THE EARLY AGE OF GREECE VOL.I by W.Ridgeway 1901

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The
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THE HOMERIC AGE. 301
central tang. Warriors are seen fighting with the spear, as
on Fig. 53, whilst on the fragment of the silver vase from
Mycenae the defenders of the fortress are seen plying the bow
(Fig. 54). But, as Tsountas has remarked, only the picked
men used spears and shields, the mass being armed with bows
was the shield.
and slings. The only defence of the body
Two varieties are seen depicted on the monuments, a large
oblong shield narrowed in the middle and roughly resembling
the figure 8; a smaller one of qiiadrangular shape (Figs. 53, 54).
The Homeric warrior on the contrary has regularly,
as
we have seen, spear and sword of iron : above all things he
despises a man who employs
the bow
in warfare, and the word arcJter (ro-
^OTT]^) is used as a term of reproach
to Paris. No Achean wariior em])Iovs
the bow for war (though of course it
was used for the chase), hut it is the
chief wea])on of Pandarus, the chieftain
of the Lycians'^ a people who,
we saw, had come from Crete (eveifamous
for its archery) and who were
indubitably closely connected with the
oldest inhal)itants of Greece. Whilst
the arrowheads fiMind in the Acropolis ^.j,; -5 ()i)si.liaii Anowgraves
at !\iycenae are all of obsi- ^'"^^'^'^ Mycenao.
dinn. the aiTow shot bv Pandai-us,
which sevcii'ly wounded Mcnelaus. was of iron, and fashioned
with long sit'nder barbs which bmt back as it
was di-awn out of
the wound by the chinngeon.
Jr was attached to the shaft
by siiu'w ifevpov), its tang })robablv boing inserteil in tlu> top
of the shaft. Such iron arrowheads with long barbs and langs
are a characteristic of the early
Ii'oii
Age in Central Furope.
We, however, hear of arrows tipped with bi'on/e (
yaXArvp'/s^
oiCTTos', ios'"'^). Soiiietiinc- the epithet 'thrice-barbed' irpiyXo}-
\ii') is apjilied to til.' ai'i'ow, as fo|- e.\anijli' that ot' Hei-acles,
which })iercc(| the hreast of the goddess Hera. .\ow, in the
302 THE HOMERIC AGE.
upper stratum of the Mycenean Acropolis Schliemann' found
bronze arrowheads of a triangular or bayonet shape, such
as the one from Athens here
figured (Fig. 56^). Arrowheads
with three real barbs are, as far
as I am aware, unknown on
'
Greek soil or anywhere else in
Europe. We may therefore
reasonably conclude that the
epithet trigloclim' refers to the
three-edged socketed arrowheads.
Fig. 56. Bronze Arrowheads :
This form
A and B, Athens or is common in
Syracuse;
C\ Ecbataua.
Greece, and has been found in
Sicily^, Egypt", and Arabia*.
In the two latter countries the leaf-shaped form such as that
from Cyprus^ here given (Fig. 57)
is also known*'.
Bronze arrowheads with double barbs, of
much the same shape as iron arrows found
at Glasinatz, are known on Greek soil (Fig.
56 B), and probably belong to the Iron Age.
We shall meet rare examples of bronze arrowheads
of both the barbed and bayonet type
in the early Iron Age at Hallstatt (p. 417).
Homer thus gives us examples of ironbarbed
arrows and of bronze an-ows, some of
which seem to correspond in shape to a foi-m
of bronze arrowhead found in the top soil at
Mycenae but nowhere in the poems do we
",
Fig. r,i. Airowhead; hear of arrows tipped with stone.
Nicosia, Cyprus It is indeed highly probable that all
MijcriHic, p. 271, Fig. 4:-15. -
LI., h,r. cit.
.T. (le
Morgan, lleelierches siir /cs Oriiiiiies ile rK/ji/pti\ 1H{H\, p. 210, nos.
573, 57(1, -",77.
^
P^vans, Jlroiizc I mplc incuts, p. iUS.
Tlie four arrowheads licre figured arc in the Prelustoric Department,
British Museum.
-
L\ci;iii'^ ill Xrixrs' hdst were all liowiiicn (Hcioil. v. s'.(|.
//. xui. '.")(); 0,1. 1. 2i\2.
''
"
.1. de Morgan, nos. .")('i'.i, .">70.
Seliliciiiunn, Mijccmu-. p. 271, Fig. 485.