70 SCIENCE PROGRESS. 



of the Homeric poems, whom he regards as incomers from 

 the north, and responsible in particular for the replacement 

 of the Cycladic and early Mykenaean rite of burial in cists 

 or shaft graves by the later Mykenaean usage of chamber 

 burial. 



48. The same conception of the Achaeans as a dominant 

 caste of immigrant northerners, superimposed on an abo- 

 riginal population who had the yEgean culture already in a 

 high stage of development, has been amplified in special re- 

 lation to the literary question by Dr. Leaf; and, as explaining 

 the gradual acceptance of the Achaean tribal name Hellene 

 as a national designation, by Professor Bury ; while in 

 identifying the pre-Achaean aborigines with the Pelasgians 

 of Hellenic tradition Professor Ridgeway has perhaps suc- 

 ceeded in substituting, yet again, a Pelasgian 2 for the 

 Achaean y ; but perhaps also in the process has contributed 

 in detail to the eventual determination of both unknowns. 



49. But behind the Homeric Question, which is really 

 the question of the relative date of the Homeric Poems 

 themselves or their essential constituents, stands the main 

 question at issue, how far the Mykenaean civilisation should 

 be regarded as indigenous at Mykenae and on other Greek 

 sites ; how far as having been imported more or less ready 

 made. For the great differences between the Mykenaean 

 and the Hellenic in almost every department of art and 

 culture made a transition in direct series from one to the 

 other at first sight almost inconceivable, especially in view 

 of the admitted break both in the ancient Hellenic tradition, 

 and, until lately, in every class of evidence for the inter- 

 mediate period. 



50. The fact that Dr. Schliemann happened at the out- 

 set, at Hissarlik and Mykenae, upon two of the materially 

 wealthiest /Egean sites hitherto known, and in the latter 

 case upon one which until 1896 remained wholly un- 

 challenged for the variety and magnificence of its remains, 

 made the indigenous growth of a civilisation, with a character 

 so pronounced and resources so ample, even more difficult to 

 reconcile with preconceived ideas than it might have been 

 if minor and sporadic discoveries had prepared the way 



