Ancient Thrace Comes to the Getty Villa Museum
November 2024 | Vol. 12.11
By Sara E. Cole and Jens Daehner
The Getty Villa Museum’s current special exhibition, Ancient Thrace and the Classical World: Treasures from Bulgaria, Romania, and Greece, is on view now through March 3, 2025 in Los Angeles. The region of Thrace and its people — the Thracians — are a place and a culture that many museum visitors may never have heard of, but this exhibition argues that Thrace should be on everyone’s radar, and that a deeper knowledge and appreciation of Thrace is integral to understanding Mediterranean antiquity.
Gilded Silver Jug with a Goddess on a Panther from the Rogozen Treasure. 340-300 BCE. Vratsa, Regional Historical Museum, B 447. Photo: Getty Villa Museum.
Ancient Thrace at the Getty
Ancient Thrace and the Classical World is the first US exhibition to focus on Thrace since the 1990s, and it is the first to be hosted on the West Coast, reaching LA-based and visiting audiences both domestic and international. Featuring loans from fourteen different Bulgarian museums, it is the result of a collaboration between the Getty and the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Bulgaria as well as the National Archaeological Institute with Museum at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, with additional significant loans from Romania and Greece.
Many visitors may approach the exhibition with an obvious question: where and what is Thrace?
The ancient land of Thrace lay north of the Aegean Sea, in an area that now comprises Bulgaria and parts of Romania, Greece, and Turkey (Türkiye). The Thracians had their own language but left precious few written records, and much of what we know today depends on brief, often biased accounts from ancient Greek authors, particularly Herodotus and Thucydides. Archaeological discoveries made in the region of Thrace since the early twentieth century provide firsthand evidence of Thracian history and society, and the exhibition emphasizes how the material record can allow us to approach the Thracians on their own terms. Spectacular grave goods, treasure hoards, and other finds illuminate Thrace’s rich resources and varied artistic achievements, as well as its unique geographical position at the nexus of many different regions and cultures. The exhibition features over 200 artifacts and covers a period from approximately 1500 BCE to 200 CE, from the origins of the Thracians in the Bronze Age to the region’s annexation as a province of the Roman Empire.
The exhibition is the third in a Getty initiative called The Classical World in Context (CWC). This series of major international loan exhibitions, publications, and related programming uses the Getty Villa Museum’s permanent collection of Greek, Roman, and Etruscan art as a launching point to ask how those cultures interacted with and were influenced by the diverse peoples and civilizations of the ancient world. Previous CWC exhibitions looked at Egypt (2018) and Persia (2022). A major narrative thrust of the exhibition is therefore Thrace’s relationships with its many neighbors: Greece and the North Aegean to the south; Asia Minor and the Persian Empire to the east; the semi-nomadic peoples of the Eurasian Steppe to the north; central Europe and Rome to the west.
The Early Thracians
When did the Thracians become the Thracians? Their ancestors migrated from the Eurasian Steppe to settle in present-day Bulgaria, where a distinctive Thracian culture emerged around the Late Bronze Age (about 1500 BCE, give or take). The early Thracians were divided into tribal groups and were known as skilled horsemen and fierce warriors. They had contacts with the Mycenaean Greeks and the people of central Europe. Several bronze swords on display, made in Thrace, derive from both sources. Local tribes in southern Thrace worked the copper mines, manufacturing a variety of objects and trading copper ingots. Thrace was also rich in gold, and Thracian metalworkers produced highly original vessels. Perhaps the best known example of this is the Valchitran Treasure — a group of solid gold vessels and lids named for its place of discovery in Bulgaria in 1924.
Gold Tripartite Vessel from the Valchitran Treasure. About 1500-1000 BCE. Sofia, National Archaeological Institute with Museum, 3203. Photo: Getty Villa Museum.
As early as the Bronze Age, Greeks traveled north to Thrace to access its rich deposits of gold, silver, and copper. During the 600s and 500s BCE, Greek settlers — mostly from Miletos in Ionia (present-day western Turkey) — founded new cities in Thracian territories on the North Aegean and Black Sea coasts. Artifacts in the exhibition come from the Greek colonies of Mesembria and Apollonia Pontica in what is now Bulgaria, and the island of Samothrace and its mainland territory of Zone in the North Aegean. Greeks also established smaller trading posts inland, such as at the site of Pistiros. Amid ongoing violent conflict and negotiations with local Thracians, the settlements often prospered through trade and metalworking. Surviving inscriptions, most in Greek, from throughout Thrace record terms of their agreements with Thracian residents and rulers.
Greek Red-Figure Jug with Thracian Warriors (two views). About 425 BCE. Karnobat, Historical Museum, 447. Photo: Getty Villa Museum.
Thrace also caught the attention of neighbors to the east. The powerful and rapidly expanding Achaemenid Persian Empire reached Thrace in 513 BCE, when King Darius I and his army advanced northward along the Black Sea coast. Darius subjugated the various Thracian tribes he encountered and established military garrisons. Many Thracians were sent to work on the construction of the new Achaemenid capital at Persepolis (in southwestern Iran), and some reliefs there depict the Thracians as a subject people of the empire.
Thrace served as a staging ground for the Persian king Xerxes I’s invasion of Greece in 480 BCE, in which Thracians fought on the Persian side. Following the Greeks’ victories against the Persians in 480-479 BCE, the Achaemenid army retreated through Thrace, leaving only a small Persian presence there. The wealth and luxury of the Persians, however, made a lasting impression on the Thracians, who continued the Achaemenid practice of using gold and silver vessels at lavish banquets as a symbol of aristocratic status.
