Chapter I: Excavations at Tiryns

Situation of the City--Description by Pausanias--Cyclopean
Walls: meaning of the epithet--The Quarry--The rock of Tiryns
and its bordering Wall--Galleries, Gate, and Tower--Walls and
Terraces of the Acropolis--Mythical traditions and History of
Tiryns--Its destruction by the Argives--Its connection with the
myth of Hercules--Morasses in the Plain of Argos--The Walls of
Tiryns the most ancient monument in Greece--Pottery a test of
antiquity--Beginning of the Excavations--Cyclopean house-walls
and conduits--Objects discovered--Terra-cotta cows, and female
idols with cow's-horns--Both represent the goddess HERA BOÖPIS--A
bird-headed idol--A bronze figure, the only piece of metal at
Tiryns, except lead--No stone implements found--Pottery--Hellenic
remains outside the citadel, which was the primitive city--Proofs
of different periods of habitation--The later city of Tiryns--The
archaic pottery of Tiryns like that of Mycenæ--Its forms and
decoration denote higher civilisation than the rude walls
would lead us to expect--Older pottery on the virgin soil,
but no cows or idols--Probable date of the second nation at
Tiryns, about 1000 to 800 B.C.; of the Cyclopean walls, about
1800 to 1600 B.C.--No resemblance to any of the pottery in
the strata of Hissarlik, except the goblets--A human skeleton
found--Whorls--Estimate of soil to be moved at Tiryns--Greater
importance of MYCENÆ _Page_ 1

NOTE A.--"HERA BOÖPIS" 19