DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4758#0041
xl CATALOGUE OF VASES.
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spring from the bases of the plants are a regular Cretan device ;l the use of
single figures as emblemata in a blank field is characteristic of one style of
L.M. II. ;2 and precisely similar cups occur at Knossos (A 700). There was
evidently no break between the localities at this time. Yet in the following
period (L.M. \\\a) Late Mycenaean ware appears as an intruder beside Cretan
pottery at Palaikastro, Gournia and Knossos. It fits on to the linear style that
prevailed in eastern Crete in L.M. II, and contains no trace of the toreutic
patterns which were common then in central Crete and on the Mainland (A 702,
A 799), and which formed the Cretan 'close style' of L.M. Ill (p. xxxviii).
Further discoveries may explain the disconnexion of the periods, for it is evident
that many stages in the formation of the Late Mycenaean style are not yet
represented. But the finished ware is plainly marked, and is doubtless a
Mainland fabric. At its best it comes close to L.M. I pottery in appearance
(p. xxxvi), with lustrous yellow surface on fine reddish clay and brilliant red-black
varnish. White paint was rarely used (A 870, A 909, A 993). The designs are
no longer merely stylised, but have become conventional, being repeated with-
out consideration of their meaning or their function. The triton-shell (A 881,
etc.) has so far lost its natural character that it has been identified by a French
zoologist as a vegetable form/' The missing links in the evolution of this figure
are the most obvious gap in the ceramic material. Flower forms are better
explained, for they were common in both districts in the preceding period
(A 701, A 794, p. xl), when the lily was already contaminated by the lotus.
Spiral coils, arcades, net and scale patterns and simple rows of bars continue the
architectural tradition of L.M. I, and their arrangement in ever-narrowing bands
illustrates the process noted in L.M. II, by which the field of design was being
restricted to the shoulder of the vessel, and its place on the body invaded by
plain girding-lines. The history of each kind of vase and ornament is indicated
in the following Catalogue.
Late Mycenaean pottery exists in great quantity, but is nowhere represented
in a complete documented series, partly because the deposits on town-sites have
been disturbed by later builders, and partly because the prevailing method of
burial was in chamber-tombs, which were designed and used for successive
interments. Neither the stratification of a settlement, nor the association of
objects in a tomb, can be used alone in proof of date. It is possible, however, by
means of cumulative evidence from stratigraphic and stylistic observations, to
detect a definite chronological development even in the earlier form of this long-
lived fabric, which has hitherto been regarded as too rigidly conventional for
such analysis.4 The diagnostic features of the pottery are details of shape, type
of ornament, and quality of fabric.
1 Palaikastro, pi. XVIII, b.
" See A 784 and note.
:l F. Houssay in Rev. Arch. (3), xxx, p. 91 : ' Vallisneria spiralis.'
1 So Fimmen, op. cit., p. 166.
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spring from the bases of the plants are a regular Cretan device ;l the use of
single figures as emblemata in a blank field is characteristic of one style of
L.M. II. ;2 and precisely similar cups occur at Knossos (A 700). There was
evidently no break between the localities at this time. Yet in the following
period (L.M. \\\a) Late Mycenaean ware appears as an intruder beside Cretan
pottery at Palaikastro, Gournia and Knossos. It fits on to the linear style that
prevailed in eastern Crete in L.M. II, and contains no trace of the toreutic
patterns which were common then in central Crete and on the Mainland (A 702,
A 799), and which formed the Cretan 'close style' of L.M. Ill (p. xxxviii).
Further discoveries may explain the disconnexion of the periods, for it is evident
that many stages in the formation of the Late Mycenaean style are not yet
represented. But the finished ware is plainly marked, and is doubtless a
Mainland fabric. At its best it comes close to L.M. I pottery in appearance
(p. xxxvi), with lustrous yellow surface on fine reddish clay and brilliant red-black
varnish. White paint was rarely used (A 870, A 909, A 993). The designs are
no longer merely stylised, but have become conventional, being repeated with-
out consideration of their meaning or their function. The triton-shell (A 881,
etc.) has so far lost its natural character that it has been identified by a French
zoologist as a vegetable form/' The missing links in the evolution of this figure
are the most obvious gap in the ceramic material. Flower forms are better
explained, for they were common in both districts in the preceding period
(A 701, A 794, p. xl), when the lily was already contaminated by the lotus.
Spiral coils, arcades, net and scale patterns and simple rows of bars continue the
architectural tradition of L.M. I, and their arrangement in ever-narrowing bands
illustrates the process noted in L.M. II, by which the field of design was being
restricted to the shoulder of the vessel, and its place on the body invaded by
plain girding-lines. The history of each kind of vase and ornament is indicated
in the following Catalogue.
Late Mycenaean pottery exists in great quantity, but is nowhere represented
in a complete documented series, partly because the deposits on town-sites have
been disturbed by later builders, and partly because the prevailing method of
burial was in chamber-tombs, which were designed and used for successive
interments. Neither the stratification of a settlement, nor the association of
objects in a tomb, can be used alone in proof of date. It is possible, however, by
means of cumulative evidence from stratigraphic and stylistic observations, to
detect a definite chronological development even in the earlier form of this long-
lived fabric, which has hitherto been regarded as too rigidly conventional for
such analysis.4 The diagnostic features of the pottery are details of shape, type
of ornament, and quality of fabric.
1 Palaikastro, pi. XVIII, b.
" See A 784 and note.
:l F. Houssay in Rev. Arch. (3), xxx, p. 91 : ' Vallisneria spiralis.'
1 So Fimmen, op. cit., p. 166.