tholoi, present new points of ritual (which are discussed, with others, by Dr. Paribeni in Mon. Ant. xiv. pp. 677-756), and new and early indications of intercourse between Crete and North Africa.

Palaikastro.-At Palaikastro, on the east coast of Crete, the British School has uncovered the greater part of a Minoan settlement, lasting from Neolithic to Late Minoan (Mycenaean) time (B. S. A. xi. p. 258 ff.), with a "Geometric" sequel on a neighbouring site. Here the campaign of 1905 effected the clearance of two blocks of houses flanking the main street at its southern end. They contain much Late Minoan furniture, including painted vases of great beauty, and a series of carved ivory plaques. A Neolithic rock-shelter and square-built homestead at Magasà, on the adjacent plateau inland, yielded primitive pottery types and numerous stone axes and chisels. An Early Minoan ossuary, with characteristic pottery painted in white on black, shows, in conjunction with examples already published, that the custom of secondary interment lasted right on through Early and Middle Minoan times. Larnakes of Late Minoan age were found; and an examination by Mr. C. H. Hawes of skulls from Palaikastro and other Minoan sites in Crete confirm Dr. Duckworth's earlier generalisation (Proc. Brit. Ass. Southport, 1903) as to the racial types of early Crete "Mediterranean" in general, but with a brachycephalic admixture from an early period. Compare the results of Dr. Klon Stephanos' work in the Cyclades, summarised below.

In 1906 nothing was attempted at Palaikastro, except to verify previous work by a few trial pits, and to excavate, near the Roussolakkos site, a cave containing skulls, sherds, and three larnar-burials, all of the Third Late Minoan phase. But much preliminary work was done in the Candia Museum to display the finds, and to prepare them for publication in the near future.

Gournia.-At Gournià, and in its neighbourhood, Miss Boyd and her colleagues have concluded their work for the present. Their latest finds, reported in Trans. Dept.

Archaeol. Pennsylvania, I. ii.-iii., include a detached house near Vasiliké (two miles south of Gournià), with finds ranging from Neolithic to Early Middle Minoan apparently, with copious furniture of pottery; a tholos tomb, rifled; a series of larnax-burials with vases of the "palace style" and later; and four late Neolithic deposits with rectilinear ornaments at Gournià itself and at Agia Photiá.

Museum Work.-Before leaving the subject of Crete, mention should perhaps be made of remarkable progress effected in organising and displaying the contents of the Candia Museum; of the acquisition by the Louvre of a fine fragment of apparently Cretan fresco-painting (Villefosse, Bull. Soc. Ant. France, 1905, p. 147 ff.); and of the distribution to the British Museum, the Fitzwilliam, and the Ashmolean Museum of a number of typical examples of Minoan art. The new Minoan section of the Ashmolean Museum is now practically in order, and provides a conspectus of recent additions to our knowledge of the Aegean which is unequalled except at Candia.

CYCLADES.-Little has been done of late among the early tombs of the Cyclades, but Dr. Klon Stephanos communicated to the Athens Congress (C. R. Arch. Congress, 1905, pp. 216-25), an important summary of work done in 1903-4 in Naxos, where hitherto only casual finds have been reported. From the same authority comes a summary of anthropological studies on the early racial types of the archipelago, which make it clear that as far back as our evidence extends (i.e. to the beginning of the Metal Age), it is impossible to speak of any pure type of man as existing even in the central islands (l.c. p. 225). This clearly rules out all theories of Aegean ethnology which presume such pure type and restrict intrusive elements to later phases.

MYCENAEAN GREECE.-On the mainland of Greece recent advance has been mainly through the gradual accumulation of a number of minor details, which, taken collectively, do much to fill in the picture of Aegean Bronze Age culture, and extend our ideas of its range. The existence, for

example, of sepulchral tumuli in Northern and Central Greece has been long known; but little had been done before 1905 to determine their age and character. Selected examples have now been examined by M. Soteriádhes (Ath. Mitth. xxx. pp. 113-40). One at Chaeronea belonged to an early phase of culture, with incised and monochrome pottery, and "idols " analogous to those of the early tombs of the Cyclades. The mound was stratified with layers of skeletons and ashes, and at one point a regular hearth was found. Another mound at Orchomenos contained a burial with equipment in the local Mycenaean style; another at Vranézi, in Copais, was associated with a necropolis of the "Geometric" period. Clearly this tumulus-type of burial has a large range in time in Northern Greece: only further research can determine its relations either with the rarer tumular monuments of the south, or with the large series in other parts of the Balkan lands.

