James Baikie

THE PERIODS OF MINOAN CULTURE

We must now endeavour to form some idea of the various periods into which the long enduring culture of the Minoan Empire more or less naturally falls, and to note some of the characteristic features of each period. The chief aid in the formation of such an idea is given by the remains of the pottery which have survived from each period, and it is largely from the classification of the pottery at Knossos and other sites that the scheme adopted by Dr. Evans and other workers has been derived. The deposit left by Neolithic man on the hill of Kephala averages about 6 metres in thickness below the later deposit which marks the occupation of the site by the post-Neolithic culture. We are thus led to an almost fabulous antiquity for the first occupation of the site. In the earliest beginnings of human development, progress, with its consequent accumulation, is slow, and if we allow a rate of 3 feet of deposit for each thousand years, we shall probably not be very far wrong. Such an allowance brings us to about 10,000 B.C. as the time when Neolithic man began his first settlement on the hill of Knossos.

Neolithic Age.—The remains found in the deposit of this period are naturally of a very simple and primitive character. They consist of pottery, handmade without any use of the wheel, and hand-burnished, black in colour, and, in the latest specimens, adorned with incised ornament, which is sometimes filled in with a white chalky substance. While this description is characteristic of the deposit generally, a gradual progress in the potter's art is traceable from the virgin soil upwards. In the earliest stratum, immediately above the depositless virgin soil, the pottery, for the depth of the first metre, was entirely plain, unfired, polished within and without, with no appearance of narrowed necks or moulded bases. The next metre shows the beginning of incised ornament, but in almost inappreciable quantity, and the third and fourth metres show the gradual, but extremely slow, growth of this species of decoration, the proportion of incised vases in the fourth metre only reaching 3 per cent. The fifth metre deposit, however, discloses one important innovation. The proportion of incised vases is scarcely greater than in the preceding stratum, but almost all of them have the incisions filled in with the white chalky substance already alluded to, forming a geometric design of white upon black. Along with this new development of the incised ware goes a development of the unincised, whose surface is now not only polished to the highest degree of lustre, but is thereafter rippled in vertical lines by the pressure of some blunt instrument, so as to produce an undulating effect, like that of the ripple marks on sand. The rippling of the unincised pottery continues along with the chalk filling of the incised through the remainder of the Neolithic series, and, in fact, appears to have enjoyed an even superior popularity. In the sixth metre from the virgin soil indications begin to present themselves of the fact that the Neolithic period is about to draw to a close, for some of the pottery is beginning to assume the shapes which are characteristic of the painted ware of the earliest Minoan period, and in the following metre paint begins to make its appearance as a means of decoration in rivalry with the incision and rippling of the earlier strata. From this point, then, we begin to get into touch with the genuine Minoan periods, of which, according to Dr. Evans's classification, there are three—Early, Middle, and Late Minoan—each in its turn subdivided into three sub-periods.

Early Minoan I.—The pottery of this period takes over in great part the style of the primitive hand-burnished black ware inherited from the preceding age. But though this supplies the greater proportion of the material, it is not the characteristic feature. This is supplied by the fact that the potter now begins to use paint as a means for producing the lustrous black surface which his Neolithic predecessor produced by hand-burnishing. A lustrous black glaze medium is spread as a slip over the surface of the clay, so as to produce an effect generally similar to that of the hand-polished ware, and on this lustrous slip the decoration is painted, generally in white, more rarely in vermilion. Thus we have painted vases, with light design upon a dark ground.

Having made this step, the artist varied his procedure by applying the black slip itself as the decoration in bands upon the natural buff colour of the clay, thus giving a decorative scheme of dark design upon a light ground. The ware now for the first time gives evidence of having been fired. The primitive 'bucchero,' still surviving alongside of the painted pottery, is very closely related to the imported vases found by Petrie in First Dynasty tombs at Abydos; and a further link with Egypt is afforded by the fact that vases of Proto-Dynastic Egyptian form in diorite and syenite were discovered in the south and east quarters of the palace at Knossos. Early Minoan I. is thus to be equated with the earliest beginnings of Dynastic rule in Egypt—that is to say, it dates from about 5500 B.C. if Petrie's date for the First Dynasty be adopted, or from about 3400 B.C. if the Berlin dating be preferred. From this period there survive no remains of building at Knossos.

