DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.42779#0072
PREHISTORIC PERIODS 41
clear. For most lapidaries were probably not artists, and it is
doubtful if many artists or sculptors wasted their time on the
more elementary and less skilled work of the lapidary. In
this connexion I should prefer to attribute the curious
steatite cameo relief,1 like a seal, which was found at the
Harbour Town of Knossos to an artist or a gem-cutter rather
than to a lapidary. This unusual object seems to be a trial
or model for a gem which was to be cut intaglio in a harder
stone. The ‘trial’ itself consists of a rough piece of steatite
which has two gem-designs cut on one face and a third on
the other. All three designs are cut in the soft stone with a
knife blade and all three are animal figures of the types
usually seen on gems of agate or chalcedony.
1 Evans, Palace of Minos, 11. i, fig. 134.
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clear. For most lapidaries were probably not artists, and it is
doubtful if many artists or sculptors wasted their time on the
more elementary and less skilled work of the lapidary. In
this connexion I should prefer to attribute the curious
steatite cameo relief,1 like a seal, which was found at the
Harbour Town of Knossos to an artist or a gem-cutter rather
than to a lapidary. This unusual object seems to be a trial
or model for a gem which was to be cut intaglio in a harder
stone. The ‘trial’ itself consists of a rough piece of steatite
which has two gem-designs cut on one face and a third on
the other. All three designs are cut in the soft stone with a
knife blade and all three are animal figures of the types
usually seen on gems of agate or chalcedony.
1 Evans, Palace of Minos, 11. i, fig. 134.
3904
G