Lion Gate Research Articles

Fault-related sanctuaries of Mycenae (Greece): The Shaft Grave Circle A

Mycenae, one of the most important cities and sacred sites of antiquity in Greece, was built on a tectonic horst uplifted by active normal faults, and both faults show geologic evidence of recent coseismic slip. The Lion Gate fault, affecting the west slope of Mycenae, is described here through geological and archaeoseismological investigation. The tectonic offset since the Pliocene−Pleistocene sequence is 13−14 m. A 4−5-m-high scarp of the major splay of this fault, well preserved inside the Shaft Grave Circle A, exhibits tectonic geomorphological aspects typical of recent surface faulting. Mycenae experienced two earthquakes in ∼60 yr during its climax, one around 1250 B.C. and the other around 1190 B.C. Seismic damage at Shaft Grave Circle A was found to have occurred on more than one occasion. One event occurred with the earthquake of 1190 B.C., or more likely with a much later one, which cut the circular parapet. Heavy damages were also registered with the earthquake of 1250 B.C. An episode of surface faulting appears to have occurred shortly before the early graves were created in Shaft Grave Circle A (late seventeenth century B.C., Middle/Late Helladic period). The integration of available data suggests that the cults at Mycenae, particularly at Shaft Grave Circle A, deliberately chose specific sites or traits of the seismic fault as the central hub of their main sanctuaries. This occurrence was the result of a deliberate choice dictated by the fact that those sites along the fault trace were considered to be sacred and believed to be gateways to Hades.

"Well" off in animals: A taphonomic history of faunal resources and refuse from a well feature at Petsas House, Mycenae (Greece).

At the renowned archaeological site of Mycenae, striking depictions of animals in ancient art and architecture, such as the 'Lion Gate', reflect the great power of elite residents in the Late Bronze Age. To better understand how social complexity relates to human-animal interactions at Mycenae, more research is needed on the animals who actually lived there. In a first for the archaeological site of Mycenae, we utilized a contextual taphonomic approach and statistical analysis to study a faunal assemblage, focusing on a massive deposit recovered from a well feature located in Room Π of Petsas House. Petsas House was an industrial-residential complex at Mycenae used at least in part by ceramic artisans at the time of its destruction in the Late Helladic IIIA2 period. Intra-contextual analysis of the animal remains detected sub-assemblages with variable histories of animal use and deposition. The results revealed multiple disposal events and possible dog interments. Most of the refuse in the well likely originated from rubbish piles in the surrounding rooms and periphery that were cleaned after a destructive earthquake. Together, the faunal evidence yielded a more nuanced, possibly seasonal picture of animal access than previously available at this important political center. The results provide new insights into the diverse and resilient resource provisioning strategies available to extra-palatial residents of Mycenae, especially those who participated in craft production and trade networks at the height of the palatial period.

Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo, by Gary Bruce

Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo, by Gary Bruce

Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo by Gary Bruce

Reviewed by: Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo by Gary Bruce Nigel Rothfels Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo. By Gary Bruce. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017. Pp. xii + 303. Cloth $34.95. ISBN 978-0190234980. "On a night train from Nice to Berlin in 1928, two men sat mesmerized by the companion who shared their compartment" (1). With this, a line that seems crafted more toward a work of historical fiction than a sober history of a significant cultural institution of the German capital, Gary Bruce begins his fast-paced and fascinating account of the history of the Berlin Zoo from its beginnings to today. Within a few more sentences, we discover that the "companion" was a three-year-old gorilla who would become famous as "Bobby," one in a series of celebrities exhibited at the zoo, including the elephant "Rostom," the hippopotamus "Knautschke," the polar bear "Knut," and a group of Greenland Inuit, who provide milestones in this historical journey. Bruce, who has previously written about the Stasi (The Firm, 2010), follows the reception of these personalities and also tells a broader institutional and cultural history by structuring his account around both the changing leadership of the zoo and larger historical developments in Berlin and Germany. Bruce's central contention is that a history of the Berlin Zoo can also be a history of modern Germany; that the visions of the institution's leadership as much as the fascinations of the broader public tell us a great deal more about the world outside the zoo's gates than we may have anticipated. In Bruce's hands, the broad strokes of a history of the Berlin Zoo reflect the history of the city more generally. A small cultural institution founded in the early 1840s by a group of rising intellectual leaders (including Martin Heinrich Lichtenstein, the first director, and Alexander von Humboldt), it struggled to get a foothold until the city's wealth and population rapidly expanded in the second half of the century, especially after the establishment of the empire in 1871. By the 1890s the zoo had quickly grown to a position of predominance in Germany, with arguably only one international rival, its counterpart in London. Devastated by the shortages of World War I and the struggling Weimar economy, the zoo was beginning to rise again by the 1930s when the Nazis took control of the government. Led then by Lutz Heck, a figure who found in Nazi ideology resonances with his own beliefs and interests, the zoo initially benefitted but was ultimately all but completely destroyed by that ideology. Only ninety-one animals remained alive at the zoo when the Red Army entered [End Page 402] its grounds. Out of the rubble, the zoo began to rebuild quickly and greeted over a million visitors in the first year after the war. Soon, though, the zoo would be dragged into a new ideological conflict as it was promoted against its eastern counterpart, the Tierpark Berlin. Finally, with the crumbling of the Wall, both institutions would enter a period of new uncertainties and incomplete collaborations. If the general trajectory of this history isn't surprising, Bruce's account, the first full-length history of the Berlin Zoo in English, offers intriguing and important details that have been neglected in existing German accounts. The description of the zoo from 1844 to World War I is especially strong with nuanced treatments of the intentions of the founders, the exhibitions of exotic peoples, and how the zoo became a focus for the public and the government in the wake of the founding of the empire and the assertion of colonial ambitions. Arguably the most needed and controversial section of the book deals with the enthusiasm of the leadership and staff of the zoo for Nazi ideas and the relationships between Hermann Göring and the Heck family—Ludwig Heck, director of the zoo from 1888–1931, and his sons Lutz Heck, director from 1932–1945, and Heinz Heck, director of the Hellabrunn Zoo in Munich from 1927–1969. This part of the book is welcome because ongoing efforts by the zoo's...

Van Pausanias tot Schliemann

Summary Modern*Dit artikel is geschreven ter ere van het 25 jaar bestaan van Labrys reizen. Duidelijk moge zijn dat de activiteiten van Labrys in een lange traditie van reizen staan. Hopelijk kunnen zij deze nog lang blijven voortzetten. visitors to Mycenae, which will include many classicists, are likely to wonder in amazement at the enormous stone blocks which were piled up to construct the enclosure walls, and may well pause at the Lion Gate to imagine Agamemnon leaving the citadel on his fateful journey to Troy. Modern tourists are but the most recent of generations of travelers who have made their way to this celebrated site since Antiquity. All of these visitors need to find a way to connect their mythological knowledge to the physical remains which they encounter. This article explores the tensions that exist between literary and mythical, and archaeological and material perspectives on ancient Mycenae. By examining the various ways in which visitors have attempted to make sense of the site we aim to provide a more nuanced archaeological interpretation of the ruins and their settings. We argue that meanings emerge from the interplay of mythologies and archaeological remains which are actively connected to each other.

Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo

Through the Lion Gate: A History of the Berlin Zoo

In Search of Agamemnon: Early Travellers to Mycenae

In Search of Agamemnon: Early Travellers to Mycenae

Online-Only Content

Previous articleNext article FreeOPEN ACCESS ON AJA ONLINE (www.ajaonline.org)Online-Only ContentPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreOnline-only content accompanying American Journal of ArchaeologyVolume 118, Number 3 (July 2014)SUPPLEMENTARY CONTENT Image Gallery: Cult, Continuity, and Social Memory: Mycenaean Eleusis and the Transition to the Early Iron Age, by Michael B. Cosmopoulos Image Gallery: Making the Lion Gate Relief at Mycenae: Tool Marks and Foreign Influence, by Nicholas G. Blackwell BOOK REVIEWS American Egyptologist: The Life of James Henry Breasted and the Creation of His Oriental Institute, by Jeffrey Abt. Reviewed by Eric H. Cline The Gurob Ship-Cart Model and Its Mediterranean Context, by Shelly Wachsmann. Reviewed by Assaf Yasur-Landau Hellenizing Art in Ancient Nubia 300 B.C.–AD 250 and Its Egyptian Models: A Study in “Acculturation,” by László Török. Reviewed by Alicia Cunningham-Bryant The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology. Vols. 1–2, by Daniel M. Master. Reviewed by Garth Gilmour The Horsemen of Israel: Horses and Chariotry in Monarchic Israel (Ninth–Eighth Centuries B.C.E.), by Deborah O’Daniel Cantrell. Reviewed by Carolyn Willekes Lerna, A Preclassical Site in the Argolid. Vol. 6, The Settlement and Architecture of Lerna IV, by Elizabeth C. Banks. Reviewed by Erika Weiberg Le sanctuaire d’Apollon Daphnéphoros à l’époque géométrique, by Samuel Verdan. Reviewed by Nancy L. Klein The Acropolis Through Its Museum: Wandering Among the Monuments of the Sacred Rock and the Great Achievements, by Panos Valavanis; translated by Alexandra Doumas. Reviewed by John K. Papadopoulos Reconstructing Ancient Linen Body Armor: Unraveling the Linothorax Mystery, by Gregory S. Aldrete, Scott Bartell, and Alicia Aldrete. Reviewed by Raimon Graells i Fabregat Histories of Peirene: A Corinthian Fountain in Three Millennia, by Betsey A. Robinson. Reviewed by Julian Richard Anatolian Iron Ages 7: Proceedings of the Seventh Anatolian Iron Ages Colloquium Held at Edirne, 19–24 April 2010, edited by Altan Çilingiroğlu and Antonio Sagona. Reviewed by Peter Ian Kuniholm Empire, Authority, and Autonomy in Achaemenid Anatolia, by Elspeth R.M. Dusinberre. Reviewed by Catherine M. Draycott The Aphrodisias Regional Survey, edited by Christopher Ratté and Peter D. De Staebler. Reviewed by John F. Cherry The Marble Reliefs from the Julio-Claudian Sebasteion, by R.R.R. Smith. Reviewed by Andrew Stewart Le origini degli Etruschi: Storia, archeologia, antropologia, edited by Vincenzo Bellelli. Reviewed by Eóin O’Donoghue Portraits of Children on Roman Funerary Monuments, by Jason Mander. Reviewed by Sinclair Bell List of Books Received Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by American Journal of Archaeology Volume 118, Number 3July 2014 The journal of the Archaeological Institute of America Views: 9Total views on this site Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.3764/aja.118.3.online Views: 9Total views on this site Copyright © 2014 by the Archaeological Institute of America. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Making the Lion Gate Relief at Mycenae: Tool Marks and Foreign Influence

This article considers the stoneworking techniques and implements that were employed in the production of the Lion Gate relief at Mycenae, as deduced from tool marks preserved on the sculpture. Examination of these traces has revealed previously undetected details while highlighting the indispensable roles of tubular drills and saws—especially a large pendulum saw and a smaller convex blade—in the manufacturing process. A new illustration of the relief depicts the location of all discernible tool marks and other minute features, most of which are hidden to the on-ground viewer. The analytical conclusions from this investigation substantially advance our understanding of the monument's construction. The date of the relief and sequence of its production, as well as unexpected evidence for repair during the Bronze Age, are now clear. Moreover, evaluation of the extant tool marks suggests that the relief's composition should be reconstructed as heraldic lions turning their now-missing heads backward. Finally, this article argues that specific stonecutting methods evident on the relief have strong parallels in central Anatolia, so the prospect of Hittite and Mycenaean interaction, particularly on a technological level, is appraised. Additional figures can be found under this article's abstract on AJA Online.

