Epano Phournos tholos

The Epano Phournos tholos is a Mycenaean tholos tomb.^[2] Tholos tombs, or tholoi, are a form of monumental burial that originated in Messenia, in southwest Greece, at the end of the Middle Helladic III period (that is, c. 1700 – c. 1675 BCE).^[3] They may have developed as a more monumental version of the burial mounds, or tumuli, used in mainland Greece throughout the Middle Helladic period; they may also have been influenced by similar styles of built tombs used in Minoan Crete.^[4]

Tholoi consist of a narrow rectangular entrance passage, known as the dromos,^[5] which leads into an underground burial chamber, separated from the dromos by an entrance-way called the stomion, which would usually be sealed with a dry-stone wall. The walls of the chamber, and sometimes the dromos, were lined with dry-stone masonry. The chamber was capped with a rounded roof constructed by the technique of corbelling, by which courses of blocks were overlapped in increasingly small circles. They were typically used for multiple burials, perhaps of members of the same family, and many were periodically re-opened for additional interments and for ritual activity.^[4]

During the Late Bronze Age, a total of nine tholoi were constructed at Mycenae.^[6] The Epano Phournos tomb dates to the Late Helladic IIA period (c. 1635/1600 – c. 1480/1470 BCE),^[7] the first period in which the tombs were constructed at the site.^[8] It is located approximately 450 m (490 yd) west-southwest of the citadel of Mycenae,^[9] near the crest of the Panagia Ridge.^[10]

The tomb's construction is of a similar style to the nearby Cyclopean Tomb, a tholos tomb of approximately the same date.^[11] Like the Cyclopean Tomb, the Epano Phournos tomb is constructed from undressed pieces of stone, which are used throughout the chamber and stomion.^[12] The tomb's dromos is 10 metres (33 ft) in length and 4–5 metres (13–16 ft) wide;^[13] it is cut from the bedrock with no supporting masonry.^[11] The stomion is 4.5 metres (15 ft) high, 2 metres (6.6 ft) wide, and 5 metres (16 ft) deep.^[13] It was originally capped with five lintel blocks of conglomerate, which showed no sign of having been worked; it shows no evidence of a relieving triangle,^[b] found in later tholoi at Mycenae.^[15]

The tomb's chamber had collapsed by the time it was investigated;^[16] this possibly took place during the Bronze Age, since all the dateable material found at the bottom of the debris was Mycenaean,^[17] and had certainly occurred by the Geometric period.^[18] It is around 11 metres (36 ft) in diameter; Alan Wace estimates that it would originally have been around 10 metres (33 ft) high.^[15] The chamber floor was originally covered with a pavement of white pebbles.^[19]

As with the other tholoi at Mycenae, the Epano Phournos tholos was not discovered intact, but had been looted in antiquity.^[22] Finds of pottery from the Late Helladic III period (c. 1420/1410 – c. 1075/1050 BCE) close to the tomb floor suggest that it may have already been robbed in this period.^[23] The chamber floor was covered with small, rectangular pits, which the excavators interpreted as attempts by grave-robbers to find burial pits.^[19] No evidence of actual burial pits has been found in the tomb: it is likely that any burials made there were placed on the chamber floor.^[19] There was also no evidence of repeated use, as was common in tholos tombs outside Mycenae, leading Sinclair Hood, who participated in the excavation of the tomb, to suggest that it may have been used only once.^[24]

The stomion contained remains of a Palace Style storage vessel (amphora), made on Crete and contemporary with the early part of the Late Helladic II period, as well as two beads (one of amethyst and one of quartz), a small piece of ivory, and some gold leaf. Wace (who led the excavation) and Hood interpreted these as loot from the chamber dropped and left by grave-robbers. The excavators also found twenty-two sherds of pottery dating to Late Helladic II (c. 1635/1600 – c. 1420/1410 BCE), around fifty from Late Helladic III,^[25] part of a human jawbone and small pieces of gold; the latter and the bone were interpreted as originating in the chamber.^[26] A clay spool, possibly of Mycenaean date, was also recovered from the stomion.^[10]

The chamber furnished fragments of at least eight Palace Style amphorae, scraps of gold, human and animal bones, a glass-paste bead and a piece of boar's tusk, which Hood suggested could have come from a boar's tusk helmet. Hood considered all of these to be remains of the tomb's original contents.^[19] The chamber also contained sherds of Mycenaean pottery for which it was not possible to definitively establish whether they were part of the original grave goods or represented later material introduced by the collapse of the dome. It was similarly impossible to determine whether fragments of Mycenaean figurines, dating to the Late Helladic III period, and several stems of kylikes, also found in the chamber, had entered via the collapse or been placed in the tomb while it was intact.^[24]

A large amount of post-Mycenaean material was recovered from the tomb. James Whitley considers it sufficient to provide evidence of hero cult (the use of the tomb as a site of worship for legendary or deified ancestors) during the Geometric and Archaic periods (the latter dating to c. 700 – 479 BCE).^[27] Eighty-eight pieces of post-Mycenaean pottery, mostly dating to the Geometric period (c. 900 – c. 700 BCE), were recovered during excavations of the stomion.^[28] A terracotta head from a statuette of a warrior, dating to the Archaic period, was found on the floor of the stomion: Hood wrote that this had been interpreted as the remains of cultic activity at the tomb.^[26] He also suggested that fragments of lead plate, found in the same place, could have been left as votive offerings, pointing to parallels known from Sparta and other sites.^[26]

Sherds of pottery from the Geometric period, as well as a few later pieces, including black-glazed pottery of the fifth and fourth centuries BCE and a sherd of West Slope Ware from the succeeding Hellenistic period, were found in the upper strata of the collapsed chamber. Wace and his team interpreted this as evidence that the resulting hollow was used in antiquity as a rubbish-dump.^[29] Susan Alcock suggests that some may have been placed as dedications in the hollow left by the collapse of the tomb's chamber.^[30]

The outer block of the tomb's lintel had two rectangular cuttings, about 30 by 15 centimetres (11.8 by 5.9 in) in area and a few centimetres deep, made into its upper surface. Wace and Hood observed that these must have been made either before the construction of the upper façade, which sat atop the lintels, or after the collapse of the tomb; if the latter, they suggested that they may have been intended to hold the bases of stelai or statues used in cult practice.^[26][c]