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The Homeric House, in relation to the Remains at Tiryns

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Extract

Every discussion relating to Tiryns may fitly commence with a tribute to the energy and enthusiasm which, there as elsewhere, have characterised the excavations of Dr. Schliemann; a tribute which has at all times been ungrudgingly rendered by his critics, even when they have been least able to accept the theories which have been founded on those results by the distinguished excavator. It will not be the purpose of the present paper to discuss the questions which have been raised concerning the origin and age of the remains at Tiryns; whether, as Dr. Dörpfeld holds, they represent a prehistoric palace, built by Phoenicians about 1100 B.C.; or, as others believe after seeing them, belong to buildings of post-classical date and of rude construction, in which partial use was made of archaic or classical material found on the spot. The question with which alone this paper deals is the following. Given the plan of the house at Tiryns, as Dr. Dörpfeld traces it, can this plan be reconciled with that of the typical Homeric house, as indicated in the Homeric poems? By ‘reconciled’ is not meant, harmonised in every detail, but brought into an intelligible agreement as regards features essential to the Homeric story. The position maintained in Dr. Schliemann's work is that, with reasonable allowance for variations between one house and another of the same period, such a general reconciliation is possible. This is a very important issue, not only for Homeric archaeology, but for all study of Homer.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1886

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References

page 170 note 1 Among recent writings on the Homeric House, the following may be mentioned: (1) Winckler, , Die Wohnhäuser der Hellenen, Berlin, 1868Google Scholar; (2) Papers by Mr.Lloyd, Watkiss in the Builder of June 4th and 25th, 1870Google Scholar; and in the Architect of August 4th and 11th, 1877; (3) A note by Mr.Lang, A. on Od. 22. 2Google Scholar, in Butcher and Lang's translation; (4) Protodikos, J., De Aedibus Homericis, Leipsic, 1877Google Scholar. He has consulted, besides Winckler's work, writings by A. Hirt, H. Rumpf, Eggers, J. B. Friedreich, J. H. Krause, Emil Wörner, L. Gerlach; (5) An article by Prof.Gardner, P. in the Journal of Hellenic Studies, iii. 264Google Scholar; (6) Buchholz, E., Homerische Realien, Leipsic, 18711873Google Scholar. Helbig, , (Das Homerische Epos aus den Denkmälern erläutert) I. viii. pp. 7488Google Scholar, deals with the materials and decorations of the house, rather than with its plan.

page 171 note 1 They are thus described by Dr.Dörpfeld, (Tiryns, p. 236)Google Scholar:—‘In the north-west part of the palace lies a small court, with colonnades and adjoining rooms, which has no direct connection with the main court; it is the court of the women's dwelling. You must pass many doors and corridors to reach this inner part of the palace. There appear to have been three ways of reaching it. First, from the back-hall of the great Propylaeum, through the long passage XXXVI., to the colonnade XXXI.; and from this, through the outer court XXX., to the east colonnade of the women's court. Secondly, you could go from the great court or from the megaron, past the bath-room, into corridor XII., and then through passages XIV., XV., and XIX., to reach the vestibule of the women's apartments. A third way probably went from the east colonnade of the great court, through room XXXIII., into the colonnade XXXI., and then along the first way into the court of the women's apartments. All these three approaches are stopped in several places by doors, and the women's apartment was therefore quite separated from the great hall of the men's court.’

The above three routes can easily be traced on our Plan I. (copied from part of a reduction of Dörpfeld's plan in the Quarterly Review for Jan. 1886), by means of the Arabic numerals which I have placed to represent Dörpfeld's Roman numerals: (1) for the first route,—36, 31, 30: (2) for the second, 12, 14, 15, 19: (3) for the third, 33, 31, 30.

page 172 note 1 This general feature is common to all plans of the Homeric house hitherto given. I have taken the plan of J. Protodikos as a basis.

page 174 note 1 Od. 17. 561.

page 175 note 1 If it is argued that, as we shall presently see, there was another way of reaching the women's apartments, —viz., by an outside passage,—it is enough to reply that the supposed stranger need not have been expected to know this; and that Eumaeus might well refrain from suggesting it,—either as divining the stranger's reluctance (Odysseus was waiting till he could see Penelope alone), or as thinking such a back-way an unsuitable mode of bringing the new-comer to the mistress of the house.

page 178 note 1 21. 424, f. In giving Butcher and Lang's version, I substitute ‘other sport be made’ for ‘we make other sport.’ In the original it is simply From my point of view the difference is significant.

page 179 note 1 22. 75.

page 180 note 1

page 182 note 1 22. 142

page 183 note 1 Another derivation has been suggested for ῥοῦγα,—viz., the Low Latin ruga (‘furrow,’ then ‘path’) whence O. It. ruga, and Fr. rue (see Brachet s.v.). But the Greek use of ῥοῦγα goes too far back to make this explanation probable. And the way in which the ῥῶγες are mentioned (Od. 22. 143) proves that the word was in familiar use.

page 187 note 1 Protodikos thinks, as I do, that Melanthius went out by the ὀρσοθύρα: but, assuming the ὀρσοθύρα to be the only way from the hall into the λαύρα, he has to suppose that the door which Eumaeus was set to watch was that leading from the mouth of the λαύρα into the court. This places Eumaeus outside of the hall. But he was inside it, close to Odysseus, to whom he speaks when he sees Melanthius slip out (22. 163). Further, he has to suppose that the of 22. 127 is the edge of the threshold of the ὀρσοθύρα on the side towards the λαύρα, and that it is called the ‘threshold of the hall’ merely because the ὀρσοθύοα led out of the hall.

page 186 note 1 In a foot-note on the same page (227) another passage is adduced from Od. 6. 50 ff., where it is said that Nausicaa, after finding her mother at the hearth, met with (ξύμβλητο) her father as he was going forth to the council. This argument assumes that the hearth at which Nausicaa found her mother was in the women's apartments, and that, as Nausicaa, coming thence, ‘met’ her father leaving the house, she entered the hall by the door from the court. The answer is furnished by Od. 7. 139 ff. We there find Aretè and Alcinous sitting together in the men's hall near the ἐσχάρα at its upper end,—where Penelope also sits in 20. 55, and where Helen joins Menelaus (4. 121). Nausicaa, on awaking, wishes to tell her dream to her parents. She goes κατὰ δώματα, ‘through the house,’ from her own bed chamber in the women's apartments, to the men's hall,—the door between them being open. In the hall she finds her mother. Her father she found, we may suppose, in the prodomos or in the aulè, ‘about to go forth.’ It is absurd to press ξύμβλητο as if it necessarily implied that the two persons were moving in exactly contrary directions. It means simply ‘fell in with,’ ‘chanced to find.’

page 188 note 1 Vol. iii. p. 281.