User:UndercoverClassicist/Nichoria

Nichoria

Νιχώρια
Shown within Peloponnese
Location	Messenian Gulf
Region	Peloponnese
Coordinates	37°0′12″N 21°54′46″E / 37.00333°N 21.91278°E / 37.00333; 21.91278
Type	Tholos tomb and settlement
Area	5
History
Abandoned	1100BC
Periods	LHIIIA:2
Cultures	Mycenaen
Satellite of	Pylos
Site notes
Condition	Ruined
Ownership	Ministry of Culture and Sport (Greece)
Public access	Yes

Nichoria (Greek: Νιχώρια) is a site in Messenia, on a ridgetop near modern Rizomylos, at the northwestern corner of the Messenian Gulf.^[1] From the Middle to Late Bronze Age it cultivated olive and terebinth for export.^[2] During the Helladic period it was part of the Mycenaean civilisation.

Nichoria reached its greatest extent (5 hectares) in LHIIIA:2, and even sported a royal Pylos-style megaron; although it was always smaller. Nichoria became subordinate to Pylos and lost the use of its megaron.^[3]

Toward the end of LH IIIB, the palace at Pylos knew Nichoria under the name of TI-MI-TO A-KO.^[4] Nichoria was a major outpost of Pylos's "Trans-Aigolaia" province. According to Palaima, "it occurs on ten tablets that relate to: bronze working, six standard items of regional taxation, bronze recycling for weaponry production, coastal defensive arrangements, gold, landholdings, livestock, male personnel, and rather intensive levels of flax production";^[5] and "during the late Bronze Age as much as 10% of the total surface land might have been devoted to olive growth".^[2]

Controversy remains over how to transliterate "TI-MI-TO A-KO" into Greek. "TI-MI-TO" has been interpreted as themittos, for "border", comparing Knossos's term "O-U-TE-MI" as a religious ou themis ("not allowed," literally "not set down, in this case 'by law'"). Palaima contrarily reads O-U-TE-MI as a description of furniture, ou termis ("no 'termis', i.e., border or edge"). For Palaima, interpreting the "TI-MI-TO" element in "TI-MI-TO-A-KO" as the genitive of Greek 'themis' is problematical. In Mycenaean, an alternation of i for e is found in words of pre-Greek, not Greek, origin. (Compare Artemitos vs Artimitei.) This would fit taking TI-MI-TO as "tirminthos", for the terebinth tree (pistacia terebinthus) which served as sources for scented resin. "A-KO" meanwhile could mean "agos" for "holy ground" or more likely "agkos" for "hillside" or "glen".^[6]

Nichoria was destroyed in the same event which claimed the main palace at Pylos.^{[citation needed]}

The University of Minnesota Messenia Expedition under William Andrew McDonald surveyed the area in the 1960s, and began excavating Nichoria in 1969.^[7]