The Project Gutenberg eBook ofGreek vase-painting (Griechische Vasenmalerei)

The Project Gutenberg eBook ofGreek vase-painting (Griechische Vasenmalerei)This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: Greek vase-painting (Griechische Vasenmalerei)Author: Ernst BuschorAuthor of introduction, etc.: Percy GardnerTranslator: G. C. RichardsRelease date: May 1, 2020 [eBook #61986]Most recently updated: October 17, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Turgut Dincer, Chuck Greif and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (Thisfile was produced from images generously made availableby The Internet Archive)*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEK VASE-PAINTING (GRIECHISCHE VASENMALEREI) ***

This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.

Title: Greek vase-painting (Griechische Vasenmalerei)Author: Ernst BuschorAuthor of introduction, etc.: Percy GardnerTranslator: G. C. RichardsRelease date: May 1, 2020 [eBook #61986]Most recently updated: October 17, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Turgut Dincer, Chuck Greif and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (Thisfile was produced from images generously made availableby The Internet Archive)

Title: Greek vase-painting (Griechische Vasenmalerei)

Author: Ernst BuschorAuthor of introduction, etc.: Percy GardnerTranslator: G. C. Richards

Author: Ernst Buschor

Author of introduction, etc.: Percy Gardner

Translator: G. C. Richards

Release date: May 1, 2020 [eBook #61986]Most recently updated: October 17, 2024

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Turgut Dincer, Chuck Greif and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (Thisfile was produced from images generously made availableby The Internet Archive)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEK VASE-PAINTING (GRIECHISCHE VASENMALEREI) ***

Contents.

Index of Names

Index of Illustrations(In certain versions of this etext [in certain browsers] clicking on the image will bring up a larger version.)

(etext transcriber's note)

GREEK VASE-PAINTING

PLATE I.Frontispiece: THESEUS, ATHENA AND AMPHITRITE: KYLIX WITH THE SIGNATURE OF THE POTTER EUPHRONIOSFrom Furtwängler-Reichhold, Griechische Vasenmalerei.

PLATE I.

Frontispiece: THESEUS, ATHENA AND AMPHITRITE: KYLIX WITH THE SIGNATURE OF THE POTTER EUPHRONIOS

From Furtwängler-Reichhold, Griechische Vasenmalerei.

GREEKVASE-PAINTINGby ERNST BUSCHORWITH C·L·X ILLUSTRATIONSTRANSLATED BY G. C. RICHARDSM.A., F.S.A., FELLOW OF ORIELCOLLEGE OXFORD & WITH APREFACE BY PERCY GARDNERLITT.D., F.B.A., PROFESSOR OFCLASSICAL ARCHÆOLOGYIN THE UNIVERSITYOF OXFORD

WITH C·L·X ILLUSTRATIONSTRANSLATED BY G. C. RICHARDSM.A., F.S.A., FELLOW OF ORIELCOLLEGE OXFORD & WITH APREFACE BY PERCY GARDNERLITT.D., F.B.A., PROFESSOR OFCLASSICAL ARCHÆOLOGYIN THE UNIVERSITYOF OXFORD

LONDONCHATTO & WINDUS1921

AHISTORY of Greek vase-painting has been for a long time a desideratum of students of Greek art and antiquity. Many years ago I planned such a work, but the difficulty of the necessary illustration caused the plan to break down. In the meantime an extensive literature has grown up on the subject, mainly in German, but with contributions from other countries. In his first chapter Dr. Buschor has shewn how the result of excavation in Greece and Italy has been to throw our starting-point further and further back, until it lies in the Neolithic age. But it is not only in regard to the earlier phases of Greek vase-painting that research has brought light: the red-figured vase-painting which is one of the most perfect fruits of Greek art in the fifth century has been far more minutely and intensively studied. The result has been to fix the outlines, and more than the outlines, of the history of a fourth great branch of Greek artistic activity; the history of architecture, of sculpture and of coinage having been already thoroughly investigated. And this fourth branch is not merely vase-painting; but since the fresco and other paintings of the great age of Greece have almost entirely perished, we may fairly say that it includes almost all that we can ever know of the history of early Greek painting. Vase-paintings can but feebly image the colouring of the great painters of Greece; but they can give us invaluable information as to the principles of grouping and perspective adopted by them; they can reflect the extreme beauty of their figure-drawing; and they can shew us how they treated subjects from the vast repertory of Greek mythology and poetry.

