Outside the northern wall of the city, northwest of the port of Alkinou, in the present-day area of Garitsa, was the city's cemetery. In ancient times, there was an extensive, sandy beach in this area. The cemetery was used throughout the Archaic, Classical and Hellenistic periods, while during the Roman period its use was limited. During the Archaic period the dead were placed in large pithos covered with stone caps (inlays), buried directly in the ground or burned in pyres. In exceptional cases, stone enclosures were built to protect burial monuments.
Inside the graves of all types were placed clay vessels and - more rarely - objects of personal use. On the tombs were placed simple or luxurious marks that were sometimes works of art such as the "lion of Menecrates". Also worth mentioning is the circular cenotaph that was built in honor of the consul Menekrates. The image of the cemetery during the classical, Hellenistic and Roman periods is more fragmentary because the upper layers were destroyed by modern interventions. Also some classical period tombs were found in the southern area of the peninsula attesting to the view that the area of the cemetery was outside the area that extended the ancient city.
The final abandonment of the ancient city took place at the beginning of the 7th century. BC due to the barbarian raids, which led to the gradual movement of the inhabitants to the current Old Fort, for defensive reasons. The destruction that the ancient city suffered from the period mainly of the Venetian occupation and then contributed to the fact that the knowledge, which comes from the excavation, is incomplete.
Editor: Fotini Anastasopoulou