In the mid 19th century archaeologists had investigated sites in the area, finding an impressive palace.

Excavation was abandoned for a time but began again in the 1930s, only to be interrupted by World War II.

But after the war the archaeologists returned in earnest, among them Turkish-born, Oxford educated Manolic Andronikos.

On November 8, 1977, 40 years ago today, he made an amazing discovery, the tomb of an ancient king.

And not just any king. Andronikos believed the evidence pointed to this being the tomb of great Macedonian leader Philip II, the father of Alexander the Great.

It was akin to the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb, although it could be argued far more important given Tutankhamun had been a relatively minor king while Philip was a major ruler who had united the city states of Macedonia, conquered the city states of what is today Greece and made it possible for his son to become one of the greatest conquerors in history.

The discovery of Philip’s tomb remains one of the great moments in archeology, although the discovery became a bone of contention, with both Greece and Macedonia claiming Philip’s remains as a national symbol.

Born in 382BC in Pella, then capital of Macedon’s kingdom (today in northern Greece), Philip was one of the younger sons of King Amyntas III.

When Amyntas died in 370BC, Philip’s older brother Alexander II came to the throne, but he was very young and easily manipulated.

He was assassinated by Ptolemy of Aloros, one of Amyntas’s envoys in 369BC.

Ptolemy seized power as regent, because Philip’s other older brother Perdiccas III was too young to rule on his own. But under Ptolemy’s rule Macedon began to crumble, threatened by outside forces.

When Perdiccas was killed battling an Illyrian invasion in 359BC the crown didn’t automatically pass to Philip, because Perdiccas had an infant son Amyntas IV.

Philip became regent and tutor to Amyntas IV, and immediately began a program of strengthening Macedonia, largely through military innovations that turned the army into a formidable force.

Before the end of the year Amyntas IV had been deposed and Philip crowned king.

With his improved army and tactics, Philip invaded Paeonia, defeated the Illyrians and either defeated other enemies or forged alliances with them, bringing them under Macedon’s influence.

Peace was made with Epirus by his marriage to the princess Olympias who bore him a son, Alexander.

After enduring years of political and military opposition from Athens, Thebes and their allies, including famously being denounced by orator Demosthenes in a series of speeches known as the Philippics, Philip defeated them at the battle of Chaeronea in 338BC.

Out of this he created an alliance known as the League of Corinth, with himself as president.

This allowed Philip to put his mind to defeating the declining Persian empire. But while he was making preparations to invade Persia’s eastern possession he was assassinated in 336BC, by Pausanias, a soldier in his bodyguard.

Philip’s funeral was the most lavish of its time. He was placed on a gold and ivory deathbed, before being burned on a funeral pyre.

His bones were later collected and placed in a golden box or ossuary known as a larnax embossed with a vivid sun symbol. The larnax was placed in an underground tomb in Aegae, which was then the capital of Macedonia.

The tomb lay undisturbed for centuries after Aegae was destroyed by the Romans in the second century BC.

The site of Macedon’s ancient capital all but forgotten until archaeologists began making discoveries in the area in the 19th century, but it was Andronikos who would make the greatest discovery.

Born in Bursa, in what is today Turkey, in 1919, his parent had fled to Thessaloniki after his birth. He studied in both Thessaloniki and Salonika before going to Oxford in 1954.

He later returned to Greece and became convinced that there were royal tombs in Vergina, where one of his university lecturers had excavated in 1937.

He began excavating a mound outside the town in 1962 and persisted over the next decade and a half.

On November 8, 1977 he literally struck gold, finding the gold ossuary which he assumed to be that of Philip II. It is now on display in the Archaeological Museum of Vergina (Royal Tombs).

Despite some early doubts that the tomb was Philips’ subsequent studies showed the bones display injuries known to have been sustained by Philip in his lifetime.