In Paroikia, Paros island, the main cemetery of the ancient town, which had been in use from the late eighth to the third second century B.C., came to light. The area started to be used in the last decades of eighth century, when, after a battle two large trenches were dug for the burial of the urns holding the cremated bones of about 160 men. Two of these vessels are decorated with war scenes, which present iconographic data unknown from such an early period, therefore they essentially reform our knowledge about the beginning of ancient Greek painting.