DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.809#0269
242 HARBOUR TOWN OF KNOSSOS : MINOAN SHIPPING
Mav Cycladic designs are of great interest from the fact that, as already noted in
Aegean an earlier Section of this volume dealing with the pre-dynastic Egyptian
h^Eariy culture, the fish ensigns that they bear, with a double streamer floating from
Nilotic the pole, correspond in these characteristic features with a type of ensign
that occurs on a well-known class of Nile craft of late Prehistoric date.1
These ensigns, which form a small series of not more than a dozen varieties,
in several cases answer to early Nome signs of the Delta.2 These Nilotic
vessels were provided with numerous oars, but they do not, like the Aegean
sea-going craft, show the tail-like rudder behind.
Preference It looks as if the ' fish ' ensign may have marked the Northern galleys
of Early t]1at jn t^e j[fenem season were already making- their way to the mouths of
iNaviga- j a
tors for the Nile from Crete and the Aegean at the opening of the Early Minoan
Age. It is, as already observed, a great mistake to suppose that primitive
navigators shrank from the open sea. What they rather feared were iron-
bound headlands and stretches of surf-beaten coast. That the use of the
sail was probably as early known to the islanders as to those who dwelt by the
masted ^i'e or ^e Euphrates, and had already supplanted oars for long voyages,
sailing niav be gathered from the frequency of single-masted ships on Cretan seal-
vessels on-'& i-ii -iii
Early stones of the pictographic class. 1 here seem, indeed, to be good grounds
Seals?" f°r believing that it was from the Aegean side and neither from Egypt nor
the Syrian coast that fully equipped sailing vessels first traversed the open
Mediterranean. The Minoan mariners might with greater right have put
forth the claim, later advanced on behalf of the Greeks of Aegina : 3
01 8 tjtoi npwTot £tv£av via? dfitpieXiacras
TTpS>Toi 8' l<TTia OkvTO, vea>? TTTfpa. TrovTonopoio.
The tradition of the spur or 'fixed rudder' is still seen on some three-sided
seal-stones of the more advanced pictographic class, illustrated above (vol. i,
p. 283,Fig. 215,d), belonging to the close of E.M. Ill or the beginning of the
Middle Minoan Age. On the lentoid of black steatite (Fig. 139), which, though
early of its class, is best referred to the close of M.M. II, this feature has dis-
appeared, and we see in place of it the two steering oars clearly marked,
the prow. In the case referred to where there is 2 Professor P. E. Newberry, The Petty
an incipient spur in front,—the precursor of the Kingdom of the Harpoon and Egypt's Surliest
Geometrical series,—the stern is indicated by Mediterranean Port {Ziv. Anns., vol. i, p. 18),
a steering oar. who has also pointed out that some of the
1 See above, p. 26, and my Huxley Lecture 'decorated' pre-dynastic pots on which vessels
(P. Anthr. Inst. Journ., 1925), pp. 7, 8. The with these ensigns occur show them grouped
position of the ensign on these Nilotic vessels in a geographical connexion preserved by the
is in front of the first of the two cabins seen position of the Delta Nomes in historic times,
amidships. s Hesiod, CataL, Fragm. 96.
Mav Cycladic designs are of great interest from the fact that, as already noted in
Aegean an earlier Section of this volume dealing with the pre-dynastic Egyptian
h^Eariy culture, the fish ensigns that they bear, with a double streamer floating from
Nilotic the pole, correspond in these characteristic features with a type of ensign
that occurs on a well-known class of Nile craft of late Prehistoric date.1
These ensigns, which form a small series of not more than a dozen varieties,
in several cases answer to early Nome signs of the Delta.2 These Nilotic
vessels were provided with numerous oars, but they do not, like the Aegean
sea-going craft, show the tail-like rudder behind.
Preference It looks as if the ' fish ' ensign may have marked the Northern galleys
of Early t]1at jn t^e j[fenem season were already making- their way to the mouths of
iNaviga- j a
tors for the Nile from Crete and the Aegean at the opening of the Early Minoan
Age. It is, as already observed, a great mistake to suppose that primitive
navigators shrank from the open sea. What they rather feared were iron-
bound headlands and stretches of surf-beaten coast. That the use of the
sail was probably as early known to the islanders as to those who dwelt by the
masted ^i'e or ^e Euphrates, and had already supplanted oars for long voyages,
sailing niav be gathered from the frequency of single-masted ships on Cretan seal-
vessels on-'& i-ii -iii
Early stones of the pictographic class. 1 here seem, indeed, to be good grounds
Seals?" f°r believing that it was from the Aegean side and neither from Egypt nor
the Syrian coast that fully equipped sailing vessels first traversed the open
Mediterranean. The Minoan mariners might with greater right have put
forth the claim, later advanced on behalf of the Greeks of Aegina : 3
01 8 tjtoi npwTot £tv£av via? dfitpieXiacras
TTpS>Toi 8' l<TTia OkvTO, vea>? TTTfpa. TrovTonopoio.
The tradition of the spur or 'fixed rudder' is still seen on some three-sided
seal-stones of the more advanced pictographic class, illustrated above (vol. i,
p. 283,Fig. 215,d), belonging to the close of E.M. Ill or the beginning of the
Middle Minoan Age. On the lentoid of black steatite (Fig. 139), which, though
early of its class, is best referred to the close of M.M. II, this feature has dis-
appeared, and we see in place of it the two steering oars clearly marked,
the prow. In the case referred to where there is 2 Professor P. E. Newberry, The Petty
an incipient spur in front,—the precursor of the Kingdom of the Harpoon and Egypt's Surliest
Geometrical series,—the stern is indicated by Mediterranean Port {Ziv. Anns., vol. i, p. 18),
a steering oar. who has also pointed out that some of the
1 See above, p. 26, and my Huxley Lecture 'decorated' pre-dynastic pots on which vessels
(P. Anthr. Inst. Journ., 1925), pp. 7, 8. The with these ensigns occur show them grouped
position of the ensign on these Nilotic vessels in a geographical connexion preserved by the
is in front of the first of the two cabins seen position of the Delta Nomes in historic times,
amidships. s Hesiod, CataL, Fragm. 96.