Agamemnon's Home

When Heinrich Schliemann excavated Mycenae in 1876 and discovered a royal palace and its treasures, he called the palace "Agamemnon's palace" and a bronze war-mask "Agamemnon's mask." But, is the city of Mycenae or that of nearby Argos the actual home of Agamemnon? Near the beginning of the Iliad, Agamemnon refers to "my house, in Argos" (1.34).* This may mislead you into supposing that, according to Homer, Agamemnon's royal palace was actually at Argos. Consider these other passages:

(1) Helen is called "queen of Argos" (4.201), even though she was the wife of Menelaus of Sparta.

(2) Achilles calls Great Ajax and Odysseus "men of Argos" (9.411), even though these heroes are, respectively, from the islands of Salamis and Ithaca.

(3) Nestor refers to the Achaean captains as having sacrificed to Zeus "in Argos' golden wheatlands" (15.438), even though, by the Catalogue of Ships (2.584-862), we learn that these same captains sailed from all parts of the territory that would later be known as Greece.

What these and similar passages tell us is that Argos is not merely the name of a city; it is also the name of the country of the Achaeans. Thus, when Hector relates his fears to his wife, telling Andromache that, if she is taken by the Achaeans as a slave, "Then far off in the land of Argos you must live" (6.542), we are not to suppose that Hector believes that Andromache would be taken to any one particular city. That would depend upon whose slave she became. Hector merely indicates that she would be taken somewhere in the vast land of the Achaeans. Thus, Glaucus speaks of "a city, Corinth, deep in a bend of Argos" (6.178-79). Likewise, when Agamemnon suspects that Zeus is demanding that he return "back to Argos in disgrace" (9.25), it is not the city of Argos that Agamemnon is referring to, but the country vast country from which he came. This explains why the Achaeans are often referred to as "Argives." They are the "men of Argos."

Of course, this information only proves that, when Agamemnon refers to "my house, in Argos," we cannot assume that his house was in the city of Argos. It neither proves nor disproves the proposition. In order to establish that Homer located Agamemnon's palace in Mycenae, we need to consider these additional passages:

(1) Agamemnon, son of Atreus, speaks of Tydeus (the father of Diomedes), who "came to Mycenae once" as Atreus's guest (4.433-43). Lest you suppose that "Mycenae" may be used, like "Argos," to refer to a large country, rather than simply a city, know that Tydeus came to Mycenae from his home in the nearby city of Argos.

(2) Achaean warriors refer to Agamemnon as "the proud king of all Mycenae's gold" (7.207). Agamemnon had no claim over the gold of Pylos, Tiryns, Athens, or Corinth. He was not the proud king of the gold of Argos. His claim was restricted to the city of Mycenae. Thus, he is elsewhere referred to as "the great king of Mycenae rich in gold" (11.52).

(3) Most conclusively, when Agamemnon suggests that the Achaens "cut and run" back to Argos, Diomedes tells Agamemnon that, if he is inclined to run away, he may take his own troops, "those that followed you from Mycenae" (9.52).

Because Agamemnon of Mycenae was the wealthiest and most powerful of Achaean kings, historians speak of the period of his rule as the "Mycenaean" age and of his rule as the "Mycenaean" empire. However, Homer never uses the term "Mycenaean" in this sense. When he tells of Periphetes, "a Mycenaean," the sense in which the term is used is clear, for Periphetes's "wits outstripped the best in all Mycenae" (15.742, 747). Surely, Homer did not expect his audience to believe that Periphetes out-witted every man in all the territories of the Achaeans. No, Homer used the term "Mycenaean" in the same way that he might have used the term "Corinthian." If historians were to use Homeric terms, they would speak of the "Argive age" and the "Argive empire."

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*All citations are to the Iliad translated by Robert Fagles (New York: Penguin, 1998).