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Chapter 2 (part 10)
Layer VI: the Mycenaean castle, continued (p.132).
The
current state of the south gate VI T with the modifications from later times is
shown in addition to the large plan III, the adjacent ground plan
(fig.43) and the image of photo 18. Fig.43 shows what the floor
plan was like without the later walls during the existence of the sixth
layer. All the added parts are marked in the latter drawing by dots;
there are mainly a few places that have not yet been excavated and a
piece that was destroyed by a later construction. In all essential
points, the floor plan is secured by the preserved ruins.
 The
gateway has a width of 3.20 to 3.35 m and is completely paved with
stone slabs. In the middle, under the pavement, runs a partly
uncovered, brick canal about 0.50 m deep and 0.30 to 0.40 m wide, which
was used to drain rainwater. It is doubtful whether the pavement and
canal really come from the time of the sixth layer, because the (p.143]
gateway was still used in the seventh and eighth layers; however, it
seems to me by far the most likely that it belonged to the layer VI castle. Fig.43: Ground plan of the south gate VI T, current condition.
More
recently, however, we can attribute some repairs and a partial
elevation of the pavement. The older pavement leads up to the castle in
a uniform incline of about 1 : 6 to the north; the path was therefore
still easy to drive on. How the continuation of the gateway was
designed remains unclear. It is not yet known whether the path, after
passing the castle wall, turned to the left or to the left, or whether
it continued in a straight line, nor do we know where the actual gate
lock was and what it looked like.
Photo 18:
Walls (o and g) of the tower and gate T of the VI layer; Foundation (h)
of building IX E and wall (i) of the theater (bouleterion ?) of the IX
level.
While
the gateway to the east is framed by the 5 m thick fortress wall (d g),
which is not reinforced here by a tower or projection, a large square
tower (r 1 o p in Figure 44). As the existing embankment r sp proves,
it was not originally there and was only added later. Before its
construction, the castle wall further west had a tower-like projection
s p t u, the depth of which is not entirely certain, however, because
its rear part (at w) has not yet been excavated.
 We
also do not know if there was a tower room inside. In the younger Tower
VI i we found an
interior space that is 5.70 m long and on average 5.30 m wide. It was
accessible from the north through a door in the castle wall (a in
fig.44 and e on photo 18), which was bricked up at a later time.
Fig.44: Ground plan of the south gate VI T at the time of Layer VI.
What
the foundation (q in fig.44) uncovered in its interior served I
dare not say. I would consider it the base of a pillar supporting the
ceiling if it were more in the middle of the room. Of the three gate
walls, the front wall is 4.40 m thick, while the side walls are only
half as thick. The right side wall has a bend on its outside at k,
which returns in a very similar way, only with a projection, at the
large north-east tower. These bends are probably caused by the uneven
slope of the foundations. It was thus achieved that the tower was
probably exactly right-angled in its superstructure. There can be no
doubt that the location of the bend was chosen with regard to the
opposite corner of the wall g. As a continuation of the same side wall
to the north, we have uncovered wall b, which may not belong to layer
VI and is therefore drawn lighter in fig.44. The wall running
south from corner g is certainly more recent, probably from layer VII.
Like this corner itself, it can be seen clearly on photo 18 and is
marked with a k.
We
have no information about the structure of the gate and the tower. The
walls have only survived up to a height of 2m, all higher parts are
completely destroyed. On the other hand, a few things could still be
determined about the external furnishings of the gate. First of all, at
the two front corners of the gateway (at g and 1), high-edged, unworked
stone slabs are set up, which were certainly intended to serve as curb
stones to protect the corners. However, they possibly belong to layer
VII, because we found a similar stone at the corner of a building of
this layer in B 7. Because of this uncertainty, I only drew one of them
(g) in all black.
However, two larger, upright (p.135) stones
(m and n) can certainly be ascribed to layer VI, which, due to their
significant size and the place where they were erected, served some
special purpose that is unfortunately unknown to us. One (n) is very
weathered and therefore difficult to measure; the other (m) has been
better preserved because it was built over by walls of the VIII or IX
layer. The latter is 0.78m wide, 0.51m deep and now 1.05m high; We do
not know how high it originally was.
 Fig.45: Large standing stone (a) in front of the southern tower (b) of the VI layer.
Photo 18 and the adjacent
fig.45 illustrate its current appearance 0.12 m from the outer wall of
the tower. In accordance with the inclination of the tower wall, it is
also inclined backwards. One edge seems to have been beveled in ancient
times. The wall visible in both illustrations, adjoining to the right,
belongs only to layer VIII; when it was erected, our stone was slightly
worn away at the top and sides.
If
we imagine what the gate once looked like when the two large stones
rose up next to each other at the main entrance of the castle and next
to them perhaps a third stone further to the west stood, then we
involuntarily think of the powerful upright cult stones that were used
further east (e.g. on the island of Cyprus) in large numbers. In my
opinion, the idea that our stones also had a connection to the worship
of the gods cannot be completely dismissed.
