BURIED CITIES, Part 3 MYCENAE BY JENNIE HALL Author of "Four Old Greeks, " Etc. Instructor in History and English inthe Francis W. Parker School, Chicago With Many Drawings and Photographs From Original Sources The publishers are grateful to the estate of Miss Jennie Hall and to hermany friends for assistance in planning the publication of this book. Especial thanks are due to Miss Nell C. Curtis of the Lincoln School, New York City, for helping to finish Miss Hall's work of choosing thepictures, and to Miss Irene I. Cleaves of the Francis Parker School, Chicago, who wrote the captions. It was Miss Katharine Taylor, now ofthe Shady Hill School, Cambridge, who brought these stories to ourattention. FOREWORD: TO BOYS AND GIRLS Do you like to dig for hidden treasure? Have you ever found Indianarrowheads or Indian pottery? I knew a boy who was digging a cave ina sandy place, and he found an Indian grave. With his own hands heuncovered the bones and skull of some brave warrior. That brown skullwas more precious to him than a mint of money. Another boy I knew wasmaking a cave of his own. Suddenly he dug into an older one made yearsbefore. He crawled into it with a leaping heart and began to explore. Hefound an old carpet and a bit of burned candle. They proved that someone had lived there. What kind of a man had he been and what kindof life had he lived--black or white or red, robber or beggar oradventurer? Some of us were walking in the woods one day when we saw abone sticking out of the ground. Luckily we had a spade, and we set towork digging. Not one moment was the tool idle. First one bone and thenanother came to light and among them a perfect horse's skull. We felt asthough we had rescued Captain Kidd's treasure, and we went home drapedin bones. Suppose that instead of finding the bones of a horse we had uncovered agold-wrapped king. Suppose that instead of a deserted cave that boyhad dug into a whole buried city with theaters and mills and shops andbeautiful houses. Suppose that instead of picking up an Indian arrowheadyou could find old golden vases and crowns and bronze swords lying inthe earth. If you could be a digger and a finder and could choose yourfind, would you choose a marble statue or a buried bakeshop with breadtwo thousand years old still in the oven or a king's grave filled withgolden gifts? It is of such digging and such finding that this booktells. CONTENTS 1. How a Lost City Was Found _Pictures of Mycenæ_: The Circle of Royal Tombs Doctor and Mrs. Schliemann at Work The Gate of Lions Inside the Treasury of Atreus The Interior of the Palace Gold Mask; Cow's Head The Warrior Vase Bronze Helmets; Gem Bronze Daggers Carved Ivory Head; Bronze Brooches A Cup from Vaphio Gold Plates; Gold Ornament Mycenæ in the Distance MYCENAE HOW A LOST CITY WAS FOUND Thirty years ago a little group of people stood on a hill in Greece. Thehilltop was covered with soft soil. The summer sun had dried the grassand flowers, but little bushes grew thick over the ground. In this waythe hill was like an ordinary hill, but all around the edge of it ranthe broken ring of a great wall. In some places it stood thirty feetabove the earth. Here and there it was twenty feet thick. It was builtof huge stones. At one place a tower stood up. In another two stonelions stood on guard. It was these ruined walls that interested thepeople on the hill. One of the men was a Greek. A red fez was on hishead. He wore an embroidered jacket and loose white sleeves. A stiffkilted skirt hung to his knees. He was pointing about at the wall andtalking in Greek to a lady and gentleman. They were visitors, come tosee these ruins of Mycenae. "Once, long, long ago, " he was saying, "a great city was inside thesewalls. Giants built the walls. See the huge stones. Only giants couldlift them. It was a city of giants. See their great ovens. " He pointed down the hill at a doorway in the earth. "You cannot see wellfrom here. I will take you down. We can look in. A great dome, built ofstone, is buried in the earth. A passage leads into it, but it is filledwith dirt. We can look down through the broken top. The room inside isbigger than my whole house. There giants used to bake their bread. Oncea wicked Turk came here. He was afraid of nothing. He said, 'The giants'treasure lies in this oven. I will have it. ' So he sent men down. Butthey found only broken pieces of carved marble--no