DR. SCHLIEMANN" S DISCOVERIES. ■ 13 



ing a circle and a I'ow of fish 8}3ines ; further, five blades of bronze, 5^ to 6J 

 inches long, and a Juno idol, of the usual form, with two horns. 



"In the Acropolis I have entirely cleared out the passage south of the 

 Lions'G-ate, and brought to light the enormous threshold of the latter, 

 which consists of a fifteen-foot long, eight-foot broad, very hard calcareous 

 block. The ruts caused by chariot wheels, of which all guide books speak, 

 exist in the imagination of enthusiastic travelers only, but not in reality. 

 The different monuments which I have brought to light in close proximity 

 to the Lions' Gate, such as the immense double parallel row of closely 

 joined slabs, the gigantic sepulchers, etc., have, since a very remote antiquity, 

 barred the access of chariots to the Acropolis. No doubt, the fifteen small, 

 straight, parallel furrows, which are cut all along the threshold, have been 

 mistaken for ruts of chariots. The opening of the gateway wndeus from 

 the top downward. It is lOf feet high, and the width of the door is 9^ feet 

 at the top and lOJ feet below. In the 15 -toot long and 8-foot broad lintel, 

 are the 6-inch deep holes for the hinges, and in the two uprights, which it 

 covers, are four quadrangular holes for the bolts or bars. There is a 1-foot 

 3-inch long and 1-foot broad quadrangular hole in the midst of the thresh- 

 old, where the two wings of the gate joined. The threshold further shows, 

 on its east side, a 1-foot broad artificially cut straight furrow, and on its west 

 side another, which forms a curve ; both seem to have served as channels 

 for the rain water, the rush of which must have been great, the threshold 

 being lower than the rock of the passage, which gradually rises. In the 

 side of the threshold which faces the north is a long artificial hole of a 

 peculiar form, which, in some way or other, must have been connected with 

 the gate, for a cutting of precisely the same form exists in the large flat 

 stone in the midst of the Scsean G-ate at Troy. On the suffix of the gate 

 stands a triangular slab of gray calcareous stone, 10 feet high 12 feet long 

 and 2 feet thick, upon the face of which are represented in high relief two 

 animals, hitherto thought to be lions, standing on their long-stretched hind 

 legs, and resting with their paws on either side of an altar, in the midst of 

 which is a column, which becomes broader toward the top, and has a capital 

 ornamented with four circles, enclosed between two horizontal fillets. This 

 ornamentation is peculiar to Mj^cenae. The general belief that the heads of 

 the two animals are broken off is wrong, for on close examination I find that 

 they were not cut out of the same stone together with the animals, but that 

 they were made separately and fastened on them with bolts ; most probably 

 they were of bronze and gilded. The straight cuts and the borings in the 

 necks of the animals leave no doubt that they were put in separately. 

 Owing to the narrowness of the space the heads must have been exceeding- 

 ly small, and must have been facing the spectator. As stated in my first 

 letter from Mycenge, the great resemblance of the horned animal in one of 

 the bas-reliefs in the Acropolis to the animals on the gate makes me believe 

 that the latter were also fantastical animals with horns. At a distance of 

 11^ feet from the threshold is, on either side of the passage, as in Troy, a 

 quadrangular cyclopean masonry, two feet broad and high, and three feet 

 long, which marks the site of a second gate of wood. 



"At a few yards from the second gate 1 have brought to light a very 

 curious cyclopean water conduit, leading into one of the two long and nar- 

 row Cyclopean reservoirs which I had at first thought to be corridors. 

 There is another cyclopean water conduit and another cistern immediately 

 south of them. Both these water conduits have doubtless brought the wa- 

 ter from the copious fountain called 'Perseia' by Pausanias, which is not, 

 as he erroneouslj> mentions, in the Acropolis itself, but at a distance of half 

 a mile east of it. Its name seems to be derived from Perseus, the founder 



