Title-Page. For ‘The School Excavations at Mycenae, 1921–1923,’ read ‘1920–1923.’

Page 141, l. 32. For ‘the design on No. III,’ read ‘the design on No. II.’

Page 351, note 3. For ‘La Soc. Roy. des Lettres de Land,’ read ‘de Lund.’

The excavations of 1921 in Macedonia recorded in Vol. XXIV. of the Annual (p. 1 ff.) were completed in 1922. The site known as Chauchitsa was completely examined and the cemetery on the two rocky mounds was sufficiently excavated to make it possible to establish the main features of the burial methods and equipment. The high mound at the back of the cemetery on the edge of the plateau was also excavated and found to be an undisturbed stratified site. The strata revealed were of the fourth century B.C., of the Early Iron Age, and below that of the Bronze Age. The objects found in the Bronze Age strata and the nature of these strata have been fully dealt with elsewhere: the purpose of this report is to describe the cemetery, the Iron Age deposit which overlay the Bronze Age settlement, the Historic strata which overlay the Iron Age settlement, and, finally, to shew the connection between the Iron Age settlement and the cemetery at the foot of the plateau.

The East Mound (Figs. 1 and 2).—Fourteen graves in all were opened in the first season and have been duly recorded. In the second season a further twenty-two graves were opened, and all alike shewed the same general character as the first fourteen.

The pottery described below was picked up by Mr. Cuttle and myself on mounds, many of which have been noted by Wace or Rey (locc. citt.). We have retained their numbering, so as to avoid confusion. Of the mounds mentioned by Rey, we visited his 2, 3, 4, 5, but not 1, 6, 7, 8. Of those noted and visited by Wace we re-examined A 3, B 8, B 9 and C 9. Of those noted but not visited by him, we visited B 12, B 13, B 15. We could not identify his B 14. On B 13 we found no sherds at all, and it may be a burial tumulus, like A 3. We also collected sherds from a site (not a mound) in the hills one hour north-east of Gerakiní, shewn us by Mr. Bliss of the Anglo-Hellenic Magnesite Company at Gerakiní, and from three mounds in the Ormylia valley, marked Ormylia 1,2 2, 3 on the map (Pl. VI, 1).

The following notes were made partly in the course of a voyage taken in a small sailing boat in the late summer of 1922, from Corinth across the gulf, and along the Boeotian coast, during which all the south Boeotian harbours, as well as Voulis in Phokis, were visited, and partly in the course of subsequent visits from the land side. It is hoped that the notes may supplement, if they cannot improve upon, Mr. Gomme's excellent description of this part of Boeotia, and at the same time throw some light on trading relations between the two sides of the gulf in pre-Hellenic times.

Of the three possible harbours from which Thebes could be reached from the south, the nearest to Thebes is Kreusis, or, as it is now called, Livadóstro. The difficulties of the journey from there to Plataea are vividly described by Mr. Gomme (op. cit., p. 204), but there is reason to think that communication between Livadóstro and Thebes has always passed through Parapoúngia or its ancient representative Eutresis, rather than through Plataea. At the present day there are two paths to Parapoúngia, which serve the east and west sides respectively of the Livadóstro plain.

The study of mediaeval, Turkish and modern Greek history now attracts considerable attention in Athens. Important works upon these periods have been recently published by Greek scholars; lectures upon Byzantine history in particular are crowded not merely by students, but also by the general public, and several newspapers make a special feature of articles by specialists on social life in the reign of Otho. In these circumstances it is fortunate that the British School has possessed since 1899 the Finlay library, to which the adjacent library of M. Gennadios, opened in April, now provides a worthy counterpart.

The Finlay library, of which I speak from some two years' work among its shelves, consists, apart from general literature and travels, mainly of four divisions: (1) books used by Finlay for the Byzantine, Trapezuntine, Frankish and Turkish periods of his history; (2) books about the War of Independence and the reign of Otho; (3) a collection of Greek newspapers; and (4) Finlay's review articles, Times' correspondence, diaries and other documents. Of these the first section is nowadays the least important. Since Finlay's death much has been published about the Byzantine, Frankish and Turkish times, and the Empire of Trebizond, which renders some of his sources inadequate or obsolete.

