The parallel is, perhaps,
even closer when we come to the details of metal-working, which
are described for us in Homer, and of which illustrations have
been found in such profusion among the Mycenaean relics. We are
told, for example, that on the brooch of Odysseus was represented
a hound holding a writhing fawn between its forepaws, and we have
the elaborate workmanship of the cup of Nestor--'a right goodly
cup, that the old man brought from home, embossed with studs of
gold, and four handles there were to it, and round each two golden
doves were feeding, and to the cup were two bottoms. Another man
could scarce have lifted the cup from the table, but Nestor the
Old raised it easily.' The Mycenaean finds have yielded examples of
metal-working which seem to come as near to the Homeric pictures as
it is possible for material things to come to verbal descriptions.
One of the golden cups from the Fourth Grave at Mycenae might almost
have been a copy on a small scale of Nestor's cup, save that it
had only two handles instead of four. On the handles, as in the
Homeric picture, doves are feeding, and like Nestor's, the Mycenaean
cup is riveted with gold.
Or, take again such examples of another form of art-work in metal
as are given by the scenes of the lion hunt and the hunting-cats
on the dagger-blades found in Graves IV.
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