The Sea-Kings of Crete

me of the characteristic features of each period. The chief aid in the formation of such an idea is given by the remains of the pottery which have survived from each

o an almost fabulous antiquity for the first occupation of the site. In the earliest beginnings of human development, progress, with its consequent accumulation, is slow, and if we allow a rate of 3 feet o

fourth metres show the gradual, but extremely slow, growth of this species of decoration, the proportion of incised vases in the fourth metre only reaching 3 per cent. The fifth metre deposit, however, discloses one important innovation. The proportion of incised vases is scarcely greater than in the preceding stratum, but almost all of them have the incisions filled in with the white chalky substance already alluded to, forming a geometric design of white upon black. Along with this new development of the incised ware goes a development of the unincised, whose surface is now not only polished to the highest degree of lustre, but is thereafter rippled in vertical lines by the pressure of some blunt instrument, so as to produce an undulating effect, like that of the ripple marks on sand. The rippling of the unincised potter

re. This is supplied by the fact that the potter now begins to use paint as a means for producing the lustrous black surface which his Neolithic predecessor produced by hand-burnishing. A lustrous black glaze medium is spread as a slip over the surface o

ll surviving alongside of the painted pottery, is very closely related to the imported vases found by Petrie in First Dynasty tombs at Abydos; and a further link with Egypt is afforded by the fact that vases of Proto-Dynastic Egyptian form in diorite and syenite were discovered in the south and east quarters of the palace

incised geometric-patterned ware. A curious development of this period is found in the mottled ware from Vasiliki, where the decoration was accomplished neither by incising nor by painting a design, but by a method of firing in which the vases, first painted red, were so placed that the hot coals actually came into contact with the vases at certain points, and produced black patches upon the red paint. The resultant mottled surface was then hand-polished, and sometimes, but more rarely, used as the medium for a design in white. To

BASI

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ILLA, KNOSS

vival of the incised ornament, attributed by Dr. Evans to influence from the Cyclades, which at this time also gave to Cr

On these bands the chief ornament is the zig-zag, and curves directly derived therefrom, and the spiral begins to appear as a form of decoration. It is uncertain whether the credit for the origination of this favourite form of decorative motive is to be attributed to Egypt or to Crete. Miss Hall[*] regards the Early Minoan III. spirals as late-comers in the field, attributing the first development of the spiral to the painters of Egyptian pre-Dynastic vases; but Mr.

rative Art of Crete in

Society of Biblical Arch?ology, v

: 'Scripta Mi

All that can be said is that on Petrie's system of dating the Minoan period which is contemporary with the end of the Sixth Dynasty would date about 4000 B.C., and on the Berlin system about 2475 B.C. Though the two cultures are contemporaneous, it is, of course, by no means to be inferred that the art of Early Minoan III. has left us any relics which ar

eady alluded to, which belong to this period, have a colour scheme of black and white, red and orange. Along with this development of the use of colour goes a corresponding advance in design. The motives of the former period are continued, but are much more developed, and more freely handled. Instead of being stiffly disposed in bands round the vessel, they are now frequently grouped with the idea of covering the ground of the vases in a graceful manner without any attempt at formal definition of the limits of

ackenzie,[*] on which the figures of three of the Cretan wild goats are followed by that of a gigantic beetle with a tail. 'The subject of the design,' says Dr. Mackenzie, 'in its naturalistic character is so advanced that, were it not for the company in which the fragments occur, we should be tempted to assign it to a much later age.' It is unfortunate that only a part of the design has survived, and that no parallel to it has ever been found. Was it merely a sport, the freak of some ancient potter who was weary of the conventional designs of his ti

ellenic Studies, vol. xxv

at from the end of the Sixth Dynasty to the establishment of the Eleventh, Egypt appears to have been passing t

OSSOS

VATING A

of extreme thinness and delicacy, approaching to that of the finest egg-shell china. The designs upon the vases are often moulded in low relief as well as painted, and the thinness of their walls, the form of their handles, and the knobs upon them, which are evidently meant to suggest rivets, show that the potters of the time were endeavouring to emulate the achievements of their brother artists, the metal workers. The designs upon the vases themselves are conventional, the idea being to produce a rich and harmonious effect of form and colour rather than to secure any imitation of Nature. Indeed, the patterns are very largely geometric; the zig-zag, the cross, and concentric circles occur frequently; and when plant life is imitated it is skilfully conventionalized, as in the case of the water-lily cup, perhaps the most beautiful specimen of the ware of the period, on which the white petals start from a c

e the synchronism with the Twelfth Dynasty was fully established by Professor Garstang's discovery at Abydos of fragments of a polychrome vessel of late Middle Minoan II. type in an untouched tomb, which also contained glazed

