DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16205#0045
BRONZE TOOLS
REPEATEDLY at Gournia we had to regret the value of bronze as plunder, which is the reason
for its absence from tombs well supplied with terra-cotta vases (see p. 46), and to lament
its destructibility, as in the case of a beautiful jug, found in the Palace, of which the handle
alone remains, the rest being broken, bent, and corroded beyond repair. We unearthed no
treasures of metallurgy that can be compared with the gold Vaphio cups, the inlaid sword blades of
Mycenae, or the bronze vessels of the Northwest Building and Tombs of Knossos. Metal vases of
Knossian types are depicted in Theban tombs and evidently were highly prized by Egyptian nobles.
Our only proof that such objects were known at all at Gournia was the discovery on the East Slope
of a bronze rim-fragment with foliate ornament and two small attachments, one in form of the 8-shaped
shield (Plate XI 15), the other in shape of a shell (Plate XI 16), designed to cover rivet-heads. Similar
attachments occur on Knossian masterpieces, and the foliate ornament is a favorite in the best metal work;
it was copied on Late Minoan pottery, and may be seen on the neck and shoulder of a charming vase from
our Palace (Plate X 12) as well as on Palace Style amphorae from Knossos and the mainland. Of
precious metals our yield was small: a silver cup from a burial of Middle Minoan date
(p. 56, Plate C 1), a gold tip, perhaps belonging to a wand of office, from a Late Minoan
burial (Fig. 12, actual size), fragments of gold leaf, three gold rivets set in a bronze
dagger (No. 61), and an electron amulet from the Palace (Plate XI 14). But if objets
de luxe were wanting, tools and weapons were well represented. They are always cast
and we have cited evidence that this craft was practiced by Gournia burghers,
especially in houses Ea and Cg (pp. 24, 26). The position of Ea at the entrance
of the Town reminds us of Hesiod's village "forge, where saunterers meet" {Works
fig. 12 and Days, 1. 493). Analysis teaches us that Gournia burghers used copper in an almost
pure state when they needed a metal that was malleable and flexible, but that their
tools and weapons were of bronze containing as much as ten per cent of tin. For example, the metal
strip used in mending (No. 65; cf. p. 32) is of copper with a little lead but no tin, and Professor Mosso
reports that our kettle (No. 72), presumably the bowl, is 98.212% copper, mixed with iron, lead, and
sulphur, zinc and tin being absent (The Palaces of Crete, p. 288). On the other hand, specimens of
implements from Gournia, analyzed in American laboratories, show 9.6% tin and 10.45% tin.
During the campaign of 1900 at Kavousi, peasants conducted us to a place called by them
the Golden Furnace. It lies on a headland bordering the sea, west of Kavousi plain. The ground
is strewn with fragments of an ancient furnace, which was made of coarse terra-cotta, about
three-quarters of an inch thick, pierced by many vent-holes. Slag is abundant; we gathered a
few bits of copper which had been smelted on the spot. Some specimens of rock obtained from
the adjacent cliff showed on analysis the presence of a low percentage of copper, not sufficient to
attract modern enterprise, but not neglected, it appears, by the prehistoric inhabitants. This was
the first indication that Crete contained native copper and no importance can be ascribed to so
insignificant a supply. Cyprus, on the other hand, owed its early prosperity in large part to rich
deposits of copper, which were worked not only to fill the local need, but also for export. The
oldest Cypriote implements and weapons were of pure copper or of bronze with very little tin. But
Crete shows the same phenomenon as Hissarlik, the sudden appearance of bronze at a date not later
than 2500 B. C. On the evidence at present available, no Copper Age can be predicated for the island;
Vasiliki (E. M. 11) as well as its contemporary, the Second or Burnt City of Troy, is in the Bronze
Age. The natural conclusion is that Crete knew nothing of copper until it knew tin also, and the
superiority of the alloy. This knowledge must have come through the extension of trade relations,
not by conquest, for no country shows more independence in its metal series than Crete.