The importance of Rhodes as an art centre in Hellenistic times has led to a theory that its sculpture was different in character from that of other places. My aim in this paper is to collect the more important objects of Rhodian provenance and to see if they support this view.

The fourth-century work from the island is in no way distinctive, as is shown by two female heads in Boston, which date from the middle and the third quarter of the century. The latter so closely resembles Attic grave-stelae that Caskey suspects it of belonging to one: this is quite likely, since we know that these stelae were exported (e. g., the fragment in the Argos Museum which bears the head of a boy with his name Kephisodotos written above in Athenian lettering), and the mention of five colossal statues by Bryaxis and a Helios and quadriga by Lysippos proves that foreign artists were already employed for Rhodes. The influence of Lysippos may be traced in a colossal head of Helios in the collection of Hiller von Gaertringen, in another Alexandroid head of no great merit, and in the colossal head from Ialysos in New York (Pl. VIII, 1). This came from a high relief and is remarkably like the heads on the Alexander Sarcophagus (cf. Pl. IX); it may be significant that both are of Pentelic marble instead of the customary Parian.

In Volume XII of the Annual of the British School were published two fragments of stamped pithoi (Nos. I. and II.) from Kameiros, part of a series of such fragments in the collection of the School. The remaining examples, mainly from Melos, are described below, the drawings having been made at the same time as those published in 1906.

No. III. (Pl. XI. A) ·105 × ·12 × ·02 — ·03 m. From Melos.

Coarse reddish clay.

Decoration : border of arches; border of double plait with three strands in each twist and bosses between; frieze projecting ·004 m. with lion and Centaur. The lion's mouth is open, shewing the tongue, his left forepaw is raised. The motive of the paw is a common one: cf. the lion on the Ionic B.F. bowl, Pfuhl, Malerei und Zeichnung der Griechen, iii. Pl. XXVIII. No. 128, and the kylix, Louvre, A. 478. The Centaur, likewise, is a common type. He is the vanquished Centaur begging for mercy, made popular through illustrations like those of Herakles and Nessos, and used here because he was a familiar figure which fitted the space. An excellent parallel is on a steatite lentoid intaglio from Melos. The Centaur has equine, not human fore-legs, as on other pithos fragments from Melos: contrast the type with human fore-legs from Kameiros and Asia Minor, where it seems never to have been superseded.

The output of books and articles dealing with Byzantine music has in the last few years been small. Dr. Wellesz has written a valuable summary of information not only on Greek, but also on Armenian and other Eastern ecclesiastical music. Prof. Psachos of Athens has tried to revive the so-called Stenographic Theory of the Neumes, which was current in the time of Chrysanthus. But, although his reputation as a musical investigator stands deservedly high, it seems very unlikely that Western scholars will accept the theory on the evidence afforded. In Dom Jeannin's introductory volume on Syrian music there is a good deal of information on the Byzantine system. Most important is his account of certain phonographic experiments made by Père Thibaut on the Modern Greek modes, proving these, where untouched by recent Western influence, to be identical with some of the Turkish scales. We must therefore recognise in England (as continental writers have long done) that the modern or Chrysanthine system is mainly Oriental and that its connection with the mediaeval modes is quite remote. In other words, Byzantine music is not a thing that any Greek cantor could teach us or a gramophone-record make intelligible.

The Greek Love-god of the fifth and fourth centuries before our era may perhaps be looked upon as an amalgamation of three distinct divine entities. Eros was Love, the creative desire of nature, and as such the soul within god and man; Eros was the love-child, son of Aphrodite-Cypris; Eros was the idealisation of human beauty beloved.

