Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1879-01-02

ancient mansion, OF Wnlcn large PORTIONS
were visible to the ri ht and left of the
gate, because these structures would at
once have upset their Priam's pigsties.
had, Just when l recommended the ex-
cavations, the visit Of Capt. II. Bremish,
Lieut.. H. G. Sayce, Lieut.. Burgess Wat
son, and Mr.. Charles Curgenvan, all off,
GERS of her majesty's ship Pallas, now in
Besika Bay, who, at my request, care
fully examined the debris by which the
passage of the gate was barred, and will
be happy to take up my defense. have
now cleared the whole entrance, and
there are three gates, of which the first
two are 12} feet, he third Ia feet broad;
beyond the third gate the masonry on
either side of the passage continues still
for ten feet: the threshold of the third
gate is 81 feet broad"
The masonry of these gates, and the
passage formed merely the substructures
to wooden works of defence, which must
have been of enormous size, because
otherwise those tremendous masses of
wood ashes could not have been produced
by their combustion, and the heat could
not have been so great as to destroy even
the large fiat slabs with which the pas
sage below the gates is paved. Those
wooden works must have been in the
form of tower many stories high and
densely inhabited, otherwise we cannot
again explain the large number of hand
millstones of trachyle and rude stone
hammers, as well as the masses of pottery
found in the ashes.
To the east of the gate, having cleared
away the later buildings and tile ashes,
he. has brought to light number of
house walls which likewise, he says,
have served only as substructures to
wooden buildings. On this point he
insists again and again. The walls of
the Trojan houses, he remarks, seldom
exceeds six feet in height, and they
never appeared to have been higher for
! they served merely "as substructures to
very high and probably tower-like build
ings." The house walls for the most
part consist of sun.dried bricks, made
brown or reddish by the heat of the
great confagration; but there are also
many house walls of uncut stones Joined
with earth. These seldom exceed two
feet in thickness, while the average
thickness of the brick walls is three feet
four inches. The bricks consist of clay
| mixed with straw, with average dimen.
sions of 26 $40 inches in length, Is $40
iuches in breadth, and 40 inches in
thickness.
By far the most interesting object he
ever found in his excavations at Troy is,
he considers, dagger of steel four in.
ches long. The blade, which is double
edged and in the form of an arrow, is /
go inches long, and in a perfect state
of preservation, which DR.. Schliemann
attributes to the antiseptic power of the
| redwood ashes mixed with charcoal in
which he found it embedded, in the
large mansion close to the gate, twenty
eight feet below the surface. He says:
"This is the first object of iron found by
me here; nay, until now I had found no
trace of iron. in any one Of the four
prehistoric cities the ruins and debris OF
which succeed each other here, neither
had l found a trace of that metal at
Mycens."
In deepening the trench on the north
p: west side in order to facilitate the exca'
walton of the kings mansion, he discov'
cred at depth Of about forty-six feet
below the surface of the hill two splen.
did ladies' hairpins, one of which is three
inches long and very massive and heavy
It is ornamented with piece Of gold
one-and-a-half inches long, seven-tenths
of an inch broad, with a quadrangulal
plate running out at the base into
spirals, and divided into six large and
four small vertical columns. The top o.
the quadrangle is ornamented with siz
beautiful little golden vases, all standing
separately, and with handles protrudin{
one on the front and the other on the
reverse, and with fat round covers
which add greatly to the beauty of tn,
design. The second hairpin is littl,
longer than The other, but much lighte
and simpler. DIR. Schliemann is o
opinion that these ornaments must hav,
belonged to the successors of the Trojans
as they are unlike anything yet foun.
in the calcined strata of the old city
Besides, the potsherds among which the!
were discovered belong, he thinks, to til
later period.
In the course of visit from some off
GERS of the British ship Monarch, an.
i under their eyes, he brought ID ligh
] what he callsss quite>aSlittl trsasure
of gold and silver ornaments, contained
in a red handmade vase which lay brol
en- in an oblique position in the red o
yellow wood ashes, 26 feet 5 inches be
low the surface of the mount, and abou
8 feet above the ground floor of an apart
ment of the king'smansion. This treas
ure contained, among Other thing
twenty gold earrings, four golden orns
|ments, perfectly familiar to those foun
in the third tomb at Mycene, some COL
'hairpins, very large number of smal