Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/53

32 Primitive Greece : Mycenian Art. The two principal tombs at Mycenae, as well as the Treasury of Minyas, imply the co-operation of numerous and skilful hands engaged upon the work, which a prince alone could command, in order to satisfactorily carry through such enter- prises as these, with their lavish display of bronze and gold ; a monarch alone could exact from press-gangs the needful effort for setting in place enormous lintels such as those of the Treasury of Atreus. The furniture of these graves, as a rule, has not come down to us ; but the little that has been saved is suggestive of wealth which, in the social state of that early date — as reflected in the Homeric tales — was hardly to be found except with tribal chiefs. The precious metals are not rare at Menidi or Spata, and a great quantity of ivory has been picked up there. Ivory must then have been an expensive material ; out of it were made small costly objects. Besides the treasure said to have been brought out of one of the great tombs at Mycenae by Veli Pasha, M. Tsoundas discovered, in a very similar sepulchre, ornaments, engraved stones, and two goblets, in which the Mycenian goldsmith has surpassed himself. If a single second-class grave has yielded so rich a booty, what unparalleled riches must not the great tombs at Mycenae and Orchomenos have contained ere they were relieved of their contents ! Tradition, moreover, connected the buildings in ques- tion, whether in Argolis or Boeotia, with the ancient kings of the country ; and in so far as it applies to the sepulchral domes, it is perhaps entitled to more respect than when it pretended to know the names of the dead interred beneath the stelae composing the circle. The cupolas wherein it recognized the treasuries of the Atridae and Minyae did not go back to so remote a period as the mysterious pit-graves on the acropolis. The men that erected them were nearer to the classic age ; and the reigning princes of Mycenae, at the time of the Dorian invasion, may have been the descendants of those who had built them these tombs. The proportions, style of construction, and more or less elaborate ornamentation of a given tomb varied according to the power and wealth of the chief for whom it was prepared ; but whatever its importance and massive grandeur, the same methods prevailed in all.^ The site of the future tomb was selected either in the plain, ^ R. BoHN, Ueber die technische Herstellung der Tholos bci Menidi.