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Mycenae, 1939

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Extract

The excavations were directed mainly to four points: the ruins of the Greek temple on the summit and a large Mycenaean house on the east side of the acropolis, an area outside the Lion Gate, and the Treasury of Atreus.

The foundations of the Greek temple were cleared, surveyed, and studied in detail. As they survive to-day they are certainly of the Hellenistic period, and it is clear that neither the Hellenistic sanctuary, nor any earlier temple that preceded it, had a peristyle. Blocks from earlier structures had been built into the foundations, and all round a great variety of tiles from early archaic to Hellenistic times was found. Pottery found below the surface of the northern terrace of the temple area shows that a sanctuary had existed throughout ‘Geometric’ times, and the tiles and architectural fragments indicate that it was succeeded by an early archaic shrine. The temple, with the massive substructures that supported it on the north, lies south and north, and it is possible that it owes this abnormal orientation to the fact that it overlies the shrine of the Mycenaean palace, which faced south. It now seems that the early archaic sculpture in relief previously found did not belong to a temple, but, since it was all found in the southern part of the temple area, may have belonged to some structure, perhaps an altar, which stood before the south front of the sanctuary.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1939

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