Most of those who take up the study of Greek art are strongly attracted by vases, the subjects of which are more varied, and the treatment freer than is the case with sculpture. For mythology, religion, athletics, daily life, they are first-hand authorities. Yet one may fairly say that, until a few years ago, satisfactory study of them was impossible. Vase-paintings, in consequence of the shape of the vessels themselves, can very seldom be adequately reproduced by photography. And the published drawings of them, until about 1880, were quite untrustworthy; partly because the draughtsmen had insufficient sense of style, partly because most of the vases in the great museums were more or less restored, often in a most misleading way.

Thus merely to reproduce published engravings of the vases was quite misleading. The truth about them could only be known from a technical examination of the originals scattered through Europe. Yet one must say that in nearly all our English classical books and dictionaries, old engravings are uncritically reproduced. It is a fouling of the springs; and however practically inevitable such a course may often have been, the result is that the reader never knows whether he is treading on firm ice or on a mere crust. Anything more reckless and misleading than the procedure of the publishers and editors of illustrated classical books can scarcely be imagined. The errors resulting can only be weeded out by slow degrees.

Since about 1880 things have slowly mended. The German Archæological Institute, and the French and English Societies for the promotion of Hellenic Studies have published really careful drawings of a multitude of vases, Mr. F. Anderson in England being one of the most accurate and careful of the artists employed. In the last few years the catalogues of vases in Berlin, Paris, Munich, London and other places have given authoritative information as to restorations. A fresh era in the knowledge of technique and subject was begun by the magnificent publication of Furtwängler and Reichhold, with its splendid plates. At present the most authoritative works on early red-figured vases are those of an Oxford man, Mr. J. D. Beazley, and an American, Mr. J. C. Hoppin. Mr. Beazley has been good enough carefully to revise the present translation.

We have reached a stage at which, for all but specialists, what was most needed was a general history of Greek vases in all their periods, compiled by a trustworthy authority, and so fully illustrated (no easy matter) as to enable a reader to follow the text throughout. Thus would the whole subject be mapped out, and the approach to any particular province be made easy. Such a book is that of Dr. Buschor. His examples are carefully chosen; his text shews full mastery of the subject; and it is very unlikely that his treatment will be superseded for a long time to come. It is, however, a book not adapted for a mere cursory reading, but for careful consideration and study.

I may add a few words by way of introduction to the subject. We may divide the whole history of Greek pottery into two sections, which are separated one from the other by the line which divides primitive from mature Greece, about the middle of the sixth century.

Before that time, before the age of Crœsus and the rise of the Persian Empire, the history of Greece is very imperfectly known to us, through the traditions of the temples and the old families, which are seldom wholly to be trusted. Where history is uncertain it is of untold value to have monuments and works of human manufacture to supplement it. These provide a skeleton of fact with which to compare legend and tradition. It is now generally recognized that before writings in the form of inscriptionsand coins come into general use, pottery furnishes the most continuous and most trustworthy material for the dating of sites, indications of commercial intercourse, the movements of peoples. In recent years the study of prehistoric Greece has made immense strides, primarily owing to the excavations of Schliemann, Evans and other investigators. The subject seems to fascinate the younger generation of archæologists; and the pottery found in the graves of the early inhabitants of Greece and Asia Minor has been worked at with great minuteness and to much result. It has revealed to us the outlines of the early history of Crete, the Troad, Laconia, Thessaly, and a number of other districts. Constant comparison with the results of finds in Egypt which can be dated from inscriptions has revealed in a measure the state of the civilization of the Ægean in century beyond century, back to Neolithic times.

