DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9804#0219
INDO-EUROPEAN THEORY 193
home.1 The sub-Neolithic vases of Melos were on this
view derived from those of Hungary, but the Galician
and South Russian spirals were worked by later genera-
tions who had remained at home. This is not really a
solution of the difficulty. If the South Russians were
able in their own home to advance to the art of Petreny
before the end of the Neolithic Age, how was it that their
kinsmen, whose later history as creators of the JEgean
civilisation shows them, ex hypothesi, to be the most
progressive and artistic part of the race, did not reach
the same stage till the Bronze Age was far advanced ?
In material civilisation they apparently made quick
progress. The three-roomed houses of Volo ! are an
advance on the clay huts of South Russia. The settle-
ment at Jortan on the Caicus knew bracelets and knives,
arrow and lance heads of bronze.5 It is uncertain
whether even the First City of Troy is purely Neolithic.4
Yet the pottery of all these places, as well as the begin-
nings of Early Cycladic and Early Minoan art, is behind
that of Petreny. Can Petreny really be earlier ? It
will, perhaps, be answered that Petreny may have re-
mained Neolithic while its kinsmen were learning the
use of metals, so that chronologically it may be equated
with Early Minoan III. or Middle Minoan I. ; but, if so,
the original position that we have no right to equate
Bronze with Neolithic is given away, and the whole
argument falls to the ground. In particular Dr. Schmidt
thus obtains no assistance from the elaborate comparisons
he himself previously drew 6 between the spiral ornaments
of the Bronze Age of Central Europe and those of the so-
1 So Schmidt in Z. f. Ethnol. 1905, p. 113, which must, I
presume, be taken as his matured opinion on the matter.
2 Tsountas, C.R.A.C. p. 207. They had not, however, yet
learnt there the use of the potter's wheel [ibid. p. 208).
3 Collignon in C.R.A.I. 1901, p. 814.
4 A. Gotze in Dorpfeld's T.I. i. p. 325. So Mackenzie,
Phylaknpi, p, 242, note 1.
6 Z. f. Ethnol. J004, pp. 608-34.
13
home.1 The sub-Neolithic vases of Melos were on this
view derived from those of Hungary, but the Galician
and South Russian spirals were worked by later genera-
tions who had remained at home. This is not really a
solution of the difficulty. If the South Russians were
able in their own home to advance to the art of Petreny
before the end of the Neolithic Age, how was it that their
kinsmen, whose later history as creators of the JEgean
civilisation shows them, ex hypothesi, to be the most
progressive and artistic part of the race, did not reach
the same stage till the Bronze Age was far advanced ?
In material civilisation they apparently made quick
progress. The three-roomed houses of Volo ! are an
advance on the clay huts of South Russia. The settle-
ment at Jortan on the Caicus knew bracelets and knives,
arrow and lance heads of bronze.5 It is uncertain
whether even the First City of Troy is purely Neolithic.4
Yet the pottery of all these places, as well as the begin-
nings of Early Cycladic and Early Minoan art, is behind
that of Petreny. Can Petreny really be earlier ? It
will, perhaps, be answered that Petreny may have re-
mained Neolithic while its kinsmen were learning the
use of metals, so that chronologically it may be equated
with Early Minoan III. or Middle Minoan I. ; but, if so,
the original position that we have no right to equate
Bronze with Neolithic is given away, and the whole
argument falls to the ground. In particular Dr. Schmidt
thus obtains no assistance from the elaborate comparisons
he himself previously drew 6 between the spiral ornaments
of the Bronze Age of Central Europe and those of the so-
1 So Schmidt in Z. f. Ethnol. 1905, p. 113, which must, I
presume, be taken as his matured opinion on the matter.
2 Tsountas, C.R.A.C. p. 207. They had not, however, yet
learnt there the use of the potter's wheel [ibid. p. 208).
3 Collignon in C.R.A.I. 1901, p. 814.
4 A. Gotze in Dorpfeld's T.I. i. p. 325. So Mackenzie,
Phylaknpi, p, 242, note 1.
6 Z. f. Ethnol. J004, pp. 608-34.
13