ANCIENT CARVED IVORIES 15 



teenth century B.C. and written in the little -known Mitanni 

 language, there seems to be noted a statue or statues of 

 ivory.* 



There was recently brought from the Island of Crete a 

 small ivory statuette, evidently belonging to an early period 

 of the fictile art of the inhabitants of Crete. In form and 

 appearance the figure vividly suggested a faience statuette 

 unearthed in Crete by Sir Arthur Evans, in 1903, in a small 

 inner room of the ancient temple of Knossos, representing a 

 female figure grasping in one hand the head of a snake and 

 holding its tail in the other, while its coils are wound about 

 her body. This faience statuette was found with a number 

 of other objects of the same material, votive offerings, etc., 

 the whole having been enclosed in two large stone chests 

 and apparently constituting the outfit of a shrine or altar. 

 Another somewhat similar but smaller figure, holding in 

 each upraised hand a small snake, was also found in the same 

 depository. The larger figure was believed by Sir Arthur 

 Evans to be intended to represent the great Cretan goddess 

 in her earth-born aspect. While in the Cretan ivory we 

 figure the serpents are lacking, the pose and drapery so 

 closely resemble the faience of Knossos as to strongly suggest 

 that the artist wished to portray the Cretan goddess. It is 

 true that some archaeologists consider that the snake-bearing 

 figures merely signified snake charmers whose services may 

 have been used in some of the entertainments offered to 

 the Minoan lords and ladies of olden time; but it seems rather 

 unHkely that such objects should have been carefully con- 

 served in the royal palace. 



The prehistoric Greek remains of Attica, Crete, and Cyprus 

 prove that ivory was used at an extremely early period in 

 these regions for ornamental purposes, the supply coming, of 



*P. Jensen, "Vorstudien zur EntzifEerung des Mitanni," in Zeitschrift f. Assyrologie, 

 Vol. V, p. 189; Leipzig, 1890. 