Early Minoan II.—The distinguishing characteristic of the second period of Early Minoan is the greater freedom and originality shown in the designs of the vases. The style of painted decoration remains much the same as in the preceding period; but the vases now develop long spouts or beaks, and are the 'beak-jugs' (Schnabelkanne) of the German archÆologists. While a tendency may be observed to vary the straight line decoration of Early Minoan I. by the introduction of simple curves, there is also a revival of the fashion for the old incised geometric-patterned ware. A curious development of this period is found in the mottled ware from Vasiliki, where the decoration was accomplished neither by incising nor by painting a design, but by a method of firing in which the vases, first painted red, were so placed that the hot coals actually came into contact with the vases at certain points, and produced black patches upon the red paint. The resultant mottled surface was then hand-polished, and sometimes, but more rarely, used as the medium for a design in white. To this period belong the oldest parts of the deposit at Hagios Onouphrios, and the greater part of the contents of the bee-hive chamber tomb at Hagia Triada, where, along with incised and early painted vases, were found copper daggers with very short triangular blades, a number of rude stone seals, and very primitive idols, rudely imitating the human form. There are still no traces of any surviving building on the hill of Knossos, nor is there any definite link with Egypt to afford an opportunity for determining the date of the period.

Plate XXIV 1

THE BASILICA.

Plate XXIV 2

STONE LAMP.

THE ROYAL VILLA, KNOSSOS (p.108)

Early Minoan III.—In this period the proportion of painted vases steadily increases, though for a time there is also a revival of the incised ornament, attributed by Dr. Evans to influence from the Cyclades, which at this time also gave to Crete the idea of the flat, banjo-shaped human figurines which are characteristic of the early deposits of Melos and Amorgos.

The use of the potter's wheel probably now begins, and the clay is carefully sifted and fired, the favourite colour scheme being white on lustrous brown or black slip, though sometimes the alternative scheme of dark upon light is adopted; and vases are sometimes fashioned out of very thin clay, in anticipation of the fine egg-shell Kamares ware of Middle Minoan II. The chief decorative motive is a horizontal band, or more than one, around the upper part of the vase. On these bands the chief ornament is the zig-zag, and curves directly derived therefrom, and the spiral begins to appear as a form of decoration. It is uncertain whether the credit for the origination of this favourite form of decorative motive is to be attributed to Egypt or to Crete. Miss Hall[*] regards the Early Minoan III. spirals as late-comers in the field, attributing the first development of the spiral to the painters of Egyptian pre-Dynastic vases; but Mr. H. R. Hall[**] denies the right of the volutes on the pre-Dynastic vases to be regarded as spirals at all, considers that the true spiral appears suddenly in Egypt as 'a new and unprecedented thing' about the beginning of the Middle Kingdom, and infers that in its use the Cretans were original, and the Egyptians merely borrowers; while Dr. Evans[***] denies originality to both, and holds that the use of the spiral was first developed on the European side of the Ægean.

[Footnote *: 'The Decorative Art of Crete in the Bronze Age,' p. 9.]

[Footnote **: Proceedings of the Society of Biblical ArchÆology, vol. xxxi., part 5, pp. 221, 222.]

[Footnote ***: 'Scripta Minoa,' p. 126.]