<sc>The Cat's Meow</sc>. Produced by Julie Baines and Carol Lewis; directed by Peter Bogdanovich; screenplay by Steven Peros (adapted from his play). 2002; color; 110 minutes. Distributed by Lion's Gate Films

<sc>The Cat's Meow</sc>. Produced by Julie Baines and Carol Lewis; directed by Peter Bogdanovich; screenplay by Steven Peros (adapted from his play). 2002; color; 110 minutes. Distributed by Lion's Gate Films

Jerusalem

Poem Jerusalem “Then keep thy heart ....” Melville, Clarel They will lift up their heads: the Lion Gate, St. Stephen’s,the New, Jaffa, and, last, the Gate of Dung. The gates will lift up their heads that the King of Glory may come in. AsJudah means “Praised,”its chief city will be more highly praised, the ramparts and the towers of David’s citadel praised and exalted. Come this far, how close the door on what not even they had strength enough to bar? The Rock, where Isaac, his wrists bound tight, saw above him a face clench in agony moments before an angel dove down to stay Abraham’s hand is now perpetual, preserved in the furnace of tradition along with that ram whose horn became the shofar. -Or is it rock as fact, one of the sights, coated with dust and roofed with a golden dome reverberant with a murmured sum expanding on the Prophet’s airborne nocturnal journey, which fixed him like a star on the cusp of the crescent moon? Just as the present-day pilgrim goes from station to station in a loud array of discount tours, tenants have reconstrued the basilica of the Holy Sepulcher as real estate for hereditary zeal to balkanize L E V I A T H A N A J O U R N A L O F M E L V I L L E S T U D I E S 1 1 3 among several sects. Each has its sharply defended square yardage of theology,but none equals that stone niche off to one side where an oil lamp’s starred wick baffles the sway of archaic shadows. The Temple abides in its myth but also in limestone fact, at least the part Roman demolition experts failed to pound into undatable rubble. Foundation Wall, you won’t be alone again, alive with the Shekhinah‘s quiet thunder, bloodwarm dovecote of fissured building blocks into which ten thousand hand-written praises or lamentations have flown. And Via Dolorosa toils south from Gabbatha’s courtyard, where a few detached centurions gave their charge the prescribed flogging before sending him on his forced march. A path useless to retrace without spiriting away two millennia or any obstacle to contemplation of punished flesh at ground zero staggering forward under a massive wooden T, palm fronds still underfoot, but dry and broken, whispering hosannas no one hears. Because a Procurator exercised available options, the name “Pilate”survives globally on the lips of millions when the Credo’s recited tenets descend into history and make it faith. What was truth? What will it be? For the condemned whose breath comes shorter and shorter, “Evendeath may prove unreal at last”-unreal, like the sound of a tree fallen to earth far from any ear, or any human ear. 114 ~ L E VI AT H A N When the body atoned to its trunk and limbs toppled out of time, did it finally become audible to his listener? To some. To Clarel, and for later pilgrims who risked as much as one step beyond doubt. No other dispatch could outdistance the silence following on that farewell to his friendwho , standing at the Place of the Skull, heard him say, “Woman,behold thy son,” as prelude to, “Beholdthy mother.” Seeing where sons of earth were bound to go, from that day forth he housed a second mother under his roof. Lift up your heads. -ALFRED CORN A J O U R N A L O F M E L V I L L E S T U D I E S 1 1 5 ...

The new research laboratories of the Museums of France

On Thursday, 16 February 1995, Jacques Toubon, the Minister of Culture and the French‐speaking Community, inaugurated the new Research Laboratory of the Museums of France in the Palais du Louvre, near the Lion's Gate of the Pavilion de Flore. The laboratory, which has 5,000 m2 of floor space, is built underground around a naturally lit shaft in the Carrousel Gardens, following a design by the architects Eric Saunter and Jérôme Brunet.

