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The Date of the Cretan Shields

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2013

Sylvia Benton
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Extract

Dr. Kunze's splendid presentation alone makes possible the study of Cretan shields, many of which he put together with his own hands. Even where I differ from his conclusions I have to start from the premises he laid down from his careful and scholarly analysis, and his magnificent illustrations.

Dr. Kunze dated the beginning of the Cretan shields by the date of certain gold bands (op. cit. pp. 247, 266) found with Attic vases, from the end of the ninth to the beginning of the seventh century B.C. He has subsequently lowered the date of at least some other Attic vases by some fifty years, and he has told me that he is now disposed to date the shields also later than he did.

Dr. Kunze was naturally looking for an early date, since Johansen had affirmed the dependence of Protocorinthian vase-painting on Crete, particularly on Cretan metal-work, in which he was firmly supported by Payne.

Type
Research Article
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 39 , November 1939 , pp. 52 - 64
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1939

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References

page 52 note 1 Kretische Bronzereliefs. He has read this paper and corrected some errors. I have not convinved Dr. Kunze.

page 52 note 2 I omit the discussion of the date of the Afrati shield, as it now appears that tomb L (see Kunze p. 40) contains vases belonging to the second half of the seventh century (Levi, , Annuario X–XII figs. 462–464Google Scholar).

page 52 note 3 Göttingische Gelehrte Anzeiger 1937 p. 291Google Scholar. Athens, N.M., nos. 770–5; figured by Hampe Frühe Griechische Sagenbilder pls. 32, 33.

page 52 note 4 Les Vases Sicyoniens, passim

page 52 note 5 Necrocorinthia p. 53. Protokorinthische Vasenmalerei p. 11.

page 52 note 6 p. 54. It is impossible to derive the patterns of Early Protocorinthian like those of floral chains (Johansen p. 119 figs. 72, 74–7) from the Cretan chain of fig.89 (as Johansen does, p. 122), even though fig. 89 may be more organic. The influence must have gone the other way: equally organic and earlier chains exist in Protocorinthian painting, e.g., Payne PV pl. 9, 5.

page 52 note 7 Dr. Kunze tells me that he thinks the frieze may belong to the first half of the seventh century.

page 53 note 1 pp. 90 ff.

page 53 note 2 BSA XXXV 117Google Scholar. See below p. 59 for shield patterns.

page 53 note 3 See Payne, Necrocorinthia p. 68Google Scholar on the dates of the Hittite prototypes of Protocorinthian lions.

page 53 note 4 MrPendlebury, (Archaeology of Crete, p. 336Google Scholar) apparently attempts to resuscitate the ‘hotchpotch’ legend: in my view, Dr. Kunze's analysis killed it.

page 53 note 5 I.e., it should have a style of its own which develops; otherwise it is un-Greek and unimportant.

page 53 note 6 ‘The designs are hammered out—more rarely incised,‘ (Pendlebury loc. cit.). They are all incised. Dr. Kunze says that the shields were beaten up without a matrix and then engraved (pp. 70 ff.), but surely the engraving would spoil the shape. The outline sketch at least must have been done first, for on one shield (Kunze no. 43 pl. 39) we seem to have an abandoned sketch of a stag's head intruding between a bull's legs. The question of technique has a dating value, for a matrix may continue long in use. In the shields freehand engraving ensured variety and progress, though some kind of block was no doubt used.

page 53 note 7 Kunze p. 73, 5.

page 53 note 8 Hammered tripods, Furtwänglers Class II. Olympia iv p. 81Google Scholar pl. XXXI.

page 53 note 9 See Hampe Sagenbilder.

page 54 note 1 Cf. the outline of lions on the Olympian corselets Olympia iv pls. LVIII (no. 980) and LIX: also the border of the frieze at Prinias Annuario. I. fig. 19.

page 54 note 2 Payne PV pl. 5, 3. Johansen, Les Vases Sicyoniens pl. XIV 1Google Scholar.

page 55 note 1 PV, pl. 10, 3.

page 55 note 2 Id., pl. 26, 3 and 6.

page 55 note 3 E.g. PV pl. 16, 2. They are not common until the late Protocorinthian period (Johansen pl. XXXVI).

page 55 note 4 NC pl. 45 p. 225.

page 55 note 5 Surely the stag on a broken fragment above does not belong to this shield. It is in a different style, and has only one antler.

page 55 note 6 JHS 1938 p. 226Google Scholar fig. 6: also Johansen pl. XXXVII 5: PV pl. 30, 7.

page 55 note 7 NC pl. 25 p. 68.

