DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12762#0016
X
THE VAULTED TOMBS OF MESARA
from the smaller tholos of Hagia Triada was found by Mosso to contain as
much as 14-220 p.c. of tin.
In reviewing the different classes of objects found in these ossuary vaults,
their explorer has rightly called repeated attention to the relation in which
so many of them stand to still earlier prototypes from the land of the Nile.
This indebtedness is indeed a root fact in the history of the origins of Minoan
civilisation. It goes back, indeed, beyond the earliest dynasty of Egypt. As
has been already noted, predynastic as well as protodynastic descent reveals
itself in the forms of certain stone vases, to which may be here added a type
well represented in the Mesara remains, consisting of tubular receptacles bored
out of more or less oblong blocks.1 The Early Minoan pots with prominent
spouts are themselves reminiscent of the typical copper utensils of the earliest
dynasties. Articles of the toilet such as the depilatory tweezers and stone
palettes tell the same tale. The cylinder seals of ivory with the animal pro-
cessions, amuletic pendants in the shape of the human leg, the toad or frog
and cynocephalus apes, are of the same Nilotic origin, and beads or other
small objects occur in a native glaze-ware which in Egypt itself preserves the
name of the old Delta tribe of the Tehenu.2 In this connection, indeed, certain
forms of small stone images found in these ossuary vaults have a special interest,
since they are neither the outcome of the old Neolithic family of clay idols
nor of imported Cycladic marble types, but go back to a class found in
the prehistoric cemeteries of Egypt, which reproduced the pointed hard and
domical head of the older inhabitants of the Nile Valley later represented by
the Libyan tribes.
In estimating the elements in the deposits due to these Nilotic influences
we must continually bear in mind the fact already noted, that the contents
of these ossuaries in the main represent the later phases in their history, the
earlier remains having largely disappeared owing to the picking over of the
bones when they were periodically heaped on one side. The relics date for
the most part from the Third Early Minoan to the First Middle Minoan Period—
from a time, that is, when these Southern ingredients had been fully acclima-
tised and any exotic stock among the population itself probably largely
assimilated to that of the Cretan indigenae. The earlier Nilotic tradition,
indeed, as we see from certain classes of objects, is already intruded on by
counter-influences from the Oriental and the iEgean side. The Babylonian
cylinder and the Cycladic marble images found in the later deposits of this
group of ossuary tombs are symptomatic of these new conditions.
Did we possess an adequate record of these Mesara folk from the beginning
of the Early Minoan age, the epoch, that is, to which many of these ossuaries
date back, the correspondences with the farther shores of the Libyan Sea
1 There is no occasion, therefore, to connect 2 P. Newberry, Address to the Anthropological
these with a type of neolithic clay tray with Section of ike British Association (Liverpool, 1923).
partitions, as suggested in the text, p. 17.
THE VAULTED TOMBS OF MESARA
from the smaller tholos of Hagia Triada was found by Mosso to contain as
much as 14-220 p.c. of tin.
In reviewing the different classes of objects found in these ossuary vaults,
their explorer has rightly called repeated attention to the relation in which
so many of them stand to still earlier prototypes from the land of the Nile.
This indebtedness is indeed a root fact in the history of the origins of Minoan
civilisation. It goes back, indeed, beyond the earliest dynasty of Egypt. As
has been already noted, predynastic as well as protodynastic descent reveals
itself in the forms of certain stone vases, to which may be here added a type
well represented in the Mesara remains, consisting of tubular receptacles bored
out of more or less oblong blocks.1 The Early Minoan pots with prominent
spouts are themselves reminiscent of the typical copper utensils of the earliest
dynasties. Articles of the toilet such as the depilatory tweezers and stone
palettes tell the same tale. The cylinder seals of ivory with the animal pro-
cessions, amuletic pendants in the shape of the human leg, the toad or frog
and cynocephalus apes, are of the same Nilotic origin, and beads or other
small objects occur in a native glaze-ware which in Egypt itself preserves the
name of the old Delta tribe of the Tehenu.2 In this connection, indeed, certain
forms of small stone images found in these ossuary vaults have a special interest,
since they are neither the outcome of the old Neolithic family of clay idols
nor of imported Cycladic marble types, but go back to a class found in
the prehistoric cemeteries of Egypt, which reproduced the pointed hard and
domical head of the older inhabitants of the Nile Valley later represented by
the Libyan tribes.
In estimating the elements in the deposits due to these Nilotic influences
we must continually bear in mind the fact already noted, that the contents
of these ossuaries in the main represent the later phases in their history, the
earlier remains having largely disappeared owing to the picking over of the
bones when they were periodically heaped on one side. The relics date for
the most part from the Third Early Minoan to the First Middle Minoan Period—
from a time, that is, when these Southern ingredients had been fully acclima-
tised and any exotic stock among the population itself probably largely
assimilated to that of the Cretan indigenae. The earlier Nilotic tradition,
indeed, as we see from certain classes of objects, is already intruded on by
counter-influences from the Oriental and the iEgean side. The Babylonian
cylinder and the Cycladic marble images found in the later deposits of this
group of ossuary tombs are symptomatic of these new conditions.
Did we possess an adequate record of these Mesara folk from the beginning
of the Early Minoan age, the epoch, that is, to which many of these ossuaries
date back, the correspondences with the farther shores of the Libyan Sea
1 There is no occasion, therefore, to connect 2 P. Newberry, Address to the Anthropological
these with a type of neolithic clay tray with Section of ike British Association (Liverpool, 1923).
partitions, as suggested in the text, p. 17.