DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1021#0134
THE DWELLINGS OF THE DEAD 91
was strewn with small gold leaves, of which more than half
a pound were gathered up.
The mere inventory is enough, to show the barbaric splen-
dor which went with the Mycenaean to his tomb, but for a
clear conception of ancient burial one should see the tomb
itself with its tenants and their offerings about them. This
every visitor to Athens may do, for in the National Museum
Grave VI. (discovered by Stamatakes) has been reproduced
(so to speak), and its occupants — two men — there lie out-
stretched on their pebble bed, with their drinking-cups at
hand and their armory in reach, while great vases are ranged
about their feet.
We now proceed to a general study of this Royal Ceme-
tery and the questions raised in connection with it. And
first, of the monuments.
The stelae are of soft shelly limestone (a sort of poros
composed of countless minute shells), and so easily cut, but
at the same time easily fractured. Schuchhardt The Tomb-
has undertaken to show " that only the graves of 3tones
the men were marked by sculptured slabs with reliefs rep-
resenting occupations which belong exclusively to men,
whilst the graves of women only received modest polished
stones." This is doubtless true, though even the men's
graves are not invariably distinguished in this way. At
any rate, according to Stamatakes, the sixth grave, in which
men were undoubtedly buried, was marked by an unsculp-
tured slab. Beside the four sculptured stones found in
plaee (one on Grave IT. and three on Grave V.) Dr. Tsountas
found a fifth at a depth of five feet near the polygonal
tower; and there must have been more, for some thirty
sculptured fragments have been found within and without
the circle — a third of the number showing parts of figure-
subjects.
was strewn with small gold leaves, of which more than half
a pound were gathered up.
The mere inventory is enough, to show the barbaric splen-
dor which went with the Mycenaean to his tomb, but for a
clear conception of ancient burial one should see the tomb
itself with its tenants and their offerings about them. This
every visitor to Athens may do, for in the National Museum
Grave VI. (discovered by Stamatakes) has been reproduced
(so to speak), and its occupants — two men — there lie out-
stretched on their pebble bed, with their drinking-cups at
hand and their armory in reach, while great vases are ranged
about their feet.
We now proceed to a general study of this Royal Ceme-
tery and the questions raised in connection with it. And
first, of the monuments.
The stelae are of soft shelly limestone (a sort of poros
composed of countless minute shells), and so easily cut, but
at the same time easily fractured. Schuchhardt The Tomb-
has undertaken to show " that only the graves of 3tones
the men were marked by sculptured slabs with reliefs rep-
resenting occupations which belong exclusively to men,
whilst the graves of women only received modest polished
stones." This is doubtless true, though even the men's
graves are not invariably distinguished in this way. At
any rate, according to Stamatakes, the sixth grave, in which
men were undoubtedly buried, was marked by an unsculp-
tured slab. Beside the four sculptured stones found in
plaee (one on Grave IT. and three on Grave V.) Dr. Tsountas
found a fifth at a depth of five feet near the polygonal
tower; and there must have been more, for some thirty
sculptured fragments have been found within and without
the circle — a third of the number showing parts of figure-
subjects.