9 March 2010 (Tuesday #5) – Argolis day, Mycenae

Argolis tour - Mycenae: fortified palace complex

After touring (what’s left of) the Treasury of Atreus, we hopped on the bus for the short drive to the fortified palace complex of Mycenae. The first excavations at Mycenae were done in the 1840s, but a complete excavation was started by that amateur archeologist Heinrich Schliemann in 1874. He uncovered the ancient graves that with their treasures that proved the historical truth of Homer's epic poems. The fortified palace complex of Mycenae is one of the earliest examples in the world of a sophisticated citadel.

In its heyday somewhere between 1700 BC and 1100 BC the hilltop palace was occupied by the Mycenaean ruling class, with artisans and merchants living in many houses just outside the fortified walls. It was abandoned after 1100 BC, about the time the palace was burned.

We got off the bus and walked up a long path that led us to the famous Lion Gate of Mycenae:

This gate was probably erected in the 13th century BC. It takes its name from the lions carved above the lintel (huge horizontal stone above the opening).

Closer look at the gate:

In the triangle above the opening you can see the bodies of two lions, but their heads went missing. Since their heads are gone, their sex is unknown, but they’re believed to be lionesses. This motif is believed to have been the insignia of the Royal House of Atreus.

Once again we have a massive lintel that could only have been placed there by the Cyclops.

The Lion Gate was the entrance to the ancient fortified citadel of the Mycenaean civilization and the surrounding settlement. The citadel walls were over 40 feet high and 10-46 feet wide. Those Cyclops were busy guys!

View from the Lion Gate:

Closer look at some of the Cyclopean masonry:

Views of the nearby ruins from the Lion Gate:

Resident dog sunning himself at the Lion Gate:

View of the reconstruction of Grave Circle A, right beyond the Lion Gate:

This is a better view of Grave Circle A:

Grave Circle A contained shaft graves for six royal families, with a total of about 20 skeletons, and it had a bunch of gold. Although it is down the acropolis from the palace/citadel, it was excavated by Schliemann, too. Unlike the Treasury of Atreus, it had not been looted prior to its excavation.

A look back at the Lion Gate resident dog who has now moved:

(Yikes! He’s not wearing a collar! He might be rabid!! No, . . . he probably doesn’t have enough energy to be rabid.)

Now we’re walking up the long pathway to the top of the high hill to what has been excavated of the palace:

We’re still walking up that path:

Here are our friends Ronnie and Marilyn in the foreground. Hi, Ronnie and Marilyn!

Ronnie is looking at our bus, which is far down below.

Almost to the palace!

The Palace!

Okay, not much is left of the palace, but what a view! (And look how far away our bus is now; see red arrow).

(When one has a broken leg, one gives a lot of thought to how far one is walking.)

The ancient citadel had the royal palace, a secret stairway to protect the water system in times of siege, tombs, a surrounding settlement, . . .. It was a thriving area for hundreds of years. From the palace the watchmen had a clear view across the Argolid to the Saronic Gulf, from which enemies would try to approach.

They also had good views of the whole surrounding area:

The diagram on the left shows the layout of the entire citadel, while the one on the right shows what would have been the palace’s east wing, which was the Artisans’ Quarters:

What goes up must come down. It was a long and winding road to the bottom of the acropolis on which sat this ancient citadel of Mycenae. We were quite high up:

(“Acropolis” means the high, fortified area of an ancient Greek city, or a raised area holding a building or cluster of buildings. There are many acropolises in Greece, but the one on which the Parthenon sits is the most famous. It’s so well-known that it’s called The Acropolis.)

What we saw as we were going back down the path to ground level:

Our path is in the foreground. It was narrow and usually without a railing. (I was glad it was not made of slippery marble.) To the left in the background is a highway. This gives an idea of how high up we walked.

Still walking down the path:

Going back through the Lion Gate from the top of the acropolis:

What a picture-perfect view through the gate!

A not-so-encouraging sign in the restroom at the base of the hill:

. . . not that I typically drink restroom water anyway.

Flags—the Greek flag on the left and some other flag on the right:

A model inside the museum on the property, which shows the excavated site:

At the end of a hall inside the museum was this sign about the Treasury of Atreus that we toured prior to this citadel. It’s a drawing of what the tomb entrance (supposedly) looked like on the outside:

Also in the museum we saw various gold pieces found during the excavation digs of the Grave Circles.