pottery in Cyprus—Graeco-Phoenician fabrics—Shapes and
decoration—Hellenic and later vases—Primitive pottery in
Greece—Troy—Thera and Cyclades—Crete—Recent discoveries—Mycenaean
pottery—Classification and distribution—Centres of
fabric—Ethnography and chronology.
In the preceding chapters we have given a general _résumé_ of the
subject of Greek pottery; we have discussed the sites on which Greek
vases have been found, the methods employed in their manufacture, the
shapes which they assume, and the uses to which they were put both on
earth and in the tombs; and we have now reached perhaps the most
important part of the subject, at any rate in the eyes of
archaeologists, namely, the history of the rise, development and
decadence of painting on Greek vases.
It has already been noted (in Chapter I.) that this branch of the study
of Greek vases is one that has only been called into existence in
comparatively recent times, and that up to the year 1854 or thereabouts
all attempts at dating the vases (chiefly of course owing to the
poverty of material) were purely empirical and tentative. They were
moreover largely combined with fantastic interpretations of the painted
designs.
During the last forty years, and especially during the last twenty, the
steady growth of archaeological study and increased attention to
excavations have enormously increased both the material at command and
the power of utilising it with scientific method. The extensive finds
of pottery in Greece, Asia Minor, Northern Africa, Italy, and
elsewhere, including more especially products of the earlier periods,
have enabled the students of the subject to trace the sequence of
fabrics from the rude wares of Troy and the Greek Islands up to the
graceful and finished products of the Athenian _ateliers_, and onward
to the overgrown luxuriousness of the gigantic Apulian wares. The
subjects of the paintings, once of all-absorbing, are now only of
subordinate interest, except so far as they illustrate certain phases
of development, and the chief interest of the vases is the question of
their origin, their maker, or their place in relation to others.
It will therefore be the object of this and of the succeeding chapters
to trace with all possible detail, as far as space permits, the history
of Greek vase-manufacture and vase-painting in all their aspects. We
have already indicated (p. 31) the limits within which the subject
falls, and the convenient rough division into four main classes of
which it permits (p. 23). This introductory chapter, therefore, deals
with the primitive fabrics, leading up, through the two following, to
the period of black-figured vases in Chapter IX. The lines of
demarcation are, indeed, difficult if not impossible to draw, but they
must not in any case be taken as rigid ones, being largely
conventional, and only adopted in order to obtain a point of division
for the chapters.
Perhaps the leading feature of the early history of Greek vases is the
gradual coalescence of the numerous local fabrics first into two or
three main streams, and finally into the one great and all-absorbing
current of Athenian art. In the sixth century this was really brought
about more by historical causes than anything else, as a result of the
gradually increasing supremacy of Athens in art and culture from the
time of the Peisistratidae down to that of Perikles.
One region, and one only, pursues its artistic course without regard to
the contemporaneous tendencies prevailing in the Greek world, and that
is the island of =Cyprus=. Here again the causes are largely political,
as we shall see; largely also ethnographical and geographical, from the
character of the inhabitants and the position of the island, a
meeting-place and bone of contention between the great nations of the
Eastern Mediterranean. For this reason we propose to deal first with
the pottery of Cyprus, which has little in common with that of the rest
of Greece, and always retains something of its primitive character,
though it is always as much influenced from Greece on the one hand as
from the East on the other. It is in Cyprus also that we meet with some
of the earliest remains of pottery yet found on Greek soil.
§ 1. CYPRIOTE POTTERY
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cesnola, _Cyprus_; O.-Richter, _Kypros, the Bible, and Homer_;
Perrot and Chipiez, _Hist. de l’Art_, iii. p. 648 ff.; _Cyprus
Mus. Cat._ (Myres and O.-Richter); _B.M. Excavations in Cyprus_
(Turner Bequest), 1894–6; Dümmler in _Ath. Mitth._ xi. (1886), p.
209 ff.; _Archaeologia_, xlv. p. 127 ff.; Pottier, _Cat. des
Vases ant. du Louvre_, i. p. 82 ff., and other references there
given.
In order to understand aright the history of Cypriote art, it is indeed
necessary to know something of its ethnography and political history,
and the various influences to which it has been subjected. But space
forbids us to do more than make very brief allusions to the more
important of these features. Speaking generally, Cyprus may be regarded
as a centre wherein have met all the currents of ancient civilisation,
forming an amalgamation of artistic elements. Thus Cypriote art, though
it loses in originality, gains in interest; and yet though often
slavishly imitative, it has at bottom great individuality, more
especially in its pottery. Hence it will be seen that it is essentially
necessary to consider the pottery of Cyprus as a thing apart.
As regards chronology, except for a certain determinable sequence of
artistic phases, even more caution than in dealing with Hellenic art is
required. The remarkable conservatism and persistence of types
exhibited by Cypriote art has more than once proved a pitfall, and has
given rise to considerable controversy at one time or another. Dates
can only be used in the vaguest manner.
The pottery of Cyprus falls under three headings, which for
convenience, though not perhaps with the strictest accuracy, are
usually defined as follows:—
1. _Bronze Age_, from about 2500 B.C. to 800 B.C.
2. _Graeco-Phoenician period_, from 800 B.C. to 400 B.C., overlapping
with
3. _Hellenic period_, from 550 B.C. to 200 B.C., representing the
time during which imported Greek vases are found in the tombs,
native pottery gradually dying out except in the form of plain
vessels.
The pottery of the Bronze-Age period again falls into two distinct
periods: (1) Copper Age or pre-Mycenaean period (2500–1500 B.C.),
during which few bronze implements are found in the tombs, and all the
pottery is purely indigenous, the work of the original inhabitants of
the island, without any admixture of importations. (2) The Mycenaean
period (1500–800 B.C.), during which the local pottery (including both
unpainted and painted vases) is reinforced by large quantities of
imported Mycenaean pottery, together with elaborately decorated vases
of Mycenaean technique, either made locally or specially made for
Cyprus and imported.
The sites on which Bronze-Age remains are found (see above, p. 66) are
chiefly confined to the central and southern parts of the island, the
most important sites being near the modern towns of Nicosia, Larnaka,
and Famagusta. The discovery in these tombs of such objects as
milking-bowls and querns is an additional proof of the conclusion
naturally to be drawn—that the early inhabitants of Cyprus were a race
of pastoral lowlanders.[820] The tombs (see p. 35) are mostly pit-tombs
of moderate depth, recalling in type the Egyptian _mastaba_, and burial
is universal.
There is no doubt that the art of pottery was introduced into Cyprus
coincidently with the beginning of the Copper Age, which may be placed
at about the year 2000 B.C. Although no bronze is found in the earliest
tombs, on the other hand stone implements are absent, and the types of
the pottery are identical with those of the later Bronze Age. It will
be seen that it presents throughout very striking parallels with the
pottery of Hissarlik, which will form the subject of the next section.
The forms are largely similar and the technique is the same, but the
Hissarlik pottery is ruder and of inferior clay. Stone implements are
found at Hissarlik, but no copper, from which the inference may be
drawn that that metal, being indigenous to Cyprus, supplanted stone
there at an earlier date than in the Troad, whither it had to find its
way by means of commerce. It was no doubt largely due to the existence
of its copper ores that Cyprus so early shows an advance in its
civilisation.
The shapes of the earliest Cypriote pottery are purely indigenous and
very characteristic, but the technique may very likely have been
learned from elsewhere; in regard to which it should be noted that as
it is invariably hand-made, an Egyptian origin is altogether precluded,
owing to the early use of the wheel for pottery in that country (see
pp. 7, 206). For the most part the forms are characterised by a
tendency to fantastic and unsymmetrical modelling, with a preference
for complicated forms, such as two or three vases joined together.
Others again imitate gourds or vessels of straw and basket-work, such
as are used in Cyprus at the present day. They have no foot or
“base-ring” to stand upon; and another characteristic is the frequent
absence of handles, the place of which is supplied by small ears, by
means of which the vase was hung up or carried by cords.[821] Sometimes
these ears cover the whole outline of the vase. The plastic principle
is always popular in the Bronze-Age pottery, and manifests itself in
more than one direction. From the first it is exhibited in the
tendency, so common in early art, to combine the vase and the
statuette,[822] a tendency which is even stronger in the pottery of
Hissarlik. It also takes the form of designs in relief covering the
surface of, or moulded to, the vase.
In one point Cyprus is manifestly in advance of the rest of the ancient
world, and that is, in the decoration of the pottery. Here, in fact, we
meet with the first attempts at painted vases, combined with the
employment of a fine bright red or polished black slip to cover the
surface. In the earlier varieties the designs, when they occur, are
confined to simple rectilinear geometrical patterns incised through the
slip before baking; but these are soon supplemented by the employment,
first of a matt-white pigment, secondly of a brown-black paint obtained
from the native umber. The only other locality in which painted vases
occur at so early a period is the island of Thera (see below, p. 260).
We pass now to the consideration of the later Bronze-Age
pottery—namely, that which is found in tombs together with vases of
Mycenaean style. In this we see various modifications of the indigenous
art, and witness its eventual transformation by the introduction of new
processes and ideas from various sources. The main streams of influence
are three in number, coming from the east, south, and west
respectively. Of these the first represents the Asiatic civilisations
of Babylonia and the Hittites, to whom in the first place are due the
engraved cylinders frequently found in these tombs, and at a
comparatively late date such objects as the ivory draught-box from
Enkomi in the British Museum, which affords points of comparison with
the reliefs of Kouyounjik. Egyptian influences date from the invasion
of Cyprus by Thothmes III. (eighteenth dynasty), about 1450 B.C., as
exemplified by the frequent occurrence of scarabs and porcelain
objects. A counter-influence of Cyprus on Egypt is seen in the presence
of exported Cypriote pottery in tombs at Kahun, Saqqara, and
elsewhere.[823] Lastly, there is the far more extensive influence of
the Mycenaean civilisation, covering several hundred years, and
eventually absorbing the indigenous fabrics until the foundations of a
new phase of decorative art were laid on a combination of the two. The
Mycenaean vases belong to the later styles exclusively (see below, p.
271), and show a strong preference for certain forms such as the
false-necked amphora and the large richly-decorated krater peculiar to
Cyprus; but these we must discuss later in fuller detail. Briefly, they
represent the first entry of Greece proper into the Cypriote world.
The ethnological affinities of the early inhabitants of Cyprus cannot
be positively ascertained. In M. Heuzey’s opinion they were Asiatics,
Syrian rather than Phoenician, and he suggests that the names of Kition
(Chittim) and Amathus (Hamath) imply Hittite and Hamathite colonists.
Dümmler regarded them as closely akin to the race which inhabited the
second city at Hissarlik,[824] an idea to which the similarity of the
pottery might be thought to lend support. At all events in Greek legend
this people was personified by the mythical king Kinyras, the father of
Adonis, who came from the neighbouring Asiatic coast. The Hellenic, or
rather Achaean, invasion is crystallised into the legends of Teucer’s
colonisation of Salamis after the fall of Troy,[825] of an Arcadian
settlement at Kerynia and elsewhere, and of the founding of Curium by
Argives (? Mycenaeans).[826]
The first attempt to classify the pottery of Cyprus, and to distinguish
between the Bronze-Age wares and what are now known as the
Graeco-Phoenician fabrics, was made by the late Mr. T. B. Sandwith in
1876.[827] Considering the comparative poverty of material at his
command, and the state of archaeological knowledge at the time, his
brief but illuminating monograph is a wonderfully accurate and
scientific contribution, and, so far as it goes, his classification can
still be accepted in the main. But the extensive series of excavations
in the island since the British occupation, and the investigation of
such fruitful sites as Salamis, Curium, and Kition, have resulted in a
great advance of our knowledge of the subject. The elaborate
classification made by Messrs. Myres and Ohnefalsch-Richter of the
representative collections of the Cyprus Museum must for the present be
regarded as final, and of necessity forms the basis of the succeeding
description.
* * * * *
The pottery of the Bronze Age may be classified under two main
headings: Painted and Unpainted Pottery. Of these the former is
practically confined to the later tombs, and we naturally turn first to
the unpainted pottery as taking precedence in chronology and
development.
Almost the commonest, and probably the earliest, variety is the =red
polished ware=, sometimes plain, but generally ornamented with incised
patterns or reliefs (see Plate XI., Nos. 3, 4, 7).[828] The polished
surface, which seems to betoken a great advance in technique, was
doubtless produced by means of a burnisher. In some varieties the
surface is black, a result due to the action of smoke in firing. The
commonest forms are a globular bottle with long neck and handle, a
plain bowl, a cooking-pot on feet, and a two-handled globular amphora;
besides composite and abnormal forms. None of these vases have any kind
of base except the cooking-pots.
The incised patterns, when they occur, are scratched in deeply before
firing, and often filled in with white; the patterns, which tend to
become more and more elaborate, consist of zigzags, wavy lines,
chequers and lozenges, network patterns, and concentric circles.
Ornament in relief is applied in the form of strips of clay, often
worked into the shape of rude figures of trees, snakes, animals, or
simple patterns. Many tombs and even cemeteries, as at Alambra, Agia
Paraskevi, and elsewhere, contain no other form of pottery; but though
these are undoubtedly earlier than the mixed tombs, the red ware in a
degenerate form continues long afterwards.
There is also a small class of =black-slip ware=, covered with a thin
dark lustreless slip which flakes off easily. The ornamentation, which
is seldom absent, is generally in the form of a straight or wavy line
with a row of dots alternately on either side, either incised or in
relief. The forms are much the same as in the red ware, but often seem
to suggest metal or leather prototypes.
An interesting class is formed by the =black punctured ware=, in which
the clay is black throughout, without a slip, but partly polished. Most
of these vases are small jugs with a narrow neck, swelling body, and
small foot, and they are ornamented with punctured dots, usually in
triangular patches, but sometimes irregularly distributed. In Cyprus
they are mostly found in the early necropolis at Kalopsida, but they
also occur in the late Mycenaean tombs at Enkomi. The special interest
of this ware is that it is found in Egypt, under such circumstances
that it can fairly be dated; notably at Khata'anah in conjunction with
scarabs and flint chips of the twelfth and thirteenth dynasties
(2500–2000 B.C.). It is also found in the Fayûm, where Prof. Petrie
obtained some good specimens.[829]
Allied to this is the Cypriote _bucchero_ ware, of plain black clay
without slip, ornamented with ribs or flutings. It is only found in the
later tombs, and can be traced through the subsequent transitional
period.[830]
Of the remaining fabrics the most conspicuous is that termed by Mr.
