deyan Dichev and the team of the Strandzha Archaeological Expedition, led by the famous Bulgarian archaeologist Daniela Agre.

In the past, the village was located on an important trade route within the Ottoman Empire. The road that leads to the village and from there to Turkey is the main Roman road, through which the trade caravans to Asia passed along the ridge of a mountain branch. In 1814 the village was witnessed by a visiting officer from the military engineering troops of the French Empire, Captain-Engineer Francois-Daniel Thomassen [2]. whose waters flow into Arda. According to a French source in the early XIX century, the village has a defensive tower, where a post was set up for security of communications.

One of the legends about the founding of the village is the story of a princess married to the wife of an Ottoman ruler. Passing through the old Roman road, she found fresh traces of battle. Saddened by the pain and grief of the living and wounded, she struck a stone at the site and ordered the establishment of a settlement where people could live in peace and happiness.

After the Liberation the village was relatively large and had customs. Over time, and especially after September 9, 1944, the population decreased and today consists mainly of elderly people. Near the village is the area of ​​Gol Bunar, where a holiday resort has been built.

The low population and the pristine nature make the area of ​​the village an extremely good place for recreation. Two dolmens have been discovered south of the village. In the research started in 2005, they were categorized as Thracian burial chambers.

Dolmens are megalithic structures made of several large natural stones or roughly worked stone slabs, placed vertically and covered with another stone slab. Dolmens are the oldest tomb architecture known in the Balkans. They are located singly or in groups on mountain ridges and hills. Regardless of their configuration - single or grouped in a necropolis, the dolmens are covered with a mound consisting of earth and stones, and their entrances are always oriented to one of the sunny directions and never point north.

Depending on their construction, the dolmens are united in the following typological scheme, which also includes cyst tombs, which are found in dolmen necropolises:

• Single-chamber dolmens or single-chamber dolmens with dromos and two-chamber dolmens with dromos;

• Double dolmens - free-standing, attached, but different in construction and size;

• Dolmen-like cysts - usually single connected in a common embankment and mound next to a dolmen.

The ancient Thracian tribes used them mostly for the burials of high-ranking representatives of the tribal aristocracy and the related cult rites. Similar megalithic structures are preserved in Western Europe and the Caucasus. On the Balkan Peninsula they are found only in the Eastern Rhodopes, Sakar Mountain and Strandzha. The most common are single-chamber, less common are double-chamber. Both types can be with or without an entrance corridor (dromos). The larger of the two dolmens near Golyam Dervent was studied in 2007 and consists of two chambers and a dromos (entrance). It dates from the IX - VIII century BC.

 According to Daniela Agre, this is the largest dolmen discovered in Thrace so far, on which the dromos (corridor) to the burial chambers is covered, which is a very rare architectural solution. Of particular note is the fact that based on 800 famous dolmens in Bulgaria, Turkey and Greece, this is the only one on which the entrance plate is ornamented with relief images: labris, mutually biting snakes and a maze.

Labris (double ax) in ancient times was a symbol of ruling power and might. Later it became the emblem of the royal dynasty of the Odrysians, which created the most powerful Thracian state union in the second half of the first millennium BC.

The finds from the dolmens from the village of Golyam Dervent can be seen in the exposition "Archeology" at the Ethnographic-Archaeological Museum - Elhovo.