The third gate of
the VI layer is the West Gate VI U. In spite of the great destruction
it has suffered and in spite of the various constructions it has
undergone, its ground plan can still be determined as far as it is
drawn in Fig.46. The southern castle wall h g f ends in the almost
vertical plane f e, while the western castle wall a b c is cut straight at c d.
Between the two ends of the wall was the gateway with a width of about
4m. On the model of the gate VI T one expects a projecting tower in
front of the wall b c to flank the gate way. Although we have not found
anything of the kind in our excavations, it may have been there because
later walls and large masses of earth did not permit thorough
investigation. It may have been entirely destroyed when the gate was
walled up, as we shall shortly see.
 Fig.46: The Gate VI U and its surroundings in the VI.
Behind
the walls, the gateway turned in an arc to the right, to the southeast,
in order to reach the gallery between the southern wall and the VI M
building on the one hand and, with another turn, the terrace of the VI
A and VI M buildings on the other hand with a gentle incline.
Both
paths are denoted by arrows in fig.46.. Only the two ends of the
supporting wall dkm, which laterally limited the gateway, are
preserved; the middle was broken off when the houses of the VII level
were built and is therefore only punctured in our figure. The corner m
is probably a (p.136) paved ramp, the slope of which can be read from
the inscribed height numbers.
We can add the gate lock at i k,
where a wall serving as a doorstep and an upright stone of the door
pillar (k) have been preserved. I assumed the width of the gate opening
to be about 2.50 m after the pillar. In addition, a piece of a drainage
channel (s) is uncovered in the gateway, which let the rainwater out
through the gateway to the castle.
On the one hand, the poor
execution of the wall i k, especially at the pillar k, and on the other
hand their elevation must give rise to doubts as to whether the
original gate closure is really present here. If we see that the
southern castle wall at f reached down to a depth of 23m above sea
level and the ancient floor at this point can be estimated at about 25m
after the weathering of the corner of the wall, and if we compare the
height of 30m with it, which the gateway shows between n and 1, then
(p.137) we must expect a much deeper lying gate; its ordinate should be
about 28m instead of 29.75m.
During our excavations in 1894 we
didn't think we should assume a deeper gate, because between i and 1 a
layer of ancient building rubble consisting of small stone chips came
to light, which had apparently been created by working the stones
during the construction of the southern castle wall and is therefore
safe had to be under the floor. In fig.39 (p. 122), which shows a
section through the southern castle wall and the VI M building, I have
indicated the rubble next to the right edge of the castle wall and
assumed the floor of the VI layer to be about 30m thereafter.
What
we didn't know at the time, however, is that it could also have been
caused by the conversion of the brick superstructure of the castle wall
into a stone wall. Whether this is actually the case and whether there
is still an older floor under the rubble can only be determined by a
small excavation. Incidentally, it must be pointed out here that the
rubble shown in fig.41 on the east wall of the castle may have only
been created during the reconstruction of the upper wall and can
therefore be higher than the original floor of the VI layer. In fact,
we found a black humus layer there as traces of an older floor, which
may not have to be ascribed to the V but to the first period of the VI
layer. However, further excavations must also be carried out here
before we are entitled to indicate an older, lower-lying floor of the
VI layer with certainty in the drawing.
Due to the relatively
high position of the gate i k one could come to the assumption that it
does not belong to the VI layer, but was only built by the VII
settlers. But that is not possible, firstly because of the presence of
the mentioned layer of building rubble, which is at the same height and
the sixth layer must not be denied, and secondly because the gate was
walled up while the sixth layer was still in existence. There is still
a wall between c d and f e (see Plate V), through which the gate is
completely blocked.
In our fig.46 I left them out so that the
old floor plan is clearer. It still has to be assigned to the VI layer,
both because of its construction and because the residents of the VII
layer, when building their houses, already used the existing wall. It
is also very conceivable that the lord of the castle reduced the number
of gates by walling up one of the gates in order to make it easier to
defend the castle during the war that resulted in the complete
destruction of the castle.
The dimensions of the Gate VI U are
slightly larger than the other two Gates VI S and VI T and may
therefore have formed the main Gate. Taking into account the preferred
location of the gate (p.138) VI T, however, in the area of which
the main entrance to the castle hill lay in older and younger strata,
and with regard to the later walling up of gate VI U, we believe that
we have to stick to the assumption for the time being, that VI T was
the main gate of VI Castle. This question can only be decided once the
continuation of Gate VI T towards the interior of the castle has been
completely excavated.