When Greek civilization became fully established, in the sixth century, when inscriptions and coins begin to give us far more exact information than that which can be derived from pottery, the interest attaching to the latter does not cease, but it changes in character. We no longer go to it to determine the outlines of the history of civilization. But it has now become a thing precious in itself because of its beauty, its close relation to the poetry, the religion and the life of Greece. The elegant forms of Greek vases and the charm of the designs painted on them have caused them to be sought after by great museums and wealthy collectors. The graves of Italy, Sicily, Hellas, have poured out a constant supply of these works of art, some of them beyond value. Classical archæologists have naturally given much attention to them; and of late years the assignment of examples to noted masters, and the study of their technique have been zealously prosecuted. They belong too wholly to a civilization which has passed away to be readily understood by ordinary visitors of museums; but those who have once been bitten with their charm find in them an occupation, a delight and a solace which are great helps in life. Greece is the classical land of art in all its forms, and the principles of art which were established by the successive schools of art there can never be wholly neglected. If we set aside the pottery of China and Japan, which is, in another sphere, of unsurpassed beauty, the pottery of Greece is the only perfectly developed and thoroughly consistent pottery in the world; and the noted productions of modern Europe seem in comparison poor and half-civilized.

Dr. Buschor’s general plan has compelled him to write but in a summary way of the works of red-figured style, which are incomparably the most beautiful. In fact, in such small and rough illustrations as are possible in a handbook, their quality could not be reproduced. For them the reader must go on to other works, or visit the vase-rooms of museums. A conspectus of successive styles and periods was all that was possible. And I think that enough is here accomplished to arouse the interest of those who love art and have some sympathy with the Greek spirit.

The old supremacy of the Classics in education has passed away, and in future they will have to hold their own not by prescriptive right but in virtue of their intrinsic value, on which more and more stress is being laid by those who feel what their neglect in the modern world would mean. It is time to strengthen their hold by shewing how they lie at the very root of philosophy, literature and art. Our successors will not be satisfied with drilling boys in Greek and Latin grammar, but will have to insist on the place held by ancient peoples, the Jews, the Greeks and the Romans, in the evolution of all that is valuable and delightful in the modern world. We have to widen the field of Classics, and illustrate the literature from every point of view. And ifit be felt that the object of education is not merely to enable boys and girls to earn a living, but to help them to lead a worthy and happy life, then I have no fear that the Classics will be permanently eclipsed.

Mr. Richards’ work as a translator was very difficult. In spite of kindred origin, the German mind in literary production moves on different lines from the English. Not only is the order of words in a sentence different, but the sentences themselves are much more involved, and German scientific writers aim at an exactness in the use of terms which we seldom attempt. Mr. Richards’ version is very accurate; but it must be allowed to be not always easy reading. He preferred to retain as much as possible of the meaning, even if it involved some stiffness in the text. Students will thank him for this; and if the general reader finds that he has to give the text a closer attention than he is used to give to books, he will in fact have his reward.

Dr. Buschor’s work is a solid stone for the temple of knowledge, and the main lines of the subject are now so firmly fixed by induction, that they are not likely to suffer very much change in the future.

P. Gardner.

STUDENTS of the history of Greek vases have been gradually led backwards from a late period to earlier and earlier stages of civilization by the course of circumstances. First of all graves were opened in Lower Italy; the first great collection of vases, formed by Sir William Hamilton, British ambassador in Naples, and published in 1791-1803, contained chiefly the output of later Italian manufactories. Next, from 1828 onwards, the doors of Etruscan graves were unlocked, and their contents proved to be the rich treasures of Greek red and black-figured vases, procured in such numbers by the Etruscans of the 6th and 5th centuries. About twenty years later a bright light was thrown on eastern Greek pottery of the 7th century by the discovery of a cemetery in Rhodes. About 1870 the ‘Geometric’ style became known and the Dipylon vases at Athens were revealed. In the seventies and eighties Schliemann’s spade unearthed the Mycenean civilization, and in the beginning of the present century we were introduced to the culmination of this period in Crete. Finally in quite recent times finds of vases of the Stone Age in Crete and in North Greece have given us a view of vase-production in the third millennium B.C. If therefore we wish to retrace this long road, we must begin at a period, of which the investigation has only just begun and which presents most difficult problems.

