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Another Warrior-Grave at Ayios Ioannis near Knossos

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 October 2013

Extract

Position. This tomb (Knossos Survey 5) lay about 130 metres east along the most southerly of the roads leading from the main Knossos-Herakleion road to Ayios Ioannis, and some 160 metres due south of the Late Minoan shaft-grave discovered in this area in 1950.

The tomb, although of modest size and mutilated before excavation, has more than ordinary interest from the presence in it of a gold cup, the first recorded from an excavation in Crete. The arms accompanying the single warrior buried in the part of the tomb preserved to us were by no means exceptional in point of decoration and adornment; but they represent the most complete and formidable armoury of Bronze Age weapons that has yet been found in Crete, standing comparison with such ‘royal’ collections of weapons as those from the Mycenae shaft-graves or the Dendra tholos tomb.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1956

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References

page 81 note 1 Knossos Survey 2; BSA xlvii (1952) 245 f.

page 81 note 2 But there is a gold cup, apparently from Zakro, in the collection of DrGiamalakis, at Herakleion, (K Ch vii (1953) 487).Google Scholar

page 81 note 3 The collapsed fill of the tomb produced scraps of pottery, all of it that was recognizable Minoan including some M.M. and a few L.M. sherds, but nothing closely datable.

page 83 note 1 Platon has given his opinion that the weapons and the lamp belong rather to L.M. II than to L.M. IB (K Ch vii (1953) 487). For the overlap of L.M. IB with L.M. II at Knossos, see PM iv. 322; Chron MP 81.

page 83 note 2 See BSA xlvii (1952) 243 f. Such ‘warrior-graves’ include the ‘shaft-grave’ at Ayios Ioannis and tombs II, III, and V of the new Hospital site (ibid. 245 f.); the ‘Acropolis’ tomb (PM iv. 849; cf. ii. 547 and plan opposite: ‘Rock Tomb L.M. I’); and Zafer Papoura tombs 36 (‘The Chieftain's Grave’) and 44. Four other tombs, 42, 43, 55, and 98 at Zafer Papoura, contained cruciform swords but no other weapons (Prehistoric Tombs).

The ‘warrior-grave’ tomb XVIII in the Mavrospelio cemetery (BSA xxviii (1926–7) 282) appears to have contained a horned sword together with a dagger with flanged pommel of Furumark's type b 1 (Chron MP 93 f.): it may therefore date from the period after the destruction of the L.M. II Palace, like tombs with daggers or swords of similar type at Zafer Papoura.

Possibly some of the tombs with weapons cleared by Tsountas at Mycenae were ‘single-graves’ analogous to these ‘warrior-graves’ at Knossos: Evans almost suggests as much (PM iv 852).

page 83 note 3 As in tomb III of the Hospital site with nine vases and three lamps (BSA xlvii (1952) 249 f.).

page 83 note 4 e.g. the shaft-grave at Ioannis, Ayios (BSA xlvii (1952) 245 f.)Google Scholar; Mavrospelio, tomb XVIII (BSA xxviii (19261927) 282).Google Scholar

page 83 note 5 e.g. tomb V of the Hospital site (BSA xlvii (1952) 252); the ‘Acropolis’ tomb (PM iv. 849).

page 83 note 6 e.g. tomb 44 at Zafer Papoura (Prehistoric Tombs 62).

page 83 note 7 The two spear-heads 11 and 13. Whether any other objects besides the two spear-heads were found in the destroyed part of the tomb is uncertain. The men who had been working on the road said not.

page 84 note 1 A blocking wall of mud-brick was observed by Tsountas in a tomb at Mycenae, (AE 1888, 129 and 142Google Scholar: tomb 24. Cf. Tsountas and Manatt, The Mycenaean Age 133).

page 84 note 2 See below p. 86 and n. 4.

page 84 note 3 But the wooden coffin at Dendra appears to have been about 1·90 m. long and 0·55–0·60 m. wide (Dendra NTs 111).