Two Statuettes from Mycenae

The destruction of by the Argives ca. 468 B.C. seems to have been so thorough that two ancient authors imply that the site was abandoned after the event. Diodorus, who tells the story of that destruction so dramatically (11.65), adds that Mycenae remained uninhabited until our day, while Strabo, echoing this impression, wrote a trace of the city was to be seen in his day (8.6.io). The work of the excavators of Mycenae, however, has proved that these authors were not accurately informed. Tsountas especially and after him Wace revealed within the citadel of abundant remnants of houses proving that the site was re-inhabited. It is definitely established that in the third century B.C. the people of Argos built a kome, a township on the hill of Mycenae. It was then that the Cyclopean walls of were patched with polygonal masonry, that the breeches made in the destruction of 468 were bridged. Within the citadel many houses were built, often using the Mycenaean retaining walls and foundations, and the temple on top of the hill was reconstructed on a larger scale. In addition, part of the ridge to the west of the citadel was enclosed by fortification walls and transformed into a Lower City. Of the public buildings in the Lower City, the remains of an imposing fountain, perhaps the Perseia of Pausanias, were cleared by Wace in 1952 and the scanty remains of a theater were revealed, built across the dromos of the so-called Tomb of Clytemnestra. None of the houses excavated was described in detail, and the pottery found in the early excavations was summarily mentioned. Of the other objects discovered only the inscriptions were carefully studied and published, and it is from these inscriptions that we learn of the abduction of the Ephebes of at the very beginning of the second century B.C. by Nabis, the King of Sparta.' Plutarch also has preserved the information that in 235 B.c. the Argive tyrant Aristippos, after an unsuccessful attack on Kleonai, was killed at Mycenae.2 No statuary from the Hellenistic era has been recorded as having been found among the ruins of the Hellenistic village. We have to bear in mind these general facts of the later history of when we try to evaluate works of art found in its ruins. The two statuettes presented here were discovered in our campaign of 1961 on the north slope of the acropolis of Mycenae. They are of small artistic merit perhaps, but since they are the only pieces of sculpture found, or at least recorded, from the Hellenistic township they may prove of some interest. We offer them as a humble tribute from to a distinguished scholar and real friend who has devoted a lifetime to the study and appreciation of Greek statuary. Both were found on the floor of a Hellenistic room built against the Mycenaean terrace wall which formed the south margin of the road leading from the Lion Gate to the foot of the north stairway of the Palace. The context will place them in the second half of the third century B.c. Figures I and 2, pl. 80, illustrate the bronze statuette found on top of fragments of an unpainted pithos lying on the floor of the room. The profile of the rim of the pithos will place it midway between the pithos' fragments from the Agora area published by Thompson,3 i.e. in the third century s.c. and probably in the second half of that century. It stands 6.5 cm. in height and is tolerably well preserved. It represents a kouros holding a phiale in his right hand and a round object in his clenched left. The phiale would seem to indicate a votary preparing to sacrifice. The beardless face and the long hair, done in a pleasant manner combining plasticity and graphic but smooth linear patterns especially noticeable in the rear view, could suggest Apollo, but the phiale indicates a votary. In spite of the fact that the face is rather crudely modeled,

Part IV. Prehistoric Cemetery: A Deposit of L.H. III Pottery

In 1939, following up the suggestion of Tsountas that Schliemann's Grave Circle with the tombs found under the houses round it had once formed part of a Prehistoric Cemetery which had been, so to speak, cut in two when the Lion Gate and Cyclopean Citadel Wall were built, we excavated an area north-west of the Lion Gate outside the walls in the hope of finding tombs belonging to the Cemetery. We were not disappointed and we found fifteen tombs ranging in date from Middle Helladic to Late Helladic II. A report of this discovery with an account of the tombs has already been published.In 1950 one of the objects of our excavation was to extend the exploration outside the Cyclopean walls of this area, now known as the Prehistoric Cemetery. The south-west corner of the area already excavated had proved to be rich in M.H. tombs (Graves XI, XIII–XV). We decided, therefore, to clear the immediately adjoining section to the south-east, where we hoped to find other graves of the Cemetery. The excavation was entrusted to Miss D. H. F. Gray, and her notebook has been freely drawn upon in the preparation of this report.The part excavated divides naturally, as will be seen by the plan (Fig. 2), into a northern and a southern division which are separated by an east–west cross–wall (A–A on the plan). This wall is the eastern continuation of a wall found in the south-western area in 1939 just to the south of Grave XIII. Immediately to the east of Grave XIII the wall is crossed by a north–south wall, B–B, at a higher level. This later wall seems almost certainly Hellenistic, for it belongs to the uppermost strata of the area which contained Hellenistic tiles, loom weights, and pottery. It runs northwards for about 2·50 m. to 3·00 m. and then returns at a right angle eastwards, C–C, forming the southern boundary of the area excavated in 1939. The return at its east end runs into another, rather irregular north–south Hellenistic wall, D–D, which we took as the limit of our excavations in this direction.

