530 



NA TURE 



[October i, 1896 



no lonyev he maintained. The island world of the /ligean was 

 Ihe naluial home of primilive navigation. The early sea-trade 

 of the inhabitants gave them a start over their neighbours, and 

 produced a higher form of culture, which was destined to react 

 on that of a vast European zone — nay, even upon that of the 

 older civilisations of Egypt and Asia. 



The earlier stage of this /Egean culture culminates in what 

 may conveniently be called the Period of Aniorgos from the 

 abundant tombs exjilored by Dr. Diimnder and others in that 

 island. Here we already see the proofs of a widespread com- 

 merce. The ivory ornamentspoint to the South : the abundance 

 of silver may even suggest an intercourse along the Libyan coast 

 with the rich silver-producing region of South-eastern Spain, 

 the very ancient exploitation of which has been so splendidly 

 illustrated by the researches of the brothers Siret. Additional 

 weight is lent to this presumption by the recurrence in these 

 Spani.sh deposits of pots with rude indications of eyes and eye- 

 brows, recalling Schliemann's owl-faced urns; of stone "idols," 

 practically identical with those of Troy and the .^igean islands, 

 here too associated with marble cups of the same simple forms ; 

 of triangular daggers of copper and bronze, and of bronze 

 swords which seem to .stand in a filial relation to an " Amorgan " 

 type of dagger. In a former communication to this Section 

 I ventured to see in the so-called " Caliiri " of Malta — very far 

 removed from any Phoenician sculpture — an intermediate link 

 between the Iberian group and that of the /Egean, and to trace 

 on the fern-like ornaments of the altar-stone a comparison with 

 the naturalistic motives of proto-Mycena;an art, as seen, for 

 instance, on the early vases of Thera and Therasia. 



A Chaldfean influence cannot certainly be excluded from this 

 early /Egean art. It reveals itself, for instance, in indigenous 

 imitations of Babylonian cylinders. My own conclusion that 

 the small marble figures of the ^Egean deposits, though of 

 indigenous European lineage, were in their more developed types 

 influenced by Istar models from the East, has since been 

 independently arrived at by the Danish archaeologist, Dr. 

 Blinkenburg, in his study on praj-MycenKan art. 



More especially the returning-spiral decoration, which in the 

 "Amorgan Period" appears upon seals, rings, bowls, and 

 caskets of steatite, leads us to a very interesting field of com- 

 parison. This motive, destined to play such an important part 

 in the history of European ornament, is absent from the earlier 

 products of the great Anatolo-Danubian province. As a 

 European design it is first found on these insular fabrics, and it 

 is important to observe that it first shows itself in the form of 

 reliefs on stone. The generally accepted idea, put forward by 

 Dr. Milchhofer, that it originated here from applied spirals on 

 metal work is thus seen to be bereft of historical justification. 

 At a somewhat later date we find this spiraliform motive 

 communicating itself to the ceramic products of the Danubian 

 region, though from tlie bold relief in which it sometimes 

 appears, a reminiscence of the earlier steatite reliefs seems still 

 traceable. In the late Neolithic pile-station of Butmir, in 

 Bosnia, this spiral decoration appears in great perfection on the 

 pottery, and is here associated with clay images of very advanced 

 fabric. At Lengyel, in Hungary, and elsewhere, we see it 

 applied to primitive painted pottery. Finally, in the later 

 Hungarian Bronze Age it is transferred to metal work. 



But this connection — every link of which can be made out — of 

 the lower Danubian Bronze Age decoration with the ^Egean 

 spiral system — itself much earlier in origin — has a very important 

 bearing on the history of ornament in the North and West. 

 The close relation of the Bronze Age culture of Scandinavia and 

 North-western Germany with that of Hungary is clearly 

 established, and of the many valuable contributions made by 

 Dr. Montelius to prehistoric archeology, none is more brilliant 

 than his demonstration that this parallelism of culture between 

 the North-west and South-east owes its origin to the most 

 ancient course of the amber trade from the North Sea shores of 

 Jutland by the valley of the Elbe and Moldau to the Danubian 

 Basin. As Dr. Montelius has also shown, there was, besides, a 

 western extension of this trade to our own islands. If Scandi- 

 navia and its borderlands were the source of amber, Ireland was 

 the land of gold. The wealth of the precious metal there is 

 illustrated by the fact that, even as late as 1796, the gold 

 washings of County Wicklow amounted to 10,000/. A variety 

 of evidence shows a direct connection between Great Britain 

 and Scandinavia from the end of the Stone Age onwards. Gold 

 diadems of unquestionably British — probably Irish — fabric have 

 been found in Seeland and Eiinen, and from the analysis of early 



NO. 1405, VOL. 54] 



gold ornaments it clearly results that it was from Ireland 

 rather than the Ural that Northern and Central Europe was 

 supplied. Mr. Coffey, who has made an exhaustive study of 

 the early Irish monuments, has recently illustrated this early 

 connection by other comparisons, notably Ihe appearance of a 

 design which he identifies with the early carvings of boats on the 

 rocks of Scandinavia. 



