The Treasury of Atreus or Tomb of Agamemnon is a large ''tholos'' or

beehive tomb A beehive tomb, also known as a tholos tomb (plural tholoi; from Greek θολωτός τάφος, θολωτοί τάφοι, "domed tombs"), is a burial structure characterized by its false dome created by corbelling, the superposition of suc ...

constructed between 1350 and 1250 BC in

Mycenae Mycenae ( ; grc, Μυκῆναι or , ''Mykē̂nai'' or ''Mykḗnē'') is an archaeological site near Mykines in Argolis, north-eastern Peloponnese, Greece. It is located about south-west of Athens; north of Argos; and south of Corinth. Th ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

.Wace, A. J. (1940). The Treasury of Atreus. ''Antiquity, 14'', 233. ISSN 0003-598X The tomb was used for an unknown period. Mentioned by the Roman geographer

Pausanias Pausanias ( el, Παυσανίας) may refer to: *Pausanias of Athens, lover of the poet Agathon and a character in Plato's ''Symposium'' *Pausanias the Regent, Spartan general and regent of the 5th century BC *Pausanias of Sicily, physician of th ...

in the 2nd century AD, it was still visible in 1876 when the German archaeologist

Heinrich Schliemann Johann Ludwig Heinrich Julius Schliemann (; 6 January 1822 – 26 December 1890) was a German businessman and pioneer in the field of archaeology. He was an advocate of the historicity of places mentioned in the works of Homer and an archaeologi ...

discovered the shaft graves under the "''agora''" in the Acropolis at Mycenae. The tomb perhaps held the remains of the sovereign who completed the reconstruction of the fortress or one of his successors. The grave is an exceptional example of

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...

Mycenaean

tholoi A beehive tomb, also known as a tholos tomb (plural tholoi; from Greek θολωτός τάφος, θολωτοί τάφοι, "domed tombs"), is a burial structure characterized by its false dome created by corbelling, the superposition of suc ...

and architecture as it is considered the finest and largest of the surviving nine tholos tombs found at Mycenae and the many more in the Argolid. The Treasury of Atreus exemplifies aspects of architectural form and technical construction used in Bronze Age Mycenean culture. The tomb is a funerary chamber constructed within the slop of a hill once surrounded by Mycenaean citadels, it is structurally complex, and its monumental shape and grandeur make it one of the most impressive Mycenaean monuments.

Background

Mycenae, ruled by Greek kings

Atreus In Greek mythology, Atreus ( , ; from ἀ-, "no" and τρέω, "tremble", "fearless", gr, Ἀτρεύς ) was a king of Mycenae in the Peloponnese, the son of Pelops and Hippodamia, and the father of Agamemnon and Menelaus. Collectively, hi ...

and

Agamemnon In Greek mythology, Agamemnon (; grc-gre, Ἀγαμέμνων ''Agamémnōn'') was a king of Mycenae who commanded the Greeks during the Trojan War. He was the son, or grandson, of King Atreus and Queen Aerope, the brother of Menelaus, the husb ...

, was an important and powerful society during the Bronze Age in Greece. The ancient city of Mycenae was located on the Argive Plain in northeastern

Peloponnese The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic regions of Greece, geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmu ...

Greece. The Mycenae acropolis was built on a hill hundreds of meters above sea level, fortified by the surrounding environment. Specifically, Mycenae was fortified by the hills and peaks of Mount Profitis Ilias and Mount Zara. Additionally, the acropolis was separated from these peaks by two ravines, the northern Kokoretsa and the southern Chavos. The Chavos closely intersects Mycenae, Mount Zara and the Panagia ridge.Mason, David J. (2007). The Location of the Treasury of Atreus. ''Oxford Journal of Archaeology, 26''(1), 35-52. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0092.2007.00272.x

Location

The Panagia ridge divides Mycenae’s nine tombs into two groups. The tholoi on the east side of the ridge are thought to have been built by Mycenaean rulers, as they are located closer to the acropolis and are larger and more ornate than those on the western side. In order of construction, the eastern tombs are the Treasury of Atreus, the Tomb of Aegisthus, the Lion Tomb, and the

Tomb of Clytemnestra The Tomb of Clytemnestra was a Mycenaean tholos type tomb built in c. 1250 BC. A number of architectural features such as the semi-column were largely adopted by later classical monuments of the first millennium BC, both in the Greek and Latin wor ...

