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 3): The great transitional age in the northern and eastern sections of the Palace (London, 1930)

NILOTIC ELEMENTS IN CERAMIC DECORATION 115

a fashion identical with that of the landscapes of the ' House of the Frescoes'.
In that case we find these exotic blooms associated with animals adapted
from the blue monkey of the Soudan.1

But the best evidence of the lasting influence of the Nilotic duck-
hunting scenes on Minoan decorative tradition is to be found in the
adaptations of the papyrus in its ' acclimatized' shape, as a constant theme

Influence
of Nile
scenes on
Minoan
ceramic
art.

Fig. 65. Parts of Bath-pans from Phylakopi, with Designs of Water-fowl.

of vase paintings, from the very beginning of the ' New Era' onwards to the
last days of Minoan and Mycenaean Art. At times water-fowl are also
introduced, as in the case of two interesting fragments of bath-pans of
Cretan form from Phylakopi in Melos, the designs of which are clearly from
the hand of the Minoan artist (Fig. 65, a, b).2 There can be no reasonable
doubt that the scenes here depicted reflect contemporary wall-paintings of the
Knossian school,3 indeed the conventionalized papyrus tuft as here rendered
(Fig. 65, b) itself affords the best existing prototype of the typical shape in
which it appears on amphoras of the ' Palace Style '.* On a painted larnax

1 P. ofM., ii, Pt. II, p. 45h Fig- 264, and
cf. Coloured Plate X.

2 C. C. Edgar, Phylakopi, pp. 141, 142,
Figs. 114, 115.

3 A painted sherd from the same stratum at
Phylakopi presents a flying swallow, where the

manner in which the white colour is intro-
duced into the bird's body and tail reflects
the influence of fresco technique.

1 E.g. P. of M., ii, Pt. II, p. 477, Fig.
285, G.

I 2