The excavations in Northern Greece,i.e., in NorthBoeotia, Phocis and above all Thessaly, have introduced us to a purelyNeolithiccivilization. Here alongside of the two simpler prehistoric techniques, unornamented (monochrome) and incised ware, was discovered, even in the oldest strata, a richly developed painted style, with linear ornaments painted either in red on vases with a white slip or in white on vases made red by firing. The monochrome, red or black vases are often brilliantly polished and of excellent workmanship. In the later layers of the Stone Age finds this civilization differs considerably according to locality. One class of painted (and incised) vases is very prominent: it was found chiefly at Dimini and Sesklo, and shows quite a new principle of decoration (Fig.1). It combines curvilinear patterns, especially the spiral motive, with rectilinear decoration (zig-zag, step pattern, chequers, primitive maeander, etc.); the colouring varies, white on red, black on white, brown on yellow. Side by side with this style we find in other places the greatest variety of painted and unpainted vases: even polychrome decoration appears. In the early Bronze Age all this splendour vanishes and gives place to the production of coarse unpainted ware.

It appears that this Stone-Age Ceramic of North Greece has no connection with the finds of South Greece, and is rather to be traced to the North and the civilization of the Danube valley.

The South presents us with a much more primitive picture. The large layer of Stone Age finds, which came to light in Crete, produced vases with incised geometrical ornament, alongside of coarse undecorated pottery, but curvilinear patterns of Thessalian type are completely absent and painted vases are rare. The reason for a less elaborate development of Neolithic civilization in Crete seems to be that it gave place to the Bronze Age comparatively

PLATE II.Fig. 1. STONE AGE BOWL FROM THESSALY.

PLATE II.

Fig. 1. STONE AGE BOWL FROM THESSALY.

Fig. 2. FACE-URN FROM TROY II-V.

early: in Thessaly it seems to go down far into the second millennium.

According to these early vase finds one has thus to picture to oneself the beginnings of ceramic art. First, the most essential household vessels are fashioned by hand out of imperfectly cleansed clay, and burnt black in the open fire, and before long the outer surface is also polished, probably with smooth stones. Rectilinear ornaments are pressed or incised into the soft clay, and by degrees the method of filling and indicating the incised lines by a white substance is learned; the clay is also treated plastically, for instance channelled. Gradually the clay is made less impure, is more cleanly polished and more evenly baked in the oven, and by the actual firing has various colours, red, black, grey, yellow and brown, imparted to it. Thus a ground is also obtained for painting, on which the rectilinear ornaments are imposed with colour. Greater solidity and brighter colouring are obtained by covering the vase with a slip, which moreover sets off the painting excellently. The invention of the wrongly styled ‘varnish,’ a black colour glaze which, though technically undeveloped, appears even in North Greece of the Stone Age, is of the highest importance for the whole history of Greek vase-painting. The forms are primitive, little articulated, but already very various: the decoration covers uniformly almost the whole vase.

But the different techniques do not regularly succeed each other; inventions are not immediately communicated from one locality to another; primitive methods subsist alongside of more advanced, nay even sometimes drive them out again. This much is clear, that a section taken through these contemporaneous prehistoric civilizations would present a highly variegated aspect.