The fact that the seals of this period show motives derived from the Egyptian Sixth Dynasty 'button-seals' suggests that Early Minoan III. is to be equated with the end of the Old Kingdom in Egypt. This, however, is but a slight help as to the positive date of the Minoan period, owing to the huge gap between the different systems of Egyptian chronology. All that can be said is that on Petrie's system of dating the Minoan period which is contemporary with the end of the Sixth Dynasty would date about 4000 B.C., and on the Berlin system about 2475 B.C. Though the two cultures are contemporaneous, it is, of course, by no means to be inferred that the art of Early Minoan III. has left us any relics which are worthy of being placed on a level with the wonderful work of the Egyptian Old Kingdom artists. The primitive pictographs on the bead-seals of this period mark the beginnings of this form of Minoan script, which persisted until Late Minoan I., when it was at last superseded by the linear form of writing which had made its appearance in Middle Minoan III.

Middle Minoan I.—With this period we have distinct advance in more directions than one. The Minoan artist is beginning to feel his way towards that polychrome style of decoration which reached such a remarkable development in the Kamares vases of the succeeding stage. In the decoration of his ware, which does not exhibit any marked advance in form upon that of Early Minoan III., he has begun to supplement the familiar white on the dark slip by adding yellow, orange, red, and crimson. The Petsofa figurines, already alluded to, which belong to this period, have a colour scheme of black and white, red and orange. Along with this development of the use of colour goes a corresponding advance in design. The motives of the former period are continued, but are much more developed, and more freely handled. Instead of being stiffly disposed in bands round the vessel, they are now frequently grouped with the idea of covering the ground of the vases in a graceful manner without any attempt at formal definition of the limits of each article of the design, the artist's idea being simply to fill, in a manner satisfying to the eye, the space upon which he had to work. The zonal system still persists side by side with the freer style, and is often very skilfully handled as a means of decoration. One of the characteristic features of Middle Minoan ceramic art—the use of relief to enhance the effect of the polychrome decoration through the addition of contrasts of light and shade—is seen coming into use in the earliest part of the period.

Decoration is still geometric, and was to continue so for long. Not until Middle Minoan III. do we get a really naturalistic style of decorative art. But in Middle Minoan I. there are indications which, though slight, seem to point to a striving after realism on the part of some of the artists of the period. This tendency is apparent even in some of the geometric designs, which are so disposed as to form an approach to naturalistic patterns. But the most remarkable example of the tendency is seen in a fragment of a vase from Knossos, figured by Dr. Mackenzie,[*] on which the figures of three of the Cretan wild goats are followed by that of a gigantic beetle with a tail. 'The subject of the design,' says Dr. Mackenzie, 'in its naturalistic character is so advanced that, were it not for the company in which the fragments occur, we should be tempted to assign it to a much later age.' It is unfortunate that only a part of the design has survived, and that no parallel to it has ever been found. Was it merely a sport, the freak of some ancient potter who was weary of the conventional designs of his time, and tried his hand at something new, combining the wild life that he could see from the window of his workshop with that which crawled upon its floor, without ever dreaming of the problem he was setting for the students of 4,000 years later to exercise themselves upon? The style of the goat and beetle fragment is dark upon light. The goats are surrounded by an incised outline, and filled in with lustrous black glaze; the beetle is drawn freely in the black glaze, without incision, almost as though it had been a humorous afterthought of the potter.

[Footnote *: Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. xxvi., part I, plate ix. 3.]

Middle Minoan I. has no surviving link with Egyptian art, a fact which may be explained by the consideration that from the end of the Sixth Dynasty to the establishment of the Eleventh, Egypt appears to have been passing through a time of great confusion. The period is practically a Dark Age so far as Egyptian history is concerned.