page 56 note 1 Olympia iv pl. LIX.

page 56 note 2 I underline ‘woven’, for Professor Wace tells me that the term ‘Embroidery Style’ is misleading (Kunze p. 96). See Wace, ‘Veil of Despoina’ (AJA 1934) p. 107Google Scholar.

page 57 note 1 The top creature is a deer, with a deer's ear incised above the eye. Where Dr. Kunze draws a cat's ear (p. 170) there is a modern nail. The beast below has a cat's ear—it is a lion roaring over a dead deer. The standing lion does not threaten the top deer, it bites it in the mouth and claws its shoulder.

page 57 note 2 Johansen pl. XL.

page 57 note 3 PV pl. 26, 5.

page 57 note 4 The head of the goddess Kunze no. 2 pl. 5 is round; post-Daedalic? See below, p. 62.

page 57 note 5 Levi, Annuario 1933Google Scholar pl. XIII fig. 15. The drawing is very close to Late Protocorinthian drawing, but some features point to Crete: (1) It portrays a revelation. (2) Apollo's irregular chin, i.e. high cheek-bones. (3) The sphinxes are wingless: cf. a Geometric bronze sphinx from Crete in the British Museum (1930, 6.17.2). (4) The dragons below the legs, cf. the dragon's head on the helmet from Axos, BCH 1936 p. 272Google Scholar fig. 36. This beast is not a lion, look at its ears (Lamb, Greek and Roman Bronzes p. 64Google Scholar). Cf. AD I pl. 7, 26, where a sea-monster has such a head. (5) The ramping lions: cf. the lions on Kunze no. 8 (pls. 21–3). In any case, it is to be dated 650–40 B.C.

page 57 note 6 Neugebauer, Führer (Vasen) p 10Google Scholar above. See Payne, BSA XXIX 254Google Scholar.

page 57 note 7 The evidence for a Cretan origin of ‘Daedalic’ sculpture may be summarised as follows. The best Daedalid figure in the round is the statue once in Auxerre, which is close to the statue found at Eleutherna in Crete. The Auxerre statue is also close to the best Daedalid bronze (at Delphi), which is of the same school as a bronze said to have been found at Knossos (Neugebauer, , Die Minoischen und Archaisch Griechischen Bronzen (Berlin)Google Scholar, No. 158, Pl 19). For references to the other monuments mentioned see Jenkins, Daedalica p. 19Google Scholar ff., also Hartley, , BSA XXXI 107Google Scholar.

page 57 note 8 Winter, Kunstgeschichte in Bildern p. 197Google Scholar. Korai found at Dreros BCH 1936 pl. LXIII Goddess on a Cretan vase, Levi, Annuario x–xiiGoogle Scholar fig. 431.

page 58 note 1 E.g. shields Kunze no. 29 (pl. 35) and no. 40 (pl. 38), both from Palaikastro. I shall deal with this question more fully elsewhere.

page 58 note 2 BSA 1935 p. 117Google Scholar.

page 58 note 3 Payne, BSA XXIX no. 60 bis p. 246Google Scholar fig. 34, 41, pl. VIII, 9.

page 58 note 4 E.g. Payne PV pl. 31. Compare the panther and sphinx (loc. cit. no. 5) with those on a bronze crown in Athens (Αρχ Εφ 1892 pl. XII 5)Google Scholar: then compare the horse on the crown with the horses on the shield.

page 58 note 5 BSA 1935 p. 84Google Scholar pl. 20, 1. Companion horse, op. cit. pl. 21, 6, in Candia, found in the excavation of the Idoean cave.

page 58 note 6 Payne, JHS 1933 p. 291Google Scholar fig. 16.

page 58 note 7 Pernier, Annuario I figs. 37, 38, p. 69Google Scholar.

page 58 note 8 Levi, Annuario x–xii pp. 323–5Google Scholar fig. 420.

page 58 note 9 Cf. the similar decoration on the Rhodian plate in London with a bull, to be dated about 600 B.C. (see below, p. 61). The plastic bronze goat mentioned above, p. 55, is probably also from a spouted dinos.

page 58 note 10 The griffin-bird's wings are straight like the shield wings. Other straight wings on a Cretan aryballos (JHS 1933 p. 293Google Scholar) to be dated just before the middle of the seventh century. The body of the sphinx on this vase is like the body of the sphinx on the shield (Kunze no. 40 pl. 38).

page 59 note 1 There is a charge very like this on an aryballos in Berlin (Johansen pl. XXXII, 1, d). The vase is to be dated about the middle of the seventh century. See also NC pl. 1 10.