Finally, looking at the distribution of
the gates around the castle, we note that the three gates revealed
include a fourth which we believe to be at the north-east corner
(roughly J 3) (p.139). having to (see p. 125) only take half of the
castle. The entire north-western half has no gate. This distribution is
due to the terrain conditions insofar as the castle hill on the
south-eastern side was most easily accessible. However, since there is
still a foothill on the western side (cf. Plate II), there may very
well have been a gate on the north-west corner because of the terrain
conditions. Unfortunately, nothing was found there either of such a
thing or of the castle wall, and the large amounts of rubble lying
there, originating from the excavations, make any investigation almost
impossible. Our assumption that there was also a gate in the northwest
will probably never be able to be tested for accuracy.
Regarding
the towers of the VI castle wall, we are already familiar with one
tower (VI i) lying next to the south gate. Two others are known and
have been excavated, namely the east tower VI h and the particularly
stately north-east tower VI g. All three show an essentially identical,
excellent construction, all three were also added later to the existing
castle wall. Nevertheless, they do not seem to come from one and the
same time. The two towers VI h and VI i are likely to be somewhat
younger than VI g because, as we shall see, they hardly had a brick
superstructure, as was securely the case for the latter.
 The
VI h tower lies in the middle between the two gates VI S and VI T and
was undoubtedly erected to flank the eastern castle wall. A little over
11m wide, it protrudes about 8m in front of the castle wall. The more
precise dimensions result from the ground plan in fig.47, in which only
the walls of the VI layer are drawn in dark, while some younger walls
are left white. The right half (defg) of the cross-hatched tower, which
forms a square as a whole, belongs to the sloped base attached to the
outside of the east wall of the castle; the left half (ca) is higher
and belongs to an upper floor of the tower.
Fig.47: Plan of the tower VI h.
The
substructure, consisting of three walls, is built of almost regular
ashlars in a similar way to the southern castle wall, as can be seen
from the stone structure drawn in the Grundrias. We already know from
fig.35 and the associated description (p. 111) that its masonry is
assembled differently than that of the eastern castle wall and also
looks different on the outside.
 The accompanying photographic illustration (fig.48) also makes the difference
obvious; a is the sloping face of the eastern castle wall, b the
northern and c the southern wall of the tower, all seen from the north.
Wall a has smaller and more irregular stones than the other two. At the
top right of the picture you can see two more sections of the wall of
the upper storey of the tower, built from small but rectangular stones.
Fig.48: The northern and southern side walls (b and c) of tower VI h and the eastern castle wall (a) of layer VI.
Contrary
to the better masonry of the tower, its foundation is not so solid as
that of the eastern wall; in (p.140) As a result, the tower has settled
heavily, and the large cracks have appeared, which are clearly visible
on the wall c in our picture. The thickness of the wall on the east
wall (ef in fig.47) is about 3m, on the other two walls (de and gf)
about 2m. I cannot say with certainty why this difference was chosen.
One might surmise that the east wall should have had a stronger slope
than the side walls, and that as a result the thickness of the walls on
the upper storeys was reduced to the same extent on all walls. In
reality, however, this is not the case; all three walls in their
preserved parts have approximately the same slope of 0.07 to 0.08 m in
height. Since there is a similar difference in wall thickness in the
other towers, I suspect that the outer wall was given the greater
strength because it was most exposed to enemy attacks.
Several
holes preserved in the two side walls confirm the existence of a
horizontal wooden ceiling inside the tower. The cross-section laid
parallel to the castle wall, shown in fig.49, is intended to illustrate
their altitude and shape; a c is the northern, h f the southern side
wall. Within these walls, three holes can be seen at d and e, which
apparently once contained wooden longitudinal beams. In the drawing
they are made darker than the masonry surrounding them.
Above
the two inner timbers were also strong deck beams, which reached from
one wall to the other. According to the holes that have also been
preserved, one of which can be seen on photo 19 in the northern
side wall b, they had a thickness of about 0.25'' square and clear
distances of 0.62™. Above these deck beams we have planks or thin
(p.141) crossbeams and reeds and a layer of earth to add on top,
because then the upper edge of the ceiling just coincides with the
surface of the substructure of the castle wall.The lower, about 3m high
interior of the tower So it only reached up to the outside of the
castle wall, while the upper room extended over the castle wall and
reached to its inner edge, where it was closed off by wall a c (cf. the
floor plan in fig.47) and two side walls.
 Photo 19: Eastern wall (a) of layer VI and walls of layer VII (d) and IX (e).
The
three surviving walls of the upper storey are even thinner than the
stone superstructure of the castle wall, but their thickness of 1.22
inches is perfectly adequate for tower walls which were not directly
exposed to enemy attacks. Their construction and their state of
preservation can be seen in the pictures in fig.48 and photo 19. On a
larger (p.142) scale, its north-west corner is shown as fig.50 below.
The regular masonry of the tower wall a stands out clearly from the
later masonry from the VII Layer house wall b. While the latter
(d) stands on rubble and ruins and was apparently only built after the
sixth layer had already been destroyed, the tower wall rests on
the solid
substructure of the castle wall, of whose surface a small piece is
still visible on the bottom left of the picture.
[Continue to Chapter 2, part 11]
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