gold. " While the guide talked, the gentleman was tramping about the walls. Hepeered into all the dark corners. He thrust a stick into every hole. Herubbed the stones with his hands. At last he turned to his guide. "You are right, " he said. "There was once a great city inside thesewalls. Houses were crowded together on this hill where we stand. Men andwomen walked the streets of a city that is buried under our feet, butthey were not giants. They were beautiful women and handsome men. "It was a famous old city, this Mycenae. Poets sang songs about her. Ihave read those old songs. They tell of Agamemnon, its king, and hiswar against Troy. They call him the king of men. They tell of hisgold-decked palace and his rich treasures and the thick walls of hiscity. "But Agamemnon died, and weak kings sat in his palace. The warriors ofMycenae grew few, and after hundreds of years, when the city was old andweak, her enemies conquered her. They broke her walls, they threw downher houses, they drove out her people. Mycenae became a mass of emptyruins. For two thousand years the dry winds of summer blew dust over herpalace floors. The rains of winter and spring washed down mud from heracropolis into her streets and houses. Winged seeds flew into the cracksof her walls and into the corners of her ruined buildings. There theysprouted and grew, and at last flowers and grass covered the ruins. Now only these broken walls remain. You feed your sheep in the city ofAgamemnon. Down there on the hillside farmers have planted grain aboveancient palaces. But I will uncover this wonderful city. You shall see!You shall see how your ancestors lived. "Oh! for years I have longed to see this place. When I was a little boyin Germany my father told me the old stories of Troy, and he told me ofhow great cities were buried. My heart burned to see them. Then, onenight, I heard a man recite some of the lines of Homer. I loved thebeautiful Greek words. I made him say them over and over. I wept becauseI was not a Greek. I said to myself, 'I will see Greece! I will studyGreek. I will work hard. I will make a bankful of money. Then I willgo to Greece. I will uncover Troy-city and see Priam's palace. Iwill uncover Mycenae and see Agamemnon's grave. ' I have come. I haveuncovered Troy. Now I am here. I will come again and bring workmen withme. You shall see wonders. " He walked excitedly around and around theruins. He told stories of the old city. He asked his wife to recitethe old tales of Homer. She half sang the beautiful Greek words. Herhusband's eyes grew wet as he listened. This man's name was Dr. Henry Schliemann. He kept his word. He wentaway but he came again in a few years. He hired men and horse-carts. Herented houses in the little village. Myceae was a busy place again afterthree thousand years. More than a hundred men were digging on the topof this hill. They wore the fezes and kilts of the modern Greek. Littletwo-wheeled horse-carts creaked about, loading and dumping. Some of the men were working about the wall near the stone lions. "This is the great gate of the city, " said Dr. Schliemann. "Here theking and his warriors used to march through, thousands of years ago. Butit is filled up with dirt. We must clear it out. We must get down to thevery stones they trod. " But it was slow work. The men found the earth full of great stoneblocks. They had to dig around them carefully, so that Dr. Schliemannmight see what they were. "How did so many great stones come here?" they said among themselves. Then Dr. Schliemann told them. He pointed to the wall above the gate. "Once, long, long ago, " he said, "the warriors of Mycenae stood upthere. Down here stood an army--the men of Argos, their enemies. The menof Argos battered at the gate. They shot arrows at the men of Mycenae, and the men of Mycenae shot at the Argives, and they threw down greatstones upon them. See, here is one of those broken stones, and here, andhere. After a long time the people of Mycenae had no food left in theircity. Their warriors fainted from hunger. Then the Argives beat down thegate. They rushed into the city and drove out the people. They did notwant men ever again to live in Mycenae, so they took crowbars and triedto tear down the wall. A few stones they knocked off. See, here, andhere, and here they are, where they fell off the wall. But these greatstones are very heavy. This one must weigh a