² Karo, G., Die Schachtgräber von Mykenai (Munich, 1930–1933), i. 245–6.Google Scholar

³ Ibid., nos. 890–1, pl. 147.

⁴ Ibid. 251.

⁵ Schliemann, H., Mycenae (New York, 1880), 332.Google Scholar

⁶ Studniczka, F., ‘Archäologisches aus Griechenland,’ AA (1921), 308–40, esp. 314.Google Scholar

⁷ I should like to thank Dr K. Demakopoulou for facilitating the study of the objects in the National Museum and for providing me with the photograph for Fig. 4. I am also grateful to Prof. Doumas for allowing me to reproduce the drawing in Fig. 7.

⁸ Karo (n. 2), pl. 147, upper centre left, shown upside down.

⁹ Ibid., upper center right, shown with a piece missing at the lower right edge. This is now glued in place.

¹⁰ Ibid., no. 891, lower row with the rim piece on the left.

¹¹ In the boxes numbered 890 and 891 in the National Museum at Athens there are 30–40 other fragments of wood from Grave V. Most of them are bits of the tables, including two fragments of tenons and a piece from a mortise of table NM 890. There are also five well-preserved fragments which in size, form, slight curvature, and depressed-oval section resemble pieces from a vase handle, and the piece cut from a small trunk or thick branch identified by Karo as a post.

¹² Baker, H. S., Furniture in the Ancient World (London, 1966), 150–3.Google Scholar A small table from Tutankhamun's tomb with dished top bordered with spiral decoration, is a unique object (Ibid., fig. 105 a).

¹³ Ibid., figs. 159, 212, and 216, lower right.

¹⁴ Kenyon, K. M. et al. , Excavations at Jericho, i: The Tombs Excavated in 1952–4 (Jerusalem, 1960), 338 fig. 132, 383–4 fig. 153. 2Google Scholar; ii: The Tombs Excavated in 1955–8 (Jerusalem, 1965), 267 fig. 128.

¹⁵ Simpson, E., ‘The wooden furniture from Tumulus MM at Gordion, Turkey’ (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Pennsylvania, 1985), 96–110.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Ibid., figs, 19, 16, 16. 1. For the tables from Jericho see Kenyon et al. (n. 14), i. 529–31, fig. 229. 1–2.

¹⁷ Rudenko, S. I., Frozen Tombs of Siberia (Berkeley, 1970), 65–8, figs. 18–19, pls 50–1.Google Scholar The legs of the Pazyryk tables were joined through collared, slotted, or cut-through mortises.

¹⁸ For the remains of two rectangular wooden tables see Kopcke, G., ‘Neue Holzfunde von Samos’, AM 82 (1967), 100–48, esp. 135–7, pls 74. 3–4, 75. 1–2.Google Scholar One of them had legs with tenons pushed through mortises and secured with horizontal pins; the other had collared mortises. For a unique hellenistic table of wood see Baker (n. 12), 271–4, fig. 450.

¹⁹ Kenyon et al. (n. 14), i. 455, 488, pl. 31. 1. Young, R. S. et al. , Three Great Tumuli: The Gordion Excavations. Final Reports, i (University Museum Monograph 43; Philadelphia, 1981), pls 48b, 49 a–b.Google Scholar

²⁰ Doumas, Ch., Thera (London, 1983), 116–17, fig. 18, pl. 84.Google Scholar

²¹ For some examples from Thera see Ibid., pl. 60; Marinatos, S., Excavations at Thera, iv (Athens, 1971), pls 81–2.Google Scholar

²² Baker (n. 12), 245.

