DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.805#0110
[370] PRIMITIVE PICTOGEAPHS AND SCRIPT 101
Phoenicians has been further shown to rest on a confusion of Ptolemaic
times.80 The ruddy hue of the Kefti chiefs in the Theban paintings,—which
seems to be the Egyptian way of rendering the rosy European cheeks,81—as
well as their dress and facial type are clearly non-Semitic.
Isolated resemblances such as those presented by the bronze figure from
Latakia, the Syrian Laodicea, now in the Louvre,82 or by the details of some
Hittite or early Cilician reliefs cannot weigh against the much greater
conformity with Mycenaean types, and, to the Peloponnesian examples already
cited, my own researches now enable me to add a striking array of Cretan
parallels. Here it may be sufficient to say that throughout Eastern and
Central Crete the commonest types of Mycenaean gems show as their princi-
pal designs a series of vessels evidently representing originals in the precious
metals, some with beaked spouts, some with S-shaped double handles and
slender bases which reproduce several of the most characteristic types of the
vessels offered by the Kefti chiefs to Thothmes III. on the Theban tombs.
The men of the Vaphio cups, who present such a striking resemblance to
the Kefti tributaries as seen in the walls of the Rekhmara tomb, recur with
the same flowing locks on a fragment of a stone vessel from Knosos. It is
true that, if on the one hand the Kefto folk are brought into connexion with
the people ' of the islands of the sea,'83 on the other hand they are found in
the company of Hittites and of men of Kadesh and Tunep (DaphnS) and
the Upper Rutenu of Inner Palestine. But if, as there is good reason for
believing, the carrying trade of the East Mediterranean was at this time
largely in Mycenaean hands, these associations and perhaps the tribute of
silver and copper—it may be from Cilicia and Cyprus—that the Kefti bore
in addition to their artistic vases would be accounted for without difficulty.
The matter will appear even simpler if we may accept the view that the
name of Kefto is to be identified with that of the Caphtor85 whose inhabi-
tants included both the Aegean islands and the coast of Canaan in their
8U In the Canopus Decree ' Kefti' is trans- numerous engraved stones found there, like
lated ioiv'iKii, which led Ebers and other Egypt- others recently brought hack by Mr. D. G.
ologists to accept the identification of the Kefti Hogarth from Ain-Tab in Commagene, are
with Phoenicians. "VV. Max Miiller however of Hittite and non-Mycenaean character.
[Asian unci JSuropa nach altcigyptischen Denk- 81 Op. cit. p. 351.
malern, p. 337) has shown how valueless the 82 Longpexier, Musee Napoleon, 21; Perrot et
Ptolemaic tradition was in such matters. Chipiez, Phenicie, &c, 429, 430.
From the place in which the name appears— 83 In the Rekhmara inscription,
after Naharin and Heta—in early Egyptian 84 Tomb of Men-Kheper-ra-seneb, Mission
lists, he himself concludes that it represents archiologique francaise cm Oaire, 5, 11, and cf.
Cilicia. Steindorff, who also (op. cit. p. 15) W. Max Miiller, op. cit. p. 347, and Steindorff,
rejects the identification with Phoenicia, is loo. cit.
led to seek the Kefti in the Gulf of Issos 85 Ebers' suggestion that Caphtor = ' Kaft-
or Cyprus. But, as noticed above, the vere' or Great KeftG (which he assumed on the
archaeological evidence does not favour either strength of the Canopus decree to be Phoenicia)
Oilieia or Cyprus. Cyprus, as we know, was is rejected by "W. Max Miiller (op. cit. p. 390),
touched by Mycenaean culture in comparatively who however expresses the opinion that the
late times, but it was never, certainly, a centre name Keft6 has nevertheless a real connexion
of its propagation. The early Mycenaean spiral with Caphtor : ' 1st der Name Kefto (the or-
work, such as is seen on the Kefti vases, is foreign thography approved by him, p. 337) auszu-
to Cypriote remains. On the Cicilian mainland sprechen so ist allerdings der Anklang mehr als
Mycenaean traces altogether fail us. The zufallig.'
