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 4,1): Emergence of outer western enceinte, with new illustrations, artistic and religious, of the Middle Minoan Phase (London, 1935)

92

SEGMENTAL ROSETTES IMITATED FROM PLAQUES

Fig.

Segmental 'Rosette' Pattern on E. M. Ill
Vessels.

Minoan associations in
which it appears certainly
point to its having been
taken over frpm circular
plaques for inlaying.
Well-known examples of
these are to be found in
faience roundels of native
fabric, such as the one
found in the ' Room of
the Throne' — derived
perhaps from the sides of
some small wooden chest—and in the ivory and
crystal 'medallions' of the Royal Draught Board.1
At first sight it would seem a reasonable sup-
position that these later inlaid designs were due
to models supplied by XVIIIth Dynasty Egypt,
where such patterns were a constantly recurring
feature of ceiling designs. In faience roundels
for inlaying we there see ' rosettes ' with both
four and three segments.

But it must still be borne in mind that this
'rosette' pattern, consisting" of a circle with three
or four segments, has a much more ancient history
in Crete than in Egypt, where examples of greater
antiquity than the New Empire seem to be non-
Fic.59. Fragsientpautiallv existent.2 The rosette on the M.M. I a polychrome
completed, with ' Rosette ' sherd (pj 59\ ■ as we see ;tseif a derivative of
Design like Roundels for v & /

Inlaying. E. M. Ill examples, painted white on a dark

ground (Fig. 5S).3 These earlier specimens,

1 P. of M. i, p. 474, Fig. 338. without such aid.) It is certain that by the

* Petrie observes [Egyptian Decorative Art, beginning of the Middle Minoan Age the

p. 47), ' The Egyptians never used circles Cretan seal-engravers were producing designs

freely in decoration: no examples are known by means of intersecting circles mechanically

before the Eighteenth Dynasty, and but few executed.

then.' On p. 49 he expresses a doubt whether E Cf. P. of M., i, p. 113, Fig. 80, b. Both

the Egyptians ' used compasses at any time', fragments are from the North Trench at

(It is hard to understand, however, how the Gournia. (See Boyd-Hawes, Gournia, p. 57)

ceiling designs of the New Empire, in which though not illustrated there),
circles are constantly repeated, were executed