Myres the =base-ring ware=, which is marked off from other Bronze-Age
types by its flat-ringed base in all cases. The clay is dark and of
fine texture, with thinly-glazed surface. The ornament is either in
relief or painted in matt-white, the patterns being exclusively of a
basket or network type (Plate XI., figs. 1, 2). The reliefs, when they
occur, consist of scrolls or raised seams curving over the body,
obviously in imitation of the seams of a leather bottle; they sometimes
end in a leaf-ornament,[831] and at other times take the form of a
snake. This fabric is very commonly found in the later tombs with
Mycenaean vases, and hardly earlier. It has been found in Egypt and at
Lachish.[832]
------------------------------------------------------
PLATE XI
[Illustration:
EARLY CYPRIOTE POTTERY (BRITISH MUSEUM).
1, 2, “BASE-RING” BLACK WARE; 3, 4, 7, INCISED RED AND BLACK WARES;
5, 6, “WHITE-SLIP” WARES.
]
------------------------------------
Among the rarer varieties of unpainted wares Mr. Myres includes white
base-ring ware (plates and bowls), imitations of straw-plait or
wicker-work, and plain _wheel-made wares_ with red or black slip, of
peculiar form.[833]
Among the Painted Pottery by far the most widely-spread local fabric is
that styled by Mr. Myres the =white-slip ware=, which appears in the
tombs of the later Bronze Age, and is more than any other associated
with Mycenaean vases. In cemeteries such as Enkomi, Curium, and
Maroni[834] it has been found in large quantities in almost every tomb,
and its range is not limited to Cyprus. The characteristics of this
ware are a black gritty clay, worked very thin, and a thick white
creamy slip with which it is covered both inside and out; it is
exceedingly brittle, and perfect specimens are comparatively uncommon.
The ornament is laid on in a black pigment, often turning to red by the
action of fire; the most common form is that of a hemispherical bowl
with a flat triangular handle, notched at the apex. Almost the only
other forms are a long-necked flask or bottle of the lekythos type and
a large jug with cylindrical body (like an _olpe_) and a flat
thumb-piece above the handle.
Mr. Myres[835] points out that the scheme of decoration seems intended
to imitate the binding and seams of a leather bowl; it usually consists
of a band of various patterns (lattice-work, zigzags, lozenges, or
lines of dots) round the rim, from which similar bands descend
vertically, but do not meet at the bottom. Similarly the handle seems
intended to represent two pieces of flexible wood bound together. In
the case of the jugs the patterns follow a similar principle, giving
the effect of a decoration in panels to the upper part. Specimens of
this ware are given in Plate XI., Nos. 5, 6.
Beyond the confines of Cyprus isolated specimens of this ware have been
found at Athens, Hissarlik, Thera, Lachish in Palestine, and at Saqqara
and Tell-el-Amarna in Egypt, in the last-named instance along with
Mycenaean vases.[836] The resemblance of some white-slip wares to the
Dipylon vases is not a little curious.[837] But it can hardly be
thought that the one influenced the other.
The other local painted wares are by no means so common. They are, in
fact, almost limited to specimens of an unpolished _white ware_, with
fine cream-coloured clay, on which patterns such as groups of straight
or wavy lines, chevrons, chequers, and triangles filled with hatched
lines are painted with a pigment varying from dull black to dull red.
The commonest forms are one-handled bowls and small bottles, either
globular or sausage-shaped. The latter are distinguished by often
having long tube-like spouts attached and by the numerous perforated
projections for the attachment of strings, handles being generally
absent at first, but when they are introduced the projections remain as
an ornamental survival. In a few isolated specimens the surface is
covered with a polished slip. Others again are covered with a _black
glaze_,[838] on which are painted in dull red groups of short parallel
lines, which (as Mr. Myres points out) seem to have been executed at a
single stroke with a cluster of brushes.
* * * * *
The =Mycenaean pottery= which has been found on not a few sites in
Cyprus, and of late years in such surprising quantities at Enkomi and
in the neighbourhood of Larnaka and Limassol (Maroni, Curium, etc.),
belongs properly to another section of this chapter, and would not call
for discussion in this connection, but for the fact that in Cyprus it
presents certain features which seem to be almost exclusively local. At
all events it is advisable to consider how far Mycenaean pottery in
Cyprus differs from that found in Rhodes, Crete, or Mycenae.
Two points claim our attention in the first instance: (1) that in point
of technique the Cypriote finds fall absolutely into line with those in
other parts of the Mycenaean world; (2) that the range of subjects
depicted on the vases found in Cyprus is wider and in a measure more
developed than elsewhere. To what extent we may be permitted, bearing
both facts in mind, to predicate a local fabric of Mycenaean pottery in
Cyprus, must for the present remain an open question; at the same time
it seems extremely probable that the larger vases, which it will be
necessary to discuss in detail, are, if not of local manufacture, at
all events a fabric made specially for exportation to Cyprus, as we
shall see was the case with a later variety of black-figured Attic ware.
The peculiarity of the Cypriote-Mycenaean pottery is that whereas on
other sites the decoration is confined to linear ornaments, and animal
or vegetable subjects drawn almost exclusively from the aquatic world
(such as cuttle-fish, shell-fish, or seaweed), in Cyprus we find
represented not only animals, such as bulls, deer, goats, and dogs, but
even human figures, both male and female, and monsters such as Sphinxes
and Gryphons. Having regard to what M. Pottier[839] calls the law of
the _hierarchie des genres_, it does not seem impossible that this may
imply a _late survival_ of Mycenaean art in Cyprus, and although this
view has been hitherto strongly contested in certain quarters, it finds
support from other evidence obtained in recent excavations. The whole
chronology of Cypriote pottery is still in a very unsettled state, and
until it can be definitely shown that the Cypriote Geometrical style
began concurrently with the appearance of Geometrical pottery in
Greece, it is still admissible to urge that Mycenaean art prevailed
here for some time subsequent to its disappearance from the greater
part of the Hellenic world. For this the accepted date is the end of
the tenth century B.C., but it is not necessary to extend its influence
in Cyprus more than two centuries longer, _i.e._ beyond the eighth
century, at the latest.
If we accept the view generally held that the Mycenaean civilisation
was Achaean, and that after the Dorian invasion its representatives
were driven in an easterly direction and settled on the coast of Asia
Minor; and if again we regard this as an historical version of the
Greek traditions of the Trojan war and the subsequent migrations of the
Achaean heroes[840]; we may then consider that the stories of Teucer’s
foundation of a new Salamis and of an Argive colonisation of Curium
find their verification in the Mycenaean settlements recently
discovered on those two Cypriote sites. The extent and richness of the
old Salamis at Enkomi at any rate seems to suggest that it may have
flourished as a Mycenaean settlement for some centuries.
But to return to the pottery. Two forms are eminently characteristic of
the Cypriote varieties. Of these, one—the “false amphora” (p. 271)—is
not peculiar to the island, but is found wherever Mycenaean pottery has
penetrated; though especially common in Cyprus, it is in fact the most
popular of all Mycenaean shapes. The other is a large krater, found in
two varieties, either a straight-sided deep bowl with wide mouth and no
neck, or a spheroidal vessel on a high stem, with a low straight neck
of less diameter than the body. It is this latter class which appears
to be of local manufacture and presents such a variety of painted
decoration.
Up to the year 1895 only some half-dozen of these kraters were known,
one of which was found by General Cesnola in the rich necropolis at
Agia Paraskevi near Nicosia[841]; another he alleged to have come from
Amathus, but it was no doubt found at Maroni, not so far distant, where
for many years a Bronze-Age cemetery has been known. In the above-named
year two more came to light at Curium,[842] one of the same type as
General Cesnola’s, with figures driving two-horse chariots; the other
having in addition the unique subject of a series of women, each figure
in a separate panel, represented as waving their arms or holding
flowers.[843] These were speedily followed by the rich and valuable
series from Enkomi now in the British Museum, since which time other
interesting specimens have been obtained for the Museum in various
excavations or have found their way into the hands of local collectors
(see Plate XII.).
------------------------------------------------------
PLATE XII
[Illustration: MYCENAEAN VASES FROM CYPRUS (BRITISH MUSEUM).]
------------------------------------
Native imitations of the Mycenaean vases, which have been described as
“sub-Mycenaean wares,” have been found in considerable numbers on most
of the sites where the genuine Mycenaean ware exists. They fall
technically under the heading of painted white ware (p. 251),[844] the
difference being that the decoration is in _matt_ colour (varying from
black to red) on an unpolished drab ground. The patterns mostly follow
Mycenaean models, but some are new. They are well represented on the
Mycenaean site at Curium,[845] especially in one or two tombs of
transitional character, and in some cases the decoration is of a
distinctly Geometrical type, illustrating the development of the
succeeding style. In any case it is not difficult to distinguish them
from the genuine Mycenaean fabrics.
* * * * *
In these so-called sub-Mycenaean vases we can trace the best evidence
of the transition from the Bronze Age to the succeeding or
Graeco-Phoenician period. But on the whole the line of demarcation is
clearly defined, as for instance by the forms and position of the
tombs, which become larger and lie deeper; by the appearance of iron
implements and bronze fibulae; and by the fact that all the native
pottery is now made on the wheel. Relations with continental Greece are
evidenced by the occasional importation of Geometrical pottery of the
Dipylon type (as in the great vase found at Curium), dating from the
ninth and eighth centuries B.C. As we have already seen, the first
Hellenic settlements in Cyprus seem to have followed on more or less
immediately after the Dorian invasion, in the sites of Salamis, Curium,
Kerynia, Paphos, and others which afterwards became the capitals of
small Hellenic kingdoms.
On the other hand, the Phoenician thalassocracy, which began about the
ninth century B.C., never had much foothold in Cyprus, less at any rate
than was formerly supposed. Politically at all events the Phoenician
influence was comparatively small, even in their settlements at Kition
and Amathus[846]; we read of expeditions of the kings of Tyre in the
tenth and eighth centuries, the object of which was to force the former
town to pay tribute; but subsequently they were compelled by the
Assyrian domination under Sargon to retreat westwards. In the seventh
century a new power arose in the shape of Egypt, and in the sixth
Cyprus became a tributary of Amasis.[847] Throughout, however,
relations with Greece were maintained, and we read that in 501 B.C. the
Cypriote princes joined the Ionians in their revolt against Persia, a
fact which shows the strength of the Hellenic element.
Nevertheless the term “Graeco-Phoenician,” which has been adopted to
describe the art of this period, is convenient, and can hardly be
improved upon, if we bear in mind that the term “Phoenician” really
represents the combination of Egyptian and Assyrian elements of art
which filtered through that race into Cyprus, and in which sometimes
the one, sometimes the other has the predominance. This is seen perhaps
more clearly in the sculpture, metal-work, and terracottas, as for
instance in the incised bronze and silver bowls,[848] than in the
pottery. Painted pottery was never a feature of Oriental art, and the
Phoenician influence in the pottery is confined to borrowed motives of
Oriental character, like foreign words in a language. Another proof
that Cyprus resisted the Phoenician domination is afforded by the
curious fact that though the Greeks of the mainland adopted the
Phoenician alphabet entirely, in Cyprus, on the other hand—where, above
all, we should have expected to find it—its place is taken by a
syllabary, the forms of which appear to bear some relation to the
Lycian, Carian, and Pamphylian alphabets. That this syllabary, which is
universally employed for inscriptions down to the fourth century, is of
a very high antiquity is shown by its close affinities with the
newly-discovered Cretan script, and by the fact that single characters
of a similar type are often found engraved on the handles of Mycenaean
vases in Cyprus. Each character represents a syllable, not a letter
(except in the case of vowels), and the dialect is thought to be
largely influenced by Aeolic.
Mycenaean influence, as might be expected, was slow to die out in
Cyprus, and the pottery is no exception. It is seen not only in the
patterns, such as the concentric circles—an invention of the
Cypriote-Mycenaean pottery, which forms a favourite and almost
universal motive at a later date—but in the subjects and technique. The
practice of painting figures in outline, not in silhouette, as in the
birds and beasts of the Enkomi kraters, the use of dull red and black
pigments on an unglazed light-coloured surface, and many other details
are an heritage from the Bronze Age, extending over many a succeeding
century. With these are combined the influences of the early Attic
pottery,[849] in the panels of Geometrical patterns, and the later
rosette and conventionalised lotos-flower, which, with the concentric
circles, form the stock-in-trade of the “Graeco-Phoenician” potter. The
British Museum collection includes one or two remarkable isolated
specimens which illustrate this principle. It is for instance
instructive to compare the Sphinxes on a krater from Enkomi[850] with
those on a large amphora lately acquired from the Karpas,[851] or the
oinochoe from General Cesnola’s collection with a chariot-scene (Plate
XIII.),[852] with those from Mycenaean sites similarly decorated. On
the other hand, the extraordinary large vase from Tamassos,[853] with
its crudely and childishly drawn figures, combines a curious admixture
of Greek and Oriental motives, and early as it must be, is not
Mycenaean in conception or technique.
Oriental influence is not, however, altogether wanting in the pottery.
The lotos-flowers and rosettes, of which we have already spoken, are
derived respectively from Egypt and Assyria, and the conventionalised
palm-trees, which also appear, are of course purely Oriental. So too,
again, the typically Oriental subject of the sacred tree between two
animals appears in various forms. But here again we are met with the
surprising fact that the Oriental element is far stronger in Greece
than in Cyprus, as will be seen later in the account of the early
Hellenic fabrics; and no doubt it is due to this cause that the
Geometric style was not driven out from Cyprus as it was from Greece,
but continued for many centuries.
In attempting a detailed description of the Graeco-Phoenician pottery,
it will be seen that any chronological system is impossible. The
conservative tendency of Cypriote art caused the same methods of
decoration to be employed with extraordinary persistency during a
period of time which saw the whole development of Hellenic
vase-painting from its earliest beginnings to its decline, and though
there is a certain amount of variety, there is no development properly
speaking, and the latest fabrics are, artistically speaking, on the
same level as the earliest. It might be thought that the evidence of
excavations would compensate for this absence of artistic criteria; but
such is not the case. As a general rule in tombs containing imported
Greek vases, the dates of which can be fixed within reasonable limits,
native pottery is conspicuous by its absence, as may be seen from the
results obtained at Curium. In any case, in the tombs richest in
Hellenic pottery, as at Poli, the local wares are largely of a
definitely late character, and so far distinct from the Geometrical and
Orientalising fabrics as to form a class by themselves. Another
difficulty which has to be taken into account, is that caused by the
frequency of re-burials in Cypriote tombs. Of this there were countless
instances at Amathus and Poli, so much so that explorers of the latter
site were actually led to believe that the Geometrical pottery was
contemporaneous with remains of the Hellenistic age with which it was
frequently found.[854] But where trustworthy evidence can be obtained,
it entirely militates against this possibility.