Phoenicians has been further shown to rest on a confusion of Ptolemaic
times.80 The ruddy hue of the Kefti chiefs in the Theban paintings,—which
seems to be the Egyptian way of rendering the rosy European cheeks,81—as
well as their dress and facial type are clearly non-Semitic.
Isolated resemblances such as those presented by the bronze figure from
Latakia, the Syrian Laodicea, now in the Louvre,82 or by the details of some
Hittite or early Cilician reliefs cannot weigh against the much greater
conformity with Mycenaean types, and, to the Peloponnesian examples already
cited, my own researches now enable me to add a striking array of Cretan
parallels. Here it may be sufficient to say that throughout Eastern and
Central Crete the commonest types of Mycenaean gems show as their princi-
pal designs a series of vessels evidently representing originals in the precious
metals, some with beaked spouts, some with S-shaped double handles and
slender bases which reproduce several of the most characteristic types of the
vessels offered by the Kefti chiefs to Thothmes III. on the Theban tombs.
The men of the Vaphio cups, who present such a striking resemblance to
the Kefti tributaries as seen in the walls of the Rekhmara tomb, recur with
the same flowing locks on a fragment of a stone vessel from Knosos. It is
true that, if on the one hand the Kefto folk are brought into connexion with
the people ' of the islands of the sea,'83 on the other hand they are found in
the company of Hittites and of men of Kadesh and Tunep (DaphnS) and
the Upper Rutenu of Inner Palestine. But if, as there is good reason for
believing, the carrying trade of the East Mediterranean was at this time
largely in Mycenaean hands, these associations and perhaps the tribute of
silver and copper—it may be from Cilicia and Cyprus—that the Kefti bore
in addition to their artistic vases would be accounted for without difficulty.
The matter will appear even simpler if we may accept the view that the
name of Kefto is to be identified with that of the Caphtor85 whose inhabi-
tants included both the Aegean islands and the coast of Canaan in their
8U In the Canopus Decree ' Kefti' is trans- numerous engraved stones found there, like
lated ioiv'iKii, which led Ebers and other Egypt- others recently brought hack by Mr. D. G.
ologists to accept the identification of the Kefti Hogarth from Ain-Tab in Commagene, are
with Phoenicians. "VV. Max Miiller however of Hittite and non-Mycenaean character.
[Asian unci JSuropa nach altcigyptischen Denk- 81 Op. cit. p. 351.
malern, p. 337) has shown how valueless the 82 Longpexier, Musee Napoleon, 21; Perrot et
Ptolemaic tradition was in such matters. Chipiez, Phenicie, &c, 429, 430.
From the place in which the name appears— 83 In the Rekhmara inscription,
after Naharin and Heta—in early Egyptian 84 Tomb of Men-Kheper-ra-seneb, Mission
lists, he himself concludes that it represents archiologique francaise cm Oaire, 5, 11, and cf.
Cilicia. Steindorff, who also (op. cit. p. 15) W. Max Miiller, op. cit. p. 347, and Steindorff,
rejects the identification with Phoenicia, is loo. cit.
led to seek the Kefti in the Gulf of Issos 85 Ebers' suggestion that Caphtor = ' Kaft-
or Cyprus. But, as noticed above, the vere' or Great KeftG (which he assumed on the
archaeological evidence does not favour either strength of the Canopus decree to be Phoenicia)
Oilieia or Cyprus. Cyprus, as we know, was is rejected by "W. Max Miiller (op. cit. p. 390),
touched by Mycenaean culture in comparatively who however expresses the opinion that the
late times, but it was never, certainly, a centre name Keft6 has nevertheless a real connexion
of its propagation. The early Mycenaean spiral with Caphtor : ' 1st der Name Kefto (the or-
work, such as is seen on the Kefti vases, is foreign thography approved by him, p. 337) auszu-
to Cypriote remains. On the Cicilian mainland sprechen so ist allerdings der Anklang mehr als
Mycenaean traces altogether fail us. The zufallig.'