Archaeologists studying the cast-off offerings of an ancient sanctuary have unearthed pieces of a unique 2,500-year-old terra cotta statue probably meant to honor Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.
"It's a tantalizing find," said William Childs of Princeton University. "We have at least 33 pieces, the entire base and feet, and other fragments, among them an eye. But we don't know how much more we'll get."The 4-foot-high figure, wearing an ankle-length robe, is known as a "kore," or young girl, a popular 6th-century statue type. "She's unique because that type of figure is known only in marble . . . but you won't find marble in Cyprus," said Childs, director of the excavation.
Cyprus - Greek for copper - has a history dating to at least 6,000 B.C. Its copper and forests made it a prize for a long line of conquerors, including the Achaean Greeks, Assyrians, Egyptians and Persians.
The statue pieces were found under a floor "as if she'd been broken and and swept away," said Joanna Smith, who found them.
Kore figures in marble with elaborate draperies in different styles were sculpted in Greece and the Aegean islands. Many were dedicated by worshippers at the Acropolis temples in Athens.