Mycenae 1998 Overview

Publication of the NW Building Complex
at the citadel of Mycenae, the Argolid, Greece
Spyros E. Iakovidis

The site is the Bronze Age citadel of Mycenae, the Argolid, Greece, the cradle and the main centre of the so-called Mycenaean civilization, which was aptly named after the site and which was the first civilization created by Greeks that came to dominate the Aegean and to influence and rival the cultures of the Levant in the second millennium B.C. Because of its importance Mycenae was investigated already in 1841 by Kyriakos Pittakis acting on behalf of the then newly founded Archaeological Society at Athens. The work was taken up again by H. Schliemann in 1874 and 1876 (who discovered the royal shaft grave circle within the citadel) continued in 1886-1910 by Christos Tsountas (Arch. Society), in 1921-23, 1939, 1952-1957 by A.J.B. Wace and in 1959-1969 by Lord William Taylour (British School of Archaeology) and brought to the present state of research by J. Papadimitriou (1951-1958), G.E. Mylonas (1951-1954, 1958-1987) and the present applicant (1988 to present) again on behalf of the Archaeological Society at Athens. The bulk of the work was done by Tsountas but his excavations went for the most part unpublished.

The purpose of the program applied for is the publication of the building complex situated in the NW corner of the citadel. The complex consists of 3 buildings of 2 - 4 rooms each, preserved to basement level and separated by open passages. They were cleared down to bedrock by Tsountas sometime before or at the turn of the century. Tsountas left only a baulk for the traffic of his wheelbarrows, which was found to cover a large jar in situ, showing together with other evidence that the basements were used as storerooms. They were built in the 13th cent. BC and were destroyed by an earthquake before the end of that century. Tsountas never published this excavation nor did he ever refer to it. The ruins were cleared by G.E. Mylonas and the applicant, working on behalf of the Archaeological Society at Athens, in 1984 and 1985, a detailed situation plan was drawn and all the surviving evidence from Tsountas' baulk and a drain running beneath the buildings was collected, enough to justify a detailed publication. The program aims at studying this evidence and organizing its publication in full, thus filling an unfortunate gap in the history of the citadel.