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 2,2): Town houses in Knossos of the new era and restored West Palace Section (London, 1928)

484

'SACRAL' IVY-LEAF A SIGN OF SCRIPT

only in sign-groups, as having a phonetic value, but singly, as an ideo-
graph, sometimes separated from a group by one of the usual dividing strokes.1
At times it is connected with both male and female personal names, or at
any rate with groups headed by an ideograph either of a man or a woman.
That it is not a 'leaf-sign in general, but that it represents the same
' sacral' plant as that seen on the wall-paintings and vases, is clearly
demonstrated by Fig. 290,^, belonging to the Linear Class B, where the
curved upper outline of the contained papyrus tuft survives in the same
manner as on certain vases.2

Possible

connexion

with

Cypriote

Vo.

Sacral
Ivy-leaf
on L.M.I

a

HIERO-
GLYPH

b c- c
Linear script

CLASS A

e vf

LINEAR SCRIPT
CLASS B

Fig. 290. The 'Sacral ' Ivy-leaf as Character of Minoan Scripts.

There is at least a possibility, moreover, that the was symbol which lies
at the root of this Minoan sign may have preserved at least some approxima-"
tion of the sound of the Egyptian original, in which case its initial element
would have resembled a w or v. In this connexion it is interesting to ob-
serve that the Cypriote w\\ »T^ ^N /T\—Vo—which,in contradistinction

to the 'broad arrow' ^S, has a bent stem—seems to be a 'leaf-sign.3

In variant forms the elements of this design are taken over into the
painted decoration of vases of L. M. I a and b date. On a lower zone of
the remarkable L. M. la jar from Pseira, already illustrated above in
Fig. 284,4 we see a continuous band formed of linked ogival canopies of this
class, where the sacral spray itself is represented by ivy flowers in the
place of the papyrus heads. A closely parallel foliation also appears on an
amphora (Fig. 294) of the same early L. M. I date from Old Pylos"'

1 It is common in both linear classes and
occurs at Hagia Triada by itself on clay
nodules. At Knossos. on tablets of Class B, it
is frequently found at the beginning of sign-
groups, some of them apparently personal
names both male and female, and at times
is separated from the succeeding group by the
diacritic mark as noted in the text. A fuller
account of this sign will be given in the second
volume ofmy Scrip ta Minoa.

"- See below, p. 488 and Fig. 295.

3 The examples here given are taken from
Deecke's table, Collitz, Sammlung der griechi-
schen Dialekt-Inschriften, i, opp. p. 80.

* R. B. Seager, Excavations on the Island of
Pseira, Crete, PI. VII and p. 26. This vessel
is profusely decorated both with white paint
and the ' new' red.

5 Kurt Miiller, Alt-Pylos {Ath. Mitth.,
xxxiv, i<5oo,\ pp. 315-17 and Fig. 16 from