The Stone Age is succeeded by the Bronze Age, hereearlier and there later; here more quickly, there more slowly; i.e., metals are gradually introduced, and with them new techniques and a new civilization. It is evident that to the earlier Bronze Age belong a series of innovations which are of decisive importance for the history of vases, the invention of the potter’s wheel, the perfection of the so-called ‘varnish,’ and the imitation of metal forms in clay. In most places the potter’s oven and the painting of vases appear only in the early Bronze Age.

Into the early Bronze Age fall the finds from the earliest layers at Troy. In the unalterable faith that he was discovering the world of Homer, with the strong and weak points of a dilettante, Heinrich Schliemann began to dig at Hissarlik, and in the excavations of 1871, 1878, 1890 and 1893 Dörpfeld and he investigated the rubbish hill, which has become so famous, the nine superimposed settlements of which represent as many successive civilizations down to Roman times. The numerous ceramic finds of the five lowest layers show the transition from rude hand-made and ill-baked ware with impressed linear patterns to ever more developed stages. The potter’s wheel and oven finally succeed in producing brilliant red, black, grey, brown vases of the finest technique. The variety of shapes is very great, some are already quite developed; the imitation of metal forms is to be traced here and there. A notable speciality is found in the so-called Face-urns (Fig.2), rude imitations of the human form, produced by adding eyes, nose, mouth, ears, nipples and navel; and there are also other vase-types, which are not repeated in Western Greece. Painting is rare, the vases are either monochrome or adorned with incised linear ornaments, which are often applied in the manner of necklaces, or divide the vase vertically.

The Bronze Age civilization of the second city up to the fifth, which, judging by the rich finds of metal utensils and

PLATE III.Fig. 3. JUG FROM SYROS.

PLATE III.

Fig. 3. JUG FROM SYROS.

Fig. 4. JUG FROM MYCENÆ.

gold ornaments, was by no means primitive, recurs in the whole of N.W. Asia Minor and in Cyprus. Its last phase cannot be separated in time from the western civilization of the shaft graves (p. 7).

Parallel with Troy II-V and the mainland civilization of Marina (below), on the islands of the Aegean is the so-called Cycladic civilization. Its pottery, however, presents a much more variegated picture: beside the primitive vases there are vases incised and painted with rich, not exclusively rectilinear, ornamentation: glazed (‘varnished’) vases also occur. The forms are very varied: bronze and stone vessels often serve as models; the structure of the vases and the distribution of the ornamentation show unmistakeably definite artistic intention. There is great difference between various islands and a comprehensive view of the development is not yet possible. Specimens like the beaked jug from Syros (Fig.3) are probably contemporary with the early Minoan style of Crete (p. 7), but the pans with engraved spirals, circles, ships and fish are later. On Melos, which has quite a separate position of its own, the influence of the Cretan ‘Kamares’ civilization (p. 8) in technique and decoration is obvious.

We return to the mainland and Central Greece. Hagia Marina in Phocis is the chief place in which a pottery, following on the Neolithic, has been found, hand-made with a black or red glaze, with or without rectilinear ornaments in white. This was called ‘Primitive varnish ware,’ before the Neolithic preceding stages had become known. ‘Marina’ ware superseded the Neolithic in Boeotia (Orchomenos) and Thessaly also; similar vases have been found in the western islands (Leukas) and in the Argolid (Tiryns). It is also related to the Cycladic civilization, as is indicated by the jug imitated from metal models, which is common to both styles.

The ‘Marina’ layer is succeeded at Orchomenos by a ware of a totally different kind, which probably spread from this locality and is therefore called ‘Minyan,’ dark-grey and grey or yellow vases, especially (a) drinking-cups, with tall channelled foot, and (b) profiled two-handled cups (Fig.6), turned on the wheel, and in shape more plainly even than the Marina ware dependent on metal models. The wide extension of this already finely developed ware combines a series of bronze-age sites into a chronological unit, the so-called ‘Shaft grave’ stage (p. 7). In Northern and Central Greece as well as in Leucas it follows on the ‘Marina’ ware, in Attica and Aegina it takes the place of the monochrome and incised ware, in the islands it supersedes the Cycladic pottery, in Troy it is parallel with the ware of Asia Minor and Cyprus, in the Argolid the Marina finds of Tiryns are followed by the shaft graves of Mycenae with Minyan vases.