hundred twenty tons, --morethan all the people of your village. So the Argives gave up the attempt, and there stand the walls yet. Then the rain washed down the dirt fromthe hill and covered these great stones, and now we are digging them outagain. " The men worked at the gateway for many weeks. At last all the dirt andthe blocks had been cleared away. The tall gateway stood open. A holewas in the stone door-casing at top and bottom. Schliemann put his handinto it. "See!" he cried. "Here turned the wooden hinge of the gate. " He pointed to another large hole on the side of the casing. "Here thegatekeeper thrust in the beam to hold the gate shut. " Just inside the gate he found the little room where the keeper hadstayed. He found also two little sentry boxes high up on the wall. Hereguards had stood and looked over the country, keeping watch againstenemies. From the gate the wall bent around the edge of the hilltop, shutting it in. In two places had been towers for watchmen. Inside thisgreat wall the king's palace and a few houses had been safe. Outside, other houses had been built. But in time of war all the people hadflocked into the fortress. The gate had been shut. The warriors hadstood on the wall to defend their city. But while some of Dr. Schliemann's men were digging at the gateway andthe wall, others were working outside the city. They were making a greathole, a hundred and thirteen feet square. They put the dirt into basketsand carried it to the little carts to be hauled away. And always Dr. Schliemann and his wife worked with them. From morning until dusk everyday they were there. It was August, and the sun was hot. The wind blewdust into their faces and made their eyes sore, and yet they were happy. Every day they found some little thing that excited them, --a terra cottagoblet, a broken piece of a bone lyre, a bronze ax, the ashes of anancient fire. At first Dr. Schliemann and his wife had fingered over every spadefulof dirt. There might be something precious in it. "Dig carefully, carefully!" Dr. Schliemann had said to the workmen. "Nothing must bebroken. Nothing must be lost. I must see everything. Perhaps a bit of abroken vase may tell a wonderful story. " But during this work of many weeks he had taught his workmen how to dig. Now each man looked over every spadeful of earth himself, as he dug itup. He took out every scrap of stone or wood or pottery or metal andgave it to Schliemann or his wife. So the excavators had only to studythese things and to tell the men where to work. When a man struck somenew thing with his spade, he called out. Then the excavators ran tothat place and dug with their own hands. When anything was found, Dr. Schliemann sent it to the village. There it was kept in a house underguard. At night Dr. Schliemann drew plans of Mycenae. He read again oldGreek books about the city. As he read he studied his plans. He wroteand wrote. "As soon as possible, I must tell the world about what we find, " he saidto his wife. "People will love my book, because they love the stories ofHomer. " There had been four months of hard work. A few precious things hadbeen uncovered, --a few of bronze and clay, a few of gold, some carvedgravestones. But were these the wonders Schliemann had promised? Wasthis to be all? They had dug down more than twenty feet. A few moredays, and they would probably reach the solid rock. There could benothing below that. November was rainy and disagreeable. The men had towork in the mud and wet. There was much disappointment on the hilltop. Then one day a spade grated on gravel. Once before that had happened, and they had found gold below. They called out to Dr. Schliemann. He andhis wife came quickly. Fire leaped into Schliemann's eyes. "Stop!" he said. "Now I will dig. Spades are too clumsy. " So he and his wife dropped upon their knees in the mud. They dug withtheir knives. Carefully, bit by bit, they lifted the dirt. All at oncethere was a glint of gold. "Do not touch it!" cried Schliemann, "we must see it all at once. Whatwill it be?" So they dug on. The men stood about watching. Every now and then theyshouted out, when some wonderful thing was uncovered, and Schliemannwould stop work and cry, "Did not I tell you? Is it not worth the work?" At last they had lifted off all the earth and gravel. There was a greatmass of golden things--golden hairpins, and bracelets, and great goldenearrings