The Shaft Graves of Mycenae

The Shaft Graves of Mycenae have been used by many to establish a framework of the social organisation of Mycenaean culture. The Mycenaean world was a culture which developed in the late Bronze Age in the Helladic mainland and in Crete; the most striking elements of this are the pottery style and lavish burial practices. The Shaft Graves found are chambered tombs approached by vertical shafts found in Bronze Age Mycenaean Greece and normally lined with stone and topped with beams.

At Mycenae, there are two grave circles that are useful in analysing the city’s social organisation. Grave Circle B is the earlier of the two grave circles with twenty-six graves with multiple inhumations in the shaft. From the Early Phase Period to the Late Phase I the dichotomy of the élite class and the lower social classes increased . This is shown by the increased wealth in burials in Grave Circle B and the select number that were buried there. I believe that Mycenae at this time developed a non-egalitarian society, evidence of this is the disproportionate number of males and females: fifteen males, six females. However there are a number of sub-adult burials (two males and two females), that suggest that they were of some importance, for example the burials of members of a ‘royal family’. Grave goods found at Grave Circle B show that male and females roles were engendered (weapons for males, jewellery for females) and this further supports the idea that there was some sort of separation between the sexes and/or it was a non-egalitarian society.

Adult skeletons from both circles seem to be in the higher height range with thicker bones and suffered less from arthritis, though males often suffered from some trauma, such as head wounds. . This ...

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...g separation between the classes. A different royal line or noble family rose up and used this new ethos, which developed in the Late Helladic I , to consolidate their influence producing more ostentatious burials within the city walls strengthening their form of kingship/elitism

Works Cited

Wardie K.A and D., (2004), Cities of Legend: The Mycenaean World, Bristol, Classical Press

Graziadio, G, (1991) The Process of Social Stratification at Mycenae in the Shaft Grave Period: A Comparitive Examination of the Evidence, American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 95, 403-40

Graziadio, G, (1988), The Chronology of the Graves of Circle B at Mycenae: A New Hypothesis, American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 92, no.3, 343-72

Dickinson OTPK, (1977), The Origins of Mycenaean Civilisation, Göteborg

Shear IM (2004), Kingship in the Mycenaean World, INSTAP Academic Press