The principal sites[855] on which “Graeco-Phoenician” pottery has been
found are: Amathus, Curium, Dali (Idalion), Kition, Lapathos, Poli
(Marion-Arsinoe), Paphos, Salamis, Soli, and Tamassos. Other sites are
not at present identified, but the finds were made in the neighbourhood
of the modern Achna, Ormidhia, and other villages, and in the Karpas.
Of these sites the richest are Amathus, Dali, Curium, and Poli; but in
the finest collection of vases of this class, that of General Cesnola
at New York, the alleged sites are not always to be accepted with
certainty.
[Illustration: FIG. 75. JUG WITH CONCENTRIC CIRCLES: GRAECO-PHOENICIAN
PERIOD (BRITISH MUSEUM).]
Graeco-Phoenician pottery is, as has been said, exclusively wheel-made,
and almost always supplied with a “base-ring.” Reliefs and incised
ornaments are never found, but instances of moulded wares, combining
the vase with the statuette, are not wanting, especially among the
later varieties. The designs are usually painted in a non-lustrous
black pigment, varied with the use of opaque purple and white,
corresponding to the pigments employed by Hellenic potters. The ground
is either white, without any polish or slip—as in the painted white
ware of the Bronze Age and sub-Mycenaean fabrics—or else covered with a
more or less lustrous red slip, varying from a bright orange or deep
red to a dark brown (the latter usually with unpolished surface).
Purple is employed only on the white wares, white only on the red. The
typical decoration of the white wares consists of lotos-patterns,
tree-ornaments, and water-fowl. Generally speaking, these are earlier
than the red. On the lustrous red wares the decoration is usually
confined to simple patterns of concentric circles, vertical and
horizontal, maeander crosses, lozenges and triangles. Fig. 75, from
Curium, is a typical specimen of the more elaborate types, and another
is shown in Plate XIII.
The forms are at first very varied, but gradually crystallise into some
half-dozen main types: dishes, bowls on stems, lekythi with one or two
handles, jugs with globular bodies, and large amphorae with vertical
side-handles. Of these the jug is by far the commonest. Among the
peculiar forms in the earlier tombs (eighth to sixth centuries) may be
mentioned _aski_ in the form of birds or oxen (the latter a Mycenaean
survival), and a kind of flask with barrel-shaped body, on which the
decoration of concentric circles, etc., does not follow the usual
horizontal system of classical pottery, but is disposed vertically, in
contradiction to all artistic feeling (see Plate XIII.). The circles
are often very fine and close, and were produced by holding a brush
full of paint close to the surface of the vase as it was turned on the
wheel. The drawing of the circles in different planes, without regard
to the lines of the vase, was easily effected by placing it in
different positions. In the period of Hellenic importations the
principal form is the jug with ovoid body and modelled spout, and flat
dishes are also common.
* * * * *
Unpainted pottery is almost as common as painted in the
Graeco-Phoenician period, and calls for a few words of separate
treatment. For the most part it comes under the heading of Domestic
Ware, or earthenware vessels similar to those in ordinary use at the
present day. They are made of plain, unrefined, usually reddish, clay,
without any slip or polish, and include various forms of jugs, bowls,
and plates, as well as the large wine-amphorae with pointed bases
universally found at all periods. Many lamps and small “cup-and-saucer”
double bowls occur in this category. In the earlier tombs of the
Transitional period, pottery of a black-slip ware, with reeded body, is
frequently found, chiefly in the form of jugs and kraters. Plain black
wares, like the Italian _bucchero_, are also rarely found; as are
vessels covered with a fine red slip and polished.
* * * * *
In most of the painted pottery of the Graeco-Phoenician period,
especially in its earlier phases, the technical methods are those which
we have already described in speaking not only of the “sub-Mycenaean”
or Transitional fabrics, but also of the painted white ware of the
Bronze-Age tombs. That is to say, that the decoration is in dull colour
on a lustreless and (usually) unpolished white or drab ground. The
colour, however, is usually not red, as in the earlier stages, but
black, red being used chiefly as an accessory or for picked-out
details. The latter varies from a pale brick-red to deep purple. The
system of decoration is often extremely elaborate, although the range
of subjects is limited. Apart from geometrical or conventional
patterns, such as the stylised palmette, lotos-flower, stars, or trees,
we only find water-fowl, fish, a few quadrupeds such as bulls or
deer,[856] and finally human figures. But the last are exceedingly
rare, and confined to the white wares, the best example being perhaps
the very Oriental design of two warriors driving in a chariot,[857] or
the worshippers rendering homage to seated deities on the fine vase
from Ormidhia (Fig. 76).[858]
------------------------------------------------------
PLATE XIII
[Illustration: CYPRIOTE POTTERY: GRAECO-PHOENICIAN PERIOD (BRITISH
MUSEUM).]
------------------------------------
The system of geometrical decoration on some of the earlier vases,
especially the large jars, is often extremely elaborate, covering every
available inch of the surface[859]; the patterns consist of rosettes,
panels of lozenge-pattern or chequers, triangles of hatched lines,
dotted circles, etc., all combined in parallel bands or friezes, much
in the same way as on the Dipylon wares. The disappearance of this
elaborate style, together with human figures and figures of animals, is
perhaps to be accounted for by the importations of Hellenic wares which
began in the sixth century, and relegated the local fabrics to a
subordinate position, just as in Greece the early Geometrical fabrics
were obscured by the Mycenaean pottery (see below, p. 279).
Some interesting specimens, forming a late survival of these earlier
Geometrical wares, were found at Amathus in 1894.[860] They include one
which has a parallel in a vase found at Phocaea by Prof. Ramsay,[861]
and originally thought to be Ionic in origin; the decoration consists
of a head of Hathor the Egyptian goddess in a panel, with debased
geometrical patterns. There can be no doubt now that the fabric is
Cypriote, probably of the fifth century, and not without traces of
Ionic influence. Another shows a remarkable development in the
direction of naturalism, and the subject is unique in Cypriote pottery:
men banqueting under a palm-tree.
[Illustration:
From _Baumeister_.
FIG. 76. CYPRIOTE VASE FROM ORMIDHIA.
]
These probably date from the fifth century, the period which seems to
be represented by the later Geometrical red wares with concentric
circles, now slowly dying out under the influence of Hellenic
importations, and exceedingly rare in tombs where Greek vases are
found. At the same time a great transformation comes over the contents
of the tombs, which themselves begin to increase in size, with a
shorter δρόμος, to which a flight of steps leads down. Other tombs—and
this is often the case where Greek importations are found, as at
Curium—are merely in the form of ramifying passages cut in the earth,
without any structural remains. Sixth century and earlier Greek
fabrics, such as the Geometrical, Corinthian, or Ionian wares, are very
rare; but the imported Dipylon vase found by General Cesnola at
Curium[862] is a notable instance. Black-figured vases when found are
almost invariably of a late and careless type, characteristic of the
last efforts of that style in the fifth century. There is, however, a
remarkable exception in the case of a small class of jugs, which are in
shape an exact imitation of the globular Cypriote jugs with
concentric-circle decoration[863]; the long narrow neck and trefoil
mouth, with its incised eyes, are retained, but the decoration is
purely Attic, in the style of B.F. vases of 520–500 B.C. These are
found at Poli and Amathus, and appear to have been made specially at
Athens for importation to Cyprus. Poli (Marion) was for some reason a
great centre for Athenian imports in general, and has yielded many fine
specimens of Hellenic pottery (see p. 67). Red-figured vases signed by
Chachrylion, Hermaios, etc., have been found here,[864] and at Curium a
fine R.F. krater with the name of Megakles (καλός)[865]; also some fine
white-ground specimens at Poli.[866]
By the fourth century, if not earlier, the Geometrical and Hellenic
vases are almost entirely replaced by a new class of wares, which may
be termed “Graeco-Cypriote,” in contradistinction to the
Graeco-Phoenician. The same red clay, covered with a more or less
polished red slip, still obtains, but the painted decoration is
confined to olive-wreaths in brown or plain bands of colour. We also
witness the revival of an old practice, in a partial return to the
taste for plastic decoration on vases. In many of the fourth-century
tombs are found large pitchers, with a spout modelled in the form of a
woman holding a jug, out of which the liquid was intended to pour
(Plate XIII.).[867] These are sometimes richly decorated in polychrome,
red, blue, green, black, pink, and white; but the colouring is apt to
flake off and disappear. The imported wares of the fourth century are
confined to plain cups and bowls of glazed black ware with stamped
patterns, such as are often found in Greece and Italy. In the
Hellenistic period (300–146 B.C.) painted vases are practically
unknown, though a few rare specimens have turned up at Curium[868]; and
it is not long before they are entirely replaced by the glass vessels
and common wine-amphorae of the large and elaborate Roman tombs.
§ 2. PRIMITIVE POTTERY IN GREECE
BIBLIOGRAPHY
TROY: Schliemann, _Ilios_; Dörpfeld, _Troja 1893_, and _Troja und
Ilion_ (1902), i. p. 243 ff.; Dumont-Pottier, _Céramiques_, i. p.
3 ff.; Pottier, _Louvre Cat._ i. p. 74 ff.
THERA: Fouqué, _Santorin_; Dumont-Pottier, _Céramiques_, i. p. 19
ff.; Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, vi. p. 135 ff.; Furtwaengler and
Loeschcke, _Myken. Vasen_, p. 18; Pottier, _Louvre Cat._ i. p.
119 ff.; Hiller von Gaertringen, _Thera_, vol. ii. (1903), p. 127
ff.; _Ath. Mitth._ xxviii. (1903), p. 1 ff.
MELOS: Excavations of British School at Phylakopi (_J.H.S._
Suppl. Vol. iv. 1904). See also Dümmler in _Ath. Mitth._ xi.
(1886), p. 15 ff.
The earliest remains of pottery on Hellenic soil are to be sought
chiefly in the Cyclades and on the site of ancient Troy. We have
already had occasion to allude to the latter in speaking of the
earliest Cypriote fabrics, and it is therefore fitting that we should
now give it our first attention.
The site of =Troy=, now known as Hissarlik, was, as is well known,
first explored by Dr. Schliemann in his laudable endeavours to prove
the truth of the early Greek legends of the Trojan War. Although
doubtless there are visible links between the Homeric poems and the
discoveries at Hissarlik, and although it is not necessary to deny all
credence to the historical truth of the “Bible of the Greeks,” yet it
is now generally recognised that Dr. Schliemann’s pardonable enthusiasm
sometimes led him to hasty conclusions. For instance, Dr. Dörpfeld in
his more recent investigations proved that if any remains are to be
connected with the tale of Troy, it is those of the sixth, not of the
second or burnt city.[869] Nine layers in all have been traced, of
which the five lowest may be termed prehistoric, the third, fourth, and
fifth being mere villages on the ruins of the first two. In the lowest
and earliest of all, which may be roughly dated 3000–2500 B.C., flint
implements were found, together with rude black pottery: hand-made
utensils baked in the open, with rings for suspension in place of
handles.
The second city belongs to the period 2500–2000 B.C., and it is this
which has yielded pottery analogous to the earliest examples from
Cyprus (p. 238). It is of the same rough hand-polished black ware, with
decoration either of a plastic character or engraved in the clay while
wet and filled in with white paint. Apart from this there are no traces
of painted decoration, or of any slip; but the colour of the surface
varies with the firing. The patterns consist of zigzags, circles, and
other rudimentary geometrical ornaments. A few wheel-made specimens
were found, but the majority are made by hand. What artistic sense was
evinced by these primitive potters was shown exclusively in the forms,
and in the tendency which is especially conspicuous in primitive times,
though it lingered on through the history of Greek art, and again broke
out in the period of the decadence, to combine the ceramic and the
plastic idea, and to give to the vase the rude resemblance of the human
form.[870] That this was no far-fetched idea is shown by the universal
nomenclature which permits us to speak of the mouth, neck, shoulder,
body, and foot of a vase—a principle which has been extended by general
consent to countless inanimate objects. Thus we find the Hissarlik
potter incising eyes on the upper part of the vase, or affixing lumps
of clay to give a rude suggestion of ears, nose or breasts, or bands to
denote necklaces. The handles often seem intended for rudimentary arms,
and we are tempted to see in the hat-shaped covers of the vases the
idea of a head-covering. Schliemann even went so far as to regard them
as actual idols, and was led by the superficial resemblance of some to
the form of an owl into identifying them with figures of the “owl-eyed”
(γλαυκῶπις) Pallas Athena (cf. Fig. 77). But this interpretation has
not found favour for many reasons, and the accidental combination of
forms is obviously only an artistic phase. There are also many similar
shapes, such as plain jars and jugs, and deep funnel-shaped cups with
two graceful handles.
[Illustration: FIG. 77. “OWL-VASE” FROM TROY.]
M. Dumont[871] classifies the fabrics as follows: (1) ordinary vessels,
plates, etc.; (2) large jars or amphorae; (3) primitive kraters, deep
cups, etc.; (4) spherical vases with base-ring [?] and long neck[872];
(5) long two-handled cups; (6) vases reproducing the human form; (7)
vases in the form of pigs and other animals; (8) exceptional forms,
such as double vases; (9) vases with incised patterns, on one of which
a Sphinx is engraved. Figs. 78–80 give examples of classes (5), (7),
and (8); Fig. 77 a specimen of class (6).[873]
[Illustration: FIG. 78. FUNNEL-VASE FROM TROY.]
The Hissarlik pottery may be regarded as a local development, partly
parallel with that of Cyprus,[874] partly derivative therefrom; of
Oriental influence there are no traces, but the connection with Thera
and Cyprus is indisputable.
[Illustration: FIG. 79. VASE IN FORM OF PIG, FROM TROY.]
Passing over the unimportant traces of the three succeeding
settlements, we find in the sixth city a great advance. The plastic
forms disappear, and generally speaking the shapes become more
classical. Besides plain pottery with matt-black polished surface we
meet with painted vases with curvilinear and vegetable patterns. The
remains of genuine Mycenaean pottery, the fortifications and buildings,
with great halls in the style of Mycenae and Tiryns, bear out Dr.
Dörpfeld’s contention that this is the Troy of Homer. Two points among
the pottery finds of this period are worth noting; firstly that they
included a fragment of Cypriote “white-slip” ware, secondly that
Geometrical patterns mingle with the Mycenaean in the upper layers.