Introduction; and Addendum

In 1956 the Greek Archaeological Council decided that there should be no excavations at Mycenae. The Anastelosis Department was still busy with the rebuilding of the Cyclopean walls of the Citadel along the western side and along the stretch of ashlar work in conglomerate from the Lion Gate to the north-western angle. At the actual north-western angle the Cyclopean work of the northern wall of the acropolis had originally met the conglomerate work in ashlar with a straight vertical joint. This has now been obscured in the rebuilding. The Archaeological Service was also planning and preparing to put into effect various measures to protect the site from damage by the large numbers of tourists who visit it every year.Since we were thus not able to excavate, we devoted ourselves to studying and preparing for publication the finds from the excavations of previous years in the museums at Athens and Nauplia. In Athens the Director of the National Museum, Dr. Karouzos, and his wife, Mrs. Semne Karouzou, made us very welcome and afforded us every possible facility. Mrs. Sakellariou and Mr. Papathanasopoulos, assistant curators in the museum, also gave us much friendly help. At Nauplia Mr. N. Verdeles, the Inspector of Antiquities, and Miss Protonotariou, the Epimeletes, made special arrangements for our work and gave us every support.

Part I. Neolithic Mycenae

Stamatakes's excavations in the Grave Circle area revealed, although it was not recognized until much later, that Mycenae had been inhabited in the Early Bronze Age, the Early Helladic Period. This was confirmed by subsequent researches which produced Early Helladic material from the foot of the Ramp, outside the Grave Circle, beneath the South House and below the Palace. Now the recent work of Dr. Papademetriou and ourselves has yielded fresh evidence. He has found more E.H. material in Schliemann's Grave Circle and some possible Neolithic sherds as well. In the area of the Prehistoric Cemetery outside the Cyclopean walls to the north-west of the Lion Gate we have found in a mixed unstratified layer at the eastern foot of the mound or tumulus which covered the dome of the ‘Tomb of Aegisthus’ many fragments of E.H. pottery, both decorated and plain. Since the plain E.H. ware found is of a simple, thickish fabric hand-polished and usually of a dull red or of a mud colour, we had at times wondered whether some of these fragments might not almost be classed as Neolithic. This was especially so in the case of some of the fragments from the lowest strata at the foot of the Ramp. Unfortunately these fragments were lost during the war in the Nauplia Museum and cannot now be checked.The discovery of Neolithic B pottery at the Argive Heraeum, and still more recently Dr. Caskey's most successful excavations at Lerna, encouraged us in the idea that a site like Mycenae was probably inhabited in Neolithic times also. Since the Early Helladic material is not stratified, except in areas like the foot of the Ramp or below the South House, it was hardly to be expected that Neolithic remains, if found, would be stratified. It is always possible, however, that some part of the site, not yet explored, may have escaped later disturbance or overbuilding. We have therefore now paid particular attention to the unstratified debris found above the Prehistoric Cemetery at the eastern foot of the Aegisthus mound. Among this we have found two sherds which are in our opinion almost certainly Neolithic.

Part II. The Prehistoric Cemetery: Graves below The House of the Warrior Vase

The exploration of the Grave Circle within the Cyclopean Walls near the Lion Gate, which we began in 1920, resulted in the discovery or identification of several groups of graves, which led us to the conclusion that a Prehistoric Cemetery had lain on the hillside at this point before the fortifications were constructed and that the Shaft Graves were a group of royal graves enclosed within that cemetery.In 1939, following a suggestion made by Tsountas, we explored the area to the north-west of the Lion Gate outside the walls and found there fifteen graves belonging to the Prehistoric Cemetery which was in use from Middle Helladic to Late Helladic II times. Subsequent exploration outside the walls in this region has resulted in the discovery of yet more graves, and those so far noted and explored outside the walls now number forty. To these we should probably add one more, a disturbed grave found recently by the Anastelosis Section of the Greek Archaeological Service in its operations at the north-west angle of the bastion on the west of the entrance to the Lion Gate.

