The Guardian of the Necropolis

1/12/2025

by M.P. Pellicer | Stranger Than Fiction Stories
She is a mystery and she has kept her secrets since her discovery in 1897. A 14-year-old boy found the statue which is a woman's head, neck and shoulders on a private estate at L'Alcudia in Valencia Spain. The icon is known as the Lady of Elche.

The Lady of Elche dates back to 4 centuries before the birth of Christ. Is she a depiction of a real person or just a representation of a Goddess?

Prior to the arrival of the Romans in the Iberian Peninsula there were several cultures that settled on the land and left their mark. This included the Iberian, Celtic, Greek, Phoenician, the Tartessian and the Carthaginian people.

In 1897, a farm worker unearthed the 21-inch bust while he was clearing a plot of land on an estate at l'Alcudia. The news of the discovery spread, and people from the town and beyond came to see the Lady. Due to popular demand, she was displayed on a balcony for all to admire.

News of the discovery came to the attention of French archaeologist Pierre Paris. The landowner soon sold the site to the archaeologist, and he arranged for its transfer to the Louvre Museum in Paris, where it was exhibited for 40 years.

The lady's headdress is reminiscent of Star War's Padmé Amidala in her royal regalia, however this limestone bust was created in the 4th century B.C., and some believe it is older than this. When it was found, it contained traces of red, white and blue decorative paint, leading to the belief that she was a priestess. The coils on either side of her face are known as rodetes, and once thought to be made of hair, proved they are part of a headdress that covers her head and neck.

The composition of the stone reveals that it was carved at L'Alcudia. There are other theories that posit that she is an Atlantean goddess, and that her elongated head and her headdress is a type of technological headgear.

The opening in the rear of the sculpture indicates it may have been used as a funerary urn, and that she was part of either a seated or standing statue.

Bust of a female figure that has been sometimes hypothesized to represent Tanit, or probably Demeter found in the Carthaginian necropolis of Puig des Molins, dated 4th century BC

There is also a theory she is a representation of Tanit, the Iberian goddess of Carthage. The goddess' consort was Baal-Hamon, however she was identified as a virginal goddess, with ties to war and fertility. After the fall of Carthage, she continued to be worshiped under the name Juno Caelestis in North Africa.

Ironically despite her ties to fertility, Baal and Tanit were given human sacrifices. This continued a tradition started by the Phoenicians, who were the ancestors of the Carthaginians. The religion of Carthage was connected with that of its mother city and is related to that practiced by the Phoenicians and Canaanites.

In 1987, relics were shipped to the American Museum of Natural History in New York that were unearthed where Carthage once stood. Present day it is a suburb of Tunis on the north African coast. Built on a promontory on the Tunisian coast, it was placed to influence and control ships passing between Sicily and the North African coast as they traversed the Mediterranean Sea.

There were beautiful mosaics, bronze figures, jewelry and more. This was seen as proof of the wealth of the merchant rulers of Carthage. Also included in the collection were cremation urns and religious items, used to sacrifice some 20,000 children from about 800 B.C. until Rome destroyed Carthage in 146 B.C.

Where Carthage once stood is considered by scholars the largest cemetery of sacrificed humans ever found. The children's bones were first discovered in 1921.

Dr. David Soren of the University of Arizona who spent years organizing the collection, observed that the Carthaginians lived a prosperous and good life but even the richest among them would give up their son or daughter to "the flames of the sacrificial pit to redeem a pledge to the gods."

The Greek author Keitarchos reported:

Out of reverence for Kronos the Phoenicians, and especially the Carthaginians, whenever they seek to obtain some great favor, vow one of their children, burning it as a sacrifice to the deity, if they are especially eager to gain success. There stands in their midst a bronze statue of Kronos, its hands extended over a bronze brazier, the flames of which engulf the child. When the flames fall upon the body, the limbs contract and the open mouth seems almost to be laughing, until the body slips quietly into the brazier.

The grave markers for these sacrificial remains were decorated with a peculiar primitive stick figure that represented this bloodthirsty goddess.

Dr. Lawrence E. Stager, professor of Middle Eastern archaeology at Harvard University said:

''Some have argued that those children died natural deaths and that the Precinct of Tanit is an ordinary cemetery, but in an ordinary Carthaginian necropolis, one finds normal proportions of both adults and children, some cremated and some not. At the Precinct of Tanit, however, there are only cremated children ranging in age from still-born fetuses to children four years old. There are also bodies of young cremated animals. The charred bones of both children and animals were buried individually in special clay urns with stone markers dedicating them by a special symbol to Tanit, the preeminent Carthaginian goddess, and to Ba'al Hammon, of whom Tanit was the consort. The graves in normal cemeteries do not have these dedicatory markers.'