. The other five tombs, the tombs of aristocracy, are located on the west side of the Panagia ridge.Mason, David J. (2007). The Location of the Treasury of Atreus. ''Oxford Journal of Archaeology, 26''(1), 35-52. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0092.2007.00272.x The Tomb of Aegisthus, the Lion Tomb, and the Tomb of Clytemnestra were built close together near the acropolis. The Treasury of Atreus, however, is set alone at the southern edge of a bowl on the Panagia ridge’s eastern slope. Although the reasoning for the distinct placement of the Treasury of Atreus is unknown, its difference in location and bolstering features which undermine the rest, make this tholos unique and highlight the special status of the ruler who constructed the tomb.

Construction

Mycenaean tholoi generally consist of a subterranean funerary chamber with

corbelled In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal jutting from a wall to carry a superincumbent weight, a type of bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in the wall, whereas a console is a piece applied to the st ...

roofing. Thus, tholoi construction combined excavation works, complex masonry works, and mound placement. The foundation and floor of these tombs required excavating a large, cylindrical cavity out of the bedrock or hillside for which the masonry chamber and

ogee An ogee ( ) is the name given to objects, elements, and curves—often seen in architecture and building trades—that have been variously described as serpentine-, extended S-, or sigmoid-shaped. Ogees consist of a "double curve", the combinatio ...

corbelled dome could then be constructed within.Lazar, N. A., Kadane, J. B., Chen, F., Cavanagh, W. G., & Litton, C. D. (2004). Corbelled Domes in Two and Three Dimensions: The Treasury of Atreus. ''International Statistical Review / Revue Internationale de Statistique'', ''72''(2), 239–255. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1403856 Inside, tiers of

ashlar Ashlar () is finely dressed (cut, worked) stone, either an individual stone that has been worked until squared, or a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, generally rectangular cuboid, mentioned by Vitruv ...

masonry were laid in rings so that each successive tier projected slightly farther inward, until only a small opening was left at the top. Following the tombs’ construction, the masonry work was then covered by a mound of earth projecting above the sloping landscape of the hillside. As a result of the emplacement of an earth mount, the chamber’s masonry works can only be seen from the inside. The Treasury of Atreus is rather atypical compared to the majority of ancient tholoi. The Treasury features unique masonry construction with a long, heavy

lintel A lintel or lintol is a type of beam (a horizontal structural element) that spans openings such as portals, doors, windows and fireplaces. It can be a decorative architectural element, or a combined ornamented structural item. In the case of w ...

placed below a relieving triangle designed to direct the weight of the masonry away from the lintel and avoid breakage. The tomb was the tallest and widest dome in the world for over a thousand years until the construction of the

Temple of Mercury The Temple of Mercury was a sanctuary in Ancient Rome on the Aventine Hill, which was dedicated to Mercury (mythology), god Mercury. Samuel Ball Platner, s.v. Aedes Mercurii, in A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome, London, Oxford Universi ...

in Baiae and the

Pantheon Pantheon may refer to: * Pantheon (religion), a set of gods belonging to a particular religion or tradition, and a temple or sacred building Arts and entertainment Comics *Pantheon (Marvel Comics), a fictional organization * ''Pantheon'' (Lone S ...

in Rome.

Structure

The Treasury of Atreus, like other Mycenae tholoi, features a dromos, or long straight ceremonial passage, set within the sloping landscape. The dromos leads into the tomb’s enormous

façade A façade () (also written facade) is generally the front part or exterior of a building. It is a Loanword, loan word from the French language, French (), which means 'frontage' or 'face'. In architecture, the façade of a building is often t ...

