Mycenae, 1968

Abstract

The principal object of the campaign was to demolish the great baulk that had purposely been left unexcavated from the very beginning to provide a record of the stratigraphy of the site.* This earth was now required by the Restoration Department of the Greek Archaeological Service to secure and safeguard the mud brick walls that were destroyed in a great fire in Late Helladic IIIB towards the end of the 13th century BC. The intensity of the fire had served to preserve these walls in their original state, though off axis, and they are the most complete examples of their kind on any Mycenaean site. The second object of the excavation was to uncover the rest of the plan of the LH IIIB walls which in the western sector of the site are buried below the postdestruction walls of LH IIIB/IIIC. The second objective was only in part accomplished because of the remarkable and outstanding finds that were brought to light, mostly under the great baulk. The work of their recovery sIowed down the excavation considerably. At the east central end of the great baulk a small room, c. 2 m. x 2 m., was uncovered that was filled with a great variety of clay objects in considerable disarray (PL. xra; see plan, FIG. I,I). Outstanding among these were idols from 0.50 to 0.60 m. in height of a kind that had never been found on the Greek mainland before, although somewhat similar examples are known from Gazi in Crete [I]