How to Study ArchitectureCaffin, Charles H. (Charles Henry)
History
How to Study Architecture
Caffin, Charles H. (Charles Henry)
Architecture -- History
At Mycenæ are earlier tombs than that of Atreus, which consist simply of
a deep shaft lowered into the rock. These are situated just inside the
Lion Gate, the area which they occupy being enclosed by two concentric
circles of thin slabs, set up on end with others laid across the top of
them. It is a feature that in its attenuated form seems to recall
Stonehenge. Dr. Schliemann reached the conclusion that these were the
graves which were shown to Pausanias, as being those of Agamemnon,
Cassandra, and her companions.
On the summit of the Acropolis at Mycenæ are the remains of a palace,
similar to, but less extensive than, that of Tiryns, which we may
therefore examine in preference.
=Tiryns.=--The palace of Tiryns, which probably dates to a period between
the fourteenth and twelfth centuries <small>B.C.</small>, seems to have combined the
luxuriousness of the residence of an Oriental king with the feudal state
of a mediæval baron and his crowd of retainers. The acropolis is of oval
shape, with its long axis north and south, surrounded by immense
ramparts of Cyclopean masonry, from 30 to 40 feet in thickness, while
the outside height was about 50 feet and that of the inside 10 feet from
the level of the ground. In certain parts chambers were embedded in the
thickness of the wall, and round its inner side ran a colonnade,
supported by wooden posts.
The area thus enclosed was divided into three successive levels, of
which the highest was excavated by Schliemann and Dörpfeld, 1884-1885.
The plan shows the entrance situated on the west side, away from the
sea, which probably was once fitted with a gateway similar to that at
Mycenæ. The approach passes between massive walls to another gate,
whence it proceeds to a propylæa, with rooms for the guard. This opens
into a forecourt, from which another propylæa gives approach to the
actual palace.
The first feature of the =Palace= is a court bounded on three sides by a
post-supported colonnade. An altar or sacrificial pit is in the same
position as that occupied by the altar of Zeus in a later Greek house.
It may be possible in this connection to see evidence that the principal
deity on the mainland of Greece was already, unlike that of Crete, a
male; perhaps a terrible prototype of the later benignant Zeus, to whom
human sacrifices were made, as to the hideous Mexican divinity,
Huitzilopochtli.
On the north side of the court a portico, succeeded by a vestibule,
gives access to the Megaron. In the centre of this is the hearth, a
feature not needed in the warmer climate of Crete and therefore not
found in the palaces of that island. Four columns supported the roof,
the centre of which may have been raised to allow openings for light and
smoke escape. Adjoining the sleeping chambers on the west side of this
hall is a bathroom, about 12 feet by 10 feet, the floor of which is
composed of a single slab of stone, sloped so that the water drained out
through a pipe in the wall.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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