Almost everywhere along with the Minyan ware we find vases not so finely constructed, generally hand-made, which are neither burnt dark nor glazed, but show a decoration applied in dull colour. This lustreless painting (Mattmalerei) in Central and Northern Greece, and also in Attica (white-ground ware of Aphidna, Eleusis), uses only geometrical ornaments; in the Argolid on red or light clay vases linear patterns, wavy lines, running spirals or even figured decorations (e.g.birds, Fig. 4) are painted in brown colour. The decoration generally emphasises the shoulder; the lower part of the vase is unadorned and separated by stripes from the upper.

The next stage is that Minyan ware and lustreless painting are almost everywhere driven out by Creto-Mycenean ‘Varnish’ pottery. In many places this process did not take place till the end of the Bronze Age, as in Thessaly, Central Greece and Attica (Eleusis). It was apparently

PLATE IV.Fig. 5. KAMARES VASE FROM KNOSSOS.Fig. 6. KYLIX FROM MYCENÆ.

PLATE IV.Fig. 5. KAMARES VASE FROM KNOSSOS.

PLATE IV.

Fig. 5. KAMARES VASE FROM KNOSSOS.

Fig. 6. KYLIX FROM MYCENÆ.

the lords of the Argolid who first and most freely opened their gates to Cretan importation and influence; in the shaft graves of Mycenae, famous for their rich treasure of gold, discovered by Schliemann in 1874 behind the Lion Gate, the oldest Cretan import in the shape of vases of the first late Minoan style (p. 10), appears beside Minyan and lustreless ware (Figs.4and6).

By the side of these local products, the ‘Varnish’ vases in the shaft graves appear like children of a strange and sunnier world, representative of a quite different and superior style of art. The idea that they came from Crete has been confirmed by the excavations carried on since 1900, which in different parts of the island disclosed a compact civilization of markedly un-Greek character, developing without a break from the third millennium to the end of the second, which is in striking contrast to that of the mainland. This civilization has been named Minoan after the fabulous king Minos, the builder of the labyrinth, and it has been divided into three epochs, of which the first two precede the period of the shaft graves.

In the early Minoan period, following on the miserable Stone Age (p. 2) the Cretans must have laid the foundation of their riches, if an inference may be drawn from the stone vases and goldsmith’s work of Mochlos. The ceramic art enters on two paths, which have a future before them. The vases were hitherto unpainted and only incised. Noweitherthey are covered with brilliant black paint (‘varnish’) on which the old patterns are painted in tenacious white colour, a technique which celebrated its triumph in the subsequent period, or the vases are left in the colour of the clay and painted with bands of ‘varnish’; to this so-called ‘Mycenean’ technique belongs the whole late period (p. 10). There is a special group of flamed ware, the patterns of which, like much that is Minoan, are far nearerto modern applied art than to Greek. Even in the first half of this period the kiln seems already to be known; the potter’s wheel appears in the second, which is characterized by the first appearance of curvilinear patterns, especially the wave series and running spiral.

The Middle Minoan period, a pure and richly-developed bronze civilization, is the height of polychromy: the clay is finely cleansed, the black glaze is at its very best, red in different shades occurs besides white. A transition leads to the brilliant period of the Kamares style, named after the first discoveries in the Kamares cave on Mt. Ida. The ‘Mycenean technique’ occurs not infrequently alongside of the polychrome; but as it often edges the ornaments with incised lines or puts white spots on them, it does not reject the tendency to richer effect, which is a feature of the age and is also expressed in the relief-like ornamentation of many vases (Barbotine). The ornamentation is still very fond of linear patterns, and also develops the spiral still further, and lays the foundation of the numerous decorative motives which characterize the later periods; living creatures also (birds, fishes, quadrupeds) are represented in painting. The motive of drops falling from the brush, which would be inconceivable in Greek vase-painting proper, occurs already. There is a simultaneous use of decoration in bands, and without division; the emphasizing of the shoulder by ornamentation is found in contrast with the lower part decorated, if at all, with stripes (Figs.3and4). The stock of forms increases, and the imitation of metal-work is often unmistakeable.

