532 



NA TURE 



[October i, 1896 



Myeensean slraUiin, containing numerous volive objects, in the 

 great cave of Mount Dikta, which, according to the Greek 

 legend, was the birthplace of Zeus. • 



This early Cretan script, which precedes by centuries the 

 most ancient records of I'hcenician writing, and supplies, at any 

 rate, very close analogies to what may be supposed to have been 

 the pictorial prototypes of several of the Phcenician letters, 

 stands in a direct relation to the syllabic characters used at a 

 later date by the Greeks of Cyprus. The great step in the 

 history of writing implied by the evolution of symbols of 

 phonetic value from iiriniitive pictographs is thus shown to 

 have effected itself on European soil. 



In many other ways the cultiue of Mycenaf — that extraordinary 

 revelation from the soil of prehistoric Greece — can be shown to 

 be rooted in this earlier .Egean stratum. The spiral system, 

 still seen in much of its pure original form on the gold vessels 

 and ornaments from the earlier shaft-graves of Mycence, is 

 simply the translation into metal of the pre-existing steatite 

 decoration. {See Hel/enic Journal, xii., 1892, p. 221.) 



The Mycenaian repousse work in its most developed stage as 

 applied to human and animal subjects has probably the same 

 origin in stone work. Cretan examples, indeed, give the actual 

 transition in which an intaglio in dark steatite is coated with a 

 thin gold plate impressed into the design. On the other hand, 

 the noblest of all creations of the Myceniijan goldsmith's art, 

 the Vaphio cups, with their bold reliefs, illustrating the hunting 

 and capture of wild bulls, find their nearest analogy in a frag- 

 ment of a cup, procured by me from Knosos, of Black Cretan 

 steatite, with naturalistic reliefs, exhibiting a fig-tree in a sacred 

 enclosure, an altar, and men in high action, which in all 

 probability was originally coated, like the intaglio, with thin 

 plates of gold. 



In view of some still prevalent theories as to the origin of 

 Mycenaean art, it is important to bear in mind these analogies 

 and connections, which show how deeply set its roots are in 

 ..■Egian soil. The Vaphio cups, especially, from their superior 

 art, have been widely regarded as of exotic fabric. That the 

 art of an European population in prehistoric times should have 

 risen above that of contemporary Egypt and Babylonia was 

 something beyond the comprehension of the traditional school. 

 These most characteristic products of indigenous skill, with 

 their spirited representations of a sport the traditional home of 

 which in later times was the Thessalian plains, have been, 

 therefore, brought from "Northern Syria"! Vet a whole 

 series of Mycena:an gems exists executed in the same bold 

 naturalistic style, and of local materials, such as lapis Lacedae- 

 monius, the subjects of which are drawn from the same artistic 

 cycle as those of the cups, and not one of these has as yet been 

 found on the Eastern Mediterranean shores. Like the other 

 kindred intaglios, they all come froin the Peloponnese, from 

 Crete, from the shores and islands of the -Egean, from the area, 

 that is, where their materials were procured. Their lentoid 

 and almond-shaped forms are altogether foreign to Semitic 

 usage, which clung to the cylinder and cone. The finer 

 products of the Mycena;an glyptic art on harder materials were, 

 in fact, the outcome of long apprentice studies of the earlier 

 -Egean population, of which we have now the record in the 

 primitive Cretan seals, and the explanation in the vast beds of 

 such an easily worked material as steatite. 



But the importation of the most characteristic Mycenoean pro- 

 ducts from " Northern Syria " has become quite a moderate 

 proposition beside that which we have now before us. In a 

 recent communication to the French Academy of Inscriptions, 

 Dr. Helbig has reintroduced to us as a more familiar figure. 

 Driven from his prehistoric haunts on the Atlantic coasts, torn 

 from the Cassiterides, dislodged even from his Thucididean 

 plantations in pre-IIellenic Sicily, the Phoenician has returned, 

 tricked out as the true " Mycensean." 



A great part of Dr. Helbig's argument has been answered by 

 anticipation. Regardless of the existence of a regular succession 

 of intermediate glyptic types, such as the " Melian " gems and 

 the engraved seals of the geometrical deposits of the Greek main- 

 land, like those of Olympia and of the Henieon at Argos, which 

 link the Mycena;an with the classical series. Dr. Helbig takes 

 a verse of Ilomer to hang from it a theory that seals and en- 

 graved stones were unknown to the early Greeks. On this imag- 

 inary fact he builds the astounding statement that the engraved 

 gems and seals found with Mycen;tan remains must be of foreign 

 and, as he believes, Phienician importation. The stray diffusion 

 of one or two examples oi Mycena>an pots to the coast of 



NO. 1405, VOL. 54] 



Palestine, the partial resemblance of some Ilitlite bronze figures, 

 executed in a more barbarous Syrian style, to specimens of quite 

 different fabric found at Tiryns, Mycenix", and, it may be .idded, 

 in a Cretan cave near Sybrita, the wholly unwarranted attribu- 

 tion to Phionicia of a bronze vase-handle found in Cyprus, 

 exhibiting tlie typical lion-headed demons of the My- 

 censcans — these are only a few salient examples of the 

 reasoning by which the whole prehistoric civilisation of the 

 Greek world, so instinct with naturalism an<l individuality, is 

 handed over to the least original member of the .Semitic race. 