Middle Minoan II.—We now come to the period when the first undoubted traces of the Cretan palaces begin to reveal themselves. The chief architectural remains of the period are, however, not at Knossos, but at PhÆstos. There the Theatral Area, at least, was in existence early in this period, possibly in the later part of the preceding one. But at Knossos the chief evidence for the high state of civilization attained in this period is the pottery, which reaches a very advanced development. This is the age of the splendid polychrome vessels of the type called 'Kamares,' from the cave on Mount Ida where they were first discovered by Mr. J. L. Myres. The vases and cups of this fabric, from the delicacy of their forms, the grace of their designs, and the richness of their colour, are among the most notable survivals of Minoan ceramic art. The clay is fine and carefully sifted, and the walls of the vessels are of extreme thinness and delicacy, approaching to that of the finest egg-shell china. The designs upon the vases are often moulded in low relief as well as painted, and the thinness of their walls, the form of their handles, and the knobs upon them, which are evidently meant to suggest rivets, show that the potters of the time were endeavouring to emulate the achievements of their brother artists, the metal workers. The designs upon the vases themselves are conventional, the idea being to produce a rich and harmonious effect of form and colour rather than to secure any imitation of Nature. Indeed, the patterns are very largely geometric; the zig-zag, the cross, and concentric circles occur frequently; and when plant life is imitated it is skilfully conventionalized, as in the case of the water-lily cup, perhaps the most beautiful specimen of the ware of the period, on which the white petals start from a centre at the foot of the cup and enfold its body. The ground of this cup is lustrous black, and the white of the petals is accentuated by thin lines of red, while a geometric pattern moulded in low relief runs round the rim of the cup above the waterlilies (Plate XXIX. 4). The colours of the vases are varied, consisting chiefly of white, orange, crimson, red, and yellow, and each colour is used in several shades. 'Black shades into purple, white into cream; brown has sometimes a red, and sometimes an olive tint; yellows are either pale or orange; and red is not only a crude vermilion, but is weakened to pink, or strengthened with shades of orange and cherry and terra-cotta.' In the decoration of the vases both styles flourish side by side, dark design upon light ground, and light upon dark. In some vessels of the period there is a combination of conventionalized naturalistic ornament and geometric design.

A distinct link between Egypt and Middle Minoan II. is afforded by the fact that at Kahun, close to the pyramid of Senusert II., near the Fayum, Professor Petrie discovered vases which are unquestionably of Kamares type, while the synchronism with the Twelfth Dynasty was fully established by Professor Garstang's discovery at Abydos of fragments of a polychrome vessel of late Middle Minoan II. type in an untouched tomb, which also contained glazed steatite cylinders with the names of Senusert III. and Amenemhat III. Middle Minoan II., then, equates with the times of the Twelfth Egyptian Dynasty, a period which was in many respects the most brilliant of Egyptian history.

When we come to inquire, however, as to positive date, we are still met, though almost for the last time, by the great discrepancy between the systems of Egyptian dating. The Twelfth Dynasty is placed by Professor Petrie at about 3400 B.C., by the traditional dating about 2500 B.C., while the modern German school brings down the date as low as 2000 B.C. No more can be said than that Middle Minoan II. certainly does not begin earlier than 3400 B.C., and can scarcely begin later than 2000 B.C. The period closes with the evidence of a great catastrophe at Knossos, in which the palace was burned; and, as already mentioned, the fact that PhÆstos shows no evidence of such a disaster at this point has roused the suspicion that the Lords of PhÆstos may have been responsible for the destruction of the greater palace.

Middle Minoan III.—To this period belong the beginnings of the second palace at Knossos. The western portion of the palace probably dates largely from this time, though it was altered and extended later; and we must place here the Temple Repositories, and certain other chambers on the northeast side of the Central Court, though they were covered up and built over in Late Minoan I. At all events, a very great and splendid building must have existed upon the site at this time. Egypt was passing through the dark period between the Thirteenth and Seventeenth Dynasties, which includes the domination of the Hyksos; but the civilization of Crete, on the contrary, was continually and steadily advancing. To this age belong many of the most interesting and precious relics of the Minoan culture.