Thucydides as Archaeologist

In i.1–21 Thucydides gives a brief interpretation of early Greek history. This is important not only for the critical standard of its author, but also because in ten instances he says what his evidence is. Twice his evidence is archaeological. The two passages deserve careful study.Mycenae had been destroyed by the Argives in the 460's and was deserted till the third century B.C. Thanks to modern archaeologists and Pausanias we can form some idea of what was to be seen in the time of Thucydides. Much of the Bronze Age wall, including the Lion Gate, should have been above ground; it was anyhow visible to Pausanias, and before him the Hellenistic fortifiers had made use of it. Some of the tholos tombs were open, to judge by finds made in their excavation and by Pausanias's mention of ‘underground treasuries of Atreus and his sons’. Of the Bronze Age palace and houses nothing was left above ground, so the stratification suggests. But the ruins of the city demolished in the 460's must still have survived, and its sanctuaries may have been intact; it would have been natural enough for the Argives to spare them, and there is some positive evidence that the temple on the summit of Mycenae and the sanctuary near the fountain house outside the Lion Gate were both kept in repair and that the Agamemnoneion over half a mile to the south was still visited.

Part VI. The Cyclopean Terrace Building and the Deposit of Pottery beneath It

The Cyclopean Terrace Building lies to the north-west of the Lion Gate on the northern end of the Panagia Ridge and faces almost due west across the valley of the Kephissos and modern main road from Corinth to Argos. It lies just below the 200 m. contour line, and one terrace below the houses excavated in 1950–51 by Dr. Papadimitriou and Mr. Petsas to the east at the same end of the ridge. The area contains a complex of buildings, both successive and contemporary, and in view of the discovery of structures both to the south-west and, by the Greek Archaeological Service, to the north-east it is likely that this whole slope was covered by a portion of the outer town of Mycenae. This report will deal only with the structure to which the name Cyclopean Terrace Building was originally given, the so-called ‘North Megaron’, supported by the heavy main terrace wall.The excavation of this structure was begun in 1923. The main terrace wall was cleared and two L.H. IIIC burials discovered in the top of the fill in the south room. In 1950 it was decided to attempt to clear this building entirely in an endeavour to find out its date and purpose. The clearing was not, however, substantially completed until the close of the 1953 excavation season, and this report presents the available evidence for the date as determined by the pottery found beneath the building; the purpose is still a matter for study, though various tentative conclusions can be put forward.

Mycenae, 1953

The British excavations at Mycenae in 1953 had the following main objectives: the further exploration of the Prehistoric Cemetery outside the Cyclopean walls to the west of the Lion Gate, the area south of the Perseia Krene where a fine wall of ashlar poros was discovered in 1952, the houses to the north and south of the House of the Oil Merchant, and further investigation of the Cyclopean Terrace Building. At the same time work was begun on the excavation of the area within the Acropolis between the South House and Tsountas' House. The excavations were supported by a research grant from the American Philosophical Society, with contributions from the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford, the British Academy, the Bollingen Foundation, and the British School at Athens, under whose aegis the work was conducted.In the Prehistoric Cemetery several tombs of the Middle Helladic period were discovered. On the northern edge of the cemetery an interesting group of graves was found, one of the latest Mycenaean period, L.H. IIIC, and two of the developed Geometric period. With the larger of the latter, a cist grave, nineteen vases were found which included undecorated vases of excellent fabric and a shallow bowl of ‘Pie Ware’ which demonstrate the contemporaneity of these styles. These vases, together with two others from a Proto-Geometrie grave dug into the ruins of the House of Shields, form a series illustrating the gradual evolution of culture at Mycenae from the end of the Bronze Age into the Iron Age. They show that there was no sudden break in its development, but only a slow evolution as in Attica. The ‘Dorian Invasion’ was not a cultural revolution.