In the ancient cult centres of Thespiae and Parium the god was apparently not so much the personification of human love as a great physical and elemental force of nature. As such he ranks among the three primaeval Forces in the Theogony of Hesiod, who opens with these words his tale of creation (116 ff.): ‘Verily at the first Chaos came to be, but next wide-bosomed Earth, the ever-sure foundation of all the deathless ones who hold the peaks of snowy Olympos and dim Tartaros in the wide-pathed earth, and Eros, fairest among the deathless gods, who unnerves the limbs and overcomes the mind and counsels within them of all gods and all men.’ This is apparently the Eros who figured in the earliest Orphic Theogony, concerning which A. B. Cook has collected a wealth of material. He reconstructs partially the contents, which possibly told that in the beginning was Nyx. Black-winged Nyx laid an egg from which ‘sprang golden-winged Eros. Apparently heaven and earth were regarded as the upper and lower halves of the vast egg.’

The year 1913 witnessed the publication, under the auspices of the Prussian Academy, of the Corpus of Laconian and Messenian inscriptions (I.G. v. 1), edited (after part of the preliminary preparation had been carried out by M. Fraenkel and H. von Prott) by Walther Kolbe, at that time Professor of Ancient History in the University of Rostock. This event marked the beginning of a new epoch in the study of Laconian inscriptions, for the volume in question, thanks to its authoritative character and to the skill and devotion of its successive editors, naturally serves as the almost unquestioned basis of all further investigation. Its completeness and its correctness are accepted as axiomatic. It seems worth while, therefore, at a time when the British School is renewing its campaigns of excavation at Sparta with every hope and prospect of important epigraphical results, to make an attempt to strengthen this foundation, in however slight a degree, (1) by presenting a brief account of the Laconian inscriptions omitted from I.G. v. 1 or published in the twelve years which have elapsed since its issue, and (2) by making certain additions to the bibliographies of the inscriptions which it contains. With the Messenian section of the volume I shall not here deal.

When the British School decided to bring to an end its excavations at Sparta in the year 1910, after five campaigns, it was fully aware that the possibilities of the site were by no means exhausted. Its varied activities before the war, at Phylakopi and in Crete, and after the war at Mycenae, have formed the subjects of full reports in various volumes of the Annual from XVII (1910–11) onwards, but when Mr. Wace's tenure of the Directorship came to an end, the decision of the Committee to resume work on a site of the Classical period led to the renewal of work at Sparta forming their first choice. The fact that the new Director had taken an active part in three of the five original campaigns was an additional reason for returning there, and it was accordingly resolved to resume operations in 1924, with the Theatre as the first objective; and in hopes, moreover, of carrying out a fuller exploration of the Acropolis, and also of gaining fresh information as to the topography of ancient Sparta by extensively testing portions of the ancient city previously unexamined. The principal results of the work of the two seasons, 1924 and 1925, form the subject of the present report.

The scanty references preserved from the ancient writers who alluded to the Theatre at Sparta include no description of its shape, size or appearance, with the single exception of the passage in which Pausanias tells us (iii. 14. 1) that it was of white marble (λίθου λευκοῦ, θέας ἄξιον) The other authorities make mention of it only in reference to festivals or other events which took place in it. These allusions cover a long period, but do not help us to gain any idea either of the history of the building or of its form or size at any given date. They may be advantageously cited in chronological order, thus:—

Herodotus, vi. 67. (The quarrel of Demaratos and Leotychidas in the Theatre on the occasion of the Gymnopaidiai, ca: 491 B.C.)

Xenophon, Hell. VI. iv. 16. (The news of the battle of Leuktra arrived on the last day of the Gymnopaidiai, τοῦ ἀνδρικοῦ χοροῦ ῦνδον ὄντος That ἔνδον means ‘in the theatre’ is confirmed by Plutarch's account, Ages. 29, which repeats Xenophon's, adding ἐν τῷ ′θάτρῳ.)

Athenaeus, xv. 631 c. (Quoting Aristoxenos (Aristotle's pupil) for the celebration of the Gymnopaidiai in the Theatre); and iv. 139 e (quoting Polykrates (date unknown) for the procession of boys on horseback passing through the Theatre on the occasion of the Hyakinthia.)

In the various regions of the Theatre we found during those two seasons a total of 1199 coins and 16 Byzantine the first season yielding 526 and the second 673. These have not all been cleaned, and many still require identification. Hopelessly indecipherable pieces were more numerous in the first year's finds.

