The Poetics of the Homeric Citadel

The Poetics of the Homeric Citadel is an enquiry on the origins of the architectural forms as expressed in Mycenaean architecture. The Homeric Citadel is woven within concrete landscape formations and realizes the concept of the all-embracing space, which, in religious philosophy, represents God’s image in man. It is both a cosmogonic symbol and, at the same time, a ‘philosophical’ one. The rocky citadel with the deep well was the scene where ancient mysteries took place, and it is experienced by its citizen in his process of psychological transformation into the higher being which is called Anthropos; where ‘anthropos’ is the inner and complete man, which impacts upon the life of the individual. The basic architectural elements; column, triangle and megaron are archetypal images and revealed within this self-perfecting process of acquiring the goal and ultimate end of our archetypal journey towards ‘self-realization’. The famous Lion Gate provides the mystical symbol called tetraktys, which is represented figuratively by the triangular slab. The tripartite, four-columned ‘Megaron’ unfolds within the same schema and expresses one of the oldest religious symbols of humanity.The research draws on a multiplicity of sources within the fields of history, history of religion, philosophy, anthropology, historical geography, historical biographies, the Jungian analytical psychology and alchemy, archaeology and history of art and architecture, and ancient Greek literature. It relies on observation from visits to archaeological sites and of the arts and artifacts of the period under study which provide the link that reveals the poetic dimension of Mycenaean architecture.