ns have been preserved. Leaving
aside all disputed points, the broad fact remains that 'all the
structural features described, the courtyard, with its altar to
Zeus and trench for sacrifices; the vestibule; the ante-chamber;
the hall, with its fireplace and its pillars; the bathroom, with
passage from the hall; the upper story, sometimes containing the
women's quarters; the spaciousness; the decoration; even the furniture,
have been most wonderfully identified at Tiryns and Mycenae, and
in Crete.' In Crete, along with the resemblances above referred
to, are found important differences, such as the position of the
hearth, and the details of the lighting. These, which are probably
due to differences of climate, do not, however, invalidate the
fact of the general correspondence.

In details, we have the frieze of _kuanos_ of the Palace of Alcinous,
paralleled by the fragments discovered, as already mentioned, at
Tiryns, and by similar friezes at Knossos, while the bronze walls
of the same palace have been, if not paralleled, at all events
illustrated, by the bronze decorations of the vaults of the great
bee-hive tombs at Mycenae and Orchomenos. The parallel is, perhaps,
even closer when we come to the details of metal-working, which
are described for us in Homer, and of which illustrations have
been found in such profusion among the Mycenaean relics. We are
told, for example, that on the brooch of Odysseus was represented
a hound holding a writhing fawn between its forepaws, and we have
the elaborate workmanship of the cup of Nestor--'a right goodly
cup, that the old man brought from home, embossed with studs of
gold, and four handles there were to it, and round each two golden
doves were feeding, and to the cup were two bottoms. Another man
could scarce have lifted the cup from the table, but Nestor the
Old raised it easily.' The Mycenaean finds have yielded examples of
metal-working which seem to come as near to the Homeric pictures as
it is possible for material things to come to verbal descriptions.
One of the golden cups from the Fourth Grave at Mycenae might almost
have been a copy on a small scale of Nestor's cup, save that it
had only two handles instead of four. On the handles, as in the
Homeric picture, doves are feeding, and like Nestor's, the Mycenaean
cup is riveted with gold.

Or, take again such examples of another form of art-work in metal
as are given by the scenes of the lion hunt and the hunting-cats