The Coming of the Greeks
evidence for a sixteenth-century takeover, the Argolid was ap-
parently not the only part of Greece taken over in "the coming
of the Greeks." The argument here depends especially upon the
sudden appearance of momumental tombs, quite unprece-
dented in Middle Helladic Greece. Nothing quite so spectac-
ular as the shaft graves has been found elsewhere, but tumuli
and tholos tombs—the circular and corbeled "beehive" tombs
that were to culminate in the "Treasury of Atreus" and the
"Tomb of Clytemnestra"—suggest that five or six other plains
were subjugated in the sixteenth century B.C. 65 In Lacedae-
monia, first of all, the Eurotas valley must have been under the
domination of the Vaphio princes well before 1500 B.C., the
date of the Vaphio Tomb. This Laconian tholos, one of the
earlier tholos tombs thus far discovered, held a splendid array
of grave goods. Although dwarfed by the shaft graves' corredo,
in quality the Vaphio treasure compares rather well. Here, too,
we find expertly crafted weapons, ornaments, and other gifts,
and a cosmopolitan taste. The two Vaphio Cups, made of gold
and showing strong Minoan influence, are among the most fa-
mous of all Late Helladic artifacts. No palace has yet been
found, but it is likely that the Vaphio princes ruled Lacedae-
- The funerary innovations at the end of the Middle Helladic and
the beginning of the Late Helladic period can hardly be explained without
some foreign derivation. The tholos tomb itself seems to have developed
rather quickly from the tumulus burial and the grave circle, perhaps under
the influence of the built tombs of Crete and Egypt. However, there has
been considerable controversy about the origins of the grave circle, with its
deep shaft graves, and the tumulus burial. It has been held that the Myce-
naean shaft graves developed from the cist graves of the MH period, but that
view is increasingly difficult to maintain. For arguments against the evolu-
tion from MH tombs, defended especially by Mylonas, see M. J. Mellink,
"The Royal Tombs at Alaca Huyuk and the Aegean World," in The Aegean
and the Near East: Studies Presented to Hetty Goldman, ed. Saul S. Weinberg
(Locust Valley, N.Y.: Augustin, 1956), 55-56. That both the tumuli and
the grave circles of the LH I period have a "kurgan" origin is maintained in
the massive study by O. Pelon, Tholoi, tumuli et cercles funeraires. Recherches
mr les monuments funerairei deplan circulaire dans 1'Egee de I'age du bronze (Ath-
ens: Ecole Franchise d'Athenes, 1976).
185
