Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/518

 General Characteristics of the Mycenian Period. 461 poet extols the wealth of Orchomenos and Mycenae. No better opportunity than this could be found for inquiring whence had originated treasures whose splendour and bulk fairly dazzled the imagination of the singer ? Remembering the Achaians' mode of life, we may be sure that war and brigandage were one of its main sources. The leaders of those Minyi who had first crossed the Hellespont in quest of the Golden Fleece, the Pelopidai who had come from Asia Minor and extended their dominion over Peloponnesus and the adjacent islands, were Vikings every man of them. War and pillage, however, are inadequate to found a lasting prosperity. As regards Orchomenos, its good fortune was due no doubt to the vast and fruitful plain of Boeotia, and the artificial drainage of Lake Copais. It is the same with Argolis. The oldest myths represented it as the first Grecian land ever visited by Oriental vessels, and in consequence of it the first to be initiated in the usages of polite life. Even before Schliemann's spade had exhumed shimmering gold from the shaft- graves, we might have safely inferred that agricultural and indus- trial development had been early in the champaigns' surrounding that spacious and safe roadstead turned towards the morning sun. A dense population, alone in possession of the plain and the side valleys abutting thereto, could furnish as many hands as were needful to quarry and set up the materials for building the colossal ramparts and strong castles of the native chieftains. Taking into consideration the depth of these walls, and the technical skill required to erect the constructions that have been described, the historian, unless he deliberately refuses the testimony of his own senses, will allow a larger measure of credence to the Argian cycle of myths than has been generally accorded thereto ; the information it contains will disclose to him a civilization contemporary with the Perseidee and the Pelopidai, whose glory was sung by pre- Homeric bards. All that was known of this culture were its buildings, and its sculpture was represented by the Mycenai lions alone. No prospect looked more hopeless than that we should ever* be able to define the characteristics of its industry and its arts. The descriptive portions of the Epic referred to a different period in the evolution of the Greek mind ; moreover, like all descriptions that cannot be confronted with the objects themselves, they left many points obscure and uncertain. Nobody dreamt that we