page 59 note 2 Published Bosanquet, BSA VI 113Google Scholar. Better drawing of no. 79 (not 81 as stated by Blinkenberg) Blinkenberg, , Fibules Grecques et Orientales p. 266Google Scholar fig. 312.

page 59 note 3 Olympaia IV no. 980 pl. LVIII.

page 59 note 4 See p. 57 above AM XXII 1897Google Scholar pl. VI. Jenkins, DatedDaedalica pl. VI, 6, 640–30Google Scholar B.C. The chain reappears on an ivory disc found in a tomb at Enkomi, which is thus identified as Cretan. Gjerstad, Swedish Cyprus Expedition I Tomb 18 No 41 pl. CLIIGoogle Scholar.

page 60 note 1 74, 7, 15, 1. I owe trie photograph to the authorities. The vase is figured Kinch, Vroulia p. 46Google Scholar fig. 20, a, b, quoted by Kunze p. 122, 176.

page 60 note 2 I.e. Hittite, (see NC p. 68Google Scholar), though an occasional Assyrian lion is found. Cf. the lion's head from tomb L at Arkades (Levi, , Annuario X–XII p. 355Google Scholar no. 55.

page 60 note 3 For dots on the faces and bodies of lions see NC 170 ff.

page 60 note 4 See NC pls. 170 ff and cf. the panther pl. 23, 2.

page 60 note 5 Kunze, Beil. 7; Mühlestein Der Kunst der Etrusker pls. 104, 105. Note especially the deep-cut palmettes on the front and the deep wrinkles on the top of the nose.

page 60 note 6 Cf. the feathering on the bronzes from Eleutherna (NC fig. 104, A, B): second half of the seventh century.

page 61 note 1 J.D.I., Olympia Bericht, 1937, pl. 20.

page 61 note 2 See a bronze heifer 64.10.7 and a Rhodian plate, both from Kamiros and in the British Museum. Cf. also a ‘Naukratite’ (Chiot) chalice in Delos (Price, E.JHS 1924 pl. IX 11)Google Scholar.

page 61 note 3 Kunze no. 75 pl. 49 p. 50. Prof. Beazley points out to me a rather obscure reference to this bronze, as ‘Thierschs Tympanon’ (Ippal, Winkelmannsprogramm 1937 p. 41Google Scholar, note 149). The note should have been on Kunze's case, not on Thiersch's errors.

page 61 note 4 The knee of the right-hand figure on the tambourine is exactly like a knee on the gates of Shalmaneser (King Bronze Reliefs from the Gates of Shalmaneser pl. XXVI). Such borrowing does not prove that the tambourine is contemporary with the Gates. See above p. 56, on Assyrian lions; also p. 63 below.

page 61 note 5 For the rosettes on the tunic cf. (1) The Crowe corselet (Olympia IV pl. LIX). (2) The dress of the goddess of the temple at Prinias (Pernier, Annuario I fig. 21)Google Scholar. (3) Boeotian plastic pithoi, Hampe op. cit. pls. 37 and 38.

page 62 note 1 Mr. Dunbabin calls my attention to a terracotta at Athens (‘draped’ Robinson, AJA 1906 p. 160Google Scholar pl. X 2, ‘nude’ Jenkins, Daedalicas p. 28Google Scholar pl. 2, 10) and tells me there is another earlier terracotta from Perachora.

page 62 note 2 To the terracottas published by Mrs. Dohan (see below) add the following bronze: female figure from a support found at Praisos (to be published); early seventh century.

page 63 note 1 Dr. Kunze (p. 279) dated these in the second half of the eighth century, but perhaps he dates them later now, since he dates a lion protome found at Olympia in the first half of the seventh century (ILN 31 Dec. 1938 p. 1233Google Scholar fig. 10). In my view it comes nearer to the lions NC pl. 17 than to those on pl. 16—Early Corinthian, not Transitional.

page 63 note 2 Olympia IV no. 641: Benton, BSA XXXVGoogle Scholar pl. 24, 4.

page 63 note 3 One was found at Praisos another at Palaikastro (to be published).

page 63 note 4 Levi, Annuario X–XII fig. 281 p. 240Google Scholar.

page 63 note 5 Kunze Beil 7. Mühlestein pl. 102.

page 63 note 6 The aryballos in Berlin, Payne PV pl. 9, 4. He might add also the dinos on a stand in Athens, AM 1892 pl. X, dated by Mr. J. M. Cook to the last quarter of the eighth century.

page 64 note 1 See JHS 1926 pl. VIII.

page 64 note 2 Papers of the American School at Rome, Vol. III, pl. 54.