[Illustration: FIG. 80. VASE WITH TWO NECKS (TROY).]
The three remaining layers cover respectively the archaic period, the
developed Hellenic and Hellenistic periods, and the age in which the
city of Ilium was refounded by the Romans. Dr. Dörpfeld found some
interesting local fabrics dating from the fifth century, examples of
which had previously been obtained by Mr. Calvert for the British
Museum.[875]
* * * * *
Of almost equal antiquity with the remains at Hissarlik is some of the
pottery discovered in the Cyclades, and especially at =Thera=. Here,
indeed, we meet with the earliest known examples of Greek _painted_
pottery (Crete excepted), and that, as we shall see, of a remarkably
developed type.
The island of Thera may be described as a sort of prehistoric Pompeii
buried under volcanic deposits, which have completely transformed the
configuration of the island. The results of preliminary excavations by
the French in 1866 showed that the cataclysm which overwhelmed the
island must (on geological grounds) have taken place about the
twentieth century B.C., and that the remains of pottery must be
anterior to this event.[876] Herodotos[877] states that Kadmos founded
a settlement in the fourteenth century, and the Minyae again about the
twelfth, and the island must have been uninhabitable for a long time
previously.
The houses and other remains of civilisation discovered below the
volcanic deposits show an advance on Hissarlik (second city) and the
earliest Cypriote culture, and the pottery is no exception. The vases
are wheel-made, fired at a moderate heat in closed furnaces (sometimes
baked in the sun), and plastic forms are almost wanting.[878] Many are
pierced with holes in the bottom, for what purpose is not known. They
were often found _in situ_, mixed with stone implements, and with
evidence of having contained grain. The forms are very regular, a
cylindrical shape being specially affected, and they are made of a
badly levigated clay, covered with a greyish slip, on which the
patterns are laid in _matt_ colours—white, black, or red—without any
incised markings.
[Illustration:
From _Baumeister_.
FIG. 81. VASES FROM THERA.
]
M. Dumont distinguishes four varieties of ornament: simple patterns,
such as bands, hatchings, and dots; volutes, wave-patterns, and
intersecting circles; vegetable motives, such as long narrow leaves or
flowers; and animals, including deer, and ducks or swans. Generally
there is a strong predilection for vegetable motives, and in this
naturalistic tendency we may see the prelude to the Mycenaean period.
Among those now at the French School at Athens, which has the best
collection, are several interesting examples illustrated in Fig.
81.[879] One is a trefoil-mouthed jug with running quadrupeds in black,
and red bands, on a grey ground; another jug is painted with birds in
black, the details in red and white. A sort of cream-jug is decorated
with water-plant patterns; a cylindrical jar with oblique wreaths; and
a dish with seaweed. A funnel-shaped vase and a beak-mouthed jug are
obvious prototypes of Mycenaean forms.
The chief differences from the Hissarlik vases are in the forms and
methods of decoration, but resemblances may be noted in the long narrow
necks, and the rings for suspension, as in the plastic forms when they
do occur. That the fabric is a local one hardly admits of doubt, but it
is interesting to note the occurrence of a bowl of white-slip ware from
Cyprus in Thera,[880] and conversely the appearance of a vase of Thera
fabric at Mycenae.[881] Thus we have evidence of extensive commercial
relations. Some tombs of the Hellenic period seem to have been dug
right down into the volcanic deposit, for they contained pottery with
Geometrical decoration.[882]
The discovery of primitive stone idols in Thera shows that it belonged
to the Cycladic civilisation, which extended from 2500 to 1600 B.C.,
filling up the gap between Hissarlik and Mycenae. It has been suggested
that these Cycladic peoples were Carians,[883] subsequently driven to
the Asiatic mainland by Minos, who typifies the rising power of Crete
and the Mycenaean world.[884] This Cycladic civilisation is also
exemplified in the earliest finds from other islands, such as Amorgos,
Syra, Paros, and Antiparos, and in other instances noted early in the
century by the observant traveller Ross.[885] The pottery from these
sites is, however, less advanced than that of Thera, but varies in
character. Painted patterns were found on vases from Amorgos and Syra,
the latter in the form of brown foliage on yellow ground.
It would not be right to conclude this section without some notice of
the remarkably interesting pottery excavated at Phylakopi in =Melos= by
the British School in 1896–99, which is important as forming a
connecting link between the Cycladic wares and the fully-developed
Mycenaean style. Space forbids more than a brief abstract of the
results obtained, which have just been given to the world in an
admirable publication.[886] Mr. C. C. Edgar, to whom the task of
studying the pottery was allotted, distinguishes four main groups:
1. (_a_) Primitive pottery of the cist-tomb type, corresponding to
that of Hissarlik; (_b_) more advanced ware of the same kind.
2. Painted Geometrical wares.
3. Local pottery in Mycenaean style with spiral and naturalistic
designs, falling into two divisions, earlier and later.
4. Imported Mycenaean pottery of the third and fourth styles (see
below, p. 271).
Generally speaking the pottery is of local make, and Phylakopi seems to
have been an important centre in the early Mycenaean period, having
considerable intercourse with Crete. The earliest wares (class 1)
include plain pottery, hand-made, with burnished brown surface or
simple incised patterns; those of class 2 are painted in lustrous or
matt black on a white slip, or in white on lustrous black or red, with
simple patterns; they appear to be hand-made. The Mycenaean pottery is
more or less akin to that found elsewhere in the Aegean.
§ 3. Crete
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Dumont-Pottier, i. p. 64 (finds in 1878 at Knossos); Milchhoefer,
_Anfänge der Kunst_; Furtwaengler and Loeschcke, _Myken. Vasen_,
p. 22; Pottier, _Louvre Cat._ i. p. 173; _Mon. Antichi_, vi. p.
333 ff.; _J.H.S._ xxi. p. 78 ff., xxiii. p. 157 ff.; _British
School Annual_, vi. p. 85 ff., vii. p. 51, and ix. p. 297 ff.;
_Proc. Soc. Antiqs._ xv. (1894), p. 351 ff.
In turning our attention next to the island of Crete, we are confronted
with a new element in Greek archaeology; namely, the results of the
recent discoveries, which as yet have hardly become material ripe for
use in a general handbook. On the other hand, their singular importance
deserves full recognition. It must, therefore, be borne in mind that
much in the succeeding section is merely the embodiment of previous
researches, and that the new evidence can only be briefly summarised.
Allusion has just been made to the thalassocracy of Minos and its
bearing on the history of early Greek civilisations, and the recent
discoveries have done much to show that the prince who built the great
palace at Knossos in the early days of Mycenaean civilisation, if he is
not actually the Minos of Greek legend, yet represents the rising power
which extended its dominion over the Aegean and drove the Carian people
to the mainland. This supremacy of Crete from the fifteenth to the
eleventh century was artistic as well as political. The Crete of Minos
was, moreover, the point of contact between the Aegean peoples and the
Oriental races; and in the story of the Minotaur we may perhaps see a
reflection of the human sacrifices offered to the Phoenician Moloch or
Melkarth. The familiar passage in Homer[887] which deals with the
ethnography of Crete speaks of four component elements, which may be
explained as (1) the Eteokretes, or aborigines of the island, to whom
the early civilisation exemplified in their ceramic and glyptic
products is mainly due; (2) the Kydonii or Leleges, brought by Minos
from the islands[888]; (3) the Achaeans or mainland Greeks of the
period of the Trojan War; (4) the Dorians, whose connection with the
island dates from the eleventh century onwards.
Even before the recent excavations pottery had been found in Crete
which dated from the dawn of the Mycenaean period, and from the
island’s early connection with Egypt was thought to be contemporaneous
with that of Hissarlik and Thera. From the circumstances of its first
appearance in any quantity at Kamaraes, in the plain of Ida, it has
usually been named after that place. Dr. Orsi discovered two fragments
of Hissarlik type at Phaestos,[889] also a vase of island type, one of
Thera type,[890] and some early Cypriote wares.[891] Large numbers of
fragments of this ware in the Museum at Candia were first noted by Dr.
Orsi and Mr. J. L. Myres about 1894.[892] The extensive discoveries
made by Messrs. Hogarth and Welch for the British School at Athens in
1899–1900 (see p. 60) have added still further to our knowledge of the
ware; and these, taken in conjunction with Mr. Arthur Evans’s extensive
finds at Knossos (1899–1902), have enabled a recent writer to draw up a
tentative classification of all the prehistoric pottery of Crete.[893]
In his paper Mr. Mackenzie divides the pottery into three main classes,
which he distinguishes as Neolithic, Early and Middle Minoan, and Late
Minoan. The first-named extends down to about 3000 B.C.; the second
covers the period 3000–2000 B.C.; and the third (including Mycenaean
pottery of the usual types) lasts down to 1500 B.C., about which time
the Cretan supremacy came to an end, and the Mycenaean centre of
gravity was shifted to the mainland of Greece.
(1) Pottery of the Neolithic period is quite exceptional in Aegean
localities; yet the evidence from the excavations is so unmistakable
that there can be no question of its great antiquity. It consists of
common household vessels of grey clay, hand-made and burnished; at
first devoid of decoration, but subsequently fragments appear with
incised patterns filled in with white. These, it may be noted, may help
to date the analogous wares from Troy and Egypt. The black surface
becomes more and more lustrous, and in some cases a sort of rippling
effect is produced in the soft clay with a blunt instrument[894];
finally an age of decline manifests itself, but at the same time an
advance is made from filling in hollows with white to painting in
colours on the flat surface.
(2) The pottery in this stage is still hand-made; but the clay, which
is of a brick or terracotta colour, is greatly improved, and shows that
a potter’s oven must have been employed. The most remarkable feature is
that, along with the white or polychrome patterns on dark ground, the
origin of which has been noted, there appear vases with patterns in
lustrous dark colour on buff ground, like the Mycenaean wares. Hitherto
it had been supposed that the latter process was much later than the
other[895]; but the Cretan evidence admits of no doubt as to their
synchronism, even at this early stage of painted pottery in any form.
The pre-Mycenaean character of the Early Minoan deposits is, for
instance, proved by the entire absence of plain pottery of Mycenaean
types. It is then clear that Crete developed both independently of, and
with far greater rapidity than, the rest of the Aegean at this period.
The painted patterns are usually of a Geometrical character.[896]
The middle deposits of the third millennium, found above the floors of
the first palace, are, like the preceding, both polychrome and
monochrome in their decoration. The former include most of the types
formerly known as Kamaraes ware, the patterns being mainly but not
exclusively Geometrical; the curvilinear are rather later in date. The
commonest shape is one resembling a tea-cup.[897] In the next stage
relief-work is introduced to enhance the polychrome effect, probably in
imitation of metal. In the latest deposits a great decline is manifest,
and the monochrome vases tend to assert themselves to the exclusion of
the others.
That the period under discussion must have been one of great length is
shown by the depth of the “Minoan” deposits; they are, moreover, so
extensive at Knossos, and so scanty and isolated are examples from
other sites, that it cannot be doubted that here we have the centre of
the fabric. As regards their date we have good evidence from early
Aegean deposits in Egypt. By means of Professor Petrie’s finds at Kahun
in the Fayûm, which include specimens of the best Minoan ware,[898] we
are able to place the height of the period about 2500 B.C.
------------------------------------------------------
PLATE XIV
[Illustration:
From _Brit. School Annual_, ix.
STAND FOR VASE; KAMARAES WARE.
FROM PALAIOKASTRO, CRETE.
]
------------------------------------
The appearance of the so-called Kamaraes ware is unmistakable, with its
bright, almost gay, aspect, and the contrast of the colours with the
lustrous black ground. The pigments employed are four in number—milky
white, yellow ochre, brick-red, and purple-red. These vases are mostly
made on the wheel, and the buff-coloured clay is fairly well levigated,
as is the slip, on which the pigments are directly laid; its lustre
often almost rivals that of the best Hellenic pottery. Mr. Evans found
some specimens in 1902 of an extremely delicate character, almost as
thin as an egg-shell. The colours are, however, sometimes dull and
powdery, and apt to flake away except when fired. The forms are of a
Cycladic type, the favourite being a two-handled globular vase with
spout, and a pear-shaped one-handled vase, also with a spout[899] (see
also Plate XIV.[900]).
The decoration is, as has been indicated, plastic as well as pictorial;
the relief ornaments are often of an elaborate type, as may be seen in
some of Mr. Hogarth’s finds.[901] Some vases are merely covered with
knobs, or with a sort of honeycombing in relief[902]; in others toothed
or bossed bands are employed, either simply or combined into complex
patterns. In any case this plastic element is quite a new departure.
The pictorial designs include geometrical and linear patterns, zigzags,
network, concentric circles, spirals, and swastikas; leaves, rosettes,
and other vegetable forms; fishes, and even in one case a human
figure.[903] The chief field of decoration is the shoulder of the vase.
Although varying in the extent of their naturalism, the patterns
exhibit considerable boldness and power of drawing; they seem to be
drawn chiefly from floral or textile sources, and are closely parallel
to the Thera vases, but more advanced. Some motives are of Mycenaean
character, such as the use of rows of white dots[904]; on the other
hand, the style of the fishes and human figure is more like that of the
Geometrical vases.
Mr. Hogarth notes that metal types of Kamaraes cups appear in the hands
of Kefti tributaries in the paintings of the tomb of Rekhmara (about
1550 B.C.), and he even found their Neolithic prototypes at Kephala,
near Knossos.[905] He also traces a connection with the early Aegean
pottery of Phylakopi in Melos. The Kamaraes pottery can be shown not to
have survived the incoming of the new Mycenaean influences, but the
patterns rapidly became conventionalised, and are replaced by the new
motives of the Mycenaean wares. It may further be noted that fragments
of Kamaraes ware have turned up not only in Egypt, as at Kahun (already
mentioned), but at Tiryns, in the fifth and sixth Acropolis graves at
Mycenae, and at Curium in Cyprus.
