THE TREASURES OF MYCENM.

27

that they consist of the plunder of Greek cities, mingled with works
of Gothic art, and were interred with the body of some great chief of
the Heruli who, starting from the sea of Azov, invaded the Pelo-
ponnese in 267 A.D. This view of the matter has been supported by
Schultze, A. S. Murray,1 Westropp,2 and others. Mr. Murray says that
' the gold ornaments have all the character of Celtic ornamentation,
and that, instead of the zig-zag and mceander of Greek archaic art,
we find the Celtic Iriquetra and spiral.' In advocating the Gothic
origin of the treasures Stephani lays great stress on the presence of
golden butterflies, because this insect does not occur in Greek art
before the second century B.C. He seems to have overlooked the
fact that his opponents do not claim a Greek origin for the contents
of the grave. Mr. Percy Gardner 3 expressly says that ' one does not
find among them a single object of which one can unhesitatingly say
that it is of Greek origin.' Now butterflies have been found in abun-
dance on an Egyptian wall in the British Museum,4 which dates from
the fifteenth century B.C., and, as Mr. Gardner says, they may have
occurred in the art of pre-historic Asia Minor, and why not in that
of pre-historic Greece, which seems to have been nearly connected
with it ?

I am inclined, after a careful examination of the Mycenaean
treasures, to attach some weight to another argument of Stephani,
derived from the elegant form and exquisite workmanship of the
famous silver olvoyoT) (cup for ladling out wine), the bull's head of
silver with golden horns, and some of the cups of gold, which are
highly finished works of developed art, and might well form part of
the plunder of Grecian cities. There are, however, very patent objec-
tions to both the main propositions in M. Stephani's theory. It
would be strange indeed if the spoil of Greek cities contained no re-
presentation of a Greek god or man, no coins or inscriptions, nothing,
in fact, which is ttudcniably Greek; and equally strange that in the
grave of a Gothic chief there should not be a single weapon made of

1 Nineteenth Centmy, 1879.

* Athttucum, Sept. iS, 1SS0.

"In the Journal of Htllm

vol. i. p. 94.

' Mr. A. S. Murray, in the Academy,
July 3, 1SS0.