Greek archaeologists have uncovered ruins of an ancient palace filled with striking artefacts that may belong to Sparta’s Mycenaean culture, one of the most famous civilisations of ancient Greece. The palace was uncovered near the village Xirokambi, located close to where Sparta existed in southern Greece.

The 10-room complex, called Ayios Vassileios, was filled with artefacts, including fragments of ornate murals, a cultic cup with a bull’s head, a seal emblazoned with a nautilus and several bronze swords.

The palace, which burnt to the ground in the 14th century BC, also contained several tablets written in Linear B script, the earliest known form of written Greek, the Greek Ministry of Culture said in a statement.

The discovery could shed light on an era of the Mycenaean civilisation, the Bronze Age culture that mysteriously collapsed in 1200 BC. The Mycenaeans, whose culture likely inspired Homer’s epics “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey,” rose to prominence in 1700 BC. The culture disappeared 500 years later and Greece entered a mini-dark age.

In 2009, archaeologists uncovered the remains of an ancient site that was first erected in the 17th century BC. The entire complex was likely destroyed in a fire a few hundred years later, ‘LiveScience’ reported.

The ruins, which are on a low hill on a Spartan plain that is dotted with olive trees, include what is likely the palace archive.

The fire destroyed the palatial complex and also fired the clay tablets, baking the Linear B text into permanence. So far, the team has been able to identify both male and female names, as well as records of financial dealings and religious offerings.

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