We are reminded by the array of bronze on Plate IV that, among the ancients, Crete was famed
for the skill of its people in working metal. This is the meaning of the legends which made it the
home of the Idaean Dactyls. Schrader tells us that the name 'Dactyls' belongs to the same cycle
of ideas as the Germanic 'hop-o-my-thumbs,' and expresses the amazement which children of the
33
AND WEAPONS
North felt, on their descent to the Aegean, when they beheld the art of melting hard metal in the fire
and fashioning things of price out of it.1 (For notes, see p. 34.) This art Crete must have learned from
the Southeast, for it was known in Egypt and Babylonia at least as early as 3000 B. C. In the Sinaitic
peninsula and Cyprus, copper was easily obtained; but the earliest sources of tin are unknown to us,
as is the identity of that land where it is supposed the two metals were found in juxtaposition and
the natives learned by accident the superiority of the alloy over pure copper. Dr. Miiller has inter-
preted a monument of the Old Empire as "Aegeans bringing tin into Egypt" (note 35, p. 3, supra).
His location of the other terminus of this traffic in Central Germany is not yet supported by evidence.
Mr. Seager's excavations at Vasiliki unexpectedly direct us to a quarter whence tin may have been
obtained at about the middle of the third millennium B. C.
When the Pumpelly Expedition returned from Turkestan in 1904, one of the members brought
potsherds indistinguishable at first sight from the brilliantly mottled ware found at Vasiliki during
the same season (Plate B). As no examples of this special pottery from Anau have yet been pub-
lished, more exact reference to it is impossible. It came from a large tumulus near Asshkabad just
across the northern border from Khorassan. The strong likeness between the two fabrics, of which
the writer has personal knowledge from having handled them together, is more reasonably explained
by intercourse than by accident. Moreover, Dr. Hubert Schmidt, who accompanied the expedition,
reports that a neighboring tumulus, somewhat less ancient, gave them a three-sided seal-stone of
Middle Minoan type, engraved with Minoan designs—man, lion, steer, and griffin.2 How shall we
explain these evidences of Aegean influence in Southern Turkestan? They must be brought in line
with other proofs of contact.
The necropolis of Yortan in Mysia 3 yielded pottery that presents interesting analogies with our
Early Minoan finds from Gournia, Vasiliki, and Aghia Photia. Schmidt4 compared the incised dec-
oration of a schnabelkanne of Vasiliki shape from Yortan to the painted decoration of a jug from Aghios
Onouphrios (p. 6, note 36, 5 supra), and this Cretan jug is a stiffer counterpart of one from a Gournia
rock-shelter (Plate A3). In the use of metal, Yortan agrees with the Second City of Troy, between
which and Eastern Crete of the 2nd Early Minoan period many parallels can be drawn. We see that
at c. 2500 B. C. Asia Minor shared with the Aegean the knowledge of bronze, whereas three centuries
later Europe was still in the Stone Age. The backwardness of Europe in learning to employ metal
is undeniable (note 50, p. 10 supra); as further explanation of the priority of bronze in Asia Minor,
we may now suggest the probability that, long before tin was discovered in Europe, it was being brought
overland through Asia Minor1 and also by way of Transcaucasia and the Black Sea from distant Khor-
assan, Strabo's Drangiana, "where its presence has been confirmed." 6 Excavations at Elizabeth-
pol in Transcaucasia have revealed a culture in early contact with the Aegean.7 One further surmise
may be made, based on the resemblance of a peculiar decoration 8 that appears on sherds from Anau
to a design which occurs on pottery from neolithic stations of Central Europe, but is not represented
in the Aegean: namely, that carriers, not unlike the swift Scythians of Herodotus, frequented both
the tin-producing region southeast of the Caspian and the copper region of the Danube at an early
date. Yet the Copper Age of Hungary is strong proof that these carriers, if such there were, did not
introduce the white metal in that region or reveal the value of those deposits of tin which were easily
accessible in the mountains of Germany. Europe was slow in recognizing her own wealth and power,
and this tardiness gave long immunity and prosperity to the trade of Crete.
Any inquiry into the problems discussed above must take account of the work of Prof. John L.
Myres along parallel lines. The same tumuli at Anau whose lower strata yielded sherds like ' Vasiliki'
ware and sherds like neolithic pottery of Central Europe contained, nearer the surface, three-sided
arrows of a type called ' Scythian.' These are of iron. The type is spread from Siberia to France.
When bronze was superseded for tools and weapons, the Caucasus region gained at the expense of
Khorassan and the Scythians of the Russian steppes played a part in the distribution of the new
metal, called by Aeschylus, in his Seven against Thebes, "the newcomer from the Scythians."
