Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/65

 44 Primitive Greece : Mycenian Art. same campaign, M. Tsoundas lighted upon two other graves, marked 3 and 6 on our map ; these, and the one discovered in 1892, have not yet been cleared. Researches in this direction, however, are not likely to be of much consequence. Up to the present hour, the domed-buildings, for reasons of plunder, have scarcely yielded anything. All we can hope is that by some lucky chance we may come upon unviolated pits, as at Vaphio. It is just possible that the vats in question were dug when the tomb had become full, to make room for late arrivals. This was the case at Vaphio (Fig. 140), and also at the Herseum, where Stamakis thought that the pits were younger in date than the circular chamber.^ But the finds at Vaphio, which certainly belong to the Mycenian period, have proved that Stamakis was mistaken.^ This is further strengthened by M. Tsoundas' recent discovery of two pits sunk within the area of the circular chamber of Tomb III., northward of the Lions Gate, and very similar to the shaft-graves of the acropolis. Like these, one out of the two troughs has an inner casing. The first, in length, averages five metres forty centimetres by one metre sixty centimetres, and three metres ten centimetres in depth ; whilst the second is only two metres thirty centimetres long, eighty-three centimetres broad, and ninety centimetres deep. It consists of tufa slabs set up edge- wise at the sides, and others horizontally placed above to form the covering. This is another proof of the mingling of the two processes, a harking back to the primitive mode of sepulture for reasons of expediency, since they are found side by side with a well-constructed chamber. Notwith- standing the closing slabs, these troughs have kept their contents no better than the adjoining chambers. On the other hand, from a grave sunk in the dromos of Tomb II., five metres ten centi- metres from the passage entrance, which M. Tsoundas found undis- turbed, have come gold ornaments and two bronze mirrors, whose 1 Bulietin de correspondance hellhUque^ 1891, contains a note relative to the exhuming of Tomb V., in the course of which some thin gold laminae and a bron/e knife were picked up. The excavation carried on at No. VII. yielded but a few potsherds, which came from the dromos. - Aihenisc/ie Mittheilungen^ 1878. The fact that in these pits were found lamps of the Roman era, as proved by Furtwangler, who saw them on the spot, seems to favour his expressed opinion. But as the tomb remained open throughout Cintiquity, the vats, which had long been emptied of their primordial contents, may have been utilized at a comparatively modern epoch for fresh sepultures.