 The absence in historic (ireece of such arts as that of vilarsia 

 in metal work, of gla.ss-making (if true) and of porcelain- 

 making, is used as a conclusive argument against their practice 

 by an .Egean population, of uncertain stock, a thousand years 

 earlier, as if in the intervening dark ages between the primitive 

 civilisation of the Greek lands and the Classical Renaissance no 

 arts could have been lost ! 



Finally, the merchants of Kefto depicted on the Egyptian 

 monuments are once more claimed as Phunicians, and with 

 them — though this is by no means a necessary conclusion, even 

 from the premise— the precious gifts they bear, including vases 

 of characteristic Mycena;an form and ornament. All this is 

 diametrically opposed to the conclusions of the most careful 

 inquirer into the origins of this mysterious people. Dr. W. Max 

 Miiller (to be distinguished from the eminent Professor), who 

 .shows that the list of countries in which Kefto occurs places 

 them beyond the limit of Phcenicia or of any Semitic country, 

 and connects them rather with Cilicia and with Cyprus, the 

 scene, as we now know, of important Mycen.ean plantations. 

 It is certain that not only do the Keftiu traders bear articles of 

 Mycena-an fabric, but their co.stume, which is wholly un-Semitic, 

 their leggings and sandals, and the long double locks of hair 

 streaming down below their armpits, identify them with the 

 men of the frescoes of Mycenae, and of the Vaphio and 

 Knosian cups. 



The truth is that these Syrian and Phrenician theories are 

 largely to be traced to the inability to understand the extent to 

 which the primitive inhabitants of the .Egean shores had been 

 able to assimilate exotic arts without losing their own indi- 

 viduality. The prococious offspring of our continent, first 

 come to man's estate in the .-Egean island world, had acquired 

 cosmopolitan tastes, and already stretched forth his hands to 

 pluck the fruit of knowledge from Oriental boughs. He had 

 adopted foreign fashions of dress and ornament. His artists 

 revelled in lion hunts and palm-trees. His very worship was 

 infected by the creations of foreign religions. 



The great extent to which the Mycenaans had assimilated 

 exotic arts and ideas can only be understood when it is realised 

 that this adaptive process had begun at least a thousand years 

 before, in the earlier period of .Egean culture. New impulses 

 from ICgypt and Chaldcea now succeed the old. The connection 

 with Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasty Egypt was of so inti- 

 mate a kind that it can only be explained by actual settlement 

 from the .Egean side. The abundant relics of .Egean ceramic 

 manufactures found by Prof. Petrie on Egyptian sites fully bear 

 out this presumption. The early marks on potsherds discovered 

 by that explorer seem to carry the connection back to the earlier 

 .Egean period, but the painted pottery belongs to wh.at may 

 broadly be described as Mycenaan times. The earliest relics of 

 this kind found in the rubbish heaps of Kahun, though it can 

 hardly be admitted that they go quite so far back as the Twelfth 

 Dynasty date assigned to them by Mr. Petrie (<. 2500 B.r.), yet 

 correspond with the earliest Mycemean classes found at Thera 

 and Tiryns, and seem to find their nearest p.arallels in pottery 

 of the same character from the cave of Kamares on the northern 

 steep of the Cretan Ida, recently described liy Mr. J. L. Myres 

 and by Dr. Lucio Mariani. Vases of the mure typical Myce- 

 naan class have been found by Mr. Petrie in a series of deposits 

 dated, from the associated Egyptian relics, from the reign of 

 Thothmes III. onwards (1450 B.c .). There is nothing Phienician 

 about these — with their .seaweeds and marine creatures they are 

 the true products of the island world of Greece. The counter- 

 part to these Mycemtan imports in Egypt is seen in the purely 

 Egyptian designs which now invade the northern shores of 

 the .Egean, such as the ceiling of the sepulchral chamber at 

 Orchomenos, or the wall-paintings of the palace at Tirytis — 

 almost exact copies of the ceilings of the Theljan tombs— designs 

 distinguished by the later Egyptian combination of the spiral and 

 plant ornament which at this period supersedes the pure return- 

 ing spiral of the earlier dynasties. The same contemporary 



