Evans, Arthur J.: The Palace of Minos: a comparative account of the successive stages of the early Cretan civilization as illustred by the discoveries at Knossos (Band 1): The Neolithic and Early and Middle Minoan Ages (London, 1921)

EARLY MINOAN II

75

E. M. Ill and M. M. I Periods. There were also specimens of the mottled
decoration illustrated below ( Fig-. 46).

On the more developed types of this class the geometrical decoration Hatched
becomes more elaborate, hatched triangles in varied combinations being a con- < Butter- '
spicuous feature (Figs. 41, 42).1 The 'butterfly' ornament—pairs of these ^yen^rna"
with the apex meeting—survives into the First Middle Minoan Period.

Among the monochrome vessels of this Period, one from Hellenika,
near Palaikastro, is remarkable as being in the shape of a boat with a Clay
high prow and tail-like rudder. This type, significative of maritime enter- Boats-
prise, recalls Cycladic examples of the same k ind. What appears to be
a clay boat with a high ' prow ' at both ends, belonging to this or the
succeeding1 Period, was found in a house at Mochlos.

An interesting form of clay vessel also makes its first appearance during
this Period, which seems to be the prototype of the typical Minoan Pedes-
' kernoi'. These vessels, of dark burnished ware, are either round or p ^s
oval in outline, and consist of a flat-bottomed pan supported on a
pedestal. They seem, as will be seen from the restored examples, Fig. 43, a, d,'1
to be due to the coalescing of what must have been originally three
separate elements : (i) the pan-like receptacle ; (2) the flat table ; (3) the
pedestal. So far as the two last elements are concerned, this evolution
presents a curious parallelism with the Early Dynastic Egyptian Tables of Parallel
Offering 3 ; in that case the round flat table and the pedestal are found Egyptian
in their separate as well as their united phase (Fig. 45),4 and a shallow stone ^q^s
bowl was often placed on the table. This parallelism finds a further striking ing.
illustration in the vessels grouped on a similar stand, Fig. 43, c, from the
early tholos ossuary of Kumasa 5 (E. M. II—III). The triple group of pots
with their archaic perforated handles here clearly indicates a ritual destina-
tion, and anticipates in another form the triple cups of the Diktaean Libation
Table.

But this Early Minoan type itself stands at the head of a whole Minoan
family of later ' kernoi ',G a class of vessels specially devoted to the cult of
Rhea, who herself represents the tradition of the Great Minoan Goddess.

1 Reproduced from Seager, Mochlos, p. 36. 5 Xanthudides, U.S.A., xii, p. 11, Fig. 1.
Fig. 41 is from Tomb II, Fig. 42 from Tomb I. c Prof. Bosanquet has already instanced a

2 The simpler type, b, is from E. H. Hall, parallel form of vessel from Phylakopi, consist-
Sphonngaras,\). 49, Fig. 22, f. a is from Seager, ing of three pots supported by a hollow stem,
Mochlos, p. 71, Fig. 40. Others occurred at a forerunner of the ' kernos' type (U.S.A., iii,
Pyrgos. 54 seqq.). For the later Kepvot from Eleusis

3 These are of both alabaster and clay. and elsewhere see O. Rubensohn, Mitth. d. k. d.

4 Alabaster Table of Offerings from El Kab. Arch. Inst., 1898, p. 271 seqq., and PI. XIII.

' Kernoi'.