(3) The pottery of the “Late Minoan” period from the palace of Knossos
falls into two groups—the “palace” style, and the ordinary Mycenaean
fabrics. The former class of vases has been found in considerable
numbers in the second palace, and also at Zakro and other sites. The
vases are painted in a lustrous brown-to-black glaze on a buff
hand-polished slip, with fine and elaborate naturalistic designs,
including vegetable patterns, birds, and fishes; others, again, are
more architectonic in character.[906] We also find adaptations of the
Kamaraes style, with bands of white paint laid on the black varnish,
the usual forms being a flat bowl and a small cup with flat handles
like the Vaphio cups.[907]
In their decoration the most highly developed varieties of the “palace”
style show a parallelism with the wall-paintings, the patterns
consisting of rosettes, spirals, and conventional flowers; in some very
naturalistic examples this is strongly marked, the designs of olive and
myrtle wreaths and bulbous plants showing an almost Japanese fidelity
to nature. Others, again, have marine subjects—seaweed, shells, and
rocks. Lastly, there are the representations of the double axe, which
Mr. Evans has shown to be a religious symbol.[908]
The whole of this pottery belongs to the third or highest period of
Mycenaean pottery, a time when decadence was actually beginning to set
in, concurrent with the end of the eighteenth dynasty. At this time all
over the Aegean area, in Melos, Egypt, and elsewhere, the styles of
pottery were perfectly uniform, and had clearly been imported from one
centre. In the light of recent discoveries we can no longer doubt that
this centre was Crete, and the previous history of its pottery and the
early development of its technical processes, as well as its
geographical position, point in the same direction. About the year 1500
B.C. the site appears to have been invaded and abandoned, with the
consequent result that Mycenaean civilisation now spread all over the
Aegean, centring chiefly in Greece, where it lasted several centuries
longer. Of its influence on Cyprus we have already spoken.
Mycenaean vases had turned up in Crete for some time previous to 1899
in a sporadic fashion[909]; but these, being for the most part of the
ordinary type, do not call for separate consideration. There is,
however, one class that appears to be peculiar to the island. It
consists of large “false amphorae” and other vases, made of a rough
coarse-grained clay, and decorated in the “third Mycenaean” style with
large cuttle-fish; at Knossos this was found only outside the palace,
and was probably a coarse household ware. A good specimen has also been
found at Curium in Cyprus.[910]
§ 4. MYCENAEAN POTTERY
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Furtwaengler and Loeschcke, _Mykenische Thongefässe_ (1879), and
_Mykenische Vasen_ (1886); Dumont-Pottier, i. p. 47 ff.; Perrot,
_Hist. de l’Art_, vi. p. 893 ff.; Pottier, _Louvre Cat._ i. p.
181 ff. General reference should also be made to Schuchhardt,
_Schliemann’s Excavations_ (transl. E. Sellers); Schliemann’s own
works; Hall, _Oldest Civilisation of Greece_; Tsountas and
Manatt, _The Mycenaean Age_; and other works.
We have already had occasion to deal to some extent with Mycenaean
pottery in connection with Cyprus and Crete, but it is now necessary to
review it as a whole in the light of the present state of our knowledge
of this wonderful civilisation and its products. To enter here upon the
wide and much-debated questions to which the discoveries of the last
thirty years have given rise is of course beyond our province; but the
pottery of the people to whom the name Mycenaean has been somewhat
loosely given is of so homogeneous a character, although found in all
parts of the Mediterranean, that it may be treated as a phase of Greek
ceramics, independently of considerations of ethnography and
chronology. First found in any quantity at Ialysos in the island of
Rhodes, its exact position in the history of early art was not then
recognised; but when the marvellous discoveries of Heinrich Schliemann
at Mycenae became known to the world, including large numbers of
similar vases, Sir Charles Newton readily recognised that the Ialysos
vases in the British Museum belonged to the same class. It was not long
before the whole number of vases of this type, now christened
Mycenaean, was collected in a “Corpus” by two German scholars, with
numerous illustrations; but since that time the excavations of
“Mycenaean” sites in Cyprus and Crete must have doubled or even trebled
the material available.
The pottery at Mycenae was found in four different positions, implying
consecutive chronological stages, ranging roughly from the fifteenth to
the tenth or even ninth century. On these grounds Furtwaengler and
Loeschcke[911] distinguished four main classes; but it will be seen
that these are capable of even more subdivision. There are, in fact,
two main classes, distinguished by the use of _matt_ and lustrous
colour respectively; and of the first of these two, of the second four,
subdivisions are possible.
Class (1) is indeed comparatively rare,[912] and only found at Thera
and in the oldest tombs on the Mycenaean Acropolis; it represents the
transition from the pottery of Troy and Thera to that of Mycenae. The
subdivision is a purely technical one: (_a_) vases of pale coarse clay,
with patterns in a brown colour, some hand-made[913]; (_b_) wheel-made
vases of a reddish and finer clay, the designs in black and pale red,
occasionally white.[914] The decoration generally resembles that of the
Thera vases, and animals occasionally appear.
(2) The vases with lustrous painting may be classified as follows:
(_a_) Badly levigated clay; floral motives in matt-white or
red-brown on black ground.[915] A fine example of this class was
recently excavated at Maroni in Cyprus, a large krater with a
figure of a bird outlined in white on either side (Plate XII.).
(_b_) Similar clay, but coated with a white or yellow slip on which
geometrical or floral patterns are painted in lustrous black.[916]
(_c_) Fine clay with polished yellow surface; designs in black
turning to red or yellow, with occasional details in white;
chiefly marine plants and animals, but occasionally (especially in
Cyprus) human figures.[917] This class is by far the most numerous
of all, but is not found in Thera. It corresponds with the period
1400–1000 B.C.
(_d_) Clay grey or reddish, less brilliant, as is also the black;
large figures of quadrupeds and human figures.[918] The vases are
sometimes painted _inside_, which is a sign of late date.
The structure of these vases is very varied, and no less than 122
different forms may be distinguished in the illustrations to the
_Mykenische Vasen_. Most characteristic and popular is the “false
amphora,” as it is generally termed (German, _Bügelkanne_), a vase with
spheroidal body, of varying size, with the peculiarity that the
ordinary neck and mouth on the top are closed by a flat handle arching
over the vase, and the only aperture is a spout on one side (see Plate
XV. and Fig. 82). These are very widely distributed, but their
decoration is as a rule very simple; they appear depicted on the
paintings of Egyptian tombs of the eighteenth dynasty, and this has
often been used as an argument for the dating of Mycenaean vases. But
they must have remained in favour for a considerable period. Other
favourite shapes are: a funnel-shaped vase with handle at the top,
doubtless a reminiscence of a Hissarlik type (p. 258); a tall graceful
two-handled goblet or kylix, almost invariably decorated with
cuttle-fish (see Plate XV.), as the funnel-vases are with murex (purple
dye) shells; a beaked jug (German _Schnabelkanne_), derived from Thera;
a squat jar or pyxis, with three small handles (cf. Fig. 82); and a
tall pear-shaped vase with three handles on a high stem, which is
perhaps the prototype of the hydria. The large kraters are, as we have
seen, peculiar to Cyprus. Rarer forms are a sort of mug, and a
combination of the false amphora and pyxis. Mention should also be made
of the painted λάρνακες or _ossuaria_ found in Crete by Mr. J. H.
Marshall (p. 268 above) and by Dr. Orsi.[919]
The technique presents several entirely new features, such as the use
of a slip as a basis for the colours; the polished, brilliant, and even
surface; and above all the lustrous black varnish, which was the
peculiar pride of Greek potters, and is now a lost art. The comparative
monotony of the colouring is probably due to a purely technical reason,
namely, the difficulty of resisting the action of fire; otherwise such
an artistic people would doubtless have exhibited the same richness of
colouring in their pottery that we find in their frescoes.
The Mycenaean pottery is deservedly held in high estimation for its
picturesque and naturalistic style, which in its reproduction of animal
and vegetable forms often rivals Japanese art. Although its scope is
remarkably wide, yet there is a strong preference for marine
subjects—the cuttle-fish, the murex shell, the nautilus, and various
kinds of seaweed or such plants as the _Vallisneria spiralis_ (Chapter
XVI.). In Fig. 82 two good examples in the British Museum are
illustrated—one from Egypt, the other from Kalymnos.[920] Altogether
there is an originality and poetry of ideas such as never appears again
in Greek art; but that is not a peculiar possession of the potters, as
the metal-work, gem-engraving, and fresco-paintings testify—above all,
such masterpieces as the Vaphio gold cups, or some of the
wall-paintings recently discovered in Crete.
------------------------------------------------------
PLATE XV
[Illustration:
MYCENAEAN POTTERY
(BRITISH MUSEUM).
]
_To face page 273._
------------------------------------
Religious ideas, on the other hand, are strangely conspicuous by their
absence. Mycenaean mythology is so far almost nonexistent in the art;
and although attempts have at times been made to detect traces of early
cults, as in the figures of men dressed as animals,[921] or the
representations of the double axe,[922] they have not as yet met with
universal acceptance. More improbable is the curious idea recently
mooted,[923] that the subjects of the vase-paintings indicate an
acquaintance with such theories as those of biological evolution.
[Illustration: FIG. 82. MYCENAEAN VASES WITH MARINE SUBJECTS (BRIT.
MUS.).]
Mycenaean pottery has been found on a very large number of sites
throughout the Mediterranean. The most productive have been Mycenae,
Crete, and Cyprus, especially the cemetery at Enkomi in the latter
island. Other Cypriote centres are Curium, Agia Paraskevi near Nicosia,
Maroni, and the neighbourhood of Dali and Larnaka (see p. 66). In
Attica the Acropolis of Athens and the beehive tombs of Spata and
Menidi have been most fruitful, and finds have been made at Haliki and
elsewhere. In the Peloponnese the chief site is Tiryns, and many
fragments have also been found at Nauplia; in Central Greece several
sites in Boeotia, such as Orchomenos, may be mentioned. Of the Aegean
islands, Rhodes and Melos are most conspicuous, especially the sites of
Ialysos in the former island, Phylakopi in the latter. In Asia Minor,
Mycenaean remains are rare, except at Troy, but in Egypt there is ample
evidence of a close commercial relation, as in the finds at
Tell-el-Amarna, in the Fayûm, and elsewhere. In the Western
Mediterranean, Syracuse has yielded numerous fragments, and occasional
finds have been made in Italy.[924]
Having reviewed the extent of Mycenaean influence, the next question we
must consider is which, if any, was the centre whence this pottery was
exported. It had been for some time observed that the early varieties
of Thera, and those of Crete and Cyprus (_v. supra_), showed strong
indications of local origin; but on the whole the Mycenaean pottery
proper is remarkably uniform and homogeneous. It is perhaps possible to
detect technical differences between the pottery, _e.g._, of Athens and
Rhodes, but they may be only differences of date rather than fabric.
Furtwaengler and Loeschcke regarded Argolis as the centre of
manufacture, at least for the later lustrous varieties[925]; Pottier,
on the other hand, writing before the recent discoveries, thought that
Crete was, after Thera, the original centre, and Argolis only
subsequently, the pottery of Rhodes lying midway between. In the light
of the Cretan discoveries it is now possible largely to disregard
previous theories. We have seen that Mycenaean pottery found in Crete
has a pedigree which no other region can claim, and that it can only
have a local origin. We have also seen that the Cretan supremacy came
to an end about 1500 B.C., and that, though the pottery may have
continued to be made in the island, it ceased to be an exclusive
centre, and for the remainder of the Mycenaean Age the art, learned in
Crete, spread to other Aegean centres—Mycenae, Rhodes, and Cyprus.
A far more difficult question to decide is the ethnographical one,
together with the consideration of the relation of the Mycenaean
civilisation to others in which the same decoration appears (as in the
case of the spiral). One point seems to be abundantly clear, viz. that
Mycenaean decoration owes nothing to Oriental influences. That there
was a close relation with the East has already been indicated, and is
much more apparent in other forms of Mycenaean art; but no student of
this art in general can doubt that it is, as has been pointed out,
purely spontaneous and unique, the art of a people of genuine artistic
genius. Among the art of ancient races it stands alone in this respect,
that of Egypt and Assyria, its only prominent rivals, being always
essentially conventional; and herein lies its special distinction.
That the Mycenaeans were a maritime people admits of no doubt. It is
shown by the position of their chief centres, by the evidence of their
extensive commercial relations, and, as far as concerns their pottery,
pre-eminently by the subjects which form the staple decoration. Hence
of late years an attempt has been made to substitute for “Mycenaean”
the more comprehensive term “Aegean,” and there is much to be said in
its favour. As regards the actual ethnographical position of the race,
_Quot homines, tot sententiae_, may almost be said. They have been
identified with the Achaeans, the Pelasgians, the Phoenicians, the
Carians, and as combinations of Phrygians with Cretans, of Phoenicians
with Greeks of Asia Minor.[926] But few of these terms have real
historical value, and such identifications do not really advance the
solution of the question.
A more real ground of battle is that afforded by the question of date,
though on this point scholars now show a greater tendency to fall into
line, and a period culminating in the years 1400 to 1100 or 1000 B.C.
is now very generally accepted.[927] The question necessarily turns
largely on the evidence afforded by Crete and Egypt, and so far as this
is trustworthy it all points in the same direction. But it would be
beyond the scope of a work of this kind to do more than briefly
summarise the general results of archaeological criticism.
An interesting study of Mycenaean ornamentation has been made by Dr.
Riegl,[928] who deals generally with the principles underlying its
vegetable motives, and points out that here we first meet with scrolls
or continuous bands of foliage applied to a decorative purpose. These
motives are peculiar to Greek art, and in Mycenaean design their origin
is to be sought. In this way we may regard it as the immediate
forerunner of Hellenic art, although its development was temporarily
arrested by the Dorian invasion, just as the people who produced it
formed the basis of the Hellenic race. The naturalism of Mycenaean
ornament, which is seen both in continuous and in isolated patterns, is
in marked contrast to the convention of Egypt, where the same motives
may be in use. It is not, in short, the motive, but its treatment,
which shows the independence of Mycenaean art. There are, again, other
patterns, such as the spiral, which cannot be traced in Oriental art,
and seem to be purely original, at least as far as concerns the Eastern
Mediterranean.
Another recent writer, Dr. S. Wide, has noticed that where Mycenaean
influence was originally strongest, as in Crete and Rhodes, there its
characteristics were most strongly impressed upon the art of the
succeeding period, and he is inclined to place the centre of the fabric
in these islands or on the coast of the adjoining continent of Asia. At
all events the Mycenaean influence shows itself more in the pottery of
the islands than it does in Attica; and, in Crete and Rhodes in
particular, instances have been found of undoubted survivals of typical
Mycenaean ornaments in later pottery.[929]
-----
Footnote 820:
See _Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 14.
Footnote 821:
Cf. Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, iii. figs. 487–93.
Footnote 822:
Cf. Perrot, _op. cit._ iii. figs. 498–503.
Footnote 823:
See Hall, _Oldest Civilisation of Greece_, p. 72.
Footnote 824:
See _Athen. Mitth._ xi. p. 249 ff., and Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, vi.
p. 648. A fragment of late Bronze-Age Cypriote pottery was found at
Hissarlik (Dörpfeld, _Troja und Ilion_, i. p. 286, fig. 182).
