New-York tribune., 1895-02-10

Vol. ii. PIP. xiv. 4ss. A. c. Armstrong q Son
The way to a comprehension of the earliest
culture Of Greece leads through the tomb. Not
only were the greater number OF valuable relics
Of prmeval life found there, but the ruins OF me
sepulchre mark the contrast between that He
and the one which followed but did not super
sede it, NJ Perrot has based his theory for the
reconstruction Of the history and thought OF the
Mycenian period in part at least on the remark
able studies OF Erwin Rohde published under the
title Of Psyche" Long ago. In times when
Homers poems were almost the only source Of
knowledge respecting the Greeks Of the ages pre-
cedng the dawn OF history on Aegean shores
men were puzzled by the discrepancies between
the social conditions and religious beliefs attrib-
uted by the poet to his heroes and those which
were known to he prevalent soon after those
heroes disappeared. ], was natural TO ask how
the ancestor worship Of historic Greece could
have arisen without the knowledge OF the poet,
how the local dcities and loc al vorshps that were
existent later could have come into being under
the shadow OF a national religion such as he de-
picted - in short, how civilization couId nave
reached higher plane In the historic period,
while the popular faith was a stage so much
lower than that Of the Homeric poems The con-
trast was seen to be all the more glarng wnen
learned antiquarian who was also man OF
genius like the author Of the "Argonautica,
credited pre-Homeric heroes with the practices.
prejudces and superstltons not Of the HAD and
the Odyssey. but OF later times. What was worse,
the poems Of Homer contained contradictions il
Ulysses had to travel to the end Of the world 10
converse with the shades, the Inference was that
he did this because he could evoke them no.
where else; yet the ghost OF Patroclus visited the
living Achilles. and Ulysses himself, calmly dis
regarding the hopeless imprisonment In which he
found the wavering, vapory images Of his old ac-
quaintances, Knocked them with the promise OF
sacrifice TO be offered them when he got home.
He knew we'll enough. II Homer Is right, that they
would forget him soon as he departed As Tor
social affairs the difference between the feudal
empjre idealzed by Homer and the warning city,
states Of the historic age was incalculable The
only solution OF all these difficulties. apparently.
was to suppose that the descriptions In the epic
were imaginary. and to fill the Greek prehistoric
perIod with conjectures based on the analogy OF
other races But this was not satisfactory
Traces were lacking OF those long intervals OF
savaxery and barbarism manifest In other
countries. Greece passed easily and quickly over
obstacles which had kept back other nations FOR
thousands of years. That was as certain be-
fore the beginning of modem research as IL Is
now The conservatism Of the Orient had no
counterpart in Hellenic history.
The key to the mystery was hidden in the
burial places OF Mycenae and Hissarlik. Az hrs'
Il was overlooked Schllemann and those VINO
shared his enthusiasm expected TO uncover tf'ere
the relics Of tn, race which Homer celepri'ed
and to find the proofs that It's religious beliefs It's
political customs and Social practices were just
what Homer said they were. This hope was
only partially fulfilled The spade demonstrated
that the poet had not exaggerated the wonders
OF the primitive Greek civilization; but II also
showed that he misunderstood some OF the tradi-
tohs which he inherited. He committed the