DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9804#0195
THE ROUND HUT 169
that by early Minoan times the round hut,1 on which they
were without doubt modelled, was in common use in
Crete. At Sitia, indeed, Dr. Xanthoudides has just
discovered 1 a farmstead, dating from Middle Minoan L,
in which several rooms, divided by party walls of small
stones and clay, are all enclosed by an elliptical wall about
85 feet by 49. He plausibly suggests that here we have
a survival of the old round hut, divided into rooms by
party walls of wood and wicker-work. The important
point for us to notice is that both round and
square houses appear very early in Crete. Whether
they imply different races, as the Pit Caves do, is open to
question. There is at least no reason to associate the
round hut with the Indo-Europeans, as Professor Tsountas
is inclined to do.3 It may have come from Libya, or it
may be native to Crete, as it is to many other remote
and unconnected parts of the world. The need for
shelter is common to the human race and not only to
those who live in a "rigorous climate" ; ' and no form
of it is more obvious and universal than the wigwam.6
We need not discuss here Tsountas's further ingenious
suggestion c that shaft graves represent a people who
originally were lake dwellers, with huts on platforms
raised on piles. He would doubtless point to the base-
ments of the Cretan houses as a support to his theory.
Whether true or not, it does not affect our present argu-
ment, except in so far that such a people must have
come from over-seas. There may have been pile dwellings
1 For the later history of the round hut, see an interesting
article by E. Pfuhl in Ath. Mitt. xxx. 1905, pp. 331-74. He
maintains that it survives in the background of Greek cult,
e.g. in the Tholos of Epidaurus ; but that later it comes into
prominence again, and culminates in the Pantheon at Rome.
2 See pp. 29, 181.
3 M.A. pp. 246-7. * Ibid. p. 248.
0 See the mass of evidence for its wide diffusion in Africa in
Ratzel, H.M. i. pp. 107-9, PP- 30-77.
6 See a good summary of it in Frazer, Pausanias, hi. pp. 158-9.
that by early Minoan times the round hut,1 on which they
were without doubt modelled, was in common use in
Crete. At Sitia, indeed, Dr. Xanthoudides has just
discovered 1 a farmstead, dating from Middle Minoan L,
in which several rooms, divided by party walls of small
stones and clay, are all enclosed by an elliptical wall about
85 feet by 49. He plausibly suggests that here we have
a survival of the old round hut, divided into rooms by
party walls of wood and wicker-work. The important
point for us to notice is that both round and
square houses appear very early in Crete. Whether
they imply different races, as the Pit Caves do, is open to
question. There is at least no reason to associate the
round hut with the Indo-Europeans, as Professor Tsountas
is inclined to do.3 It may have come from Libya, or it
may be native to Crete, as it is to many other remote
and unconnected parts of the world. The need for
shelter is common to the human race and not only to
those who live in a "rigorous climate" ; ' and no form
of it is more obvious and universal than the wigwam.6
We need not discuss here Tsountas's further ingenious
suggestion c that shaft graves represent a people who
originally were lake dwellers, with huts on platforms
raised on piles. He would doubtless point to the base-
ments of the Cretan houses as a support to his theory.
Whether true or not, it does not affect our present argu-
ment, except in so far that such a people must have
come from over-seas. There may have been pile dwellings
1 For the later history of the round hut, see an interesting
article by E. Pfuhl in Ath. Mitt. xxx. 1905, pp. 331-74. He
maintains that it survives in the background of Greek cult,
e.g. in the Tholos of Epidaurus ; but that later it comes into
prominence again, and culminates in the Pantheon at Rome.
2 See pp. 29, 181.
3 M.A. pp. 246-7. * Ibid. p. 248.
0 See the mass of evidence for its wide diffusion in Africa in
Ratzel, H.M. i. pp. 107-9, PP- 30-77.
6 See a good summary of it in Frazer, Pausanias, hi. pp. 158-9.