Footnote 825:
See Meursius, _Cyprus_, i. chap. 20; Heuzey, _Cat. des Fig. ant. du
Louvre_, p. 115.
Footnote 826:
Strabo, xiv. 6, p. 683.
Footnote 827:
_Archaeologia_, xlv. p. 127 ff.
Footnote 828:
Similar red polished wares were found in the New-Race tombs of Egypt
(seventh to tenth dynasty), but in spite of the likeness it cannot be
said that one is borrowed from the other (_Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 16).
Footnote 829:
See Hall, _Oldest Greek Civilisation_, p. 69; _Journ. Hell. Stud._
xi. pl. 14; _Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 38.
Footnote 830:
The resemblance to Italian bucchero ware is probably only accidental.
See Chapter XVIII.
Footnote 831:
_E.g._ A 66 in B.M.
Footnote 832:
Hall, _Oldest Civilisation_, pp. 72, 98.
Footnote 833:
_E.g._ B.M. A 67–8.
Footnote 834:
Cf. _Excavations in Cyprus_, pp. 34 ff., 72.
Footnote 835:
_Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 39.
Footnote 836:
Myres, _ibid._
Footnote 837:
Cf. for instance the jug given in Cesnola, _Cyprus_, p. 408, fig. 29.
Footnote 838:
_E.g._ B.M. A 134: cf. _Cyprus Mus. Cat._ 401–2.
Footnote 839:
_Cat. des Vases du Louvre_, i. p. 250: see below, pp. 284, 315.
Footnote 840:
The Trojan legends were familiar in Cyprus, as the Κυπριακά of the
local Cyclic poet Stasinos shows.
Footnote 841:
Cf. Perrot, _Hist, de l’Art_, iii. pp. 714–15, figs. 525–26.
Footnote 842:
_Excavations in Cyprus_, p. 73.
Footnote 843:
Recent discoveries by Mr. Arthur Evans at Knossos (_Brit. Sch.
Annual_, 1901–2, p. 15) seem to suggest that these panels may be
meant for windows or storeys of houses. Cf. also the bronze from
Enkomi (_Excavations_, p. 10).
Footnote 844:
_Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 59.
Footnote 845:
_Excavations in Cyprus_, p. 74.
Footnote 846:
See _Athen. Mitth._ xi. (1886), p. 248; cf. also Meursius, _Cyprus_,
i. chap. 10; Heuzey, _Cat. des Fig. ant. du Louvre_, pp. 116–17.
Footnote 847:
Cypriote pottery with concentric circles has been found at Nebesheh
in the Delta. It was brought by the Cypriote mercenaries, enrolled by
Psammetichus, in the seventh century (_Eg. Expl. Fund_, 4th Mem. pl.
3, p. 20).
Footnote 848:
Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, iii. p. 769 ff.
Footnote 849:
M. Pottier (_Louvre Cat._ i. p. 92) thinks that Greek influence may
explain all the stages of Cypriote pottery from the Mycenaean period
onwards. See also on this subject Dümmler, in _Ath. Mitth._ xi. p.
284.
Footnote 850:
_Excavations in Cyprus_, p. 8, fig. 14.
Footnote 851:
B.M. C 244.
Footnote 852:
B.M. C 121 = Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, iii. pp. 716–17, figs. 527–8.
Footnote 853:
B.M. C 120 = _Rev. Arch._ ix. (1887), p. 77 ff.
Footnote 854:
_Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 26.
Footnote 855:
_Ibid._ p. 21.
Footnote 856:
See Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, iii. figs. 510–13; _ibid._ figs. 520–23
(human figures); Cesnola, _Cyprus_, p. 55, pls. 44–6; _Excavations in
Cyprus_, pp. 75, 104 ff.; _J.H.S._ v. p. 103.
Footnote 857:
See above, p. 249. Cf. Layard, _Monuments of Nineveh_, pl. 10 =
Nimroud Gallery of B.M., slab 4_a_.
Footnote 858:
Perrot, _op. cit._ iii. p. 711, fig. 523.
Footnote 859:
_E.g._ Perrot, _op. cit._ iii. figs. 507, 523, pp. 699, 711;
_Excavations in Cyprus_, pp. 104–5, figs. 151–52.
Footnote 860:
_Excavations in Cyprus_, p. 105, fig. 152.
Footnote 861:
B.M. C 268 = _J.H.S._ ii. p. 304.
Footnote 862:
_Cyprus_, pl. 29.
Footnote 863:
See O.-Richter, _Kypros, the Bible, and Homer_, p. 497, and
frontispiece to text volume; also _B.M. Excavations in Cyprus_, p.
105, fig. 152.
Footnote 864:
B.M. E 34; _Branteghem Cat._ 30; Klein, _Meistersig._^2 p. 221.
Footnote 865:
Louvre A 258.
Footnote 866:
_E.g._ _J.H.S._ xii. pl. 14; _Jahrbuch_, 1887, pl. 11.
Footnote 867:
See Hermann, _Gräberfeld von Marion_, p. 46 ff.; _B.M. Excavations in
Cyprus_, pp. 78, 109.
Footnote 868:
_Excavations in Cyprus_, p. 78, Fig. 110.
Footnote 869:
_Troja 1893_, p. 86; _Troja u. Ilion_, i. p. 18. On the pottery
generally see the latter, p. 243 ff.
Footnote 870:
Its evolution is well illustrated by the Canopic vases described in
Chapter XVIII.
Footnote 871:
_Céramiques_, i. p. 6: see for examples _ibid._ pp. 7, 11.
Footnote 872:
A jug with beak-shaped mouth, called by the Germans a
_Schnabelkanne_. The base-ring to which he alludes is not apparent.
Cf. for the type Fig. 81 below, from Thera.
Footnote 873:
See Schliemann, _Ilios_, pp. 340, 372, 375, 384.
Footnote 874:
Cf. _Cyprus Mus. Cat._ p. 18.
Footnote 875:
_ibid._, p. 118; _ibid._, i. p. 310; B.M. B 83 ff.; and see p. 339.
Footnote 876:
See Fouqué, _Santorin_, _passim_; Dumont-Pottier, i. p. 28; Hiller
von Gaertringen, _Thera_, i. p. 36 ff.
Footnote 877:
iv. 147–48.
Footnote 878:
One is given by Dumont-Pottier, pl. 2, fig. 13.
Footnote 879:
See Dumont-Pottier, p. 21, figs. 32–3, pls. 1, 2.
Footnote 880:
Furtwaengler and Loeschcke, _Myken. Vasen_, pl. 12, No. 80.
Footnote 881:
Fouqué, _op. cit._ p. 127, note.
Footnote 882:
On the later pottery from Thera see generally Hiller von Gaertringen,
_Thera_, ii. p. 127 ff.; _Ath. Mitth._ 1903, p. 1 ff.
Footnote 883:
Dümmler (Ath. Mitth. 1886, p. 45) calls them “Leleges”; but he places
Minos in the Geometrical period.
Footnote 884:
Cf. Hdt. i. 171, and Thuc. i. 4–8.
Footnote 885:
_Ath. Mitth._ 1886, p. 15; Ross, _Reisen durch die Inseln_, _passim_;
Athens Mus. Nos. 23–9, 136, 142–43; _J.H.S._ v. p. 53 ff.
Footnote 886:
_J.H.S._ _Suppl. Papers_, vol. iv. (1904).
Footnote 887:
_Od._ xix. 172 ff.
Footnote 888:
Hdt. i. 171.
Footnote 889:
_Mon. Antichi_, vi. p. 342, pl. 12, figs. 50, 52.
Footnote 890:
_Ibid._ pl. 11, figs. 44–5.
Footnote 891:
_Ibid._ pl. 10, fig. 23; pl. 12, figs. 57, 59.
Footnote 892:
_Mon. Antichi_, vi. p. 333 ff., pls. 9–11; _Proc. Soc. Antiqs._ 2nd
Ser. xv. p. 351 ff.
Footnote 893:
_J.H.S._ xxiii. p. 157 ff.
Footnote 894:
_Ibid._ pl. 4, figs. 6–14.
Footnote 895:
See, for instance, Furtwaengler and Loeschcke, _Myken. Vasen_, p. vi.
Footnote 896:
_J.H.S._ xxi. p. 97, fig. 31, will serve as an example.
Footnote 897:
_Ibid._ xxiii. p. 171.
Footnote 898:
_Ibid._ xi. pl. 14, figs. 5–10, p. 275.
Footnote 899:
Cf. _Mon. Antichi_, vi. pl. 9, fig. 8; pl. 10, fig. 14.
Footnote 900:
From _Brit. School Annual_, ix. p. 308.
Footnote 901:
_J.H.S._ xxi. pls. 6, 7, p. 84 ff.
Footnote 902:
_Mon. Antichi_, vi. pl. 9, figs. 2, 6; pl. 10, fig. 14.
Footnote 903:
_Ibid._ pl. 9, fig. 10.
Footnote 904:
_Ibid._ p. 339.
Footnote 905:
_Brit. School Annual_, vi. p. 85. On the Kefti, see _ibid._ viii. p.
157 ff.
Footnote 906:
See for examples_J.H.S._ xxiii. p. 192 ff.
Footnote 907:
_Brit. School Annual_, vi. p. 88.
Footnote 908:
_J.H.S._ xxi. p. 99 ff. See the _larnax_ published by Mr. Bosanquet
in _Brit. School Annual_, viii. pls. 18–9: cf. _ibid._ vii. p. 52.
Footnote 909:
See Furtwaengler and Loeschcke, _Myken. Vasen_, pls. 13–4; _Ath.
Mitth._ 1886, pl. 3 and pl. 4 (a large pithos with reliefs, for which
compare p. 152 above); _Bull. de Corr. Hell._ 1880, p. 125, 1892, p.
295; Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, vi. p. 451 ff.; Pottier, _Louvre Cat._
i. p. 176.
Footnote 910:
_Excavations in Cyprus_, p. 74, fig. 128. cf. Furtwaengler and
Loeschcke, _op. cit._ pl. 14, No. 88; _Brit. School Annual_, vi. p.
91.
Footnote 911:
_Myken. Vasen_, p. vi. ff. The evidence from Crete, however, appears
to upset this chronology, the vases with lustrous painting being
there found on a level with the matt paintings on dark ground.
Footnote 912:
For examples see Furtwaengler and Loeschcke, _Myken. Thongef._ pls.
1; 4, 13; 5, 20; 7, 40; 11, 52.
Footnote 913:
_Myken. Thongef._ pl. 1, fig. 6; _Myken. Vasen_, pls. 23–4.
Footnote 914:
_Myken. Thongef._ pl. 8; pl. 11, 52; _Myken. Vasen_, pl. 23.
Footnote 915:
_Myken. Thongef._ pl. 6, 32, 34.
Footnote 916:
_Myken. Thongef._ pl. 12; _Myken. Vasen_, pls. 7, 25.
Footnote 917:
Schliemann, _Tiryns_, pl. 22, p. 99, fig. 20; _Myken. Thongef._ pls.
2, 4; _Myken. Vasen_, pls. 26–34, 39–41.
Footnote 918:
_Myken. Vasen_, pls. 37–41.
Footnote 919:
_Mon. Antichi_, i. p. 201 ff., pls. 1–2.
Footnote 920:
See _J.H.S._ xvii. pp. 75, 76.
Footnote 921:
Cook in _J.H.S._ xiv. p. 81 ff.
Footnote 922:
Evans in _J.H.S._ xxi. p. 99 ff. Recent discoveries seem to leave
little room for doubt as to the correctness of Mr. Evans' theories.
Footnote 923:
_Rev. Arch._ xxvi. (1895), p. 1 ff.; xxx. (1897), p. 81 ff.: cf.
_ibid._ xxviii. (1896), p. 24 ff.
Footnote 924:
See _J.H.S._ xxiv. p. 125.
Footnote 925:
_Myken. Vasen_, p. ix. ff.
Footnote 926:
See for a summary of the theories, Pottier, _Louvre Cat._ i. p. 200
ff.
Footnote 927:
See Hall, _Oldest Civilisation_, chap. iii.; Pottier, _op. cit._ i.
p. 209; and _Arch. Anzeiger_, 1892, p. 11 ff.
Footnote 928:
_Stilfragen, p. 112 ff._
Footnote 929:
See Wide, in _Ath. Mitth._ 1897, p. 233; and for some general
considerations on Mycenaean pottery and its achievements, Pottier,
_Louvre Cat._ i. p. 247.
CHAPTER VII
_RISE OF VASE-PAINTING IN GREECE_
Geometrical decoration—Its origin—Distribution of pottery—Shapes
and ornamentation of vases—Subjects—Dipylon vases—Boeotian
Geometrical wares—Chronology—Proto-Attic fabrics—Phaleron
ware—Later Boeotian vases—Melian amphorae—Corinth and its
pottery—“Proto-Corinthian” vases—Vases with imbrications and
floral decoration—Incised lines and ground-ornaments—Introduction
of figure-subjects—Chalcidian vases—“Tyrrhenian Amphorae.”
§ 1. THE GEOMETRICAL PERIOD
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Perrot, _Hist. de l’Art_, vii. p. 154 ff.; _Ann. dell’ Inst._ 1872,
p. 138 ff.; _Jahrbuch_, 1886, p. 94 ff.; 1899, pp. 26, 78, 188;
_Ath. Mitth._ 1881, p. 106; 1892, p. 285; 1893, p. 73 ff.; 1896,
p. 385 ff.; Pottier, _Louvre Cat._ i. p. 212 ff. For Boeotian
Geometrical pottery, Böhlau in _Jahrbuch_, 1888, p. 325 ff.; for
early Argive wares, Waldstein, _Argive Heraeum_, i. p. 49 ff.
The Dorian invasion of Greece, which is generally supposed to have
taken place in the twelfth century—the traditional date is about 1100
B.C.—was, like the contemporaneous Etruscan immigration (Chapter
XVIII.), only an episode in the general displacement taking place
throughout Europe. In Greece it caused a dispersion of the Achaean
race, chiefly in the direction of Asia Minor, which, as we have already
seen, probably gave rise to the stories of the Trojan War and
subsequent adventures of the Achaean leaders. In other words, the
Mycenaean civilisation was driven to seek a new home elsewhere, and to
lay the foundations of a new artistic development in the cities of
Aeolis and Ionia. But its disappearance from Greece was not complete,
and Hellenic Greece was from the beginning an amalgam of the old and
new elements, the Achaean (or Ionian) and the Dorian, in which one or
the other had at different times or in different places the
pre-eminence. The Ionian element represents the civilisation of the
Mediterranean, succeeding to that of the Mycenaean world; the Dorian,
the influence of Central Europe.[930]
It has hitherto been a truism of archaeology that the Dorians brought
with them from Central Europe a new form of art, of which the chief
characteristic is that of _rectilinear and geometrical decoration_,
forming, it is obvious, a marked contrast to the curvilinear and
naturalistic Mycenaean designs. This new principle was thought to be
most conspicuously illustrated by the pottery which now replaces the
Mycenaean. But certain recent discoveries have given occasion for some
scepticism in regard to the acceptance of this idea as conveying the
whole truth; and even if they do not radically alter preconceived
ideas, they are at least worthy of consideration.