²³ Warren, P., Minoan Stone Vases (Cambridge, 1969), 97, P549.Google Scholar

²⁴ Hankey, V., ‘Stone vessels at Myrtos Pyrgos’, Πεπραγμένα του Δ′ Διεθνούς Κρητολογιϰού Συνεδρίου, i (Athens, 1976), 210–15, esp. 213, pl. 77 no. MP 70/75.Google Scholar A few tripod tables also occur among the terracotta furniture models known in Mycenaean Greece. Closest to the first wooden table from Mycenae is a table with a deeply concave top which forms part of a model representing a breadmaker (Blegen, C. W., ‘A Mycenaean Breadmaker’, ASA NS 8–9 (1946–1948), 13–16Google Scholar). Other model tables have only a slightly raised edge: see French, E., ‘The development of Mycenaean terracotta figurines’, BSA 66 (1971), 101–87, esp. 173Google Scholar; Tamvaki, A., ‘Some unusual Mycenaean terracottas from the Citadel House area’, BSA 68 (1973), 207–65, esp. 255.Google Scholar

²⁵ SirEvans, Arthur, The Palace of Minos, iii (London, 1930), 915–19, figs. 889–93Google Scholar; Platon, N., ‘Μινωιϰοί Θρόνοι’, Kr. Chron. 5 (1951), 385–412, esp. 385–98, figs. 22–4.Google Scholar

²⁶ Marinatos (n. 21), pls 102–3. A stool of this type is represented on a ring from Chamber Tomb 66 at Mycenae (CMS i, no. 101).

²⁷ Marinatos (n. 21), pl. 104. The same type of bed is represented in some Mycenaean terracotta models. The slight projections at their corners may correspond to the tops of the legs, to which the sides of the frame were joined, while the criss-cross patterns painted on some of them may reflect the interwoven rope of the resting surface. Smaller, square versions of the beds may correspond to stools, similar to the Egyptian rush-seat stools. For the models see French (n. 24), 172–3, pl. 28 c; Tamvaki (n. 24), 253–5, fig. 23. For the Egyptian stools see Baker (n. 12), figs. 214–16.

²⁸ For a discussion of the epigraphic and archaeological evidence see Poursat, J.-C., Les Ivoires mycéniens (Bibliothèque des Écoles Françaises d'Athènes et de Rome, 230; Paris, 1977), 31–5 and appendix II.Google Scholar For the footstools see also Vandenabeele, F. and Olivier, J.-P., Les Idéogrammes archéologiques du Linéaire B (Études Crétoises, 24; Paris, 1979), 161–79, figs. 104–9.Google Scholar

²⁹ Platon (n. 25), 401–7; CMS i, nos. 80, 101, 179, 264; ii.3, no. 338; V.2, no. 608; xi, no. 52.

³⁰ For a recendy published model of a bed see Kopaka, K., ‘Πήλινο ομοίωμα αναϰλίντρου από τη Φαιστό’, in Ειλαπίνη: τόμος τιμητιϰός για τον ϰαθηγητή Νιϰόλαο Πλάτωνα (Herakleion, 1987), 93–100.Google Scholar The only well-attested Mycenaean type is a three-legged chair or throne, which occurs primarily in models representing seated figures thought to be divine. The chairs do not correspond to those known from representations or stone copies, which are all four-legged. In particular, the variant with a high, solid back cannot have had a wooden prototype and may be a creation of the terracotta makers, based on a three-legged stool and given a high back to support the seated figures. For the models see Mylonas, G. E., ‘Seated and multiple Mycenaean figurines in the National Museum of Athens, Greece’, in Weinberg, S. S. (ed.), The Aegean and the Near East: Studies Presented to Hetty Goldman (Locust Valley, NY, 1956), 110–21Google Scholar; French (n. 24), 167–72; Tamvaki (n. 24), 246. See also comments by Baker (n. 12), 251–2.

³¹ As noted by Platon (n. 25), 406, fig. 26 b, d.