The first classification has given us the following particulars:—

These were mostly found singly, but three hoards occurred among them:—

(a) 28, in lamentable condition, apparently Imperial Æ 1 and 2, probably of the late second and early third centuries; found near footings of column-bases in front of centre of Scenae Frons.

(b) 60 Byzantine, copper, extending from Leo VI (886–912) to Manuel I (1143–1180); found, about one metre below modern surface, behind the S. wall of later Skenotheke, just south of the blockedup doorway.

(c) 14 small Byzantine, copper, in poor condition, mostly of twelfth century, from Byzantine house-floor ca. 2·50 m. above front seats in E. of cavea.

The yield of inscriptions from our two seasons' work at the Theatre would not have been extensive but for the fact that the marble facing-blocks of the East Parodos-wall proved to be almost covered with a series of texts, for a distance of some fifteen metres from its west end (adjoining the Orchestra). When we had finished excavating this wall, past the point where the inscriptions ended, we had before us an inscribed monument, second only, among monumental inscriptions of the Greek mainland, to the great Terrace-wall at Delphi. Our documents consist of lists of Magistrates, and the cursus honorum of individual Spartan officials, dating from the first half of the second century of our era. Twenty-eight separate documents are recorded on the wall as it stands, and other twenty-four are contained, in whole or part, on fallen blocks and fragments, some of the latter very small, which came to light in front of the wall, or a short distance away from it. In addition, three fragments of similar records, Nos. 1 E 25–27, were discovered close to the east end of the corresponding West Parodos-wall, which has had its marble facing-blocks almost all stripped away, and none of the inscriptions, which we may presume it bore, have survived in situ.

The Hieron of Athena Chalkioikos was identified and to a large extent excavated in 1907, by the late Mr. Guy Dickins, who completed the task in the following year. Accounts of these campaigns, and of the principal finds, were published by him in the Annual (xiii. pp. 137–154, and xiv. pp. 142–146, respectively). This undertaking was practically limited to the thorough exploration of the area enclosed within the wall of the Hieron (B.S.A. xiii., l.c., Fig. 1), and except for the uncovering of the south face of the south wall, and for one trial trench about twenty metres in length, running southwards from the centre of this wall, no excavation took place to the south of the Precinct, in the area contained between it and the retaining-wall of the cavea of the theatre below. As this trench had yielded a large quantity of pottery, including fine fragments of the local Geometric style, a systematic exploration of this area seemed a duty, to be undertaken without delay, when operations were resumed in 1924.

Work commenced on April 7th, 1924, and lasted until the end of the season (May 31st); in 1925, from April 13th to May 30th. The number of men employed seldom exceeded ten, though about sixteen were at work in the second half of May 1924.

The outstanding feature of the excavations of 1925 was the discovery, in the circumstances above described, of substantial portions of a marble statue, of more than life size, representing a helmeted warrior. These comprise (1) the head and armless torso down to the waist; (2) two portions of the marble crest, which join each other, and fit on to the helmet; (3) the left leg, from knee to ankle; (4) part of the right foot, lacking heel and toes (material, scale, and style as far as can be seen in its damaged condition, make the attribution practically certain); (5) a small piece from the rim of the marble shield, which we must restore the figure as holding.

There are two cuttings for the crest on the top of the helmet, of which that nearer the front is ·085 m. long, the other ·10 m.; a plain surface lies between them, ·026 m. long; the cuttings are nearly straight-sided, but vary in width between ·028 and ·035 m. A part of the tenon of the crest was found broken off short in the rearward cutting, and has since been rejoined to the fragment to which it belongs.

Damage: both arms are missing, being broken away at the shoulders, and in addition the surface has been flaked off from the back of the right shoulder and the chest close to the arm-pit.

The footless, handleless, bowls with moulded reliefs, which are commonly known as ‘Megarian bowls,’ were manufactured in various parts of the Greek world as far apart as S. Russia and Italy from the end of the fourth century onwards. Since the large discoveries of this ware made during the French excavations at Delos, and the detailed study of it published by Monsieur Courby, we are able, not only to recognise that they do not form a single homogeneous series, but also to assign certain types to various local centres.