To browse Academia. Andrzej Wypustek. Ioannis Mylonopoulos. Anna Karapanagiotou. Within general realignments, the life of women is also altered. Appreciation and acceptance is expanded in their social environment, they participate in public life more actively, and they seek and obtain education and spiritual culture. This new image of a more active and creative woman which emerged through the historical and political circumstances of the Hellenistic era survives and evolves during Imperial times, both in the center of the empire, in Rome, and in the provinces.
The environment that formed in Athens during late Hellenistic and Imperial periods created suitable conditions for greater public projection of women who belonged to the local upper class. For the first time aristocratic women are being honored with statues by the authorities of the state. The new conditions of the era also influenced the image of the non-elite Athenian women, as is depicted in the representations on the sepulchral grave reliefs.
Via iconographic study of a great number of monuments, the changes that occurred in the private and public lives of Athenian women are detected. Kostas Paschalidis. The few finds that escaped looting included some impressive pieces of gold, amber and glass jewellery and a seal stone, which were published half a century later in the monograph: Ai Proistorikai Athinai by M.
During the recent works for the renovation of the National Archaeological Museum, some unknown Mycenaean bronzes and pieces of jewellery deriving from the same tomb were located. These objects altogether, seem to comprise the context of a richly buried Athenian lady, who lived and died in the early 14th c. Furthermore, the presence of precious ornaments together with a complete set of toilet equipment in the tomb, reveal the personal articles of a deceased, who was honoured and intended to be remembered especially for her elegance and beauty.
Together with the re-evaluation of the Koukaki context, this paper deals with the inconceivable โ in contemporary terms โ coexistence of beauty and death, in many female burials of the Mycenaean and the Minoan World.