page 85 note 1 In tomb II of the Hospital site the hilt of the gold-mounted sword lay by the right hand of the warrior (BSA xlvii (1952) 249). Cf. Prehistoric Tombs 52: tomb 36 (‘The Chieftain's Grave’).

page 85 note 2 Tsountas and Manatt, The Mycenaean Age 145: ‘so at either hand lay a heap of twelve engraved gems, the two heaps obviously once forming a pair of bracelets’. The warrior in tomb 36 (‘The Chieftain's Grave’) in the Zafer Papoura cemetery had evidently been wearing three gems together on his left wrist (Prehistoric Tombs 52). The left wrist may have been the normal place for wearing seal-stones, to judge from the Gup-bearer fresco and other evidence cited by Evans, (PM ii. 705, fig. 441 and col. pl. xii).Google Scholar Even gold signet rings may have been worn on the wrist (Prosymna 209, 273).

page 85 note 3 PM iv. 582 f., 601 f.

page 85 note 4 Prehistoric Tombs 89, fig. 101.

page 85 note 5 The tips of the shafts were preserved in the sockets of the spear-heads II (4) and III (14) from the tombs on the Hospital site (BSA xlvii (1952) 267, 271 and n. 137).

page 85 note 6 BSA xlvii (1952) 251 n. 23. Cf. Hesperia xvii (1945) 157.

page 86 note 1 Unfortunately the wire fragments at a height above o·10 m. from the floor were removed by the workman before their position could be studied.

page 86 note 2 It was suggested that the bronze helmet from tomb V of the Hospital site might have been placed on top of a wooden coffin (BSA xlvii (1952) 253 and n. 27). But the boars' tusks, almost certainly the remains of a helmet, were by the feet of the skeleton in tomb 55 at Zafer Papoura (Prehistoric Tombs 66, fig. 72).

page 86 note 3 BSA xlvii (1952) 248 and n. 18.

page 86 note 4 K Ch vi (1952) 11 f. Alexiou suggests that the ‘greyish blue layer’, described by Persson as covering the remains of the coffin at Dendra (Dendra NTs 112), may have been vestiges of similar blue paint.

page 86 note 5 AE 1904, 12; Prehistoric Tombs 8 f. Evans says that these clay larnakes are in fact ‘little more than translations into clay of the wooden chests that played an important part in the furniture of contemporary Egyptian houses, and which also at times served a funereal purpose’.

page 87 note 1 Clay larnakes, including one with a cover ending in two human heads, are reported by Platon from a L.M. II tomb at Pervolia near Mallia, (K Ch viii (1954) 516.Google Scholar Cf. JHS lxxv (1955) suppl. ‘Arch, in Greece, 1954’, 17).

page 87 note 2 Many have been found during the last few years in the Middle Minoan cemetery on the slopes of Ailias east of the Palace (e.g. JHS lxxiv (1954) 166, fig. 15a). Cf. BSA xxviii (1926–7) 291, fig. 20: from the Mavrospelio cemetery; Seager, , The Cemetery of Pachyammos (Univ. Pa. Anthropological Publications vii, no. 1) passimGoogle Scholar, plates iii and xii.

page 87 note 3 There was nothing, however, to suggest that the gold had merely served as an outer skin for a cup of wood or some other perishable material.

page 87 note 4 Denra RTs 31, Frontispiece and pl. xi. ‘In the centre of the bottom of the outside can be seen a small hollow caused by a pointed tool, probably used during the construction to fix the centre so that the cup should be a true circle.’ The base of the silver cup inlaid with bulls' heads from Enkomi may display the same phenomenon, to judge from the colour Suppl. pl. D in Schaeffer, Enkomi–Alasia i.

page 87 note 5 It might be inferred that the concentric circles painted on the underneath of the bases of some Aegean Late Bronze Age clay vases were ultimately derived from an imitation of this system of concentric channels on the bases of metal vases. But concentric circles appear most characteristically on squat alabastra modelled upon stone rather than upon metal originals.

page 87 note 6 The tomb would have been on the west edge of the harbour town of Knossos. The approximate position is indicated by three red crosses with ