Part 3 (2/2)
Among the other treasures recovered by this season's work was a quant.i.ty of fine painted pottery which had fallen from the upper rooms into the bas.e.m.e.nt when the palace floors collapsed. Some of the fragments were of that early polychrome style known as 'Kamares ware,' from the cave on the southern slope of Mount Ida, where it was first discovered by Mr. J. L. Myres. Its designs are purely conventional and largely geometric--zigzags, crosses, spirals, and concentric semicircles--and are executed in beautiful tints of brown, red, yellow, black, and white, the design being sometimes in dark on a light ground, and sometimes in light upon dark. The extraordinary thinness of the walls of these polychrome vessels, and the fineness of the clay from which they are fabricated, show to what a pitch the potter's craft had reached at the early period to which they belong. Of the later pottery of Knossos, which subst.i.tuted naturalistic motives, executed in monochrome, for the conventional polychrome designs of the Kamares period, many specimens were also found during the excavations of this season.
The frescoes of the previous year were supplemented by the discovery of a number of others, representing zones of human figures, about one-third of life-size, set out on blue and yellow fields with triple borders of black, red, and white bands. One well-preserved figure is that of a girl with very large eyes, lips of brilliant red, and curling black hair. Her high-bodied dress is looped up at the shoulder with a bunch of blue, with red and black stripes, and fringed ends. A border of the same robe, adorned with smaller loops, crosses the bosom, and between its blue and red bands the white tint of the skin displays itself, showing that the material of the robe was diaphanous. Relief work in stucco was represented by fragments of a life-sized figure, since pieced together by M.
Gillieron, which must have been that of some Minoan King. The head wears a fleur-de-lys crown and peac.o.c.k plumes, and round the neck of the finely modelled torso there runs a collar of fleur-de-lys ornament.
Again the connection of Knossos with Egypt was evidenced, and this time in most interesting fas.h.i.+on. Near the wall of a bathroom which was unearthed by the north-west side of the North Portico, there was found the lid of an Egyptian alabastron, bearing the cartouche of a King, which reads, 'Neter nefer S'user-en-Ra, sa Ra Khyan.' These are the names of one of the most famous Kings of the enigmatical Hyksos race--Khyan--'the Embracer of the Lands,' as he called himself, one of whose memorials, in the shape of a lion figure, carved in granite, and bearing his cartouche upon its breast, was found as far east as Baghdad, and is now in the British Museum. The statuette of Sebek-user, son of Ab-nub, evidenced a connection between Knossos and Egypt in the time of the later Middle Kingdom. This cartouche of Khyan shows that the connection was maintained in that dark period of Egyptian history which lay between the fall of the Middle Kingdom and the rise of the Empire. The intercourse between Crete and Egypt, however, goes much farther back than either the domination of the Hyksos or the Middle Kingdom. The discovery of various stone vessels in translucent diorite, and other hard materials familiar to the student of Early Egyptian work as characteristic of the taste of the earliest dynasties, shows that for the beginning of the connection between the two great Empires we must go back to the early days of the Old Kingdom in Egypt. The two civilizations, as we shall see later, can be equated period by period from the earliest times until the catastrophe of Knossos.
Among the seal impressions in clay, which were found in considerable numbers this season, were two worthy of attention: the one of great importance, the other scarcely of importance, but at least of interest.
The first was an impression of the figure of a female divinity, dressed in the usual flounced garb of the Mycenaean period, standing upon a sacred rock on which two guardian lions rest their forefeet, the arrangement of the design being very much the same as that of the relief on the Lion Gate at Mycenae, only with the figure of the G.o.ddess taking the place of the sacred pillar. In her hands the G.o.ddess holds something which may be either a weapon or a sceptre, and before her stands a male votary in an att.i.tude of adoration.
In the background is a shrine with sacred columns, in front of which rise the 'horns of consecration,' which were characteristic of Minoan temples, as apparently also of other Eastern religious structures. The second discovery was a clay matrix, formed from the impression of an actual seal, and evidently designed for the purpose of providing counterfeit impressions. In fact, we have here an evidence, brought to light after three millenniums, of some very ancient attempt at forgery in the very palace of the great law-giver.
The main result of the season of 1902 was the practical reconstruction of a large part of the Eastern or Domestic Quarter of the palace.
The chief room in this part of the building was the Queen's Megaron, an inner chamber divided transversely by a row of pillars, along whose bases ran a raised seat, where, no doubt, the maids of honour of the Minoan Court were wont to sit and gossip. The pillared portico opened upon another elongated area, a characteristic feature of Minoan architecture, which served the purpose of a light-shaft, illuminating the inner room. The light-well had been covered with a brilliant white plaster, on which were the remains of a bird fresco--a long, curving wing, with feathers of red, blue, yellow, white, and black. Adjacent to the Queen's Megaron was a small bathroom, constructed for a portable bath--a fragment of which, in painted terra-cotta, was found in the portico of the adjoining hall.