like wreaths of yellow flowers, and necklaces with picturesof warriors embossed in the gold, and brooches in the shape of stags'heads. There were gold covers for buttons, and every one was molded intosome beautiful design of crest or circle or flower or cuttle-fish. And among them lay the bones of three persons. Across the forehead ofone was a diadem of gold, worked into designs of flowers. "See!" criedSchliemann, "these are queens. See their crowns, their scepters. " For near the hands lay golden scepters, with crystal balls. And there were golden boxes with covers. Perhaps long ago, one of thesequeens had kept her jewels in them. There was a golden drinking cup withswimming fish on its sides. There were vases of bronze and silver andgold. There was a pile of gold and amber beads, lying where they hadfallen when the string had rotted away from the queenly neck. Andscattered all over the bodies and under them were thin flakes of gold inthe shapes of flowers, butterflies, grasshoppers, swans, eagles, leaves. It seemed as though a golden tree had shed its leaves into the grave. "Think! Think! Think!" cried Schliemann. "These delicate lovely thingshave lain buried here for three thousand years. You have pastured yoursheep above them. Once queens wore them and walked the streets we areuncovering. " The news of the find spread like wildfire over the country. Thousands ofpeople came to visit the buried city. It was the most wonderful treasurethat had ever been found. The king of Athens sent soldiers to guard theplace. They camped on the acropolis. Their fires blazed there at night. Schliemann telegraphed to the king: "With great joy I announce to your majesty that I have discoveredthe tombs which old stories say are the graves of Agamemnon and hisfollowers. I have found in them great treasures in the shape of ancientthings in pure gold. These treasures, alone, are enough to fill a greatmuseum. It will be the most wonderful collection in the world. Duringthe centuries to come it will draw visitors from all over the earth toGreece. I am working for the joy of the work, not for money. So I givethis treasure, with much happiness, to Greece. May it be the cornerstone of great good fortune for her. " The work went on, and soon they found another grave, even morewonderful. Here lay five people--two of them women, three of themwarriors. Golden masks covered the faces of the men. Two wore goldenbreastplates. The gold clasp of the greave was still around one knee. Near one man lay a golden crown and a sceptre, and a sword belt of gold. There was a heap of stone arrowheads, and a pile of twenty bronze swordsand daggers. One had a picture of a lion hunt inlaid in gold. The woodenhandles of the swords and daggers were rotted away, but the gold nailsthat had fastened them lay there, and the gold dust that had gildedthem. Near the warriors' hands were drinking cups of heavy gold. Therewere seal rings with carved stones. There was the silver mask of anox head with golden horns, and the golden mask of a lion's head. Andscattered over everything were buttons, and ribbons, and leaves, andflowers of gold. Schliemann gazed at the swords with burning eyes. "The heroes of Troy have used these swords, " he said to his wife, "Perhaps Achilles himself has handled them. " He looked long at thegolden masks of kingly faces. "I believe that one of these masks covered the face of Agamemnon. Ibelieve I am kneeling at the side of the king of men, " he said in ahushed voice. Why were all these things there? Thousands of years before, when theirking had died, the people had grieved. "He is going to the land of the dead, " they had thought. "It is a dullplace. We will send gifts with him to cheer his heart. He must havelions to hunt and swords to kill them. He must have cattle to eat. Hemust have his golden cup for wine. " So they had put these things into the grave, thinking that the kingcould take them with him. They even had put in food, for Schliemannfound oyster shells buried there. And they had thought that a king, evenin the land of the dead, must have servants to work for him. So they hadsacrificed slaves, and had sent them with their lord. Schliemann foundtheir bones above the grave. And besides the silver mask of the ox headthey had sent real cattle. After the king had been laid in his grave, they had killed oxen before the altar. Part they had burned in thesacred fire