DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1118#0547
THK 'bLULnUK'b WORKSHOP 897
1 -oe amphora of a kind of veined native alabaster.1 It was 69 centimetres Great
(about 27 inches) in height, and 2-5 metres, or 6 feet S'-f inches, in circuity- fSJEa.
f rence (F.i°". 875 <z, <$). Its walls thickened from 6 cm. at the neck to 17 cm.
the sides, and some idea of its massiveness and weight may be gathered
from the fact that eleven men with ropes and poles carried it down with
difficulty to the house below, which was then our head-quarters. Two of
the handles and parts of the rim and shoulders had somewhat suffered
from their nearness to the surface, but as a whole the vessel was well
preserved.
The flat upper rim was decorated with a band of running spirals,
while round its shoulders ran a chain of coils rising up to a point and re-
semblino- a row of large irochus shells. This was interrupted by three handles,
decorated on their outer sides with the same spiraliform band as the rim.
But the most individual feature of the handles was the cutting out of
their sides into arched hollows, joined in each case by means of a
perforation devised to rivet in some inlaying material. The analogy of
the more or less contemporary alabaster frieze from the vestibule of the
' Mens' Hall' at Tiryns, where the inlaying- material was kyanos or smalt,
as well as of the Orchomenos ceiling and the columns of the ' Atreus ' tomb
at Mycenae, might, perhaps, suggest glass paste or perhaps some bright
coloured stone like jasper as the material thus employed. But rivet-holes
to "connect two plates certainly point to metal-work, and it is reasonable
to suppose in the case of an object of such splendour that the intention had
been to insert plaques of gold. That this final adornment had never been
added may be inferred both from the apparently incompleted moulding- of
the lower part of the ' amphora' and from the absence of any trace of oxidi-
zation from the bronze, that would probably have been used for the rivets,
m any of the perforations. To those familiar with the decorative spirit of
the Minoan craftsmen it will be a highly probable conclusion that in the
fully completed stage of the vessel—the material of which was uniform in
tone—it would also have been treated with coloured washes in such a way
as to bring out its sculptured ornaments into brilliant relief. With its gold
plates fixed and these polychrome touches added it would, indeed, have
been a royal possession.
That the great stone 'amphora' was in fact still in the hands of its smaller
sculptor is borne out by the analogy of a smaller, quite unfinished, vessel ™^-
°f the same kind found beside it on the floor of the ' Workshop' (Fig. 876). amphora.
l'or the 'Sculptor's Workshop ' and its and A. E., Report, Knossos, 1901, pp. 90-3.
stone 'amphoras', see, too, P. o/Af., iii, p. 26S,
1 -oe amphora of a kind of veined native alabaster.1 It was 69 centimetres Great
(about 27 inches) in height, and 2-5 metres, or 6 feet S'-f inches, in circuity- fSJEa.
f rence (F.i°". 875 <z, <$). Its walls thickened from 6 cm. at the neck to 17 cm.
the sides, and some idea of its massiveness and weight may be gathered
from the fact that eleven men with ropes and poles carried it down with
difficulty to the house below, which was then our head-quarters. Two of
the handles and parts of the rim and shoulders had somewhat suffered
from their nearness to the surface, but as a whole the vessel was well
preserved.
The flat upper rim was decorated with a band of running spirals,
while round its shoulders ran a chain of coils rising up to a point and re-
semblino- a row of large irochus shells. This was interrupted by three handles,
decorated on their outer sides with the same spiraliform band as the rim.
But the most individual feature of the handles was the cutting out of
their sides into arched hollows, joined in each case by means of a
perforation devised to rivet in some inlaying material. The analogy of
the more or less contemporary alabaster frieze from the vestibule of the
' Mens' Hall' at Tiryns, where the inlaying- material was kyanos or smalt,
as well as of the Orchomenos ceiling and the columns of the ' Atreus ' tomb
at Mycenae, might, perhaps, suggest glass paste or perhaps some bright
coloured stone like jasper as the material thus employed. But rivet-holes
to "connect two plates certainly point to metal-work, and it is reasonable
to suppose in the case of an object of such splendour that the intention had
been to insert plaques of gold. That this final adornment had never been
added may be inferred both from the apparently incompleted moulding- of
the lower part of the ' amphora' and from the absence of any trace of oxidi-
zation from the bronze, that would probably have been used for the rivets,
m any of the perforations. To those familiar with the decorative spirit of
the Minoan craftsmen it will be a highly probable conclusion that in the
fully completed stage of the vessel—the material of which was uniform in
tone—it would also have been treated with coloured washes in such a way
as to bring out its sculptured ornaments into brilliant relief. With its gold
plates fixed and these polychrome touches added it would, indeed, have
been a royal possession.
That the great stone 'amphora' was in fact still in the hands of its smaller
sculptor is borne out by the analogy of a smaller, quite unfinished, vessel ™^-
°f the same kind found beside it on the floor of the ' Workshop' (Fig. 876). amphora.
l'or the 'Sculptor's Workshop ' and its and A. E., Report, Knossos, 1901, pp. 90-3.
stone 'amphoras', see, too, P. o/Af., iii, p. 26S,