DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5538#0056
36 PHARAOHS, FELLAHS, AND EXPLORERS.
work. One week alone—the week ending on February 13,
1SS6 — yielded no less than thirty-five large basketfuls of
these exquisite potsherds, making, at a rough computation,
about four hundred and fifty pounds in weight, or a total
number of twenty-five thousand fragments. The sorting
and classifying of the fragments consumed more than a year
of Mr. Gardners time; and about twenty or twenty-five
vases, bowls, and other objects have been put together more
or less completely. Two of these mended bowls, described
by Mr. Ernest A. Gardner as among "the most magnificent
examples of ancient pottery found at Naukratis," are here
reproduced. These bowls have each two triple handles ter- -
minating in a human face at each end; while midway be-
tween the handles on each side is a boss with two faces back
to back. A frieze of gazelles browsing on a ground parseme
with floral and other emblems, runs round the outside; the
inside being decorated with a central star-shaped ornament
surrounded by a frieze of lions, geese, sphinxes, etc.(") Some
of these votive offerings, as shown by the graffiti of the do-
nors, were given by citizens of Teos, and others by Milesians.
Taken chronologically, these Naukratis fragments—for
they are mostly fragments—constitute not only a series of
valuable finds, but an " object-lesson " of the highest interest
on the history of the ceramic arts of Greece. We first of all
detect the Milesian colonist trying his " 'prentice hand " at
scarab-making, and producing at best but a blundering imita-
tion of that popular product of his adopted home. Next we
find him taking to pottery, properly so called ; and, with the
vivacious fancy of his race, adapting, varjnng, and playing
with the old stock subjects of Egyptian ornament. Presently
he casts aside the trammels of tradition and launches out
into a style of his own—a style as purely Hellenic, and as
original, as if his first lessons had never been learned in an
Oriental school.
work. One week alone—the week ending on February 13,
1SS6 — yielded no less than thirty-five large basketfuls of
these exquisite potsherds, making, at a rough computation,
about four hundred and fifty pounds in weight, or a total
number of twenty-five thousand fragments. The sorting
and classifying of the fragments consumed more than a year
of Mr. Gardners time; and about twenty or twenty-five
vases, bowls, and other objects have been put together more
or less completely. Two of these mended bowls, described
by Mr. Ernest A. Gardner as among "the most magnificent
examples of ancient pottery found at Naukratis," are here
reproduced. These bowls have each two triple handles ter- -
minating in a human face at each end; while midway be-
tween the handles on each side is a boss with two faces back
to back. A frieze of gazelles browsing on a ground parseme
with floral and other emblems, runs round the outside; the
inside being decorated with a central star-shaped ornament
surrounded by a frieze of lions, geese, sphinxes, etc.(") Some
of these votive offerings, as shown by the graffiti of the do-
nors, were given by citizens of Teos, and others by Milesians.
Taken chronologically, these Naukratis fragments—for
they are mostly fragments—constitute not only a series of
valuable finds, but an " object-lesson " of the highest interest
on the history of the ceramic arts of Greece. We first of all
detect the Milesian colonist trying his " 'prentice hand " at
scarab-making, and producing at best but a blundering imita-
tion of that popular product of his adopted home. Next we
find him taking to pottery, properly so called ; and, with the
vivacious fancy of his race, adapting, varjnng, and playing
with the old stock subjects of Egyptian ornament. Presently
he casts aside the trammels of tradition and launches out
into a style of his own—a style as purely Hellenic, and as
original, as if his first lessons had never been learned in an
Oriental school.