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)

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THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.

Pre-

Dynastic
Egyptian
com-
parisons.

The diameter of the pieces given in Fig. 342 (8 centimetres) so closely
corresponds with that of the disks of the Gaming Board that we may fairly
conclude that they had belonged to a board or boards of a very similar kind.

The ivory objects are more or less conical in shape, and of more solid
proportions than the usual Egyptian pieces. It is, however, interesting to
note that their form closely approaches that of the prehistoric clay ' men'

Fig. 342 a, b. Ivory 'Men' with engraved bases.

found, together with a gaming table of the same Nile mud, in a pre-dynastic
grave of the Cemetery of El Mahasna.1 Once more our Cretan comparisons
with Egypt are carried back beyond the Dynasties.

So early in fact was the Egyptian game taken over in the island, that,
as has been shown above,2 not only is a draught-player depicted on an Early

1 E. B. Ayrton and W. L. S. Loat, Pre- divided into 18 squares, in three lines of 6.
dynastic Cemetery of El Mahasna, PI. XVII Nine smaller and two larger pieces were found,
and p. 30. The surface of the mud table was 2 See p. 124 and Figs. 93 a, a 2, 93 c, a.