DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9804#0217
INDO-EUROPEAN THEORY 191
They believe that the solution of the question is to be
found, not in looking to the South, but in looking to the
North and the first wanderings of its peoples. Trade
routes are now not in question. The date is ex hypo-
thesi too early for intercourse, except by the method
of migration. South Russia or Central Europe was the
home of the original Indo-European race, which unaided,
and on its own merits, evolved the spirals of Petreny
and Galicia. At the end of the Neolithic Age they
moved southward across the Danube and the Balkans
into Thrace. There they divided into two streams. One
crossed the Hellespont and colonised Troy, the other moved
down the coast of the Greek mainland. One or the other
crossed into Crete, and created the Minoan culture.
The strong point about this theory is that it professes
to equate Neolithic with Neolithic, and Bronze with
Bronze. It does not force us to imagine that the Bronze
Age began much earlier in the ^Egean. On the other
hand the resemblances between the two potteries, so
far as they exist, are accounted for even less satisfactorily
by a theory of migration than by a theory of trade routes.
At what exact period could the migration have taken
place ? If we claim as a proof of it the fact that rude
sub-Neolithic vases of the First City of Troy 1 and Melos !
are like equally rude vases from South Hungary,' we
must place it very early indeed, before Early Minoan L
In this case, what of the spiral ornament and fine artistic
spirit of Petreny ? Did the Indo-Europeans forget their
beautiful designs for some hundreds of years ? There
is nothing in Melos or Crete as good as Petreny, from
the purely artistic point of view, till Early Minoan III.
or Middle Minoan L
1 Schmidt in Z. f. Elhnol. 1904, fig. 32, p. 655.
- Ibid. figs. 33-4, pp. 655-6; Edgar in Phylakopi, p. 83, and
fig. 69, -p. 84. They arc wide-necked jars with hollow feet and
handles for suspension.
3 From Lengyel, etc. Schmidt, op. cit. figs. 30-1, pp. 654-5.
They believe that the solution of the question is to be
found, not in looking to the South, but in looking to the
North and the first wanderings of its peoples. Trade
routes are now not in question. The date is ex hypo-
thesi too early for intercourse, except by the method
of migration. South Russia or Central Europe was the
home of the original Indo-European race, which unaided,
and on its own merits, evolved the spirals of Petreny
and Galicia. At the end of the Neolithic Age they
moved southward across the Danube and the Balkans
into Thrace. There they divided into two streams. One
crossed the Hellespont and colonised Troy, the other moved
down the coast of the Greek mainland. One or the other
crossed into Crete, and created the Minoan culture.
The strong point about this theory is that it professes
to equate Neolithic with Neolithic, and Bronze with
Bronze. It does not force us to imagine that the Bronze
Age began much earlier in the ^Egean. On the other
hand the resemblances between the two potteries, so
far as they exist, are accounted for even less satisfactorily
by a theory of migration than by a theory of trade routes.
At what exact period could the migration have taken
place ? If we claim as a proof of it the fact that rude
sub-Neolithic vases of the First City of Troy 1 and Melos !
are like equally rude vases from South Hungary,' we
must place it very early indeed, before Early Minoan L
In this case, what of the spiral ornament and fine artistic
spirit of Petreny ? Did the Indo-Europeans forget their
beautiful designs for some hundreds of years ? There
is nothing in Melos or Crete as good as Petreny, from
the purely artistic point of view, till Early Minoan III.
or Middle Minoan L
1 Schmidt in Z. f. Elhnol. 1904, fig. 32, p. 655.
- Ibid. figs. 33-4, pp. 655-6; Edgar in Phylakopi, p. 83, and
fig. 69, -p. 84. They arc wide-necked jars with hollow feet and
handles for suspension.
3 From Lengyel, etc. Schmidt, op. cit. figs. 30-1, pp. 654-5.