In the Kamares style proper (Figs.5and9) polychromy (white, red, and dark yellow on black) reaches its highest development, the greatest variety of plastic decoration appears, the Mycenean technique (dark on light) is relegated to the background.

PLATE V.Figs. 7 & 8. FUNNEL-VASES OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE. FROM PALAIKASTRO AND PSEIRA.Fig. 9. KAMARES PITHOS FROM PHAISTOS.

PLATE V.Figs. 7 & 8. FUNNEL-VASES OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE. FROM PALAIKASTRO AND PSEIRA.

PLATE V.

Figs. 7 & 8. FUNNEL-VASES OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE. FROM PALAIKASTRO AND PSEIRA.

Fig. 9. KAMARES PITHOS FROM PHAISTOS.

The shapes become continually more delicate, metal vases are often directly copied; cups, beaked jugs, beaked saucers, and amphorae with handles at the mouth are specially common. The list of ornaments is much increased and can scarcely be described in few words. By the side or in the place of geometrical motives, crosses, zig-zags, groups of strokes, and richly developed circle, bow and spiral motives, appear vegetable, leaves, branches, rosettes, and most important of all, the continuous wavy tendril. Even living beings appear occasionally.

The plant ornamentation of the Kamares vases is in a peculiar relation to nature. Though nature is here for the first time consistently imitated, the reproduction is not at all ‘naturalistic’ but thoroughly and from the first severely stylized. Not only does the colouring bear no relation to the object represented, not only is the combination of vegetable and geometric motives of purely decorative character, but the natural object imitated is often barely recognizable. The Kamares potter only aims at a pretty combination of colour and line, not at representations. Nor is he concerned with structural arrangement: division by bands and emphasizing the lower part of the vase by leaves pointing upward are uncommon. Usually the decoration spreads freely over the field and is not subordinated to the structure of the vessel. This undisputed predominance of the ornamentation is in the sharpest contrast to the procedure of Greek art proper.

The Kamares civilization, starting from Crete, exercised influence over the islands of the Aegean: the importation and imitation of its ware can be proved for Thera and Melos. Isolated finds in Egypt are of importance, first because they prove the relation of Crete to the Nile valley, and secondly because they give a fixed date (XII Dynasty). The technique did not disappear with the Middle MinoanAge, but was long maintained alongside of the new style.

The Kamares finds come mostly from the older palaces of Phaistos and Knossos. The investigation of their ruins has shown that these buildings were destroyed by fire and soon afterwards replaced by still finer new edifices. The vase finds in these later palaces show a complete break with the old style. Polychromy is no longer the principal attraction; it is given only a secondary place: the new style (Middle Minoan III and Late Minoan I, Figs.7,8,10and11), which is no longer satisfied with gay ornamentation, but with fresh vigour essays the conquest of Nature and her excellences, throws off the bands of the old technique, and with bold freedom depicts the newly discovered world in dark colour on light clay. In contrast to the Kamares style, it did not arise on the vases themselves by the enrichment of an ornamental style, but it is to be understood as the reflection of higher techniques. Vase-painting gives only a small extract from the rich array of subjects, which the other lesser arts and the wall-painting of the period conjure before our eyes. Of the wonderfully vivid representations of men and animals, in which the Cretans were masters, nothing is to be found on the vases. This is certainly not an accident, but a sign of the purely decorative feeling of these artists. They did not want to stylize the human or animal body till it became decorative, to distort it for the eye by placing it on a curved surface, and by combining figures to upset the ease and flow of the decorative scheme. Thus they entirely gave up all reproduction of them, and are thus in marked contrast with Greek vase-painting, the history of which may be regarded as a constant struggle to represent mankind and animal creation. The Cretans took to other objects instead, which could be represented in the vigorous way they aimed at, and yet also filled the field decoratively, without any loss to the picture from the

PLATE VI.Fig. 10. STIRRUP-VASE OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE FROM GOURNIA.Fig. 11. AMPHORA OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE FROM PSEIRA.

