Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/520

 General Characteristics ov the Mvcenian Period. 463 the whole of this period naught with a semblance to any kind of script has been seen in Peloponnesus, Central Greece, or on the thousand and one objects found in the tombs, which were designed for domestic or ornamental uses. This culture, then, is a dumb culture, so that the voice of its authors will never fall directly on our ear. The collections that have been formed by Schliemann and his compeers give no answer to a question bearing on the monuments they have unearthed, namely : To what race belonged the clans that built the Tirynthian and Mycenian walls, and what language did they speak ? Were those enormous blocks piled up by the Semite, or was it the Phrygians who erected those tall, rounded cupolas, and concealed them beneath a thick bed of earth ? Are we to consider the architectural and decorative skill seen here as due to clans of whom Thucydides relates that, ** to judge from the weapons buried in old graves found in Delos, they must have belonged to the Carians" ? Or else, with due acknowledgment for the share which colonizing groups from Asia Minor, Syria, and even Egypt had in the movement and advance of civilization, should we not rather see Pelasgi, yEolians, lonians, and Achseans — in a word, the direct ancestors of the Hellenes of the Epic and history, in the authors of these stupendous structures and products of human industry which the graves have given back to us ? The problem cannot be solved with the help and authority of plastic art. All we can say is, that in such pictures where, owing to the dimension and style of the work, the image can be clearly seen, we find what is called the ''Greek profile." Yet plastic art,, though inadequate to settle the question, seems to favour the notion that would make the Hellenes of the classic age the direct descendants of the creators of the Mycenian civilization. Such a hypothesis assumes a much greater degree of pro- bability the moment we read and inwardly digest the Epic poems by the light of recent discoveries. The //iadl is called a historical poem because, like the So/i^- of Roland, it embodies certain facts that for want of a better name may be called history, although veiled and hidden away under the rich and marvellous web interwoven by the brilliant fancy of the poet. There is perfect correspondence between the information derived from the Epic on the one hand, and on the other with the result of recent discoveries. That past whose after-glow is reflected in the