Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 1.djvu/444

The Acropolis of Athens. 417 Little is to be expected from the neighbouring heights, in that they have been submitted to a fairly thorough exploration. The defences surrounding the Acropolis, the works executed by an industrious population on the adjacent eminences, the wares collected within many a chamber of primitive sepultures, are evidences that in those early times the inhabitants of Attica were not cut ofif from the civilization which held sway over the rest, of Hellas. If their culture, as represented by the monuments they have left, cannot challenge that of Mycenae, Tiryns, and Orcho- menos, it is because the Attic rulers of that day had not the resources of the Pelopidre and of the Minyan magnates at their, disposal. Cecrops, Erechtheus, and Theseus have no status among the great Achaean families which so largely figure in the lays of the Epic bard. Athens is barely mentioned by Homer. Accordingly, it is possible that her potters and goldsmiths were not as skilful as their more favoured brethren, whose princes were served by troops of attendants and a greater reserve of the precious metals. The difference may also be accounted for from the fact that at Athens, the palace, the defensive walls, and the tombs of the first epoch have been covered by the erections of the later and greater city from age to age, when the soil was tumbled about in every direction to make room for the new buildings. In this way the graves have disappeared; and all that remains of ancient constructions are scraps of walls which the late excavations have shown to be intersected again and again by subsequent edifices.