DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.808#0014
12 ARTHUR EVANS
lock of hair hanging down behind. She wears an open, apparently short-
sleeved, bodice, leaving the bosom bare, and the upper part of her flounced
skirt is richly embroidered with what seems to have been a spiraliform design.
Her fore-arms are raised and she holds poppy capsules similar to those seen in
the hands of the Spring Goddess rising from the earth on the bead-seal No. 6
below. In this case they are held with their heads downwards, so that the
seed could be shed, and are thus an emblem of fertilization.
Behind the Goddess a little handmaiden repeats her action with two pairs
of suspended capsules, while another, standing immediately in front of her,
offers with her right hand two more poppy-heads held upright on their stalks,
while in her left she holds what looks like a bead necklace. Behind this figure
again is a seated attendant, of the same stature as the Goddess, such as is
frequently seen in her company.23 She extends with her right hand a small
chaplet, perhaps a beaded bracelet, towards the Goddess, and what seems to
be a pomegranate is held within the fingers of her left.
Between the two main figures the upper margin of the field is intersected
by a succession of waving lines. This in itself cannot fail to recall the waving
lines that cut off the upper part of the field on the great signet of Mycenae
(Fig. 12), and contain above their curve a rayed disk and crescent represent-
ing the heavenly luminaries. In the present case, perhaps owing to the
comparative narrowness of the bezel, there are no heavenly luminaries within
the waved lines, but the analogy is otherwise so close, that we are justified in
regarding them as indicative of the sky and as signifying the celestial character
of the divinity below. In No. 9 below, indeed, where the Goddess stands
holding two swans, this lacuna is supplied by the appearance on either side
of her of a disk and a star.
But the parallelism between the present group and that of the Mycenae
signet goes much further. In that case, too, the seated Goddess, whose character
is there marked by the double-axe as well as by the celestial symbols, holds
poppy-heads presented to her by a votary. On the Mycenae ring, moreover,
she is accompanied on either side by a little girl attendant answering to the
two little handmaidens, though their stature is somewhat lower than that
of the pair seen on the Thisbe group.24 The children on the Mycenae signet
are perched on piles of stones, evidently devised in order to enable them to
perform their duties—in one case to offer sprays to the Goddess, in the other
to pluck fruit for her from the tree beneath which she sits.25
The significance of these two little figures has not been hitherto noted,
but it is now possible to point to their recurrence in association with the Goddess
on a series of Minoan and Mycenaean seal types. On a seal-impression found
at Hagia Triada we see a flounced figure, in which we may with great proba-
bility recognise the same Goddess, with a diminutive handmaiden in similar
23 Compare the scene on No. 7, p. 17, of the bezel. Other examples of the same
Pig. 19, and the seated Goddess and com- divine pair show that normally they were
panion on the ' King of Nestor,' p. 65, depicted of equal height.
Fig. 55, etc. 25 There seems to be no reason to read
24 The height of these is not equal, but any particular religious sense into these
the smaller size of one is accounted for by heaps. They are really part of the
the conditions of space on the outer border mechanism of the scene.
lock of hair hanging down behind. She wears an open, apparently short-
sleeved, bodice, leaving the bosom bare, and the upper part of her flounced
skirt is richly embroidered with what seems to have been a spiraliform design.
Her fore-arms are raised and she holds poppy capsules similar to those seen in
the hands of the Spring Goddess rising from the earth on the bead-seal No. 6
below. In this case they are held with their heads downwards, so that the
seed could be shed, and are thus an emblem of fertilization.
Behind the Goddess a little handmaiden repeats her action with two pairs
of suspended capsules, while another, standing immediately in front of her,
offers with her right hand two more poppy-heads held upright on their stalks,
while in her left she holds what looks like a bead necklace. Behind this figure
again is a seated attendant, of the same stature as the Goddess, such as is
frequently seen in her company.23 She extends with her right hand a small
chaplet, perhaps a beaded bracelet, towards the Goddess, and what seems to
be a pomegranate is held within the fingers of her left.
Between the two main figures the upper margin of the field is intersected
by a succession of waving lines. This in itself cannot fail to recall the waving
lines that cut off the upper part of the field on the great signet of Mycenae
(Fig. 12), and contain above their curve a rayed disk and crescent represent-
ing the heavenly luminaries. In the present case, perhaps owing to the
comparative narrowness of the bezel, there are no heavenly luminaries within
the waved lines, but the analogy is otherwise so close, that we are justified in
regarding them as indicative of the sky and as signifying the celestial character
of the divinity below. In No. 9 below, indeed, where the Goddess stands
holding two swans, this lacuna is supplied by the appearance on either side
of her of a disk and a star.
But the parallelism between the present group and that of the Mycenae
signet goes much further. In that case, too, the seated Goddess, whose character
is there marked by the double-axe as well as by the celestial symbols, holds
poppy-heads presented to her by a votary. On the Mycenae ring, moreover,
she is accompanied on either side by a little girl attendant answering to the
two little handmaidens, though their stature is somewhat lower than that
of the pair seen on the Thisbe group.24 The children on the Mycenae signet
are perched on piles of stones, evidently devised in order to enable them to
perform their duties—in one case to offer sprays to the Goddess, in the other
to pluck fruit for her from the tree beneath which she sits.25
The significance of these two little figures has not been hitherto noted,
but it is now possible to point to their recurrence in association with the Goddess
on a series of Minoan and Mycenaean seal types. On a seal-impression found
at Hagia Triada we see a flounced figure, in which we may with great proba-
bility recognise the same Goddess, with a diminutive handmaiden in similar
23 Compare the scene on No. 7, p. 17, of the bezel. Other examples of the same
Pig. 19, and the seated Goddess and com- divine pair show that normally they were
panion on the ' King of Nestor,' p. 65, depicted of equal height.
Fig. 55, etc. 25 There seems to be no reason to read
24 The height of these is not equal, but any particular religious sense into these
the smaller size of one is accounted for by heaps. They are really part of the
the conditions of space on the outer border mechanism of the scene.