Tanit with a lion's head, similar to the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet, who acted as the vengeful manifestation of Ra's power. Sekhmet is said to breathe fire, and the hot winds of the desert were likened to her breath. She is also believed to cause plagues (which were described as being her servants or messengers)

In its earliest age, Carthage sacrificed lambs and kids to Ba'al and Tanit as "substitutes for children." Excavations found that in Carthage children eventually substituted the animals, and in the 3rd century B.C. the ratio was one animal for every ten children. A high proportion of sacrificed children seem to have been sourced from the wealthy class that ruled Carthage. The rich parents were anxious to keep their estate whole instead of dividing it among several offspring. Unwanted heirs were given to the cult of Tanit.

During the Tokugawa period in Japan, child sacrifice was committed for the similar reason. This practice was known as Hitomi-goku or Hitobashira

Feudal Europe instituted the law of primogeniture to make sure an estate would pass on to only one heir.

Those who have studied Carthage, found that a secondary gain of the sacrifices was population control, since the city had become very crowded as it prospered.

The Greek geographer Strabo observed that the capital city had 800,000 people at its peak, which might have stretched food and other resources. Another factor affecting the lower production of resources was that farmers abandoned their farms in order to seek opportunity in the big city.

Punic cemetery at Carthage where evidence of infant burial is found. (Institute for the Study of the Ancient World / CC BY-SA 2.0)

In the 3rd century B.C. Carthage equaled Rome in power, but 38 years after General Hannibal wiped out Roman defenses, Rome conquered and razed Carthage. The Romans forced the Carthaginians to learn Latin and to stop human sacrifices, however they continued to worship Ba'al under the guise of the Roman god Saturn.

In 2011, archaeologists found a number of Carthaginian temples from the 4th century B.C. in the Azores (Terceira Island). They were dedicated to the goddess Tanit. The archaeologists said, "In the first temple there are four sinks linked to conduits to collect fresh water associated with ritual libations, probably for sacrificial purposes."

Lady of Elche portrayed as a standing statue

The site where the bust of the Lady of Elche was found is an archaeological site, which has found evidence of an Iberian-Punic settlement. Unearthed were Roman houses, walls and mosaics with an effigy of Saint Abdon, which belonged to a Christian basilica dating to the 5th century.

Within a short time of its discovery the bust of the Lady of Elche was bought by the Louvre and exhibited there for 40 years.

In 1939, due to the dangers of WWII, as a precaution it was taken to the Castle of Montauban near Toulouse. It was returned to Spain in 1941 during an exchange for other artifacts negotiated with France. In 1948, her image appeared on a one-peseta banknote and in 1971 she was transferred to the National Archaeological Museum of Spain, where she is currently exhibited along with other pre-Roman examples of Iberian culture.

Four years before the discovery of the Lady of Elche another limestone sculpture was unearthed in Alicante, Spain. Depicted as a sphinx with the head of a woman, a body of a winged lion and tail of a snake, it dates to the 6th-century B.C. It's believed it was also part of a necropolis and used to carry the soul of the deceased into the afterlife.

Dama de Baza

The Dama de Baza (Lady of Baza) was discovered on July 22, 1971 by Francisco Jose Presedo Velo in Altiplano de Granada, Spain. She also dates to the 4th century B.C. and was created by the Bastetani culture. The town of Baza was the site of the Ibero-Roman city of Basti and, in one of its two necropolis, the Cerro del Santuario,

Made of limestone she is based on a real Iberian woman of the upper classes. She is seated in an armchair, and her face and hands were painted in skin tones. The cloak and tunic were painted in the colors that were really worn, and she holds a blue pigeon in her left hand, a symbol of fertility also associated in the Mediterranean with Astarté and Aphrodite.

Like the Lady of Elche it's believed she was part of a funerary ensemble in a necropolis. The throne on the right is open and the cremated ashes of the deceased were deposited in the cavity. The winged and clawed throne are indicative of a goddess, like the Lady of Galera who is seated with two sphinxes on either side. The statue presides over other tombs of high characters, possibly members of the same family. Wings on the throne suggest it is a magical vehicle.

Currently, the sculpture is housed in the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid, Spain.

The chimera Bicha of Balazote and the standing Gran Dama Oferente, also called Dama del Cerro de los Santos, are exhibited in the same room of the museum.

The Lady of Galera is made of alabaster and sits on a sphinx throne holding a bowl for liquid that poured from her breasts. The statue was probably manufactured by the Phoenicians, but there is Egyptian and Mesopotamian influences. She was eventually buried as a grave code, and was discovered in Galera, a town in Granada, Spain once called Tutugi.

The Iberian Necropolis of Tutugi is located nearby in Cerro del Real. Several toms found at the site consists of rectangular chambers covered by a circular mound which is reach via a corridor. Grave goods found inside are Phoenician, Greek and Iberian vases, weapons, furniture, ornaments and figues made of alabaster and clay. They date from between the 3rd to the 6th century B.C.