REPEATEDLY at Gournia we had to regret the value of bronze as plunder, which is the reason
for its absence from tombs well supplied with terra-cotta vases (see p. 46), and to lament
its destructibility, as in the case of a beautiful jug, found in the Palace, of which the handle
alone remains, the rest being broken, bent, and corroded beyond repair. We unearthed no
treasures of metallurgy that can be compared with the gold Vaphio cups, the inlaid sword blades of
Mycenae, or the bronze vessels of the Northwest Building and Tombs of Knossos. Metal vases of
Knossian types are depicted in Theban tombs and evidently were highly prized by Egyptian nobles.
Our only proof that such objects were known at all at Gournia was the discovery on the East Slope
of a bronze rim-fragment with foliate ornament and two small attachments, one in form of the 8-shaped
shield (Plate XI 15), the other in shape of a shell (Plate XI 16), designed to cover rivet-heads. Similar
attachments occur on Knossian masterpieces, and the foliate ornament is a favorite in the best metal work;
it was copied on Late Minoan pottery, and may be seen on the neck and shoulder of a charming vase from
our Palace (Plate X 12) as well as on Palace Style amphorae from Knossos and the mainland. Of
precious metals our yield was small: a silver cup from a burial of Middle Minoan date
(p. 56, Plate C 1), a gold tip, perhaps belonging to a wand of office, from a Late Minoan
burial (Fig. 12, actual size), fragments of gold leaf, three gold rivets set in a bronze
dagger (No. 61), and an electron amulet from the Palace (Plate XI 14). But if objets
de luxe were wanting, tools and weapons were well represented. They are always cast
and we have cited evidence that this craft was practiced by Gournia burghers,
especially in houses Ea and Cg (pp. 24, 26). The position of Ea at the entrance
of the Town reminds us of Hesiod's village "forge, where saunterers meet" {Works
fig. 12 and Days, 1. 493). Analysis teaches us that Gournia burghers used copper in an almost
pure state when they needed a metal that was malleable and flexible, but that their
tools and weapons were of bronze containing as much as ten per cent of tin. For example, the metal
strip used in mending (No. 65; cf. p. 32) is of copper with a little lead but no tin, and Professor Mosso
reports that our kettle (No. 72), presumably the bowl, is 98.212% copper, mixed with iron, lead, and
sulphur, zinc and tin being absent (The Palaces of Crete, p. 288). On the other hand, specimens of
implements from Gournia, analyzed in American laboratories, show 9.6% tin and 10.45% tin.
During the campaign of 1900 at Kavousi, peasants conducted us to a place called by them
the Golden Furnace. It lies on a headland bordering the sea, west of Kavousi plain. The ground
is strewn with fragments of an ancient furnace, which was made of coarse terra-cotta, about
three-quarters of an inch thick, pierced by many vent-holes. Slag is abundant; we gathered a
few bits of copper which had been smelted on the spot. Some specimens of rock obtained from
the adjacent cliff showed on analysis the presence of a low percentage of copper, not sufficient to
attract modern enterprise, but not neglected, it appears, by the prehistoric inhabitants. This was
the first indication that Crete contained native copper and no importance can be ascribed to so
insignificant a supply. Cyprus, on the other hand, owed its early prosperity in large part to rich
deposits of copper, which were worked not only to fill the local need, but also for export. The
oldest Cypriote implements and weapons were of pure copper or of bronze with very little tin. But
Crete shows the same phenomenon as Hissarlik, the sudden appearance of bronze at a date not later
than 2500 B. C. On the evidence at present available, no Copper Age can be predicated for the island;
Vasiliki (E. M. 11) as well as its contemporary, the Second or Burnt City of Troy, is in the Bronze
Age. The natural conclusion is that Crete knew nothing of copper until it knew tin also, and the
superiority of the alloy. This knowledge must have come through the extension of trade relations,
not by conquest, for no country shows more independence in its metal series than Crete.