The art of the period gradually undergoes a great change from that of Middle Minoan II. Polychrome decoration steadily declines, and is superseded by monochrome. The beautiful lustrous black glaze ground of the vases is replaced by a dull purple slip on which the decoration is often laid in a powdery white paint. The best designs are found in this white upon a lilac or mauve ground. In the designs themselves conventionalism and geometric ornament pass away, and are followed by a development of naturalism. Dr. Mackenzie has pointed out that it is to this growth of naturalism that we must trace the gradual disappearance of polychrome decoration. 'Once we have the portrayal of natural objects, such as flowers, which becomes so rife before the close of the Middle Minoan Age, it soon becomes apparent that a scale of colours, which in their relation to each other were capable of producing polychrome effects of great beauty, was quite inadequate towards the reproduction of the natural colours of objects. Thus green, for example, which is the first necessity towards the rendering of leaves and stems, did not exist in the colour repertory of the vase painter. The ceramic artist must thus have felt that with his limited scale of colours he could not produce the same natural effects as the wall-painter with his. On the other hand, he must have been equally conscious that natural objects such as flowers did not look natural in a polychrome guise which was not that of Nature. The only solution of the colour difficulty in the circumstances was a compromise in the shape of a convention. Thus the tendency came into being to make all natural objects either simply light on a dark ground, or dark on a light ground.'[*]

[Footnote *: Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. Xxvi., part I, pp. 257, 258.]

The two flowers most generally used for the purpose of ornamentation are the lily and the crocus. For the first time the importance of pottery as an evidence of the condition of the art of the period is second to that of other artistic products. It is to Middle Minoan III. that there belongs the wonderful fabric of faÏence, of which so many specimens were discovered in the Temple Repositories. In them the same tendency towards naturalism reveals itself. The wild-goat suckling its kid, the flying-fish, the porcelain vases, one of them with cockle-shell relief, and another with ferns and rose-leaves on a ground of pale green, are all instances of the naturalistic growth. Evidence is also afforded of a great delight in scenes connected with the sea, and we have the flying-fish and the seal with the seaman in his skiff defending himself against the attacks of the sea-monster, to witness to the Minoan appreciation alike of the curiosities and the dangers of the deep.

Fresco-painting also begins to leave survivals, and we have particularly the fresco of the Blue Boy gathering white crocuses. At the beginning of the period the old form of pictographic writing is still in general use, but by the close of Middle Minoan III. the earlier type of the linear script, Class A, has made its appearance and is extensively used. The Middle Minoans of the Third period were the fabricators of the huge knobbed and corded pithoi, or jars, some of them with the curious 'trickle,' ornament, which is surely decoration reduced to its last straits. The artist merely dabbed quantities of brown glaze paint around the rims of his jars, and allowed it to trickle down the sides at its own will. The result is curious, but can scarcely be called beautiful (Plate IX. 2). 'Ab-nub's child, Sebek-user, deceased,' whose statuette was found at Knossos, gives us a point of connection between the earlier part of Middle Minoan III. and the Thirteenth Egyptian Dynasty, while the alabastron of Khyan links the later portion of the period with the Hyksos domination in Egypt. The King who built the great tomb at Isopata, already described, must have reigned at Knossos during this period.

Late Minoan I.—In this period we come into touch with a great deal of the fine work of the Royal Villa at Hagia Triada, which has been already described. A considerable portion of the area of the palace at Knossos, dating from the preceding age, is now covered up by new construction, and the second palace begins to assume the form which was completed in the subsequent period. In pottery the naturalistic style still persists, but the technique begins to modify, and the white design on a dark ground occurs less frequently than design in dark glaze paint on the natural light ground of the clay. Ornament begins to partake increasingly of a marine character; the octopus, the Triton shell, the nautilus, and seaweed, appear as designs, and are executed in lifelike fashion, which contrasts strongly with the later conventionalized method of representing them. Indeed, Middle Minoan III. And Late Minoan I. and II. show a distinct appreciation of and delight in all the beauty and wonder of the sea, which suggest the important part which it played in the lives of the Cretan populace. 'At ports where sailors and fishermen and divers for sponge and purple went and came, it was natural for an imaginative race to acquire that sense of the magic and mystery of the sea, that curiosity about the life in its depths, which found expression in these ceramic pictures.'[*]

[Footnote *: R. C. Bosanquet, Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. xxiv., part 2, p. 322.]

