Ancient Mycenae (Part 2)

Arterfacts from the Treasury of Atreus   

The last things we looked at the the museum were the golden artefacts from ‘The Treasury of Atreus’. This was actually another tholos tomb but it had remained undiscovered until relatively recently and thus had not been looted.

Treasury of Atreus 

The treasury of Atreus is a short distance away from the citadel and we actually visited the site after we had looked at the citadel. The pictures above show the complete, uncollapsed tholos.

Tholos tomb of Clytemnestra (L) and Aegisthus (lower R)   

Outside the main citadel, on the lower slopes are the remains of houses including one known as the houses of the oil merchant. Next to them were 2 more tholos tombs. The tombs of Clytemnestra (1400-1300BC) and Aegisthus (1510-1460BC), both of which had been discovered and looted.

The Lion Gate

The path then led us up to the main, monumental entrance to the fortified citadel. The Lion Gate has been named after the carving of 2 lions in the triangle above the lintel. The city walls are about 5.5m thick and up to 12m high; their construction was an amazing technical feat for the period, perhaps justifying the mythological involvement of Cyclopes.

Grave circle A   

Inside the walls we saw a circular grave area used for royalty which dates from 16^th century BC. Golden masks and artefcts discovered here during the excavation are on display in Athens.

Parts of the palace (L) and housing lower down (R)   

Next to the grave circle were various houses but higher up we started to walk amongst the remains of the palace.

Tunnel towards the underground cistern   

Over the other side of the hill we saw the houses and workshops of the craftsmen who lived in the city and at the far extremity of the citadel we were able to walk down a long passage towards an underground cistern. Without a flashlight we couldn’t get very far but a diagram showed that it continues down 18 metres underground to a natural spring. From there the water was channelled to the citadel along clay pipes. The whole of the northeast section of the citadel walls had been built to protect this vital source of fresh water.

North Gate   

Part way along this northeast section of the walls was a second entrance known, undramatically, as the North Gate. Having seen that we felt that we had explored everywhere and made our way back around the base of the citadel, though the more splendid Lions Gate and back to where we had abandoned the hire car.  Next stop – Navplion.

Ancient Mycenae, Greece