At Dendra, in Greece’s Argolid, the architecture turns downwards. Long approaches descend towards burial chambers cut into the hillside, taking the visitor away from the raised profile usually associated with Mycenaean citadels. The cemetery lies west of Midea’s acropolis and belonged to the world of that palace centre. Here, the people connected with a powerful settlement invested labour and valuable objects in spaces designed to hold their dead.
The official archaeological account identifies one tholos, or corbel-vaulted tomb, and sixteen rock-cut chamber tombs. These are different forms of burial architecture, not a collection of identical domed monuments. The distinction is visible in the relationship between a built circular chamber and rooms excavated in the softer local rock. Reading the approaches and doorways first makes the cemetery easier to understand than simply looking for its most famous find.