Along with the marine designs went naturalistic representations of flowers and grasses—the lily and the crocus, already familiar from earlier work, the Egyptian lotus in a form adapted to the taste of the Minoan artist, and ivy leaves and tendrils. A peculiarly graceful design on a vase from Zakro shows an adaptation of the Egyptian lotus, presenting that favourite Nilotic motive in a style more flexible and easy than that of the native representations of it. The design in this case is painted in white on a reddish-brown ground, and its peculiarity is that the white was laid on after the vase had been fired, and can be removed with the finger (Plate XXIX. 2). The three vases from Hagia Triada, the Boxer, the Harvester, and the Chieftain, belong to this period, as do also the frescoes of the Hunting Cat and the Climbing Plants, and probably the Royal Gaming Board from the palace at Knossos. At this time, too, we come upon the long bronze swords which had succeeded the daggers of the preceding ages. Hieroglyphic writing is now superseded by the linear script of Class A, which now comes into regular use, although at Knossos the documents in this script, according to Dr. Evans, are only to be found in the stratum belonging to the last period of Middle Minoan, their place being supplied by Class B, which occurs only at Knossos.

At Hagia Triada and Gournia the older forms of vase are mingled with early specimens of the type variously known as 'BÜgelkanne,' 'Vases À Étrier,' or 'Stirrup-vases.' These vases, named from the stirrup-like appearance of their curving handles, may more correctly be called 'false-necked vases,' from the fact that the neck to which the handles unite is closed, and another neck is formed, farther away from the handles, for convenience in pouring. The false-necked vase is the characteristic pottery type of Late Minoan III., and occurs very frequently on the MycenÆan sites of that period. The seals with fantastic forms of monsters, such as those found in such numbers at Zakro, date from the beginning of Late Minoan I., and to this period also belong the earlier of the Shaft- or Circle-Graves at MycenÆ, so that now for the first time Minoan can be equated with MycenÆan. We are still without any system of dating that is absolutely certain, but this is the last period of which such a remark is true. The next period brings us into touch with Egyptian synchronisms whose date is certain to within a few years.

Late Minoan II.—To Late Minoan II. belong the great glories of the second palace at Knossos, which arrived at its greatest splendour just before the time at which it was to be destroyed. Now were built the Throne Room and its antechamber, and the Royal Villa with its daÏs and throne and columned hall, while the walls of the completed palace were covered with the splendid frescoes of whose beauties the Cup-Bearer and the spectators watching the games give us evidence. The reliefs in hard plaster, such as the bull's head and the King with the peacock plumes, show the style of decoration which gave variety on the walls to the paintings on the flat. In pottery the change of style and decoration is gradual, but quite pronounced. The chief characteristic of the time is the fabrication of large decorated vases and pithoi, such as the beautiful papyrus relief vase of the Royal Villa, nearly 4 feet in height (Plate XXIII.; see also Plate XXX.). Naturalism still survives in occasional designs, but the bulk of the design is conventional, and the composition of the various elements is often extremely skilful. A typical form of vessel of this period is the long narrow strainer, which is borne by the Cup-Bearer in the palace fresco, and of which various specimens have been found. In many cases these strainers were made of variegated marble, though pottery was also used for them.

The bronze vessels from the north-west house at Knossos, and the swords from the earlier Zafer Papoura graves, testify to the skill with which metal was wrought. One of these swords from the chieftain's grave, the short weapon which the noble of Late Minoan II. carried along with his long rapier, perhaps for parrying thrusts, as the gallants of Queen Elizabeth's time used their daggers, has a pommel of translucent agate, and a gold-plated hilt engraved with a design of a lion chasing and capturing a wild-goat. Great bronze vessels were wrought with splendid conventional designs, and some of the stone vases of the period are amazing in the skill with which they were worked and decorated. 'How the hard material was worked with precision in the inside of vessels which have only the narrowest of neck orifices, and that in an age of soft bronze tools, is as great a mystery as the mode of working diorite and granite in prehistoric Egypt.'[*] Perhaps the most splendid specimen is the great amphora, 2 feet high by 6 feet in circumference, with its two magnificent spiral bands, which was found in the so-called Sculptor's Workshop at Knossos, beside the smaller vessel which had only been roughed out when the catastrophe of the palace came.