The fresco of the bull-fight, already referred to, was paralleled in subject, and more than matched in artistic quality, by the discovery, in a small secluded room which had apparently served as a treasury, of a deposit of ivory figurines of the most exquisite workmans.h.i.+p.
The height of the best preserved specimen is about 11-1/2 inches, and it is hard to say whether the boldness of the design or the precision with which the details of the tiny figure are wrought out is the more admirable. The att.i.tude is that of a man flinging himself forth in the abandon of a violent leap, with legs and arms extended.
His straining muscles are indicated with perfect faithfulness, and even the veins in the diminutive hand and the nails of the tiny fingers are clearly marked. The hair had been formed by curling strands of thin gold wire inserted in the skull. There can be no doubt that these figures formed part of a scene like that of the toreador fresco, for the violent motion suggested is consistent with nothing but some desperate feat of agility like bull-grappling. Probably the leaping figures were suspended by thin gold wires over the backs of ivory bulls, and thus presented a realistic miniature reproduction of the Minoan bull-ring. The extraordinary multiplication of such scenes, in painting, in the round, on gems and seal impressions, helps one to realize the hold which the pa.s.sion of bull-fighting, or, rather, bull-grappling, had upon the Cretan mind, a hold no doubt connected with the important part which the bull appears to have played in the Minoan religion (Plate XIX.).
[Ill.u.s.tration XII: MINOAN PAVED ROAD (_p_. 110)
NORTH ENTRANCE, KNOSSOS (_p_. 75)]
One of the season's finds was peculiarly useful and interesting, as having yielded a considerable ma.s.s of material for reconstructing the appearance of a Minoan town. A great chest of cypress wood--in which perhaps some Knossian Nausicaa once kept her store of linen--had been decorated with a series of enamelled plaques, depicting a Minoan town, with its towers and houses, its fields and cattle and orchards. The chest itself had perished in the conflagration of the palace, leaving only a charred ma.s.s of woodwork; but the plaques survived. Some of them represent houses, evidently of wood and plaster fabric, for the round ends of the beams show in the frontage. On the ground-floor are the doors, in some cases double; above are second and third storeys, with rows of windows fitted with some red material, which may have been oiled and tinted parchment, while some of the houses have an attic storey with windows above the third floor. It is evident that the houses of the Minoan burghers were not the closely-packed mud hovels, separated from one another only by narrow alleys, which characterize the plan of the Egyptian town discovered by Petrie at Illahun, but were substantial structures, giving accommodation which, even to modern ideas, would seem respectable. Of course, one must suppose that the poorer quarters of the town would scarcely be represented on a fabric designed for use in the palace; but the actual remains of a Minoan town, unearthed at Gournia by Mrs. H. B. Hawes, show that that town, at least, was largely composed of houses which must have pretty closely resembled those on the porcelain plaques of Knossos.
Most surprising of all, however, in many respects, was the revelation of the amazingly complete system of drainage with which the palace was provided. The gradient of the hill which underlay the domestic quarter of the building enabled the architect to arrange for a drainage system on a scale of completeness which is not only unparalleled in ancient times, but which it would be hard to match in Europe until a period as late as the middle of the nineteenth century of our era. A number of stone shafts, descending from the upper floors, lead to a well-built stone conduit, measuring 1 metre by 1/2 metre, whose inner surface is lined with smooth cement.
These shafts were for the purpose of leading into this main conduit the surface-water from the roofs of the palace buildings, and thus securing a periodical flus.h.i.+ng of the drains. In connection with this surface-water system, there was elaborated a system of latrines and other contrivances of a sanitary nature, which are 'staggeringly modern' in their appointments.
In the north-eastern quarter, under the Corridor of the Game-Board, are still preserved some of the terra-cotta pipes which served as connections to the main drain. They are actually faucet-jointed pipes of quite modern type, each section 2-1/2 feet in length and 6 inches in diameter at the wide end, and narrowing to 4 inches at the smaller end. 'Jamming was carefully prevented by a stop-ridge that ran round the outside of each narrow end a few inches from the mouth, while the inside of the b.u.t.t, or broader end, was provided with a raised collar that enabled it to bear the pressure of the next pipe's stop-ridge, and gave an extra hold for the cement that bound the two pipes together'[*] (Plate XX. 2).
