DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.807#0009
PREFACE
IX
by Mr. Seager's epoch-making discoveries in a cemetery of that Age in
the little island of Mochlos.1 Part of these excavations I was myself privileged
to witness, and, thanks to Mr. Seager's great kindness, I have been enabled
to make a large use of his materials in illustrating the Early Minoan Sections
of this work.
It must, however, be clearly understood that the site of Knossos is the
central theme of the present work. Not only am I able to speak at first
hand about this, but the series of objects from that site is, on the whole,
more complete than can be found elsewhere. Moreover, the stratigraphic
evidence on which my whole system is grounded is here better ascertained and
more continuous, going back in fact without a break to remote Neolithic
times.
In attempting to set forth the characteristic products of the successive
Minoan Periods it will be seen that I have not relied on a single category only,
such as ceramic types—indispensable as they are in this connexion. I have
here done my best to correlate these with other parallel branches of art so as
to present a collective view of contemporary phenomena. Much, indeed, is
lost by looking at one class of objects without taking constant count of the
side lights thrown by other works of the same epoch. The clay and metal
forms of vessels, for instance, are inseparably connected ; ceramic designs at
Knossos are seen to be largely the reflection of the decoration of the Palace
walls ; and the history of the Greater Arts is well illustrated in a com-
pendious form by the types on seals and gems. These latter objects indeed,
so abundantly forthcoming from the soil of prehistoric Crete, have proved of
special utility in the present work of classification, and in some respects fulfil
the same function as coins at a later date. Closely allied, moreover, with the
sphragistic category, especially in the Early and Middle Minoan Age, is
what many will regard as the most important of Cretan discoveries, the
evidence of the successive stages in the evolution of the Art of Writing:,
beginning with a rude pictography and advancing through a conventionalized
hieroglyphic signary to a fully developed linear script, which itself shows an
earlier and a later phase.
In the present work it is naturally impossible to give more than a con-
spectus of the successive forms of script. The earlier part of the subject
1 The excavations took place in 1908. The final publication was made in 1912 {Explora-
tions in the Island of Mochlos, by Richard B. Seager. Published by the American School
of Classical Studies at Athens. Boston and New York, 1912).
IX
by Mr. Seager's epoch-making discoveries in a cemetery of that Age in
the little island of Mochlos.1 Part of these excavations I was myself privileged
to witness, and, thanks to Mr. Seager's great kindness, I have been enabled
to make a large use of his materials in illustrating the Early Minoan Sections
of this work.
It must, however, be clearly understood that the site of Knossos is the
central theme of the present work. Not only am I able to speak at first
hand about this, but the series of objects from that site is, on the whole,
more complete than can be found elsewhere. Moreover, the stratigraphic
evidence on which my whole system is grounded is here better ascertained and
more continuous, going back in fact without a break to remote Neolithic
times.
In attempting to set forth the characteristic products of the successive
Minoan Periods it will be seen that I have not relied on a single category only,
such as ceramic types—indispensable as they are in this connexion. I have
here done my best to correlate these with other parallel branches of art so as
to present a collective view of contemporary phenomena. Much, indeed, is
lost by looking at one class of objects without taking constant count of the
side lights thrown by other works of the same epoch. The clay and metal
forms of vessels, for instance, are inseparably connected ; ceramic designs at
Knossos are seen to be largely the reflection of the decoration of the Palace
walls ; and the history of the Greater Arts is well illustrated in a com-
pendious form by the types on seals and gems. These latter objects indeed,
so abundantly forthcoming from the soil of prehistoric Crete, have proved of
special utility in the present work of classification, and in some respects fulfil
the same function as coins at a later date. Closely allied, moreover, with the
sphragistic category, especially in the Early and Middle Minoan Age, is
what many will regard as the most important of Cretan discoveries, the
evidence of the successive stages in the evolution of the Art of Writing:,
beginning with a rude pictography and advancing through a conventionalized
hieroglyphic signary to a fully developed linear script, which itself shows an
earlier and a later phase.
In the present work it is naturally impossible to give more than a con-
spectus of the successive forms of script. The earlier part of the subject
1 The excavations took place in 1908. The final publication was made in 1912 {Explora-
tions in the Island of Mochlos, by Richard B. Seager. Published by the American School
of Classical Studies at Athens. Boston and New York, 1912).