³² Kenyon, K. M., Digging up Jericho (New York, 1957), 252–3.Google Scholar

³³ For comparisons see Baker (n.12), 218–24, figs. 353–6 (joinery) and 358–60 (reconstructions of a bench, a stool, and a table). Compare also the furniture from the earlier graves at Baghouz in inland Syria, in Buisson, R. du Mesnil du, Baghouz: l'ancienne Corsôté (Leiden, 1948), pls 56, 58 (beds); 45, 49 (tables); 46 , 48. 3, 51, 55 (stools).Google Scholar

³⁴ It is possible that the remains of wood observed under a large bronze vase in Grave Eta of Circle B also belonged to a table (Mylonas, G. E. M., Ο ταφιϰός ϰύϰλος Β των Μυϰηνών (Βιβλιοθήϰη της εν ΑΘήναις Αρχαιολογιϰής Εταιρείας, 93; Athens, 1973), 92).Google Scholar

³⁵ Immerwahr, S. A., The Athenian Agora, xiii: The Neolithic and Bronze Ages (Princeton, 1971), 170–7, esp. 171, 101.Google Scholar

³⁶ Platon (n. 25), 391.

³⁷ For the two most recent and comprehensive discussions see Åkeström, Å., ‘Mycenaean Problems’, Op. Ath. 12 (1978), 19–86, esp. 38–86Google Scholar; Hägg, R. and Sieurin, F., ‘On the origin of the wooden coffin in late bronze age Greece’, BSA 77 (1982), 177–86, with references to earlier bibliography.Google Scholar

³⁸ It should be noted, however, that multiple biers or coffins in a tomb are just as common as single occurrences.

³⁹ For the warrior graves see Matthäus, H., ‘Minoische Kriegergräber’, in Kszyszkowska, O. and Nixon, L. (eds), Minoan Society (Proceedings of the Cambridge Colloquium; Bristol, 1983), 203–15Google Scholar, and Kilian-Dirlmeier, I., ‘Noch einmal zu den “Kriegergräbern” von Knossos’, Jahrbuch der Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums Mainz, 32 (1985), 196–214.Google Scholar For the shaft graves see Graziadio, G., ‘The process of social stratification at Mycenae in the shaft grave period: a comparative examination of the evidence’, AJA 95 (1991), 403–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar, with discussion of methodological approaches to and problems of such studies.

⁴⁰ As in Tomb XVI at Prosymna, Tombs 2 and 12 at Dendra, and in the chamber tombs excavated by Tsountas at Mycenae; cf. Hägg and Sieurin (n. 37), 180 n. 43.

⁴¹ The evidence is presented in detail by Åkeström (n. 37), 45–54.

⁴² Persson, A. W., New Tombs at Dendra near Midea (Lund, 1942), 37–51, esp. 41, 11–12.Google Scholar

⁴³ Vermeule, E. and Travlos, J., ‘Mycenaean tomb beneath the Middle Stoa’, Hesperia, 35 (1966), 55–78, esp. 62–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁴ Blegen, C. W., Prosymna (Cambridge, 1937), 75–80Google Scholar (XXIX), 147–52 (XLII), 197–200 (X).

⁴⁵ Hägg and Sieurin (n. 37), 178, with references.

⁴⁶ Catling, H. in Popham, M. R., Catling, E. A. and Catling, H. W., ‘Sellopoulo Tombs 3 and 4: two late Minoan graves near Knossos’, BSA 69 (1974), 195–57, esp, 243–4Google Scholar; Macdonald, C. in Driessen, J. and Macdonald, C., ‘Some military aspects of the Aegean in the late fifteenth and early fourteenth centuries’, BSA 79 (1984), 49–74, esp. 64–5.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Excluded here are the graves of Elounta, where no traces of wood were found, Tomb II at the New Hospital, where remains of wood were observed just around a sword, and Tomb II at Upper Gypsadhes, in which traces existed only at the foot and opposite the face of the skeleton in association with beads. For a different opinion see Hägg and Sieurin (n. 37), 181 n. 56, with references.