At Aphidna in Attica a find has been made of very rude pottery, without
glaze or varnish, but with decoration of a Geometrical character,
sometimes painted.[931] Although earlier than any other pottery in
Attica, it need not be pre-Mycenaean in date; it seems more likely to
be a _contemporary survival_. Early wares have also been found in the
islands, as in Aegina, with Geometrical ornament in _matt_-colour; nor
must we forget that the Geometrical principle was known in Cyprus and
the Cyclades, as also at Hissarlik, at a very remote age. From these
data Dr. Wide has ingeniously drawn the conclusion that the Geometrical
style was always indigenous in Greece,[932] pointing out that it was
more likely and more in accordance with historical precedent that the
Dorians, like Rome in later days, accepted the art of the people they
conquered[933] than that they introduced their own and forced it upon
the subjugated race. This theory has the additional merit of disposing
of a difficulty which had always been felt. If the Geometrical pottery
was Dorian, how do we account for its reaching its height in Attica,
which was never at any time Doric, or influenced by Doric
characteristics? But if it can be shown to be indigenous in Attica, the
difficulty disappears.
Again, it is necessary to explain the varying character of Geometrical
pottery in different parts of Greece, as compared with the homogeneity
of the Mycenaean wares. If, as was supposed, the Geometrical style came
full-grown into Greece, why should this be? Dr. Wide therefore
maintains that there were in Greece _concurrently_ a _Bauernstil_ or
domestic art, aboriginal and industrial, which produced the rude
geometrical fabrics, and a _Herrenstil_ or _art de luxe_, exotic and
ornamental, which we know as Mycenaean. With the upheaval and
dispersion of the Achaean aristocracy this art practically died out,
but the humbler industry held its ground, and gradually forged its way
to comparative excellence, perhaps learning much from Mycenaean
technique.
The real novelty of the developed Geometrical pottery which now
manifests itself in Greece consists in its evolution _as a style_, and
the combination of the patterns into an artistic system, with a
continuous progress towards symmetry and rhythm. Geometrical patterns
are indeed the property of all primitive peoples, and are no less
spontaneous and universal in their origin than the folk-lore stories
which we find adopting the same or similar forms in all parts of the
world. In Greece, no doubt, the cultured traditions of Mycenaean art
had in course of time their due effect, and both in technique and in
ornament left their impress on the inferior fabrics,[934] as we have
seen to have been the case, especially in the Greek islands. It is an
influence which is not confined to the pottery, but made itself felt,
for instance, in architecture. It can hardly be doubted that in the
Lion Gate of Mycenae we find the prototype of the Doric column; and the
parallel with the Geometrical pottery can be further followed up when
we consider that Doric architecture also became the common property of
Continental Greece, and also realised its highest perfection at Athens.
The Geometrical pottery has been found in great numbers in Attica and
Boeotia, in the islands of Aegina, Melos, Thera, Rhodes, and
Crete,[935] in Argolis and Laconia, in Sicily and Etruria, and also
isolated specimens in Cyprus and the Troad.[936] That found in Italy
and Cyprus is certainly exported from the mainland. It has been
observed that each region has its own peculiar variety of the style,
and this is especially conspicuous in the examples from Attica and
Boeotia.[937] The first writer who attempted to deal with it
scientifically was Conze,[938] but owing to its clearly-defined
characteristics it has always been more or less correctly treated by
the older schools of archaeologists. But with a more extended outlook
over the fabrics of early Hellas, many problems have arisen in
connection with it which have called for more recent discussion, and
the writings of Kroker, Böhlau, and Wide in particular should be
studied.[939]
At Mycenae fragments of Geometrical pottery were found both on the
surface and in the palace, among the débris of the huts built on its
site; while in the island of Salamis there is a cemetery of distinctly
transitional character, containing false amphorae with linear
decoration and combinations of the spiral with the maeander.[940] It
may be noted that a similar transitional cemetery was found by Mr.
Paton at Assarlik in Caria,[941] and that the “sub-Mycenaean” pottery
of Cyprus (p. 246) has been shown to exhibit the same combination of
features. These facts fall into line with what has already been said as
to the survival of Mycenaean art in these fabrics.
From the fact that large quantities of this ware have been obtained
from the tombs of the Kerameikos near the Dipylon Gate of Athens,
chiefly between 1870 and 1891, it has frequently been styled _Dipylon
ware_; but it is questionable whether this title should not be reserved
for varieties peculiar to this site. These Dipylon tombs were in the
form of deep quadrangular trenches, and the bodies had been sometimes
inhumed, sometimes cremated, the bones being placed in vessels of
bronze or clay, containing smaller objects. Above the trenches was a
layer of earth mixed with burnt offerings, on the top of which,
_outside the tombs_, were placed the large painted vases (representing
the tombstones or stone sepulchral vases of later times) which now form
a prominent part of the collections at Athens and in the Louvre.[942]
* * * * *
Turning to treat of their general characteristics, we note that the
vases are all wheel-made, of a carefully-prepared red clay covered with
a lustrous and impermeable yellow slip, on which the designs are
painted in the same lustrous black as the Mycenaean wares. Later, but
rarely, white is introduced as an accessory. As regards the shapes,
there is less variety than in Mycenaean pottery. They include the
typical forms of Dipylon vases, a large wide-mouthed _krater_ on a high
stem, and an _amphora_ with cylindrical neck and side-handles; also the
_lebes_, the cylindrical jug or _olpe_, the wide bowl or _skyphos_, and
the _pyxis_ or covered jar. Open-work stands for vases are often found
in the Cyclades.[943] On the covers of the _pyxides_ a group of two or
three rudely-modelled horses sometimes forms the handle. In considering
the forms generally, it is permissible to say that the potter of the
day was in advance of his Mycenaean predecessor, although the painter
was not.
The decoration follows a development which permits of the division of
Geometrical vases into three periods, in which we follow Kroker[944]:
(1) for a long time it is exclusively limited to Geometrical patterns,
and (2) even when quadrupeds and birds are introduced they are still
only decorative (as in Boeotia); (3) finally, while the animals take a
subsidiary place, human figures and large compositions spring into
prominence. But this final development is chiefly characteristic of
Athens. Wide distinguishes four varieties of the Dipylon ware: (_a_)
amphorae, with black varnished bodies and designs only on the neck;
(_b_) “black Dipylon ware,” mainly varnished, but more decorated than
(_a_); (_c_) large vases, with linear decoration or figures all over in
horizontal friezes (the tomb-amphorae); (_d_) as the last, but with
vertical panels, divided like metopes. His view is that these represent
a continuous development, but that the style did not last long in
Attica. Returning to Kroker’s classification, it must be borne in mind
that the three classes are not successive in point of _time_, only in
artistic development; the plain linear decoration survived throughout,
and is often found in tombs contemporaneously with the figure subjects.
The patterns are mainly, though not exclusively, rectilinear, and
sometimes extremely elaborate. The favourite are a large bold maeander,
chevrons, chequers, and arrangements of hatched lines; also squares,
with diagonals and much ground-ornament. Among the simpler motives are
lines of dots, triangles, lozenges, and various forms of crosses; but
concentric and “tangent” circles occur not infrequently, the latter
being clearly derived from the Mycenaean spiral, and one vegetable
motive appears in the form of a conventionalised leaf, later developed
into a rosette. M. Perrot[945] gives a very instructive diagram of the
typical scheme of ornamentation on the neck and body of a vase,
including most of the principal varieties. It should also be noted that
these patterns occur frequently on the field of the designs as
ground-ornaments, to cover the vacant spaces.
In the arrangement of the patterns an architectural instinct is clearly
at work, the influence of the Doric metope being especially prominent.
They are usually arranged, as the diagram (Fig. 83) shows, in
horizontal bands round the neck and body, like the bands of painted
ornament on the entablature of a temple. The metopes and triglyphs are
represented by large square patterns of ornament, separated by narrow
vertical strips of simpler motives (cf. Fig. 84). The introduction of
the frieze principle proper is a later development. Generally speaking,
there is an invariable tendency towards symmetry and refinement in the
arrangement. When figure subjects begin to be introduced, it betokens a
great advance in decorative art, especially over the Cypriote and other
varieties of the style. In the tendency to a _horror vacui_, the style
is inferior to Mycenaean, as also in the figure-drawing, of which more
anon. The absence of any plant-ornament is most characteristic, as
showing the great change from the Mycenaean spirit; but it was not long
before this element was destined to reappear and virtually usurp the
field of decoration.[946]
[Illustration:
From _Perrot’s Hist. de l’Art_.
FIG. 83. SCHEME OF ORNAMENTATION ON GEOMETRICAL VASES.
]
In regard to its ornamentation the Geometrical style may be said to
have attained success. It is not so, however, with its representations
of living form, least of all those of human beings. But this is only in
accordance with the principle which M. Pottier styles the _hierarchie
des genres_, a principle which is universal in all early development of
Greek art, and to which we have already referred (p. 245: see also p.
315). Briefly it is this: first, the predominance of pure _ornament_
and the perfecting of the same; secondly, the employment of _animal_
forms and the relegation of ornament to a subsidiary place; thirdly and
lastly, the rise and development of _human_ forms, the other animals
ceasing to form the main theme of decoration, and sinking to the level
of mere decorative adjuncts.
[Illustration: FIG. 84. GEOMETRICAL VASE WITH PANELS (BRIT. MUS.).]
Hence we find that figures of animals when first introduced on
Geometrical vases are of a conventional and ill-drawn character, but
show a gradual progress and development. Human forms again, which now
appear for the first time, are only seen in a very rude and undeveloped
stage, from which there is continuous development throughout the
archaic period till perfection is reached in the fifth century. Their
original extreme conventionality may be the result of a training in
Egyptian canons of art.
The favourite animal motives are the horse, the deer, and water-fowl.
The first also appears in a plastic form, surmounting the covers of
vases and forming a sort of handle. Usually a single animal is seen in
a metope-like panel (cf. Fig. 84), and the frieze system is seldom
found at this period. A curious conception is that of a lion or wolf
devouring a man, whose legs are seen protruding from its mouth, and
this appears to have been adopted by the Etruscans, on whose archaic
bronze-work and bucchero vases it sometimes occurs.[947] The lions on
the Geometrical vases, it may be noted in passing, are obviously drawn
without knowledge, and borrowed from Asiatic art; the same conventional
type obtains at a later date, as in the Burgon lebes (below, p. 296).
Human figures are almost confined to the large vases from the Dipylon
cemetery, which are evidently a purely local product; almost the only
exceptions are two from Boeotia (see below, p. 288), and one from
Rhodes in the British Museum (A 439). The infantile and barbarous style
of the figures recalls in a measure the primitive marble idols from the
Cyclades; there is seldom any actual distinction of sex, the narrow
waist, wide hips, and tapering limbs being apparently common to both.
The figures being painted in plain silhouette, there is no attempt at
rendering features. Where it is intended to represent a warrior, the
body is completely hidden behind a shield of the Boeotian type
[Boeotian shield], a ready resource of the artist for avoiding
anatomical difficulties, which was also adopted later by his
seventh-century Corinthian successors, except that in the latter case
the shield is circular.
The subjects include battles and naval scenes, dances of women hand in
hand, and funeral processions. From the combination of ships with
funeral scenes, it would seem that they were sometimes used for
carrying the dead. A remarkable lebes recently acquired by the British
Museum[948] is decorated with a large ship-of-war with two banks of
rowers (bireme), and appears to represent a warrior landing therefrom
on shore.[949] The funeral scenes on the great Dipylon vases are
exceedingly elaborate, and exhibit a corpse drawn on a bier,
accompanied by chariots and bands of mourning women beating their
heads.[950] By a conventional attempt at perspective the figures are
often placed above the central group when they are supposed to be on
its farther side, just as, in the fresco from Tiryns, and an
“Island-gem” of the Mycenaean period, a man leading a bull is
represented over its back.[951]
Two very interesting specimens of Geometrical fabrics are in the
museum at Kopenhagen,[952] late indeed and almost transitional in
character, but still typical. One is a deep two-handled cup or bowl
with long panels on either side, in two tiers; the upper ones are
filled with ornaments and animals, and in the lower are several
subjects—combatants, lyre-players, a dance of armed men with shield
and spear, two lions devouring a man (see above), and men with jugs
and lustral branches preparing for some religious rite. The other is
a jug, with very little ornamentation except on the background of the
designs, which also include several subjects. On the neck is a man
holding horses; on the shoulder, dogs pursuing a hare; and on the
body, combats on land and sea.
In the range of subjects a general correspondence with epic poetry is
to be noted,[953] as in the funerals and combats; but there are some
important discrepancies, such as the _quadriga_ in place of the Homeric
_biga_, the types of the ships, and in the appearance of horsemen,
which are of course unknown to Homer.[954]
The Geometrical vases found in Boeotia form an important and distinct
local variety, which calls for separate treatment. The existence of
this local style was first suspected by Furtwaengler in 1878 on seeing
the first finds made at Thebes, and it has since been studied with
great care and detail by Böhlau.[955] Among these finds were, in
addition to the recognised local pottery, ordinary (imported) Dipylon
vases, and later Proto-Corinthian and Corinthian wares, as well as
bronze fibulae and terracotta figures, to which subsequent reference
must be made. Similar pottery was also found in large numbers on the
site of the temple of Apollo at Mount Ptoös in 1885–91, and other
examples have turned up at Tanagra. It has been suggested, though on
somewhat slight grounds, that Aulis was the centre of the local fabric;
and, further, it was supposed by Böhlau, who is supported by
Perrot,[956] that the Boeotian wares represent a primitive phase of the
Geometrical pottery, anterior to the Dipylon, and consequently that
Boeotia is the original home of the style as a whole. But in view of
what has been said above, and generally of the relation of the Boeotian
pottery to the Dipylon, and to the later Proto-Corinthian, it seems
doubtful if this view can be maintained. Moreover, it has been pointed
out by M. Holleaux,[957] in discussing the Ptoös finds, that the pure
Geometrical vases were found at a lower level than the typical local
wares, and were never found either with them or with the analogous
terracotta figures. This certainly points to the later origin of the
Boeotian pottery.