We are reminded by the array of bronze on Plate IV that, among the ancients, Crete was famed
for the skill of its people in working metal. This is the meaning of the legends which made it the
home of the Idaean Dactyls. Schrader tells us that the name 'Dactyls' belongs to the same cycle
of ideas as the Germanic 'hop-o-my-thumbs,' and expresses the amazement which children of the
33
AND WEAPONS
North felt, on their descent to the Aegean, when they beheld the art of melting hard metal in the fire
and fashioning things of price out of it.1 (For notes, see p. 34.) This art Crete must have learned from
the Southeast, for it was known in Egypt and Babylonia at least as early as 3000 B. C. In the Sinaitic
peninsula and Cyprus, copper was easily obtained; but the earliest sources of tin are unknown to us,
as is the identity of that land where it is supposed the two metals were found in juxtaposition and
the natives learned by accident the superiority of the alloy over pure copper. Dr. Miiller has inter-
preted a monument of the Old Empire as "Aegeans bringing tin into Egypt" (note 35, p. 3, supra).
His location of the other terminus of this traffic in Central Germany is not yet supported by evidence.
Mr. Seager's excavations at Vasiliki unexpectedly direct us to a quarter whence tin may have been
obtained at about the middle of the third millennium B. C.
When the Pumpelly Expedition returned from Turkestan in 1904, one of the members brought
potsherds indistinguishable at first sight from the brilliantly mottled ware found at Vasiliki during
the same season (Plate B). As no examples of this special pottery from Anau have yet been pub-
lished, more exact reference to it is impossible. It came from a large tumulus near Asshkabad just
across the northern border from Khorassan. The strong likeness between the two fabrics, of which
the writer has personal knowledge from having handled them together, is more reasonably explained
by intercourse than by accident. Moreover, Dr. Hubert Schmidt, who accompanied the expedition,
reports that a neighboring tumulus, somewhat less ancient, gave them a three-sided seal-stone of
Middle Minoan type, engraved with Minoan designs—man, lion, steer, and griffin.2 How shall we
explain these evidences of Aegean influence in Southern Turkestan? They must be brought in line
with other proofs of contact.
The necropolis of Yortan in Mysia 3 yielded pottery that presents interesting analogies with our
Early Minoan finds from Gournia, Vasiliki, and Aghia Photia. Schmidt4 compared the incised dec-
oration of a schnabelkanne of Vasiliki shape from Yortan to the painted decoration of a jug from Aghios
Onouphrios (p. 6, note 36, 5 supra), and this Cretan jug is a stiffer counterpart of one from a Gournia
rock-shelter (Plate A3). In the use of metal, Yortan agrees with the Second City of Troy, between
which and Eastern Crete of the 2nd Early Minoan period many parallels can be drawn. We see that
at c. 2500 B. C. Asia Minor shared with the Aegean the knowledge of bronze, whereas three centuries
later Europe was still in the Stone Age. The backwardness of Europe in learning to employ metal
is undeniable (note 50, p. 10 supra); as further explanation of the priority of bronze in Asia Minor,
we may now suggest the probability that, long before tin was discovered in Europe, it was being brought
overland through Asia Minor1 and also by way of Transcaucasia and the Black Sea from distant Khor-
assan, Strabo's Drangiana, "where its presence has been confirmed." 6 Excavations at Elizabeth-
pol in Transcaucasia have revealed a culture in early contact with the Aegean.7 One further surmise
may be made, based on the resemblance of a peculiar decoration 8 that appears on sherds from Anau
to a design which occurs on pottery from neolithic stations of Central Europe, but is not represented
in the Aegean: namely, that carriers, not unlike the swift Scythians of Herodotus, frequented both
the tin-producing region southeast of the Caspian and the copper region of the Danube at an early
date. Yet the Copper Age of Hungary is strong proof that these carriers, if such there were, did not
introduce the white metal in that region or reveal the value of those deposits of tin which were easily
accessible in the mountains of Germany. Europe was slow in recognizing her own wealth and power,
and this tardiness gave long immunity and prosperity to the trade of Crete.
Any inquiry into the problems discussed above must take account of the work of Prof. John L.
Myres along parallel lines. The same tumuli at Anau whose lower strata yielded sherds like ' Vasiliki'
ware and sherds like neolithic pottery of Central Europe contained, nearer the surface, three-sided
arrows of a type called ' Scythian.' These are of iron. The type is spread from Siberia to France.
When bronze was superseded for tools and weapons, the Caucasus region gained at the expense of
Khorassan and the Scythians of the Russian steppes played a part in the distribution of the new
metal, called by Aeschylus, in his Seven against Thebes, "the newcomer from the Scythians."