Lumbarda Psephisma is a stone inscription telling about the founding of a Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

 settlement on the island of Korčula

Korcula

Korčula is an island in the Adriatic Sea, in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County of Croatia. The island has an area of ; long and on average wide — and lies just off the Dalmatian coast. Its 16,182 inhabitants make it the second most populous Adriatic island after Krk...

, in modern-day Croatia

Croatia

Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...

. The Psephisma is from Lumbarda

Lumbarda

Lumbarda is a small village and a municipality located on the Eastern Cape of the Island of Korčula in Croatia, 7 kilometers away from the town of Korcula. A road passing through a picturesque area of pine woods and olive groves connects these two places...

, a small village where it was discovered in 1877 by Božo Kršinić. The Lumbarda Psephisma is kept in the Archaeological Museum

Archaeological Museum, Zagreb

The Archaeological Museum in Zagreb, Croatia is an archaeological museum with over 450,000 varied artifacts and monuments, gathered from various sources.Some of the famous artifacts include:...

 in Zagreb

Zagreb

Zagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...

.

The stone inscription

The stone inscription has a written decree that details the agreement surrounding the establishment of a Greek colony in the 3rd century or 4th Century BC

Anno Domini

and Before Christ are designations used to label or number years used with the Julian and Gregorian calendars....

. The text provides information on the Greeks from the island of Issa, today known as Vis

Vis (island)

Vis is the most outerly lying larger Croatian island in the Adriatic Sea, and is part of the Central Dalmatian group of islands, with an area of 90.26 km² and a population of 3,617 . Of all the inhabited Croatian islands, it is the farthest from the coast...

. The Greeks established a settlement on the basis of a prior agreement with the representatives of the local Illyrians

Illyrians

The Illyrians were a group of tribes who inhabited part of the western Balkans in antiquity and the south-eastern coasts of the Italian peninsula...

 who were Pil and his son Daz.

"During the time of Hijescomnamon Praksidan, in the Mahanej month, the contract about the founding of the settlement was drawn up between the people from Issa and Pil and his son Diaz. The founders agreed and the people decided: that those who first took the land and walled the town would get special sites for building inside the fortified town ...and that the authorities swear that the town and the land will never again be divided .. ."

The Lumbarda Psephisma was discovered on the top of the hill called Koludrt. It is understood that is where the Issian town most likely once stood.
The stone inscription ends with 200 names of Greek families. This valuable document is the oldest found on the territory of Croatia. It places the Illyrians on the island of Korčula and is an insight into the Greeks setting up colonies throughout Dalmatia

Dalmatia

Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....

. The colonies were set up so the Greeks could trade with the Illyrians. There is no evidence to suggest that the two communities interacted on a larger scale but rather kept to themselves. The Illyrians who had lived their ancient ways in the region for centuries would have been a sharp contrast to the Greeks Hellinic way of doing things with their urban culture and social organization. Nevertheless the two communities lived peacefully until the Illyrian Wars

Illyrian Wars

Illyrian Wars were a set of conflicts of 229 BC, 219 BC and 168 BC when Rome overran the Illyrian settlements and suppressed the piracy that had made the Adriatic unsafe for Italian commerce. There were three campaigns, the first against Teuta, the second against Demetrius of Pharos and the third...

  with the Romans

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

.

Greek Colonies

Based on historical facts there were two Greek Colonies on Korčula. Periegesis in the 1st century mentions a Greek Cnidian colony on island Black Kerkyra (Korčula) Greek colonists from Corcyra (Corfu

Corfu

Corfu is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the second largest of the Ionian Islands, and, including its small satellite islands, forms the edge of the northwestern frontier of Greece. The island is part of the Corfu regional unit, and is administered as a single municipality. The...

) formed a small colony on the island in the 6th century B.C. Black Corfu (Korčula) was named after their homeland and, the black was added to reflect the dense cyprus

Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...

and pine-woods on Korčula itself. Archeological finds are numerous, including carved marble tombstones, ceramics and foundations of Greek villas. These artifacts can be found in the town of Korčula's island museum.