DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.807#0550
5o8
THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.
Owing to certain characteristics of the dress it is ascribed below to the
beginning of the Late Minoan Age, and from the occurrence of bronze
female figures in a very similar style from Cretan sites, there can be little
remaining doubt as to the place of origin. Careful drawings executed for
me to show the arrangement of the snakes on the upper part of this
statuette are given in Fig. 365.1 It will be seen that here, as in the case
of the principal figure of the Knossian Shrine, the serpents formed a triple
group, plaited together behind her neck and with their tails reaching to her
girdle. A coiling lock of hair, easily distinguishable, falls down to the right
of these. As in the case of our Snake Goddess the head of one serpent
seems to have been placed, uraeus-like, above the front of the figure's head.
The position of the heads of the other snakes is uncertain. In order to seize
hold of one of the reptiles the figure reaches her left hand to her right
shoulder. Her other forearm is raised in front of her forehead, and her
head is slightly inclined—indications these that we may have here to do with
a priestess or votary rather than with the divinity itself.
Later Of the latest Minoan epoch is the little Shrine found at Gournia, which
Goumia^ contained a rude female idol rising from a cylinder below, with a serpent
and coiling about her waist and over one of her raised arms. With this, together
with other cult objects, are bases, tapering upwards and set with Sacral Horns,
above which other serpents raise their heads. Parallel with these relics and
clearly contemporary with them are the remains of similar clay objects found
at Prinias, where the female figures have snakes trailing along their forearms
like the faience Goddess of the Palace Shrine. The Gournia group is of
special interest, since there the relics dedicated to the snake cult are associated
with small clay figures of doves and a relief showing the Double Axe.
Snakes These conjunctions are singularly illuminating since they reveal the
emblem that the Snake Goddess herself represents only another aspect of the
Chthomc Minoan Lady of the Dove, while the Double Axe itself was connected with
both. Just as the celestial inspiration descends in bird form either on the
image of the divinity itself or on that of its votary, or in other cases, as we
have seen, upon its aniconic columnar shape, so the spirit of the Nether World,
in serpent form, makes its ascent to a similar position from the earth itself.
Nor need this manifestation of the chthonic side of the divinity be invested
with any malignant significance. It has on the contrary a friendly and
domestic aspect with which those acquainted with primitive ideas as they
Fine Arts Bulletin, loc. cit, regards it as given in Vol. II under L. M. I. The drawings
a figure of ' a snake-charming lady'. were made by Mr. E. J. Lambert from the
1 Full representations of this figure will be excellent cast in the British Museum.
THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.
Owing to certain characteristics of the dress it is ascribed below to the
beginning of the Late Minoan Age, and from the occurrence of bronze
female figures in a very similar style from Cretan sites, there can be little
remaining doubt as to the place of origin. Careful drawings executed for
me to show the arrangement of the snakes on the upper part of this
statuette are given in Fig. 365.1 It will be seen that here, as in the case
of the principal figure of the Knossian Shrine, the serpents formed a triple
group, plaited together behind her neck and with their tails reaching to her
girdle. A coiling lock of hair, easily distinguishable, falls down to the right
of these. As in the case of our Snake Goddess the head of one serpent
seems to have been placed, uraeus-like, above the front of the figure's head.
The position of the heads of the other snakes is uncertain. In order to seize
hold of one of the reptiles the figure reaches her left hand to her right
shoulder. Her other forearm is raised in front of her forehead, and her
head is slightly inclined—indications these that we may have here to do with
a priestess or votary rather than with the divinity itself.
Later Of the latest Minoan epoch is the little Shrine found at Gournia, which
Goumia^ contained a rude female idol rising from a cylinder below, with a serpent
and coiling about her waist and over one of her raised arms. With this, together
with other cult objects, are bases, tapering upwards and set with Sacral Horns,
above which other serpents raise their heads. Parallel with these relics and
clearly contemporary with them are the remains of similar clay objects found
at Prinias, where the female figures have snakes trailing along their forearms
like the faience Goddess of the Palace Shrine. The Gournia group is of
special interest, since there the relics dedicated to the snake cult are associated
with small clay figures of doves and a relief showing the Double Axe.
Snakes These conjunctions are singularly illuminating since they reveal the
emblem that the Snake Goddess herself represents only another aspect of the
Chthomc Minoan Lady of the Dove, while the Double Axe itself was connected with
both. Just as the celestial inspiration descends in bird form either on the
image of the divinity itself or on that of its votary, or in other cases, as we
have seen, upon its aniconic columnar shape, so the spirit of the Nether World,
in serpent form, makes its ascent to a similar position from the earth itself.
Nor need this manifestation of the chthonic side of the divinity be invested
with any malignant significance. It has on the contrary a friendly and
domestic aspect with which those acquainted with primitive ideas as they
Fine Arts Bulletin, loc. cit, regards it as given in Vol. II under L. M. I. The drawings
a figure of ' a snake-charming lady'. were made by Mr. E. J. Lambert from the
1 Full representations of this figure will be excellent cast in the British Museum.