DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.2533#0114
THE MYCENAEAN STYLE: EVIDENCE FOR DATE 77
What the chronological differences are between these various classes it is difficult to
say. According- to Furtwangler and Loeschcke, I. is the oldest; but it is extremely doubt-
ful whether any difference in time exists between I. and II. As I. is found in but few
other places outside of Mycenae, it is fair to suppose that it was a style more or less
local. Judging from the entire lack of this class at the Heraeum, and the fact that the
style of ornamentation of II. 1, which is the oldest class of lustrous vases at the He-
raeum, is practically identical with that of I., there seems good reason for supposing that
the two are synchronous.
Moreover, the difference between II. 1 and the dull vases is so extremely slight that it
can be detected only by a carefully trained eye, and even then cases occur where the
decision is doubtful. This would show that the lustrous technique at the beginning did
not differ materially from the dull, and is another point in favor of assigning II. 1 to
the beginning of the lustrous style.
II. 2 differs from II. 1 mainly in the technical advance, but this advance is sufficiently
apparent to enable us to see in II. 2 the successor of II. 1. The step between II. 2
and III. 1 is even greater, since the style of ornamentation has radically changed, and
all motives which II. drew from the marine life that played so great a part in the mari-
time civilization of the Mycenaean epoch have become conventionalized and are used
more with a view to their decorative effect than as an attempt to reproduce nature.
Such a change could have come only during the acme of the Mycenaean epoch.
With IV. we see the point to which the bad taste of a decadent art had come. The
wealth of ornamentation, elaborated from a given motive, with the introduction of
foreign motives, illustrated by " Heraldic" designs and those taken from Oriental
embroideries, may be accounted for by this rampant spirit of conventionalism combined
with the increased commercial activity of the age.
A few words may here be said as to the latest results in dating the whole Mycenaean
period. Through the numerous excavations recently conducted on Greek soil, and the
corresponding increase of Greek pottery brought to light, the chronology has been
worked backwards to the fourteenth century. But the excavations of Flinders Petrie1 in
Egypt, and the finding, in the towns of Illahun, Tel-el-Amarna, Kahun, and Gurob, of
rubbish heaps containing large masses of " Aegaean," i. e. Mycenaean pottery, may be
said to have absolutely established the date of the Mycenaean civilization, since the
objects of Egyptian workmanship lying in these rubbish heaps, along with the pottery,
can be dated not later than this eighteenth dynasty, circa B. c. 1450. Pseud-amphoras
of Class III. were found in tombs of a date not later than b. c. 1300. The placing of the
acme of the Mycenaean period during the fifteenth century thus accords with the hypo-
thesis advanced by Furtwangler and Loeschcke on the basis of Egyptian wall paintings.2
As Class IV. was not found by Petrie, we may assume that it is later than B. C. 1300 ; but
there is no reason for assuming that the manufacture of Class III. ceased after that date.
We must also allow at least a hundred years for the development of the Mycenaean
style from its beginning, so that to place the manufacture of dull vases as early as the
sixteenth or seventeenth centuries is permissible. We thus obtain a period of about five
1 For a more detailed account of Petrie's results, v. hurt, and Gurob, p. 10, pis. xvii.-xxvi. ; Kahun, Gurob, and
Tel-el-Arnarna, pp. 10, 17, pis. xxvi.-xxx. ; Illahun, Ka- Hawara, pi. xxviii.
2 Myk. Vas. p. xiii.
What the chronological differences are between these various classes it is difficult to
say. According- to Furtwangler and Loeschcke, I. is the oldest; but it is extremely doubt-
ful whether any difference in time exists between I. and II. As I. is found in but few
other places outside of Mycenae, it is fair to suppose that it was a style more or less
local. Judging from the entire lack of this class at the Heraeum, and the fact that the
style of ornamentation of II. 1, which is the oldest class of lustrous vases at the He-
raeum, is practically identical with that of I., there seems good reason for supposing that
the two are synchronous.
Moreover, the difference between II. 1 and the dull vases is so extremely slight that it
can be detected only by a carefully trained eye, and even then cases occur where the
decision is doubtful. This would show that the lustrous technique at the beginning did
not differ materially from the dull, and is another point in favor of assigning II. 1 to
the beginning of the lustrous style.
II. 2 differs from II. 1 mainly in the technical advance, but this advance is sufficiently
apparent to enable us to see in II. 2 the successor of II. 1. The step between II. 2
and III. 1 is even greater, since the style of ornamentation has radically changed, and
all motives which II. drew from the marine life that played so great a part in the mari-
time civilization of the Mycenaean epoch have become conventionalized and are used
more with a view to their decorative effect than as an attempt to reproduce nature.
Such a change could have come only during the acme of the Mycenaean epoch.
With IV. we see the point to which the bad taste of a decadent art had come. The
wealth of ornamentation, elaborated from a given motive, with the introduction of
foreign motives, illustrated by " Heraldic" designs and those taken from Oriental
embroideries, may be accounted for by this rampant spirit of conventionalism combined
with the increased commercial activity of the age.
A few words may here be said as to the latest results in dating the whole Mycenaean
period. Through the numerous excavations recently conducted on Greek soil, and the
corresponding increase of Greek pottery brought to light, the chronology has been
worked backwards to the fourteenth century. But the excavations of Flinders Petrie1 in
Egypt, and the finding, in the towns of Illahun, Tel-el-Amarna, Kahun, and Gurob, of
rubbish heaps containing large masses of " Aegaean," i. e. Mycenaean pottery, may be
said to have absolutely established the date of the Mycenaean civilization, since the
objects of Egyptian workmanship lying in these rubbish heaps, along with the pottery,
can be dated not later than this eighteenth dynasty, circa B. c. 1450. Pseud-amphoras
of Class III. were found in tombs of a date not later than b. c. 1300. The placing of the
acme of the Mycenaean period during the fifteenth century thus accords with the hypo-
thesis advanced by Furtwangler and Loeschcke on the basis of Egyptian wall paintings.2
As Class IV. was not found by Petrie, we may assume that it is later than B. C. 1300 ; but
there is no reason for assuming that the manufacture of Class III. ceased after that date.
We must also allow at least a hundred years for the development of the Mycenaean
style from its beginning, so that to place the manufacture of dull vases as early as the
sixteenth or seventeenth centuries is permissible. We thus obtain a period of about five
1 For a more detailed account of Petrie's results, v. hurt, and Gurob, p. 10, pis. xvii.-xxvi. ; Kahun, Gurob, and
Tel-el-Arnarna, pp. 10, 17, pis. xxvi.-xxx. ; Illahun, Ka- Hawara, pi. xxviii.
2 Myk. Vas. p. xiii.