PLATE VI.Fig. 10. STIRRUP-VASE OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE FROM GOURNIA.

PLATE VI.

Fig. 10. STIRRUP-VASE OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE FROM GOURNIA.

Fig. 11. AMPHORA OF LATE MINOAN I STYLE FROM PSEIRA.

curve of the vessel. The vegetable world had entered the decoration of vases in the Kamares period: now it does so afresh, but in a totally different spirit. Grasses, branches, ivy, crocuses, lilies as they grow and wave in nature, surround the vases. But these people were specially concerned with the sea, marine plants and live creatures. Lotus flowers, sea-weeds and reeds wave in the water, the cuttle-fish stretches out his feelers, the nautilus swims about, starfish and snails, corals and sea-anemones surround the living objects, and dolphins gambol around.

What impelled the Cretan vase-painters thus unweariedly to represent the marine world exclusively on vases? The explanation can only be sought in that supreme law of the development of artistic style, the talent for invention in a few pioneer brains and the slowness in invention of the many. The excellent idea of having the cool liquid in the vases surrounded by this decorative play of marine life, which filled the field and was so life-like, perhaps came from a single gifted brain. The idea became popular, and the common run of vase-painters created countless variations of the theme.

The excellent naturalism directly inspired by nature, which it transfers with a bold brush to the vases, is limited to a short creative period: immediately the schematic and conventional assert themselves; life disappears, but fixed decorative formulæ remain, and to them the future belongs. Moreover, the stylized ornamentation never ceased to exist alongside of the natural; nay, often appears on the same vase in conjunction with it, in the shape of wavy lines, spirals in different combinations, continuous tendrils (which are also treated naturally) or stylized plants. Thus two methods of decoration are in contrast, one ‘tectonic’ with arrangement in bands, another, which freely scatters naturalistic representations over the vase, a kind of ornament whichhas made almost everyone who has spoken of it adduce the parallel of Japanese art. The freely adorned vases are also most characteristic of the art of the Cretans, and show most plainly their gay and heedless manner, their free decorative work, their direct relation to nature, foreign to abstraction and idea: they set this art in contrast with the contemporary old civilizations of the Nile and Euphrates as well as with the Greek.

The naturalism of the first Late Minoan period has narrower limits than has been usually estimated. Not only is the stock of themes scanty (Fig.11is an exception); but also the reproduction of nature is purely superficial, knows nothing of perspective or shading, and stylizes the forms into the style of decorative drawing: thus, for instance, the marine world is represented without any indication of water. Of course, this does not mean that such abstraction from reality is not an advantage from the point of view of decorative art. Often the vase-shapes show a cultivated feeling for form in the way the body swells and contracts, but appear simple and constrained when compared with the fine lines of contour in the next period. Among new types that emerge may be mentioned the ‘stirrup vase’ (Fig.10) and the ‘funnel vase’ (Figs.7and8).

The superiority of these Cretan vases to all contemporary ceramic output showed itself in a vigorous export. The Egyptian finds of this ware give as a date the XVIII dynasty, approximately 1500 B.C., a date confirmed by some Egyptian objects found in Crete. Cretan vases were also exported in quantities to Melos and Thera: there the native industry loses itself in imperfect imitations of this imported ware. The Cretan civilization also enters the Greek mainland, especially the Argolid. The shaft graves of Mycenae (p. 7), from which the Late Minoan civilization transplanted to the mainland has been named ‘Mycenean,’

Back to Index Next