⁴⁸ For the tomb excavated in 1967 see Muhly, P., Μινωιϰός λαξευτός τάφος στον Πόρο Ηραϰλείου (Βιβλιοθήϰη της εν Αθήναις Αρχαιολογιϰής Εταιρείας, 129; Athens, 1992).Google Scholar A preliminary report has been published for another, more recently discovered, tomb by Demopoulou-Rethemiotaki, N. in Kretike Hestia, 2 (1988), 325–7.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Alexiou, S., Υστερομινωιϰοί τάφοι λιμήνος Κνωσού (Κατσαμπά) (Βιβλιοθήϰη της εν Αθήναις Αρχαιολογιϰής Εταιρείας, 56; Athens, 1967)Google Scholar; ‘Εις νέος τάφος παρά τον λιμένα Κνωσού’ Ephemeris (1970) 1–12.

⁵⁰ Alexiou, Yστερομινωιϰί τάφοι (n. 49), 76–83.

⁵¹ Hood, M. S. F. and de Jong, P., ‘Late Minoan warriorgraves from Ayios Ioannis and the New Hospital site at Knossos,’ BSA 47 (1952), 243–77, esp. 248–9, 253.Google Scholar

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⁵³ Hood, S., Huxley, G., and Sandars, N., ‘A Minoan cemetery on Upper Gypsadhes’, BSA 53–4 (1958–1959), 194–269, esp. 198–9, 218.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Popham, Catling, and Catling (n. 46), esp. 199, 202.

⁵⁵ AR (1960–1), 27.

⁵⁶ The objects associated with the coffin burials in the tombs opposite the Temple Tomb have been mentioned only in the case of one tomb, which contained a single burial accompanied by three stone bowls.

⁵⁷ Kr. Chr. 11 (1957), 335.

⁵⁸ Rethemiotakis, G., ‘Υστερομινωιϰός θαλαμωτός τάφος στο Κυπαρίσσι Ηραϰλείου’ in Ειλαπίνη: τόμος τιμητιϰός για τον ϰαθηγητή Νιϰόλαο Πλάτωνα (Herakleion, 1987), 235–43.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Karetsou, A., ‘Περισυλλογή αρχαίων στην Κεντρική Κρήτη’, Praktika (1975), 522–6.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Savignoni, L., ‘scavi e scoperte nella necropoli di Phaestos’, Mon. Ant. 14 (1904), 501–676, esp. 522.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Levi, D., Festòs e la civiltà minoica (Incunabula Graeca, 60; Rome, 1976), 715–16, fig. 1146.Google Scholar

⁶² Muhly (n. 48) 149–55, pls 2 b, 3 a 36–7.

⁶³ Whether the wood was imported or locally procured could not be determined analytically because of the poor preservation of the sample. It is also uncertain whether cedars grew in Crete in antiquity, since the word ϰέδροσ/ϰέδρον in literary sources is used also to designate the juniper-tree. For further discussion see Muhly (n. 48), 153, with references.

⁶⁴ Ibid.,pls 38–9, 40 c, and fig. 33 (partial reconstruction of the ‘biers’).

⁶⁵ Alexiou, Yστερομινωιϰοί τάφοι (n. 49), 6, pl. 12 c, upper and middle rows.

⁶⁶ See also remarks by French (n. 24), 172, and Tamvaki (n. 24), 253, concerning the similarity of beds and biers. Whether the wooden coffins were reused household chests or copies of them is also impossible to determine and is again a distinction that has no bearing on the interpretation of coffin burials. See Long, C. L., The Ayia Triadha Sarcophagus (SIMA 41; Göteborg, 1974), 17Google Scholar; Åkeström (n. 37), 58; Watrous, L. V., ‘The origin and iconography of the late Minoan painted larnax’, Hesperia, 60 (1991), 285–307, esp. 287–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶⁷ For a dissenting view see Hägg and Sieurin (n. 37).