The local clay differs from that of Athens both in nature and
appearance, being less well levigated and of a reddish-yellow colour,
as compared with the warm brown of the Dipylon. Further, the designs
are not laid directly on the clay, as in the latter, but on a thin
creamy-yellow slip, as in Mycenaean and Ionian pottery. The technique
is, generally speaking, inferior, as is also the black pigment used;
the work is rough and hasty, the drawing careless and inaccurate.
The vases are mostly small, at least compared with those of the
Dipylon, and the favourite shape is the _kylix_, with or without a
stem. Out of seventy-two examples given by Böhlau, no less than
fifty-five take this form. He traces its development from a deep bowl
with “base-ring,” which seems to be related to the Cypriote white-slip
one-handled bowls; but the Boeotian type has at first two small
finger-pieces in place of handles, afterwards replaced by a single
handle for hanging up. The majority, however, have no less than four
handles, and that they were still intended for suspension is shown by
the method of decoration which can only be properly seen in this
position (cf. Fig. 85).
[Illustration:
From _Jahrbuch_.
FIG. 85. BOEOTIAN GEOMETRICAL VASES (BERLIN MUSEUM).
]
There is a wearisome uniformity in the patterns, and indeed in the
decoration generally. Only two examples are known from Boeotia with
human figures,[958] and the rest belong to the intermediate class, with
its combination of animals and decorative patterns. On the exterior is
usually a broad frieze, divided by bands of ornament into four or five
fields, in which are birds or palmette patterns; these panels are not
necessarily arranged with reference to the position of the handles. The
patterns comprise rows of vertical zigzags, dotted lozenges, chevrons,
latticed triangles, rosettes, and scrolls, the first-named being
specially characteristic of Boeotia. It is to be noted that the typical
Athenian motives, the maeander and the ornamented square, do not occur;
in fact, these bowls have no analogies in the Dipylon ware. But it is
also interesting to observe the appearance of a new vegetable element
in the form of friezes of palmettes and lotos-flowers.[959] The
importance of this feature is due to the extensive part it was destined
to play in the ornamentation of Greek vases all through the sixth
century. Some of the palmettes are remarkably advanced, and the whole
pattern is even emancipated from the confinement of the frieze, and
treated freely without regard to space.[960] Böhlau, in his analysis of
the ornament as a whole, notes its independence of the Athenian vases,
though remaining a parallel and closely-related development.
Individual vases do not call for much comment, but there is a curious
coffer of terracotta from Thebes in Berlin (Fig. 86),[961] painted with
figures in this style. The subjects include the Asiatic Artemis, a
hare-hunt, a woman leading a horse, a horse tied up, and two serpents
erect, confronted. The ground is filled in with rosettes, crosses, and
other ornaments, such as the so-called _swastika_.
[Illustration:
From _Jahrbuch_.
FIG. 86. COFFER FROM THEBES: BOEOTIAN GEOMETRICAL STYLE
(BERLIN MUSEUM).
]
While on the subject of the Boeotian vases it is worth while to call
attention to the remarkable parallels presented by two other classes of
objects also found in that region: bronze fibulae and terracotta
statuettes. The former may be regarded as important chronological
evidence, inasmuch as their development can be clearly traced from
their first appearance at the end of the Mycenaean period (about the
tenth century), and similar types have been found in Rhodes, at
Olympia, and elsewhere. The characteristic of the Boeotian fibulae is
the flat plate which forms the foot (in some cases the central part or
bow), and is generally of a quadrangular form, decorated with an
engraved subject, usually animals or birds of a similar type to those
painted in the panels on the vases. More rarely ships or human figures
are found.[962]
The terracotta figures (p. 123), on the other hand, bear a different
relation to the pottery. They are flat board-like figures (σανίδες),
known to the modern Greek digger as “Pappades,” the high head-dress
which they wear suggesting to him the well-known hat of the orthodox
“Papas” or priest. The flat surface of the body gives scope for
ornamentation representing embroidered robes,[963] and the patterns
employed are just those which are seen on the vases; and, moreover, the
method of painting is the same, the figures being covered with a buff
slip, the patterns in black with purple details. It should be remarked
that some of these figures are comparatively developed in style,[964]
and that they are practically _later imitations_ of the decoration of
the vases.
* * * * *
In considering the Geometrical vases as a whole, we are struck with the
laudable aspirations of the artist, who, though unable to execute his
new ambitions with complete success, yet shows in his work the same
promise of the future that is latent in all early Greek art. His best
achievement is in the ornamentation. Oriental influences as yet count
for very little, though they are perhaps to be discerned in the human
figures, as already noted; Kroker also thinks that the nude female
figures on the larger vases are due to Oriental art.[965] In any case
they are not to be traced until late in the period, and first, as might
be expected for geographical reasons, in the fabrics found at Kameiros
in Rhodes.
The question of chronology must next be considered. That the developed
Geometrical style succeeds to the Mycenaean, and forms a link between
it and the early Attic attempts at black-figured ware, of which we
shall subsequently treat, is sufficiently clear. It may also be laid
down that the Dipylon ware represents the last stage of Geometrical
decoration, being in point of fact too far advanced to be regarded as a
purely typical Geometrical ware. Such data as the finding of iron in
the tombs, or the evidence of finds at Troy,[966] also tend to place
the beginning of the style at least as early as the tenth century. It
has also been noted that the figures correspond closely with the
bronzes of Olympia which are dated about the ninth century, and this,
if accepted, necessitates placing the simpler linear decoration back as
far as the tenth. The lower limits of the style may be roughly fixed by
the evidence from the tombs of Etruria, discussed in Chapter XVIII., at
about 700 B.C.
Next, there is the evidence afforded by the ships,[967] which it should
be noted are all of the bireme or διήρης form, with two banks of oars.
The invention of the trireme, as we learn from Thucydides (i. 13, 5),
was due to Ameinokles, about the year 704 B.C. Hence Kroker’s dating of
the Dipylon vases about the year 700 can hardly be accepted. But the
eighth century may be taken as representing the latest period of the
Geometrical pottery, both in Attica and Boeotia. The curious
inscription engraved on a Dipylon vase from Athens is dealt with
elsewhere (Chapter XVII.); undoubtedly the earliest known Attic
inscription, its value as evidence is limited to that of a _terminus
ante quem_, from the fact that it was probably engraved at a subsequent
time to the manufacture of the vase.
The question of centres of manufacture is one that has already been the
subject of some discussion,[968] the result of which has been to show
that there is no complete homogeneity in the wares from different
sites, and consequently no one central fabric. The colossal funerary
vases, which, it may be remarked in passing, stand at the head of a
long line of funerary fabrics and show the Athenian fondness for this
class of vase,[969] were not, and could not have been, generally
exported, in spite of the notable exception at Curium. The ordinary
wares might have been made in some one place (probably a Dorian centre,
not Attica or Boeotia); but we have seen that most finds, as in Rhodes,
present local peculiarities.[970] Athens at this period was not
sufficiently advanced to become the centre of large potteries, and did
not become so, as we shall see, before the age of the Peisistratidae;
such vases as were made were strictly confined to special purposes. It
is a curious fact that very little Geometrical ware was found on the
Acropolis.
The Geometrical pottery of Cyprus has already been discussed in its
relation to that of Greece (pp. 249, 253)[971]; but there is yet
another region which passed through a Geometrical period similar to
that of Greece, and that is Etruria (see Chapter XVIII.). It is,
however, better illustrated by the metal products of the Villanova
period, such as the bronze discs and large cinerary urns, than by the
local pottery, which never reached the same level as in Greece; in the
former the same combinations of elaborate ornament with rude animals
and yet ruder human figures may be witnessed, and it is possible that
importations from Greece may have had a share in influencing these
products. They cover the period from the tenth to the eighth century
B.C.
§ 2. ATTICA, BOEOTIA, AND MELOS
Following on to the Geometrical vases both in chronological and
artistic sequence is a small class of Athenian vases, which, more for
convenience than with regard to strict accuracy, have been styled
=Proto-Attic=. The term has this much of truth in it, that the group
may be said to stand at the head of, and in direct relation to, the
long series of painted vases produced in the Athenian potteries for
some two centuries afterwards. It is only of late years that a
sufficient number of these vases has become known for them to be
studied as a separate class, and even when Böhlau first drew attention
to them, in 1887, only two or three were known. The list up to date is
as follows (the order being roughly chronological):—
1. Athens 467
(_Couve’s Amphora Kerameikos _Ath. Mitth._ 1892, pl.
Cat._) 10.
2. Berlin 56 Amphora Hymettos _Jahrbuch_, 1887, pl. 5.
3. Athens 468 Hydria Analatos _ibid._ pls. 3, 4.
(Phaleron)
4. Athens 464 Lebes Thebes _ibid._ pl. 4.
5. Athens 469 Amphora Pikrodaphni _Bull. de Corr. Hell._
1893, pls. 2, 3.
6. Athens Mus. Amphora Kynosarges _J.H.S._ xxii. pls. 2–4.
7. Athens 650 Fragment Aegina Benndorf, _Gr. u. Sic._
_Vasenb._ pl. 54.
8. Athens 657 Amphora Kerameikos _Ant. Denkm._ i. pl. 57.
9. Athens 651 Amphora Peiraeus Ἐφ. Ἀρχ. 1897, pl. 5.
10. Berlin 1682 Lebes Aegina _Arch. Zeit._ 1882, pls.
9, 10.
11. B.M. A 535 Lebes Athens Rayet and Collignon, p.
43 = Fig. 87.
We may also add to this list Athens 652–664, a vase from Aegina
(_Ath. Mitth._ 1897, pl. 8), B.M. A 1531 (_Bull. de Corr. Hell._
1898, p. 285), and another at Athens (_ibid._ p. 283).
It will be noticed that the majority are of the amphora form, and that
all without exception have been found in or near Athens, which leaves
little room for doubt as to their origin.
A close connection with the Dipylon vases may be observed in the first
three, not only in shape and technique, but in decoration. In No. 2,
which we may take as typical of the oldest form of the Attic amphora, a
combination of Geometrical and Mycenaean ornament is to be observed,
but the figures of the warriors are purely Hellenic, like those of the
Euphorbos pinax (p. 335). The shape of No. 3 is typical of the
Geometrical vases, with its long neck and slim body, and it is perhaps
more accurately called a three-handled jug than a hydria, though at the
same time it is clearly the prototype of the later Attic hydria. The
panel on the neck of the vase (also seen in No. 6) is also a
Geometrical feature, and the figures therein are quite in the Dipylon
style. On the other hand, in the arrangement of the designs in
continuous friezes without vertical divisions we trace the incoming
influence of a foreign style—the Rhodian or Ionian. Other motives
again, such as the birds and the vegetable ornaments, have nothing of
the Geometrical or Ionian about them, and may perhaps be directly
derived from Mycenaean vases. But the typically Geometrical lozenges,
zigzags, etc., still hold their own. In No. 6 Mr. Cecil Smith notes
that the ornamentation covering the field of the design is partly
rectilinear and geometrical, partly floral and of Mycenaean origin. The
spiral pattern which here closes the design, and is also seen on No. 1,
is again an instance of Mycenaean influence, and is a motive which
became exceedingly popular. In another seventh-century class, the
so-called Melian vases, it is absolutely overdone, but the more
restrained Attic tradition is preserved for many years as an
appropriate decoration for the division of the designs under the
handles, especially in the red-bodied amphorae of the developed B.F.
style. This vase has some other unusual features, such as incised
lines, which are also found on some early Attic fragments from the
Acropolis,[972] but seem to appear equally early at Corinth, so that it
is impossible to say certainly if the process is an Attic invention. At
all events it is not Ionian, as its place is taken on the east of the
Aegean by lines of white paint (_e.g._ in the Clazomenae sarcophagi).
Curiously enough, in this same vase (No. 6) may be noted attempts at
this very process, here, no doubt, as on the Ionian vases, due to
Mycenaean influence (see p. 331); but it is unique in early Attic
work.[973] The peculiar treatment of the eye and hair is also worthy of
attention.
To sum up the characteristics of the Proto-Attic vases, it may be said
that they represent the transformation of the Attico-Dorian element
into the Attico-Ionian, just as we shall see in the next stage a
further transformation under new influences into Attico-Corinthian (p.
324). The Ionian influence brings with it into Attica not only a
revival of Mycenaean elements, but also traces of Orientalism.[974] The
general appearance of the decoration links it with the Geometrical, but
closer examination shows the admixture of spirals, rosettes, and
lotos-flowers with the lozenges and zigzags, while the Geometrical
animal-types are combined with new ones from Ionia, such as the lion,
and the funeral scenes and combats are supplanted by Centaurs and
winged genii of Assyrian character.[975] Further, there is a distinct
tendency to get rid of the old silhouette and to draw in outline, a
practice typical of Ionia and a direct heritage from Mycenaean
vase-paintings. As in the Rhodian vases, the bodies are rendered in
full colour, the heads in outline; while the practice of covering the
field with ground-ornaments is also a peculiarly Rhodian
characteristic. These latter, however, gradually disappear, as do the
Geometrical conventions in the drawing of the figures.
The amphora-type develops steadily onwards from the Berlin Hymettos
amphora, which, as has been pointed out, is the oldest Attic variety.
In some of the forms, as in No. 5, there are traces of a metallic
origin, shown by the open-work handles and other details.[976]
Generally speaking, there is a tendency towards the colossal, and
towards emphasising the figure-decoration, not only by increasing the
size of the figures, but by confining the subject to one side. M.
Pottier thinks that this is due to architectural influences, and
suggests a comparison with a temple-façade. But the local traditions
are still strong, and in spite of the influence of the lively and
original Ionic style, the vases remain “continental” at bottom, the
drawing always soberer and more powerful throughout. In many respects
there is, as we shall see, a close parallelism with the so-called
Melian fabrics.
No. 11, the large Burgon lebes in the British Museum (Fig. 87), is one
of the latest representatives of the Proto-Attic class; its
Ionic-looking lions and “Rhodian” wealth of ground-ornaments seem to
suggest Asiatic influences, the presence of which has been accounted
for above. Moreover, the loop-pattern on the reverse is distinctly
Proto-Attic, and finds its parallels on vases found at Eretria,[977] as
well as on others of the class under consideration.
[Illustration: FIG. 87. BURGON LEBES (BRITISH MUSEUM).]