The Mycenaeans: A Captivating Guide to the First Advanced Civilization in Ancient Greece by History Captivating

Author:History, Captivating
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-03-25T16:00:00+00:00

A Gold Funeral Mask

Toward the end of the Shaft Grave Era, circa the 1500s BCE, the Mycenaean elite started to be buried in imposing structures called tholos, or beehive tombs. These were larger, made of stone, and had vaulted roofs. The tholos represents a conundrum for archaeologists because it’s hard to tell whether they belonged solely to the elite with the commoners instead being buried in communal tombs, as there are some tombs that have numerous bodies, indicating they might have been communal. There is evidence that competing political or military factions attempted to build the grandest tholos in attempts to outdo one another in the game of conspicuous burials. The most famous of these tholoi is the Treasury of Atreus, also called the Tomb of Agamemnon after the famous Greek mythical hero. The Treasury of Atreus was perhaps the most impressive Mycenaean gravesite from this time period and demonstrated the prosperity of the civilization toward the end of the Shaft Grave Era. It was not only one of the most massive graves, but it also possessed some of the greatest gold treasures ever recorded in the history of Mycenaean archaeological discovery.

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