Gilded Silver Amphora. 475-450 BCE. Sofia, National Archaeological Institute with Museum, 6137. Photo: Getty Villa Museum.
The Odrysian Kingdom
Following the Persians’ withdrawal from Thrace in 479 BCE, the local rulers of the Odrysai tribe grew more powerful. They united many of the Thracian peoples under the Odrysian kingdom, which flourished from the fifth to the early third century BCE and had close ties to Greece, particularly Athens. Around 330 BCE, the Odrysian king Seuthes III established the capital city of Seuthopolis (in central Bulgaria). North of it lay the so-called Valley of the Thracian Kings, where rulers and aristocrats displayed their wealth and authority by erecting stone tombs covered by enormous mounds of earth.
These tombs were opulently furnished with armor, gold and silver drinking vessels, Athenian painted pottery and other luxury imports from Greece, and precious metal horse trappings. Teams of horses were often sacrificed and buried at the entrance of the tombs. Most of the graves were robbed in antiquity, but archaeologists have discovered several intact, and a number of these funerary assemblages can be seen in the exhibition.
Gilded Silver Greave (Shin guard). About 350-325 BCE. Vratsa, Regional Historical Museum, B 231. Photo: Getty Villa Museum.
Most notable among them are the finds from the tomb of king Seuthes III. Excavated in central Bulgaria in 2004, the royal tomb of the Golyama Kostmatka burial mound counts among Europe’s most spectacular archaeological discoveries of the twenty-first century. Found remarkably intact, the burial chamber contained the richest assemblage of grave goods uncovered in any tomb in ancient Thrace. Greek inscriptions on a helmet and two silver vessels name Seuthes III, who reigned over the Odrysian kingdom from about 330 to 300/295 BCE. An exceptional bronze portrait of the ruler was set up outside the tomb. Since no human remains were found, this may have been a symbolic rather than physical burial of the king.
Bronze Portrait of Seuthes III. About 310-300 BCE. Sofia, National Archaeological Institute with Museum, 8594.
Although the Thracian heartland was located in what is today central Bulgaria, Thracian tribes also occupied a significant portion of present-day Romania. Settlements lay on the banks of the Danube River (the ancient Istros), and rich tombs have been discovered about a hundred miles farther north. The silver and gold objects found near the Romanian village of Agighiol are from a fourth-century BCE aristocratic burial mound. They date to the era of the Odrysian kingdom and bear similarities to metalwork in southern Thrace, showing that the various Thracian tribes were in close contact during this period.
Gilded Silver Helmet. About 350-300 BCE. Bucharest, National History Museum of Romania, 11181.
Some of the most famous treasure hoards found in Thracian territory are on display. Many of the precious metal objects from Thrace were uncovered by chance, found buried in the ground without any recognizable context such as a settlement or tomb. These treasures were evidently hidden by their owners at times of political turmoil and were never reclaimed, but the specific circumstances of their burial remain unknown. Some of the most remarkable discoveries that visitors will see are a set of nine gold vessels from Panagyurishte, several silver vessels from Rogozen, and gilt-silver horse trappings from Letnitsa and Galiche (all in Bulgaria).
Gold Amphora-Rhyton from the Panagyurishte Treasure. Late 4th – early 3rd century BCE. Plovdiv, Regional Archaeological Museum.
The contents of these treasure hoards correspond to the items excavated in rich tombs from the same period. They reflect the elite lifestyle of the Thracian aristocrats, who banqueted with opulent vessels, wore luxurious adornments, and rode lavishly bedecked horses. Such objects served as status symbols as well as stores of wealth.
Gilded Silver Phiale from the Rogozen Treasure. About 400-350 BCE. Vratsa, Regional Historical Museum, B 465.
Thrace and Rome
And finally, the exhibition concludes with several artifacts from Roman Thrace. Ancient historians record numerous clashes between Rome and Thracian groups, but Thracians sometimes served as Roman allies. In the mid-second century BCE, the Roman Republic expanded its territory to the north of Greece and reached the borders of Thrace. The first Roman emperor, Augustus (ruled 17 BCE – 14 CE), incorporated the Thracian tribes in a single kingdom subservient to Rome. Thracian revolts were unsuccessful, and around 46 CE the emperor Claudius annexed the region of Thrace as a Roman province called Thracia.
The Thracian people increasingly spoke Latin and participated in Roman imperial institutions, but many local cultural traditions continued. Thracian names, alongside newly Romanized ones, are well attested in funerary and honorific inscriptions. Luxury practices like the use of gold and silver vessels persisted, as did the aristocratic Thracian custom of burying sacrificed horses, along with their carriages and trappings, in elite tombs.
Funerary Stele of Iulia. 2nd century CE. Burgas, Regional Historical Museum, 521.
The exhibition is accompanied by a richly illustrated catalogue, available from Getty Publications.
Sara E. Cole is Associate Curator of Antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.
Jens Daehner is Acting Senior Curator of Antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.
Learn more about Ancient Thrace from Dr. Sara Cole by tuning into the Friends of ASOR webinar on December 4 – click here to register!
How to cite this article:
Cole, S. and J. Daehner. 2024. “Ancient Thrace Comes to the Getty Villa Museum.” The Ancient Near East Today 12.11. Accessed at: https://anetoday.org/ancient-thrace-getty/.
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