, where the inner funerary chamber can then be entered through a stomion, or deeply set doorway. The entrance to the tomb is oriented east-west and is characterized by an uncovered, inclined passage, or dromos, 6 meters wide and 36 meters long with conglomerate stone walls on either side.Mason, David J. (2007). The Location of the Treasury of Atreus. ''Oxford Journal of Archaeology, 26''(1), 35-52. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0092.2007.00272.x The dromos walls are about 19 meters long and 10 meters high at the façade, built in ashlar, or cut and worked stone. The ashlar walls are supported by blocks of conglomerate and limestone bonded by yellow clay, a mortar commonly used by Mycenaeans.Wace, A. J. (1940). The Treasury of Atreus. ''Antiquity, 14'', 233. ISSN 0003-598X The thickness of the walls increases from 0.5 meters at the eastern entrance to 10 meters at the western entrance nearest to the façade to support the pressure from the thrust of the façade itself and the pressure from the earth behind. The cubic content of the ashlar masonry used to construct the tombs’ entrance passage is at least 600 cubic meters, weighing around 1,200 tons. The façade at the western end of the dromos is 10.5 meters high, cut by a 2.7 meter wide and 5.4-meter-high doorway. This doorway, or stomion, is 5.40 meters deep, covered with two massive horizontal beams, or lintels. The inner lintel is the heaviest block ever used in Greek architecture, weighing around 120 tons and measuring to 8 meters long, 5 meters wide, and 1.2 meters thick. Above the entryway there is an open space in the shape of a triangle. This space, which is known as a relieving triangle, is meant to funnel the weight of the structure off the lintel and onto the sides of the structure, preventing the lintel from breaking due to pressure. Great care was taken in the positioning of the enormous stones, to guarantee the vault's stability over time in bearing the force of compression from its own weight. This gave a perfectly smoothed internal surface, onto which could be placed gold, silver and bronze decoration. The entrance portal to the

tumulus A tumulus (plural tumuli) is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds or ''kurgans'', and may be found throughout much of the world. A cairn, which is a mound of stones buil ...

was richly decorated: half-columns in green limestone with zig-zag motifs on the shaft, a

frieze In architecture, the frieze is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Paterae are also usually used to decorate friezes. Even when neither columns nor ...

with rosettes above the

architrave In classical architecture, an architrave (; from it, architrave "chief beam", also called an epistyle; from Greek ἐπίστυλον ''epistylon'' "door frame") is the lintel or beam that rests on the capitals of columns. The term can ...

of the door, and spiral decoration in bands of red marble that closed the triangular aperture above an architrave.Structurae.de
Treasury of Atreus
/ref> Segments of the columns and architraves were removed, some would rather say stolen, by

Lord Elgin Earl of Elgin is a title in the Peerage of Scotland, created in 1633 for Thomas Bruce, 3rd Lord Kinloss. He was later created Baron Bruce, of Whorlton in the County of York, in the Peerage of England on 30 July 1641. The Earl of Elgin is the h ...

in the early nineteenth century and are now in the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

. The capitals are influenced by ancient Egyptian examples; one is in the

Pergamon Museum The Pergamon Museum (; ) is a listed building on the Museum Island in the historic centre of Berlin. It was built from 1910 to 1930 by order of German Emperor Wilhelm II according to plans by Alfred Messel and Ludwig Hoffmann in Stripped Class ...

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

as part of the

Antikensammlung Berlin The Antikensammlung Berlin (Berlin antiquities collection) is one of the most important collections of classical art in the world, now held in the Altes Museum and Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. It contains thousands of ancient archaeological ...

. Other decorative elements were inlaid with ''rosso antico'' marble from quarries on the

Mani peninsula The Mani Peninsula ( el, Μάνη, Mánē), also long known by its medieval name Maina or Maïna (Μαΐνη), is a geographical and cultural region in Southern Greece that is home to the Maniots (Mανιάτες, ''Maniátes'' in Greek), who cla ...

, which had produced a fine red marble since between 1700-1300 BC, later known as ''lapis Taenarius'' after

Cape Taenarum Cape Matapan ( el, Κάβο Ματαπάς, Maniot dialect: Ματαπά), also named as Cape Tainaron or Taenarum ( el, Ακρωτήριον Ταίναρον), or Cape Tenaro, is situated at the end of the Mani Peninsula, Greece. Cape Matapan ...

, and green alabaster. The tholos chamber, constructed with fitted ashlar blocks in the shape of a beehive, is 14.5 meters in diameter and 13.2 meters high. A 2.5-meter-high doorway on the northern side of the inner chamber leads into a 6-meter square side chamber. Mykene BW 2017-10-10 12-31-43

Gallery

File:Atreas 1.jpg, Dome of the treasury File:Entrance to the treasure of Atreus.jpg, Detailed view of the entrance File:Facade of Treasury of Atreus 1.JPG, Reconstruction of a capital in the National Archeological Museum, Athens Image:Schatzhaus des Atreus, Querschnitt.jpg, Section of the tomb File:DK 1608 046013.jpg, Interior

References

External links

*
Treasury of Atreus
360° Interactive virtual tour

{{DEFAULTSORT:Treasury Of Atreus Buildings and structures completed in the 13th century BC 1879 archaeological discoveries Domes Mycenae Mycenaean_tombs