The question which was of such supreme interest to Schliemann still survives, however, though in a wider and more important form than that in which he conceived of it. It is no longer a question of whether the graves which he found were actually those of Agamemnon and his fellow-victims in the dark tragedy of Mycenae, but of whether the people and the civilization whose remains have been brought to light are, or are not, the people and the civilization from which the Homeric bards drew the whole setting of their poems. Were the Mycenaeans the Greeks of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and was it their culture that is depicted for us in these great poems? The arguments in favour of such a supposition are of considerable strength. For one thing, we have the remarkable coincidence between the geography of the poems and the localities over which the Mycenaean culture is seen to have extended. The towns and lands which occupy the foremost place in the Homeric story are also those in which the most convincing evidences of Mycenaean culture have been discovered. Foremost, of course, we have Mycenae itself. To Homer, 'golden,' 'broad-wayed' Mycenae is the seat of the great leader of all the Achaeans, the King of men, Agamemnon; it is also the chief seat of the culture which goes by its name. Orchomenos, Pylos, Lacedaemon, Attica, all prominent in the poems, are also well-known seats of Mycenaean civilization. Crete, whose prominent position in the Homeric world has been already referred to, we shall shortly see to have been in point of fact the supreme centre of that still greater and richer civilization of which the Mycenaean is a later and comparatively degenerate form. There is no need to enter into further detail; but broadly it is the fact that the distribution of Mycenaean remains practically follows, at least to a great extent, the geography of the poems. The world with which the Homeric bards were familiar was, in the main, the world in which the civilization of the Mycenaeans prevailed. The Homeric house also finds a striking parallel in the details of the Mycenaean palaces whose remains have been preserved. Leaving aside all disputed points, the broad fact remains that 'all the structural features described, the courtyard, with its altar to Zeus and trench for sacrifices; the vestibule; the ante-chamber; the hall, with its fireplace and its pillars; the bathroom, with passage from the hall; the upper story, sometimes containing the women's quarters; the spaciousness; the decoration; even the furniture, have been most wonderfully identified at Tiryns and Mycenae, and in Crete.' In Crete, along with the resemblances above referred to, are found important differences, such as the position of the hearth, and the details of the lighting. These, which are probably due to differences of climate, do not, however, invalidate the fact of the general correspondence.