DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.807#0666
620
THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.
signifying units. As in that case the amount clearly referred to the contents,
we must assume a similar reference to quantity in the present instance.
Business The numerals that appear on all the clay tablets of the above series
show that we have to do with business documents recording: the amounts of
with Nu- divers possessions, and the same conclusion holds good of the later tablets
of Class A brought to light in considerable abundance at Hagia Triacla.
There, moreover, we occasionally find pictorial figures such as ships, chariots,
the saffron flower, looms, talents, tripods, and vases that enable us to identify
the character of the property referred to on these documents. In the case
of the tablets of Class B found in the later Palace these graphic illustrations
of their contents become still more frequent.
a I) c
Fig. 456, a, b, c. Sealed Clay Roundels from Temple Repository.
'Clay With the square tablet in the Temple Repository were also found
axels'1" specimens of another smaller class of document—to which the name of
inscribed ' clay roundel' may be applied—containing solitary signs or single groups,
Sealed. the circumference of which, originally of a more or less circular form, is
impressed with a series of seal impressions (Fig. 456, a, b, c).1 Thus b, the
sign on which does not seem to recur elsewhere, bears round its edges nine
impressions of a signet showing an Agrimi or Cretan wild goat, couchant
with its head turned back, a, the first sign of which is imperfect, presents on
the part of the border that is preserved impressions of three seal-stones.
One of these is a seated bull; the others, of which two impressions are seen
in each case, are of special interest from their associations. One is the cruci-
form sign +, which also occurs as the sole type of a series of clay sealings
1 The first sign on a is completed in dotted lines. The impressed edges of this had been
a good deal broken away.
THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.
signifying units. As in that case the amount clearly referred to the contents,
we must assume a similar reference to quantity in the present instance.
Business The numerals that appear on all the clay tablets of the above series
show that we have to do with business documents recording: the amounts of
with Nu- divers possessions, and the same conclusion holds good of the later tablets
of Class A brought to light in considerable abundance at Hagia Triacla.
There, moreover, we occasionally find pictorial figures such as ships, chariots,
the saffron flower, looms, talents, tripods, and vases that enable us to identify
the character of the property referred to on these documents. In the case
of the tablets of Class B found in the later Palace these graphic illustrations
of their contents become still more frequent.
a I) c
Fig. 456, a, b, c. Sealed Clay Roundels from Temple Repository.
'Clay With the square tablet in the Temple Repository were also found
axels'1" specimens of another smaller class of document—to which the name of
inscribed ' clay roundel' may be applied—containing solitary signs or single groups,
Sealed. the circumference of which, originally of a more or less circular form, is
impressed with a series of seal impressions (Fig. 456, a, b, c).1 Thus b, the
sign on which does not seem to recur elsewhere, bears round its edges nine
impressions of a signet showing an Agrimi or Cretan wild goat, couchant
with its head turned back, a, the first sign of which is imperfect, presents on
the part of the border that is preserved impressions of three seal-stones.
One of these is a seated bull; the others, of which two impressions are seen
in each case, are of special interest from their associations. One is the cruci-
form sign +, which also occurs as the sole type of a series of clay sealings
1 The first sign on a is completed in dotted lines. The impressed edges of this had been
a good deal broken away.