[Footnote *: R. M. Burrows, 'The Discoveries in Crete,' p. 9.]
Indeed, the hydraulic science of the Minoan architects is altogether wonderful in the completeness with which it provided for even the smallest details. On a staircase near the east bastion, on the lower part of the slope, a stone runnel for carrying off the surface water follows the line of the steps. Lest the steepness of the gradient should allow the water to descend too rapidly and flood the pavement below, the runnel is so constructed that the water follows a series of parabolic curves, and the rapidity of its fall is thus checked by friction. The main drains are duly provided with manholes for inspection, and 'are so roomy,' says Dr. Evans, 'that two of my Cretan workmen spent days within them clearing out the acc.u.mulated earth and rubble without physical inconvenience.'
Those who remember the many extant descriptions of the sanitary arrangements, or rather the want of sanitary arrangements, in such a town as the Edinburgh of the end of the eighteenth century, will best appreciate the care and forethought with which the Minoan architects, more than 3,000 years earlier, had provided for the sanitation of the great Palace of Minos (Plates XVI. 2 and XX. 1).
Turning from the material to the spiritual, evidence as to the religious conceptions of the inhabitants of the palace was forthcoming in two instances. In one early chamber there was found a little painted terra-cotta object consisting of a group of three columns standing on an oblong platform. The square capitals of the columns each carried two round beams, their ends showing, exactly as in the case of the pillar on the Lion Gate at Mycenae; and on the top of the beams doves were perched. Here is the evidence of a cult in which a Dove G.o.ddess--a G.o.ddess of the Air--was wors.h.i.+pped under the form of a trinity of pillars; and confirmation of the existence of such a form of belief was afforded by the discovery, in the south-east corner of the palace, of a little shrine, in which, along with the usual 'horns of consecration' and sacred Double Axes, were found three figures of a G.o.ddess, of very archaic form, on the head of one of which there was also perched a dove. The Double Axes in the shrine again emphasized the importance in the palace wors.h.i.+p of the Labrys, and underlined the suggestion that the Palace of Knossos is nothing more nor less than the legendary Labyrinth of Minos. 'That the _Labrys_ symbol should be the distinguis.h.i.+ng cult sign of the Minoan Palace makes it more and more probable that we must in fact recognize in this vast building, with its maze of corridors and chambers and its network of subterranean ducts, the local habitation and name of the traditional Labyrinth.'[*]
[Footnote *: A. J. Evans, _Annual of the British School at Athens_, vol. viii., p. 103.]
The season of 1903 was marked by two important discoveries within the palace area. Of these we may first consider the so-called Theatral Area. (Plates XXI. and XXII.). Such an area had been found at Phaestos by the Italian explorers, and it was natural to expect that something corresponding to it would not be lacking at Knossos. When found, it proved to be of later date and of more developed form than the structure at Phaestos; but the general idea was the same. At the extreme north-west angle of the palace, ab.u.t.ting on the West Court, there was discovered a paved area about 40 by 30 feet, divided up the centre by a causeway. On its eastern and southern sides it was overlooked by two tiers of steps, the eastern tier having at one time consisted of eighteen rows, while the greatest number on the south side was six, diminis.h.i.+ng to three as the ground sloped upwards. At the southeastern angle, where the two tiers met, a bastion of solid masonry projected between them.
[Ill.u.s.tration XIII: RELIEF OF BULL'S HEAD (_p_. 77)
From 'The Palace of Minos,' by Arthur J. Evans, in _The Monthly Review_.]
This area, for whatever purpose it may have been designed, was evidently an integral portion of the Later Palace structure, for no fewer than five causeways converge upon it from different directions; but it was in no sense a thoroughfare, and the rows of steps around it do not lead, and can never have led, anywhere. What can have been the purpose of its existence? Dr. Evans's view, which is generally accepted, is that it was some sort of a primitive theatre, where the inhabitants of the palace gathered to witness sports and shows of some kind, the tiers of steps affording sitting accommodation for them, while the bastion at the south-east angle may have been a kind of Royal Box, from which Minoan majesty and its Court circle surveyed the games. There would be accommodation on the steps for some four or five hundred spectators.
It must be confessed that the place leaves much to be desired as a theatre. The shallow steps must have made somewhat uncomfortable sitting-places, though one must remember that the Minoan ladies often, apparently, adopted a sitting posture which was more like squatting than sitting, and that a seat found in 1901, evidently designed for a woman's use, was only a trifle over 5 inches in height. But male dignity required more lofty sitting accommodation; the seat of the throne of Minos is nearly 23 inches high, and the spectators of the Knossian theatre cannot have been all women.
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