Universitätsbibliothek HeidelbergUniversitätsbibliothek Heidelberg
Metadaten

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

DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.807#0141
Overview
Facsimile
0.5
1 cm
facsimile
Scroll
OCR fulltext
EARLY MINOAN III

H5

Such vessels bear an incised and often punctuated decoration also very
reminiscent of primitive tradition.

These vessels resemble a primitive class of which many illustrations
belonging to the Neolithic Age in Crete have been given above, and which
shows a great persistence in the Copper Age pottery of Cyprus and a wide
Anatolian region. It now reappears in Crete, apparently from a Cycladic
source. The extent to which it was once more popularized in the island is
seen from the fact that certain dotted designs of the polychrome vases
belonging to the earliest phase of the M. M. I style are directly taken from

these chalk-filled patterns. The comparative
examples put together in Fig. 125 below
supply sufficient evidence of this.

Further indications of the strong- stream
of Cycladic influence that had set in at this
time will be seen in the imported vases and
other objects of Parian marble. The most
characteristic of these imports are the marble
' idols' or human figures of a typical Early
Cycladic class.1 These, as will be seen from
Fig. 83, differ from the traditional Cretan
types, such as those given in Fig. 13 above.
Neither have they anything in common with
what may be called the Egypto-Libyan group,
shown in Fig. 52.

A remarkable ceramic feature of this
Period is the appearance of vessels grotesquely
moulded in human or animal form. In Tomb
XIII at Mochlos was a vase (Fig. 84) in the
shape of a female figure holding her breasts.
The vessel shows a yellowish white decoration on a dark ground. The figure
wears a kind of turban, and from the similarity of the attitude may well be
identified with the matronly figures represented by the earl)' clay ' idols '.
It seems probable, indeed, that in this case as in others we see before us
a primitive Mother Goddess.2

A curious vessel in the shape of a young bird opening its mouth for
food (Fig. 85), found by Dr. Xanthudides in an early tholos ossuary of

1 Dr. Karo has noticed, as an evidence of cases they bear evidence of having been mended,
the comparative value attaching to these figures 2 Mr. Seager, Mochlos, p. 64, also takes this
of imported material in Crete that in almost all view.

I 2

Imported
Cycladic
' Idols'.

Gro-
tesquely
Moulded
Vessels.

Fig. 83. Cycladic Marble 'Idol
found in slteia, crete (§).

Comic

Bird

Vase.
 
Annotationen