⁶⁸ Branigan, K., The Foundations of Palatial Crete (London, 1970), 177.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ For example, in the cemetery of Ur in the Early Dynastic III A and the Akkadian periods individuals of higher rank were buried in wooden coffins, while those of lower rank were wrapped in mats and deposited in pits, or were occasionally placed in clay coffins (Pollock, S. M., ‘The symbolism of prestige’ (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Michigan, 1983), 194, 198, 236).Google Scholar A similar situation can be seen in the cemeteries of Olynthos from c.600–350 BC, when corpses buried in wooden coffins received more goods than those covered with tiles or left uncovered (Robinson, D. M., Excavations at Olynthus, xi: Necrolynthia (Baltimore, 1942), 175–7).Google Scholar Even in Egypt, where the obsessive need to ensure proper passage to the afterlife accounts for the dissemination of the wooden coffin throughout practically all social strata, distinctions are evident in the materials and techniques employed in manufacture. Most coffins were made of the native softwoods, lumber was reused, and small, odd-shaped pieces of wood were laboriously fitted together. Imported hardwoods, such as cedar, were used only for the coffins of the rich, who could also afford to have them made of regularly cut planks and sometimes even with solid lids. Veneering and a process that produced a kind of plywood, both attested in very early times, demonstrate not only the skill of the Egyptian carpenters but also the development of techniques for conserving a prized material. For the types and manufacture of Egyptian coffins see Taylor, J. H., Egyptian Coffins (Shire Egyptology, II; Aylesbury, 1989), passimGoogle Scholar; for a summary of technical details see Baker (n. 12), esp. 297, 302, and for detailed descriptions of coffins Lacau, P., Sarcophages antérieurs au Nouvel Empire (Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire, 11; 14, 27, 33; paris, 1904–1906).Google Scholar

⁷⁰ e.g. in the Early Dynastic cemetery at Tarkhan (Petrie, W. M. Flinders, Tarkhan I and Memphis V (London, 1913), 6, 9–10, pls 25–6)Google Scholar and in the Kerameikos cemetery from the late 8th through the 5th cents. (Kübler, K., Kerameikos, vi: Die Nekropole des späten 8. bis frühen 6. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1959), 83–4Google Scholar; viii: Die Nekropole der Mitte des 6. bis Ende des 5. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1976), 6, 19, 177). For the ϰλῖναι see Knigge, U., Kerameikos, ix: Der Sudhügel (Berlin, 1976), 60–83.Google Scholar At Gordion a child was buried on a bed in Tumulus P, surrounded by fabulously rich gifts, while in Tumulus MM ‘King Midas’ was laid on a hybrid form of bed-coffin (see below n. 76).

⁷¹ Kenyon et al. (n. 14), i. 486–90, fig. 211, pl. xxx.

⁷² Ibid. 453–5, fig. 193, pl. xxv. 1.

⁷³ As Blegen (n. 44), 245, remarked: ‘The custom of providing a raised bed on which to deposit the body of the dead seems not to have been very generally followed, but it was at least known in all three phases of the Late Helladic Period’ (emphasis added).

⁷⁴ For the use of built benches in houses see Platon (n. 25), 391.

⁷⁵ Cf. Kurtz, D. C. and Boardman, J., Greek Burial Customs (Ithaca, 1971), 148–9Google Scholar, pls 34–5, 37–8.

⁷⁶ Spyropoulos, Th., ‘Ανασϰαθή εις το μυϰηναϊϰόν νηϰροταφείον της Τανάγρας’, AAA 3 (1970), 184–95, esp. fig. 15.Google Scholar The use of a coffin, i.e. a container with a lid, does not necessarily preclude display, a stage of lying-in-state, which is a common part of funerals today. The final restingplace of ‘King Midas’, who was buried in a coffin hollowed out of a tree trunk and provided with rails rather than a lid, is a rare case where this practice can be inferred from the archaeological evidence (Simpson, E., ‘“Midas' bed” and a royal Phrygian funeral’, JFA 17 (1990), 69–87).Google Scholar

⁷⁷ Watrous (n. 66), 288–9; van Effenterre, H., Nécropoles de Mirabello (Études Crétoises, 8; Paris, 1948), 9–10, pl. 36.Google Scholar