2500 B.C., while the modern German school brings down the date as low as 2000 B.C. No more can be said than that Middle Minoan II. certainly does not begin earlier than 3400 B.C., and can scarcely begin later than 2000 B.C. The period closes with the evidence of a great ca

ther chambers on the northeast side of the Central Court, though they were covered up and built over in Late Minoan I. At all events, a very great and splendid building must have existed upon the site at this time. Egypt was passing through the dark period between

lism that we must trace the gradual disappearance of polychrome decoration. 'Once we have the portrayal of natural objects, such as flowers, which becomes so rife before the close of the Middle Minoan Age, it soon becomes apparent that a scale of colours, which in their relation to each other were capable of producing polychrome effects of great beauty, was quite inadequate towards the reproduction of the natural colours of objects. Thus green, for example, which is the first necessity towards the rendering of leaves and stems, did not exist in the colour repertory of t

ellenic Studies, vol. Xxv

of which so many specimens were discovered in the Temple Repositories. In them the same tendency towards naturalism reveals itself. The wild-goat suckling its kid, the flying-fish, the porcelain vases, one of them with cockle-shell relief, and another with ferns and rose-leaves on a ground of pale green, are all instances

he fabricators of the huge knobbed and corded pithoi, or jars, some of them with the curious 'trickle,' ornament, which is surely decoration reduced to its last straits. The artist merely dabbed quantities of brown glaze paint around the rims of his jars, and allowed it to trickle down the sides at its own will. The result is curious, but can scarcely be called beautiful (Plate IX. 2). 'Ab-nub's c

modify, and the white design on a dark ground occurs less frequently than design in dark glaze paint on the natural light ground of the clay. Ornament begins to partake increasingly of a marine character; the octopus, the Triton shell, the nautilus, and seaweed, appear as designs, and are executed in lifelike fashion, which contrasts strongly with the later conventionalized method of representing them. Indeed, Middle Minoan III. And Late Minoan I. and

Journal of Hellenic Studies,

CASE, PH?ST

raghi

ntations of it. The design in this case is painted in white on a reddish-brown ground, and its peculiarity is that the white was laid on after the vase had been fired, and can be removed with the finger (Plate XXIX. 2). The three vases from Hagia Triada, the Boxer, the Harvester, and the Chieftain, belong to this period, as do also the frescoes of the Hunting Cat and the Climbing Plants, and probably the Royal Gaming Board from the palace at Kn

er neck is formed, farther away from the handles, for convenience in pouring. The false-necked vase is the characteristic pottery type of Late Minoan III., and occurs very frequently on the Mycen?an sites of that period. The seals with fantastic forms of monsters, such as those found in such numbers at Zakro, date from the beginning of Late Minoan I., and to this period

evidence. The reliefs in hard plaster, such as the bull's head and the King with the peacock plumes, show the style of decoration which gave variety on the walls to the paintings on the flat. In pottery the change of style and decoration is gradual, but quite pronounced. The chief characteristic of the time is the fabrication of large decorated vases and pithoi, such as the beautiful papyrus relief vase of the Royal Villa, nearly 4 feet in height (Plate XXII

t agate, and a gold-plated hilt engraved with a design of a lion chasing and capturing a wild-goat. Great bronze vessels were wrought with splendid conventional designs, and some of the stone vases of the period are amazing in the skill with which they were worked and decorated. 'How the hard material was worked with precision in the inside of vessels which have only the narrowest of neck orifices, and that in an

arth, Cornhill Magazin

s B, now supersedes the

down to 1450 B.C., or thereby. It is somewhat striking that the periods of greatest splendour alike for the Egyptian Empire and for the Minoan should virtually coincide. In either case, the duration of the culmination of splendour was short. The magnificence of the Egypt of Hatshepsut, Tahutmes III., and Amenhotep III., was speedily to be clouded and dimmed by the disasters of the reign of Akhenat

a-ra tombs, but by the parallelism in the styles of art in the two countries. The art of each remains truly national, but the frescoes of Knossos and Hagia

VASE, HAGIA

raghi

been destroyed, and degeneration of the standard of art naturally followed. The level of artistic work in the earlier part of the period is still high-in fact, it is that of what is considered the best Mycen?an art-the technical skill which produced the masterpieces of the Palace period still survives, but the inspiration which gave it life is gone. Originality in design vanishes first, and is gradually followed by skill in execution; the old types are reproduced in more and more slovenly fashion, and at last even the material employed follows the example of degeneration. This period of gradual decadence is, however, the period of greatest diffusion of th

rtition-walls to suit their smaller needs. An age of transition succeeded, during which the character of the Cretan population was gradually modified by successive waves of invasion from the mainland, until Crete assumed the