for the dead king, and part the people had eaten for thefuneral feast. These bones and ashes, too, Schliemann found. For a long, long time the people had not forgotten their dead chiefs. Every yearthey had sacrificed oxen to them. They had set up gravestones for them, and after a while they had heaped great mounds over their graves. That was a wonderful old world at Mycenae. The king's palace sat on ahill. It was not one building, but many--a great hall where the warriorsate, the women's large room where they worked, two houses of manybedrooms, treasure vaults, a bath, storehouses. Narrow passages led fromroom to room. Flat roofs of thatch and clay covered all. And there wereopen courts with porches about the sides. The floors of the court wereof tinted concrete. Sometimes they were inlaid with colored stones. Thewalls of the great hall had a painted frieze running about them. Andaround the whole palace went a thick stone wall. One such old palace has been uncovered at Tiryns near Mycenae. To-daya visitor can walk there through the house of an ancient king. Thewatchman is not there, so the stranger goes through the strong oldgateway. He stands in the courtyard, where the young men used to playgames. He steps on the very floor they trod. He sees the stone bases ofcolumns about him. The wooden pillars have rotted away, but he imaginesthem holding a porch roof, and he sees the men resting in the shade. Hewalks into the great room where the warriors feasted. He sees the hearthin the middle and imagines the fire blazing there. He looks into thebathroom with its sloping stone floor and its holes to drain off thewater. He imagines Greek maidens coming to the door with vases of wateron their heads. He walks through the long, winding passages and intoroom after room. "The children of those old days must have had troublefinding their way about in this big palace, " he thinks. Such was the palace of the king. Below it lay many poorer houses, insidethe walls and out. We can imagine men and women walking about this city. We raise the warriors from their graves. They carry their golden cups intheir hands. Their rings glisten on their fingers, and their braceletson their arms. Perhaps, instead of the golden armor, they wearbreastplates of bronze of the same shape, but these same swords hang attheir sides. We look at their golden masks and see their straight nosesand their short beards. We study the carving on their gravestones, andwe see their two-wheeled chariots and their prancing horses. We look atthe carved gems of their seal rings and see them fighting or killinglions. We look at their embossed drinking cups, and we see them catchingthe wild bulls in nets. We gaze at the great walls of Mycenae, andwonder what machines they had for lifting such heavy stones. We look ata certain silver vase, and see warriors fighting before this very wall. We see all the beautiful work in gold and silver and gems and ivory, andwe think, "Those men of old Mycenae were artists. " PICTURES OF MYCENAE THE CIRCLE OF ROYAL TOMBS. Digging within this circle, Dr. Schliemann found the famous treasureof golden gifts to the dead, which he gave to Greece. In the Museum atAthens you can see these wonderful things. (From a photograph in theMetropolitan Museum. ) DR. AND MRS. SCHLIEMANN AT WORK. This picture is taken from Dr. Schliemann's own book on his work. THE GATE OF LIONS. The stone over the gateway is immensely strong. But the wall builderswere afraid to pile too great a weight upon it. So they left atriangular space above it. You can see how they cut the big stones withslanting ends to do this. This triangle they filled with a thinnerstone carved with two lions. The lions' heads are gone. They were madeseparately, perhaps of bronze, and stood away from the stone looking outat people approaching the gate. INSIDE THE TREASURY OF ATREUS. No wonder the untaught modern Greeks thought that this was a giants'oven, where the giants baked their bread. But learned men have shownthat it was connected with a tomb, and that in this room the menof Mycenae worshipped their dead. It was very wonderfully made andbeautifully ornamented. The big stone over the doorway was nearly thirtyfeet long, and weighs a hundred and twenty tons. Men came to thisbeehive tomb in the old days of Mycenae, down a long passage with a highstone wall on either side. The doorway was decorated with many-coloredmarbles