Keftiu

Extract

In JHS. li, 286, Prof. Sayce published a note from which I am happy to find that I have his support for the main thesis of my article Keftiu : Crete or Cilicia ? However, some of his remarks demand a word from me in reply.

Prof. Sayce still uses the word ‘Keftiu’ as if it were the name of the people and not that of the land. Like so many others he speaks of ‘the Keftiu,’ ‘the Kaftians,’ etc. This assumes that the name of the land was ‘Keft,’ and that of an inhabitant a ‘Kefti,’ making its plural ‘Keftiu’ in the normal way. But this is not so. The name of the land itself was ‘Keftiu,’ and a native was called a ‘Keftiu-i,’ a form which actually occurs (Wainwright, in LA. vi, 82, No. 18). The plural of this, of which, however, no example survives, would be ‘Keftiu-iu.’ The land must, therefore, be called Keftiu, and the inhabitants ‘the people of Keftiu’ or ‘Keftiuans’ or by some similar epithet.