VAPHIO  , an

ancient site in Laconia, Greece, on the right bank of the Eurotas, some 5 M . S. of Sparta . It is famous for its " bee-hive " tomb, excavated in 1889 by Dr Tsountas . This consists of a walled approach, or bpbuos, about 97 ft. long, leading to a vaulted chamber some 33 ft. in diameter, in the floor of which the actual grave was cut . The objects found here and transferred to the National Museum in Athens include a large number of gems and amethyst beads, together with articles in gold, silver, bronze, iron, lead, amber and crystal . But by far the finest of them are two golden cups decorated with scenes in relief, picturing the capture of bulls . These form perhaps the most perfect works of " Mycenaean " or " Minoan " art which have survived . It seems likely that the Vaphio cups do not represent a local art but were imported from Crete, which at that early period was far ahead of main-land Greece in artistic development . The tomb, which probably belonged to Amyclae rather than to Pharis, as is commonly stated, is now almost entirely destroyed . See C . Tsountas, 'E µepls 'ApXaw oyc,$ (1889), 136–172; J . G .

Frazer,

Pausanias's Description of Greece, iii . 135 f . (with full bibliography); W . Ridgeway, The Early Age of Greece, i . 26—28; R . C . Bosanquet, Journal of Hellenic Studies (1904), xxiv . 317 ff . ; A . Riegl, Jahreshefte d . Cistern arch . Institutes (1906), ix .

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