ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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The first treasure find of Lambousa is the earlier of a total of two silver treasures, which were discovered at the end of the 19th century. It was found near the ancient city of Lambousa (now Lapta), a Byzantine bishopric in Cyprus. The artifacts date from the period between the end of the 6th and the middle of the 7th century.

Fund history
Until a few years ago, the history of the first treasure of Lambousa was unclear, as there are few oral traditions and almost no writing sources for the discovery of the silver objects. To make matters worse, only a few years after the first treasure, a second was discovered, which was given greater attention by the David plates contained in it and thus eclipsed the first treasure find.

Through a letter found in the State Archives of Nicosia, some light came into the darkness. The letter sent by the then District Governor of Kyrenia, James Chamberlayne, on the 28th. December 1898 wrote to the chief secretary of the island administration, stating that the 1st Lambousa treasure was discovered by a farmer named Constati Thoma in 1897 while working on a field near the monastery Acheiropoietos.

Today the silver objects of the treasure are in the British Museum in London. The museum bought a total of 28 parts of the treasure in 1899.

Composition of the treasure
The Silver Treasure, which today is located in London, consists of a total of 28 individual parts. These include 25 silver spoons, a silver plate, a silver bowl and a hexagonal vessel that may have been used as an incense vessel.

Whether this is the entire treasure, however, is very controversial. O. M. Dalton, who dealt intensively with the first treasure find of Lambousa, already showed in the first publication of the treasure that possibly more silver objects of the treasure find existed. Thus, eleven of the total of 36 former silver spoons are said to have been lost. Marlia Mundell Mango even assumes that three more silver plates also existed, which were sold in the 1950s to the USA.

The ‘incense vessel’
This is a hexagonal object that was probably used as an incense vessel. Because the find circumstances of the treasure are controversial, the question arises here too, why the object is understood as an incense vessel. Some researchers, including O. M. Dalton, suggest that the vessel may have been an oil lamp.

The vessel is hexagonal, has a small standing foot and at the upper edge there are three eyes. The diameter of the object is 10.9 cm, it is 6.7 cm high and about 234 g heavy.
On each of the six sides is a round medallion with a portrait of a human figure on it. Each of these six people is depicted with a nimbus around the head. The medallions are made by a leaf must