XIV.
THE EXCAVATIONS OF DR. SCHLIEMANN, AT MYCENÆ (GREECE).
HIS EARLY LIFE AND IDEAL.—THE TREASURES OF PRIAMUS.—DESCRIPTION OF THE SPOT.—EARLY HISTORY OF MYCENÆ.—PAUSANIAS, THE ANCIENT ARCHÆOLOGIST.—WHERE THE EXCAVATIONS WERE COMMENCED.—THE TOMB OF AGAMEMNON AND HIS FAITHFUL WARRIORS.—DESCRIPTION OF THE TREASURES FOUND.—PROOFS OF THE IMMENSE ANTIQUITY OF THE TOMBS.—RECENT PORTRAITS TAKEN OF HEROES OF ANCIENT GREECE.—HOW IT WAS DONE.—THE VALUE OF THE DISCOVERIES REGARDING ART MATTERS.—HERACLES STRUGGLING WITH THE LION.—DR. SCHLIEMANN’S HEROIC WIFE.—DISCOVERY OF THE TEMPLE OF ÆSCULAPIUS.—A BYZANTINE CAVE UNDER THE ROCK.—A DISCOVERY WHICH FILLS ATHENS WITH JOY.—THE STATUE OF VICTORY FOUND IN ALMOST PERFECT CONDITION.
DR. AND MRS. SCHLIEMANN, THE EXCAVATORS, AT MYCENÆ (GREECE).
Dr. Heinrich Schliemann, the great excavator, of whom so much has been said of late, is a German by birth, and a man of an idealistic character. In his youth, he dreamed of the heroes of antiquity; he was a passionate student of the Trojan war, and the adventures of Odessus and Agamemnon. He loved to hear, in school, Homer recited, and afterwards, when he went through his variegated life, as ship’s boy, ship’s broker, clerk, commercial correspondent, and, at last, as an independent and rich merchant, one ideal pursued him, that of seeing, for himself, the seat of Homer, and the fatherland of the heroes of whom that great poet of antiquity sings; he wanted to find the traces of the past dead. After he had occupied himself, for many years, with his plan, after having surmounted innumerable obstacles, of which he gives a touching description in his autobiography, he succeeded, in 1867, in undertaking his first trip to Ithaca, the Peloponnesus, and Troja. The searches then made led to the discovery of the treasures of Priamus, which astounded the world; and scarcely has the astonishment of such remarkable discoveries cooled off, when Dr. Schliemann surprises us by a new miracle. He believed in the divinity, and found its trace; the treasures showed that Priamus had existed; the tomb identified Agamemnon.
But before entering upon a description of the excavations, and the treasures found therein, we deem it highly necessary to give a description, in outline, of the spot where the gems of antiquity are being unearthed.