DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1021#0313
THE ISLANDS IN ART
261
Circular Tower on Amorgos (Ground-plan)
Singularly enough, we have now actually found on Amor-
gos a circular building which reproduces the construction
we see copied in the Amorgos vase. Of this building a
photographic view and
ground-plan are given in
Figs. 135, 136. The build-
ing can hardly be dated
later than the seventh cen-
tury b. o.j but the construc-
tion may well be a survival
of the primitive island-dwell-
ing. In that case it offers
a remarkable confirmation
of the evidence of the hut-
model from the same island :
it has not only the same
circular form, but the same partition into two chambers.
This Mycenaean stock, then, established in their Aegean
pile-dwellings, either blended with the earlier island settlers
(Leleges or Carians), or at least were in every-day interme(I;,
contact with them. Being nearer both to Asia anea m Art
Minor and to the Semitic countries — the influence of the
latter must be recognized in the marble idols — they not
only carried the Island culture to a stage much beyond
the Trojan, but they matured earlier than their kinsfolk
in the Peloponnese. Thus maturing, they could not but
influence their development. That they actually did influ-
ence Mycenaean art in certain branches — ceramics, for ex-
ample— is now beyond controversy; that it was so in
other directions as well, is altogether probable. A thor-
ough exploration of these islands may be depended upon to
afford new light upon many a dark problem in the history
of Mycenaean art.
261
Circular Tower on Amorgos (Ground-plan)
Singularly enough, we have now actually found on Amor-
gos a circular building which reproduces the construction
we see copied in the Amorgos vase. Of this building a
photographic view and
ground-plan are given in
Figs. 135, 136. The build-
ing can hardly be dated
later than the seventh cen-
tury b. o.j but the construc-
tion may well be a survival
of the primitive island-dwell-
ing. In that case it offers
a remarkable confirmation
of the evidence of the hut-
model from the same island :
it has not only the same
circular form, but the same partition into two chambers.
This Mycenaean stock, then, established in their Aegean
pile-dwellings, either blended with the earlier island settlers
(Leleges or Carians), or at least were in every-day interme(I;,
contact with them. Being nearer both to Asia anea m Art
Minor and to the Semitic countries — the influence of the
latter must be recognized in the marble idols — they not
only carried the Island culture to a stage much beyond
the Trojan, but they matured earlier than their kinsfolk
in the Peloponnese. Thus maturing, they could not but
influence their development. That they actually did influ-
ence Mycenaean art in certain branches — ceramics, for ex-
ample— is now beyond controversy; that it was so in
other directions as well, is altogether probable. A thor-
ough exploration of these islands may be depended upon to
afford new light upon many a dark problem in the history
of Mycenaean art.