This prolongation of the Bronze Age trade route — already 

 traced from the Middle Dannbe — from Scandinavia to Irelanil, 

 ought it to be regarded as the historic clue to the contemporary 

 appearance of the spiral motive in the British Islands? Is it to 

 this earlier intercourse with the land of the \ikings that we must 

 ascribe the spiral scrolls on the .slabs of the great chambered 

 barrows of the Irish Bronze Age — best seen in the most imposing 

 of them all, before the portal and on the inner chambers of New 

 Grange ? 



The possibility of such a connection nnist be admitted ; the 

 probability is great that the contemporary appearance of the 

 spiraliform ornament in Ireland and on the continent of Europe 

 is due to direct derivation. It is, of course, conceivable that 

 such a simple motive as the returning spiral may have originated 

 independently in various parts of Europe, as it did originate in 

 other parts of the world. But anthropulogy has ceased to 

 content itself with the mere accumulation of sporadic coin- 

 cidences. It has become a historic study. It is not sufficient to 

 know how sucli and such phenomena may have originated, but 

 how, as a matter of fact, they (/«'(/. Hence in the investigation 

 of origins and evolution the special value of the European field 

 where the evidence has been more perfectly correlated and the 

 continuous records go further back. An isolated example of the 

 simple volute design belonging to the " Reindeer Period" has 

 been found in the grotto of Arudy. But the earliest cultural 

 strata of Europe, from the beginning of the Neolithic period 

 onwards, betray an entire absence of the returning spiral motive. 

 When we find it later propagating itself as a definite ornamental 

 system in a regular chronological succession throughout an 

 otherwise inter-related European zone, we have every right to 

 trace it to a common source. 



But it does not therefore follow that the only alternative is to 

 believe that the spiral decoration of the Irish monuments 

 necessarily connects itself with the ancient stream of intercourse 

 flowing from Scandinavia. 



We have to remember that the Western lands of gold and tin 

 were the goals of other prehistoric routes. E-specially must we 

 bear in mind the early evidence of intercourse between the 

 British Isles and the old Iberic region of the opposite shores of 

 the continent. The derivation of certain forms of Bronze Age 

 types in Britain and Ireland from this side has already been 

 demonstrated by my father, and British or Irish bronze flat 

 axes with their characteristic ornamentation have in their turn 

 been found in Spain as well as in Denmark. The peculiar 

 technique of certain Irish flint arrowheads of the same period, 

 in which chipping and grinding are combined, is also character- 

 istic of the Iberian province, and seems to lead to very extended 

 comparisons on the Libyan side, recurring as it does in the 

 exquisite handiwork of the non-Egyptian race whose relics Mr. 

 Petrie has brought to light at Nagada. In prehistoric Spanish 

 deposits, again, are found the actual wallet-like baskets with in- 

 curving sides, the prototypes of a class of clay food-vessels which 

 (together with a much wider distribution) are of specially frequent 

 occurrence in the British Isles as well as the i>ld Iberian area. 



If the spiral decoration had been also a feature of the 

 Scandinavian rock carvings, the argument for derivation from 

 that side would have been strong. But they are not found in 

 them, and, on the other hand, the sculptures on the dolmens of 

 the Morbihan equally show certain features common to the Irish 

 stone chambers, including the primitive ship figure. The spiral 

 itself does not appear on these ; but the nrore the common 

 elements between the Megalithic piles, n.it only of the 

 old Iberian tract on the mainland, including Brittany, 

 but in the islands of the West Mediterranean basin, are 

 realised, the more probable it becomes thai the impulse came 

 from this side. The prehistoric buildings of Malta, hitherto 

 s]ioken of as " Phcenician temples," which show in their primilive 

 conception a great aflinity to the Megalithic chambers of the 

 earliest British barrows, bear witness on this side to the extension 

 of the .Ivgean spiral system in a somewhat ailvanced stage, and 

 accompanied, as at New- Grange, with intermediate lozenges. 

 In Sardinia, as I hope to show, there is evidence of the former 

 existence of monuments of Mycenxan architecture in which the 



