DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.805#0073
64 FROM CEETE AND THE PELOPONNESE. [333]
with the round-bottomed types that precede the earliest class of Aegean
painted pottery, such as that of Thera or from the Kamares cave in Crete
itself.
It will thus be seen that the most typical forms of seals on which the
hieroglyphic characters occur, as well as the prototypes of the hieroglyphics
themselves, go back on Cretan soil to a very remote period. The earliest
class seems, indeed, to have received its characteristic stamp already before
the days of that intimate contact with Twelfth Dynasty Egypt which has left
its impress on some of the later decorative designs. The evidence collected
by Professor Petrie, at Kahun, tends to show that already by the time of
Usertesen II., c. 2681—2660 B.C., Aegean foreigners were settled in Egypt.
If, therefore, the beginnings of the Twelfth Dynasty Egyptian influences
perceptible on the Cretan intaglios date approximately from that epoch,
this still earlier class on which this influence is as yet non-apparent
may well go back to the early part of the third millenium before our era.
It stands to reason indeed that the indigenous European culture repre-
sented by the primitive Cretan population must have reached a comparatively
advanced stage before it could have placed itself in the direct contact with
the higher Egyptian civilization. Nor was it with Egypt only that the sea-
faring enterprise of the Cretan islanders was already at this early date
opening up communication—whether predatory or commercial, it might be
hard to say. A remarkable piece of evidence is supplied by a seal-stone of the
earliest class (Fig. 62), which certainly seems to point to a connexion with
the Syrian coast. On one side of this stone is the unmistakable figure of
a camel in the act of kneeling, the knees of its fore-legs however being
bent in the wrong direction, as if drawn by one who had but a distant
knowledge of the animal.
An interesting pendant to this evidence of Oriental intrusion is supplied
by a triangular stone, in every respect resembling the early Cretan type,
brought back by the late Mr. Greville Chester from the North coast of Syria,
and now in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. The facets are, in this case,
surrounded by the oval groove or cartouche which apparently belongs to the
more advanced specimens of the primitive series, but both from its compact
form and the rude style of the engraving the stone in question must be
referred to the same general period as those grouped above under Class III., and
can hardly be brought down later than the approximate date 2000 B.C.
Other independent evidence points to the same early intercourse with
Northern Syria. Certain seals in the form of a truncated or obtuse-ended
cone occur in Crete, some of which seem also to have been derived at the
same early date from this Oriental source. In the Phaestos deposit, above
referred to, three of these, and apparently a fragment of a fourth, were
found, and it is to be noted as a significant feature that one of these and
the fragment were made of ivory. This imported material might in itself
warrant the suspicion that this class of seal, which in Crete seems to be
of exceptional occurrence, was of foreign origin. As a matter of fact, in
Northern Syria, where this must be regarded as a typical form, due no
F
with the round-bottomed types that precede the earliest class of Aegean
painted pottery, such as that of Thera or from the Kamares cave in Crete
itself.
It will thus be seen that the most typical forms of seals on which the
hieroglyphic characters occur, as well as the prototypes of the hieroglyphics
themselves, go back on Cretan soil to a very remote period. The earliest
class seems, indeed, to have received its characteristic stamp already before
the days of that intimate contact with Twelfth Dynasty Egypt which has left
its impress on some of the later decorative designs. The evidence collected
by Professor Petrie, at Kahun, tends to show that already by the time of
Usertesen II., c. 2681—2660 B.C., Aegean foreigners were settled in Egypt.
If, therefore, the beginnings of the Twelfth Dynasty Egyptian influences
perceptible on the Cretan intaglios date approximately from that epoch,
this still earlier class on which this influence is as yet non-apparent
may well go back to the early part of the third millenium before our era.
It stands to reason indeed that the indigenous European culture repre-
sented by the primitive Cretan population must have reached a comparatively
advanced stage before it could have placed itself in the direct contact with
the higher Egyptian civilization. Nor was it with Egypt only that the sea-
faring enterprise of the Cretan islanders was already at this early date
opening up communication—whether predatory or commercial, it might be
hard to say. A remarkable piece of evidence is supplied by a seal-stone of the
earliest class (Fig. 62), which certainly seems to point to a connexion with
the Syrian coast. On one side of this stone is the unmistakable figure of
a camel in the act of kneeling, the knees of its fore-legs however being
bent in the wrong direction, as if drawn by one who had but a distant
knowledge of the animal.
An interesting pendant to this evidence of Oriental intrusion is supplied
by a triangular stone, in every respect resembling the early Cretan type,
brought back by the late Mr. Greville Chester from the North coast of Syria,
and now in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. The facets are, in this case,
surrounded by the oval groove or cartouche which apparently belongs to the
more advanced specimens of the primitive series, but both from its compact
form and the rude style of the engraving the stone in question must be
referred to the same general period as those grouped above under Class III., and
can hardly be brought down later than the approximate date 2000 B.C.
Other independent evidence points to the same early intercourse with
Northern Syria. Certain seals in the form of a truncated or obtuse-ended
cone occur in Crete, some of which seem also to have been derived at the
same early date from this Oriental source. In the Phaestos deposit, above
referred to, three of these, and apparently a fragment of a fourth, were
found, and it is to be noted as a significant feature that one of these and
the fragment were made of ivory. This imported material might in itself
warrant the suspicion that this class of seal, which in Crete seems to be
of exceptional occurrence, was of foreign origin. As a matter of fact, in
Northern Syria, where this must be regarded as a typical form, due no
F