Tsuntas, Chrestos: The Mycenaean age: a study of the monuments and culture of pre-homeric Greece (London, 1897)

THE PRIVATE

HOUSE AND DOMESTIC

LIFE

73

doubtless the cheapest,

for we find great leaden

jars as

much

as three feet high, used mainly for storing grai

n. No

twith-

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^^g

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Fig. 1

& Skillet (from Vaphio)





Fig. 20. Bronze Bowl
(H. .085 m., diara. .016)

standing its cheapness, lead was not a metal adapted to

many purposes. Instead,

use was made of copper,

either pure or alloyed with

some ten per cent of tin to

form bronze. Bronze is

much the harder of the two,

and could in fact serve

nearly all the uses of iron,

so that it was employed far

more freely than copper.

Of copper, a single one of the Royal Tombs (Grave IV.)
at Mycenae yielded 34 large
jugs and caldrons — one of
the latter 2 feet 6 inches in
diameter. The copper jug
(Fig. 17) is 20 inches high
and 16 inches in diameter, and
has two handles; and six more
of the same pattern were found
in the same tomb.

Of bronze the Mycenaeans

made all their tools and cutlery,

as well as vessels and utensils

Pig. 21. Bronze Pitcher of various kinds, tripods, bowls,