and beautiful bronze plates. The inside was ornamented, too, andthere was an altar in there. THE INTERIOR OF THE PALACE. From these ruins and relics, we know much about the art of theMycenaeans, something about their government, their trade, theirreligion, their home life, their amusements, and their ways of fighting, though they lived three thousand years ago. If a great modern cityshould be buried, and men should dig it up three thousand years later, what do you think they will say about us? GOLD MASK. This mask was still on the face of the dead king. The artist tried tomake the mask look just as the great king himself had looked, but thiswas very hard to do. A COW'S HEAD OF SILVER. The king's people put into his grave this silver mask of an ox head withgolden horns. It was a symbol of the cattle sacrificed for the dead. There is a gold rosette between the eyes. The mouth, muzzle, eyes andears are gilded. In Homer's Iliad, which is the story of the Trojan war, Diomede says, "To thee will I sacrifice a yearling heifer, broad atbrow, unbroken, that never yet hath man led beneath the yoke. Her will Isacrifice to thee, and gild her horns with gold. " THE WARRIOR VASE. This vase was made of clay and baked. Then the artist painted figures onit with colored earth. This was so long ago that men had not learned todraw very well, but we like the vase because the potter made it such abeautiful shape, and because we learn from it how the warriors of earlyMycenae dressed. Under their armor they wore short chitons with fringeat the bottom, and long sleeves, and they carried strangely shapedshields and short spears or long lances. Do you think those areknapsacks tied to the lances? BRONZE HELMETS. These may have been worn by King Agamemnon, or by the Trojan warriors. They are now in the Metropolitan Museum in New York. GEM FROM MYCENAE. Early men made many pictures much like this--a pillar guarded by ananimal on each side. BRONZE DAGGERS. It would take a very skilfull man to-day, a man who was both goldsmithand artist, to make such daggers as men found at Mycenae. First theblade was made. Then the artist took a separate sheet of bronze for hisdesign. This sheet he enamelled, and on it he inlaid his design. On oneof these daggers we see five hunters fighting three lions. Two of thelions are running away. One lion is pouncing upon a hunter, but hisfriends are coming to help him. If you could turn this dagger over, youwould see a lion chasing five gazelles. The artist used pure gold forthe bodies of the hunters and the lions; he used electron, an alloy ofgold and silver, for the hunters' shields and their trousers; and hemade the men's hair, the lions' manes, and the rims of the shields, ofsome black substance. When the picture was finished on the plate, heset the plate into the blade, and riveted on the handle. On the smallerdagger we see three lions running. CARVED IVORY HEAD. It shows the kind of helmet used in Mycenae. Do you think the button atthe top may have had a socket for a horse hair plume? BRONZE BROOCHES. These brooches were like modern safety pins, and were used to fasten thechlamys at the shoulder. The chlamys was a heavy woolen shawl, red orpurple. ONE OF THE CUPS FOUND AT VAPHIO. Some people say that these cups are the most wonderful things thathave been found, made by Mycenaean artists. Some people say that nogoldsmiths in the world since then, unless perhaps in Italy in thefifteenth century, have done such lovely work. The goldsmith took aplate of gold and hammered his design into it from the wrong side. Thenhe riveted the two ends together where the handle was to go, and linedthe cup with a smooth gold plate. One cup shows some hunters trying tocatch wild bulls with a net. One great bull is caught in the net. Oneis leaping clear over it. And a third bull is tossing a hunter on hishorns. On the other cup the artist shows some bulls quietly grazing inthe forest, while another one is being led away to sacrifice. The Vaphian cups are now in the National museum in Athens. They werefound in a "bee-hive" tomb at Vaphio, an ancient site in Greece, not farfrom Sparta. It is thought that they were not made there, but in Crete. PLATES. At Mycenae were found seven hundred and one large round plates of gold, decorated with cuttlefish, flowers, butterflies, and other designs. GOLD ORNAMENT. (Lower right hand corner. ) MYCENAE IN THE DISTANCE.