THE PALACE OF MINOS. 435 



houses or barns; ears of hurley or other cereals; swine; various kinds 

 of trees, and a long-stamened flower, evidently the saffron crocus, used 

 for dyes. On some tablets appear ingots, probably of bronze, fol- 

 lowed by a balance (the Greek roikavTov), and figures which probably 

 indicate their value in Mycenaean gold talents. The numerals attached 

 to man}' of these objects show that we have to do with accounts refer- 

 ring to the royal stores and arsenals. 



Some tablets relate to ceramic vessels of various forms, many of 

 them containing marks indicative of their contents. Others, still 

 more interesting, show vases of metallic forms, and obviously relate 

 to the royal treasures. It is a highly significant fact that the most 

 characteristic of these, such as a beaker like the famous gold cups 

 found in the Vapheio tomb near Sparta, a high-spouted ewer and an 

 object, perhaps representing a certain weight of metal, in the form of 

 an ox's head, recur — together with the ingots with incurving sides 

 among the gold offerings in the hands of the tributary JEgean princes— 

 on Egyptian monuments of Thothmes Ill's time. These tributary 

 chieftains, described as Kefts and people of the isles of the sea, who 

 have been already recognized as the representatives of the Mycenaean 

 culture, recall in their dress and other particulars the Cretan 3-ouths, 

 such as the cupbearer above described, who take part in the proces- 

 sional scenes on the palace frescoes. The appearance in the records 

 of the royal treasury at Knossos of vessels of the same form as those 

 offered b} T them to Pharaoh is itself a valuable indication that some of 

 these clay archives approximately go back to the same period — in 

 other words, to the beginning of the fifteenth century B. C. 



Other documents, in which neither ciphers nor pictorial illustrations 

 are to be found, nmy appeal even more deeply to the imagination. 

 The analogy of the more or less contemporary tablets, written in cunei- 

 form script, found in the palace of Tell-el-Amarna, might lead us to 

 expect among them the letters from distant governors or diplomatic 

 correspondence. It is probable that some are contracts or public acts, 

 which may give some actual formulas of Minoan legislation. There 

 is, indeed, an atmosphere of legal nicety, worthy of the house of Minos, 

 in the way in which these clay records were secured. The knots of 

 string which, according to the ancient fashion, stood in the place of 

 locks for the coffers containing the tablets, were rendered inviolable 

 by the attachment of clay seals, impressed with the finely engraved 

 signets, the tj T pes of which represent a great variety of subjects, such 

 as ships, chariots, religious scenes, lions, bulls, and other animals. 

 But, as if this precaution was not in itself considered sufficient, while 

 the clay was still wet the face of the seal was countermarked b} T a con- 

 trolling official, and the back countersigned and indorsed by an inscrip- 

 tion in the same Mycenaean script as that inscribed on the tablets them- 

 selves. 



