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

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WHO WKRE THE MAKERS ? 97
ment to Atreus on the ground of their connection (he happened
to be flying from his father on account of the death of Chrysippus)
; and when Eurystheus did not return again they say
that at the wish of the Myceneans themselves through their
fear of the Heraclidae, and also because he appeared to be
powerful and had courted the commons, Atreus received the
kingdom of the Myceneans and all that Eurystheus ruled over ;
and that thus the descendants of Pelops became greater than
the descendants of Perseus^"
In any case the dynasty only began with Pelops, the
father
of Atreus, and therefore its rule at Mycenae must have begun
at the utmost only two generations before the date represented
in the Homeric poems. There is no contradiction in Homer
of the belief of Aeschylus that another and very ancient people
had held the country round Mycenae. It was one of the three
cities held expressly dear by Hera-'.
But it is also one of the towns called 'rich in gold'
(TToXy^^pfoov) in Homer, the other two being Ilios and Orchomeiios
in Boeotia, called the Minyan.' The latter cities were
both (jf ancient prosperity, and it is on the whole more j)r(jbable
that Mycenae is called by a similai- name because it was likewise
famous f(tr its long continued wealth and s|)lendour, and
not because it had suddenly ^})lung up under one or two reigns.
The k'gends fully confirm this, foi' the walls (jf
Mycenae are
ascribed to the same ( 'yclojjes who built those of Tii-yns for
king Pi'oetus, but Proetus was certainly
not Achean, as we
siiall see very shoi'tly.
Thus Euripides-' speaks of them as tlu'
woi-k , 4.
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