[Footnote *: D. G. Hogarth, Cornhill Magazine, March, 1903, p. 329.]

The linear script, Class B, now supersedes the earlier type, Class A.

In this period we come for the first time into a sphere where there is practically an absolute certainty in dating; for now we have the Keftiu appearing in the tomb frescoes of the Eighteenth Dynasty at Thebes, with their vessels of characteristic Minoan type, and their purely Minoan style of dress and general appearance. Sen-mut's tomb gives us a date about 1480 B.C., and Rekh-ma-ra's may bring us down to 1450 B.C., or thereby. It is somewhat striking that the periods of greatest splendour alike for the Egyptian Empire and for the Minoan should virtually coincide. In either case, the duration of the culmination of splendour was short. The magnificence of the Egypt of Hatshepsut, Tahutmes III., and Amenhotep III., was speedily to be clouded and dimmed by the disasters of the reign of Akhenaten; but even before the glory of the Eighteenth Dynasty had passed away, the sun of the Minoan Empire had set. Late Minoan II., with all its triumphs of architecture and art, was brought to an abrupt close by the sack of the palaces, probably about 1400 B.C., and the great frescoes of the palace at Knossos were the last evidences of a magnificence which was never to be revived again on Cretan soil.

During this period intercourse between Crete and Egypt must have been frequent and close. It is not only indicated by the evidence of the Sen-mut and Rekh-ma-ra tombs, but by the parallelism in the styles of art in the two countries. The art of each remains truly national, but the frescoes of Knossos and Hagia Triada and those of the Eighteenth Dynasty in Egypt are inspired by the same spirit, though in either case the result is modified by national characteristics.

Late Minoan III.—This, the last period of the Minoan civilization, commences with the destruction of the palace of Knossost somewhere before 1400 B.C., and presents no definite line of termination. The great style of art represented by the preceding period does not at once degenerate into barbarism. If, as seems probable, the men who destroyed the Cretan palaces were MycenÆans of the mainland, more or less of the same stock as the Cretan representatives of the Minoan tradition, we can see how the catastrophe of the palaces need not have been followed by any immediate catastrophe of the art of Crete. At the same time the true spirit of the Minoan race had been destroyed, and degeneration of the standard of art naturally followed. The level of artistic work in the earlier part of the period is still high—in fact, it is that of what is considered the best MycenÆan art—the technical skill which produced the masterpieces of the Palace period still survives, but the inspiration which gave it life is gone. Originality in design vanishes first, and is gradually followed by skill in execution; the old types are reproduced in more and more slovenly fashion, and at last even the material employed follows the example of degeneration. This period of gradual decadence is, however, the period of greatest diffusion of the products of Minoan, or, rather, as we may now call it, of MycenÆan art. At Ialysos in Rhodes, and in the lower town of MycenÆ, types parallel with the work of Crete are found, and Tell-el-Amarna furnishes specimens of pottery whose degeneracy from the type of the Palace period declares them to belong to these days of decadence. Specimens of Late Minoan III. work are found at Tarentum, and the island of Torcello, near Venice, and even as far west as Spain. One of the characteristic features of the period is the fact that the stirrup-vase, found at Hagia Triada and Gournia in Late Minoan I., but almost totally wanting in Late Minoan II., now becomes common.

Towards the close of the period the site of the palace at Knossos was partially reoccupied by a humbler race of men, who used the rooms that had once witnessed the pride of the Minoan Sovereigns, dividing them up by flimsy partition-walls to suit their smaller needs. An age of transition succeeded, during which the character of the Cretan population was gradually modified by successive waves of invasion from the mainland, until Crete assumed the guise of 'the mixed land,' under which Homer knew it; and finally came the great invasion of the Dorians, which brought in for Crete, as for the rest of Greece, the dark age which preceded the dawn of the true Hellenic culture.