Tombs of the tholos type continue to make their appearance at Kapakli, near Volo (Ath. Mitth. xxx. 1905, p. 153 ff.), with contents like those at Mycenae, but less rich; at Thebes (id. p. 415), two examples with jewellery and glass-objects; and at Delísi (near the site of the Delion), a rock-cut tomb, associated with the remains of a Mycenaean farmstead (Rep. B. S. A. 1906).

In Peloponnese, trial pits sunk, at last, beneath the floors of the palace of Tiryns have revealed the foundations of an earlier palace, which partly explain some of the peculiarities of the later plan, and are associated with pottery and other objects which show contact with the Middle Minoan culture of Crete. It has, of course, long been known that polychrome vases of the "Kamarais" school were to be found rarely in the lower levels at Tiryns.

At Argos, Dr. Vollgraff's excavations have continued. The principal results of a prehistoric kind hitherto are as follows. Two strata of pre-Mycenaean-i.e. Early or Middle Minoan-walls have been found on the " Aspis” hill,

with associated pottery, analogous to that of Hissarlik I.—V. The ornamentation is in a rectilinear style, but Dr. Vollgraff avoids the current theory which confuses this pre-Mycenaean geometrical work (of incised origin) with the elaborate painted "Geometrical " style of post-Mycenaean date (B. C. H. xxx. pp. 5-45). A Mycenaean necropolis has been found in the valley between Aspis and Larissa, and over it the site of a village of Early Iron Age ("Geometrical ") date, marking once more the utter breach with the past which the introduction of the latter culture effected.

Mention should perhaps be made here of the recent reconstruction by the British Museum of its fragments of the façade of the "treasury of Atreus." The gorgeously decorated columns that flank a Mycenaean portal have long been familiar from restorations; but it is now for the first time possible to see them in reality, pieced together from the fragments that had been carried off from the "treasury of Atreus" at Mycenae to the west of Ireland. They have now been presented by the Marquess of Sligo to the British Museum, and mounted in the Archaic Room, and their rich spiral ornamentation must be seen to be appreciated.

1

Recent publications have thrown a good deal of light on the origin of the various types and decorations of Greek vases; the most noteworthy of these are contained in the vases of Phylakopi, in Melos, and those of the Heraeum at Argos. Many of the discoveries belong to the prehistoric age; but they serve to show that the continuous development which we can trace from the eighth century had its roots in the earlier traditions both of the islands and of the mainland; and the impression is confirmed by the vases recently found in Thera and on Rhenea, where they had been buried after Nicias purified Delos. Until recently the great series of geometric vasesbest known in Athens as the Dipylon vases-seemed to show

1 Excavations at Phylakopi in Melos.

? J. C. Hoppin, in Waldstein, The Argive Heraeum.

a style that in Greece sprang into existence fully developed ; and so, in spite of historical difficulties, some authorities regarded them as showing some external origin; but now traces have been found of a similar tendency in decoration going back to primitive times, not only in the islands but on mainland sites, such as Olympia. It is therefore contended that this style was indigenous in Greek lands, and, though locally and temporarily eclipsed by the brilliance of Mycenaean art, was never completely superseded by it. Such a theory, should it prove correct, would have very interesting consequences from the historical, as well as from the artistic, point of view.

In Laconia, scanty traces of Neolithic and early Bronze Age sites have been observed at Geronthrae (Geraki) and at Thalamae. At the former place, trial trenches about a "Pelasgian" wall on the acropolis produced also fragments of Mycenaean vases of a local painted fabric. At Sparta itself, nothing as yet seems to go back earlier than the Age of Iron.

In Leukas, explorations directed by Dr. Dörpfeld, to test his identification of the island with the Ithaka of Homer, reveal traces of a prehistoric site with the remains of what may turn out to have been a "palace"; and also of two rock sanctuaries, and a few graves. Leukas thus falls into line with other islands of the group as a site of Mycenaean occupation; but the traces described seem hardly sufficient to justify the introduction of phrases like "Achaean" and "pre-Achaean" into the published description of them.

Mycenaean Traces in Asia Minor.-Elsewhere in the Aegean there is little new to record. At Miletus the temple of Athena yields a continuous series of vase fragments, ranging backwards as far as the later Mycenaean styles (Arch. Anz. 1906, pp. 1-42), and confirms ancient tradition as to the antiquity of the Milesian settlement. It is the only one in Ionia (except the anonymous site at Tchangli on the Panionian Promontory) which can boast a Mycenaean