(piano music) Male: We're on the top of a small mountain looking over a valley and the Aegean Sea. Female: At the Citadel at Mycenae. Now, Mycenae is the name of this place, but that name also refers
to the culture that dominated the Greek mainland between about 1600 and 1100 B.C.E. We have three dominant
cultures during the Bronze Age in the Mediterranean. We have Cycladic in the Cycladic Islands, Minoan on the island of Crete, and what we call Mycenaen culture here on the mainland. Male: This citadel was
built at the height of Mycenaen power and was
expanded several times. Female: You can see why
they chose this spot. We're not only on a mountain, but
we're overlooking a vast valley. They chose a site that would allow them to view any potential
enemies from very far away and be very well prepared,
and there are also enormous walls here. Male: This was also on a
direct route between the Aegean and the Gulf of Corinth, which would have been a
critical spot in trade between say Italy and the near east. Female: Mycenaen merchants traded goods all over the Mediterranean
from the near east all the way to Spain. Male: We've walked up
a steep hill and passed through a huge wall of enormous boulders and under the Lion Gate. To our right we passed grave circle A, which was enclosed when the city walls were expanded and then
we walked up a steep series of pathways to the palace itself. Female: What we think was the palace, but here at the top we
see a series of rooms and the final room is called the Megaron. We think this was an
audience hall for the King. Male: You pass into a large courtyard. At the far end we can
just make out the bases of what were two substantial columns that would have supported a porch covering and if you passed under
that you would walk into a vestibule. Female: Then from there into the Megaron. In the center of the
Megaron were four columns and a hearth. Male: This is an architectural arrangement that we find repeated in
other Mycenaen citadels. Female: This was only
rediscovered in the 19th century by a German businessman named Heinrich Schliemann. He was convinced that much of what Homer wrote had some basis in history. Male: And Homer associates
Mycenae with gold. Female: So, you can imagine why Schliemann wanted to find this legendary city, and they did find Mycenae. Male: And they did find gold. Female: In fact, in grave
circle A which we passed by Schliemann excavated
the shaft graves there and Mycenaen elite were
buried with fabulously rich objects. Male: It turns out that
this was not coincident with Homer's epics and in
fact dates to a slightly earlier period. So, when we see titles like,
"The Gold Mask of Agamemnon," we really need to take
that with a grain of salt. Female: Right. They did
ascribe the names from Homer to what he found. Male: And this became a real sensation. Female: Should we go down
and have another look at grave circle A and
the nearby Lion Gate? Male: Let's do it. As we walk down the
hill, to our left we pass a very large grave circle. Archaeologists refer to
this as grave circle A. Female: And this is one
of the grave circles that had shaft graves. Most of which were excavated
by Schliemann's team. Male: And was originally
outside of the city walls, but was enclosed by the
city around 1250 B.C.E. The circle itself is
comprised of a series of large limestone blocks that
are relatively flat and that were covered with
other slabs so that you had this enclosed space that circles the graves themselves. Female: And so this lovely
circular shape gives us an idea of how important this space was. There were perhaps ideas of honoring the ancestors that were buried here. Male: But for all of its former
grandeur, these are ruins. All we've got left are the foundations and some of the walls. Mycenaean culture as a
whole fell into a dark age, and citadels like
this were destroyed. (piano music)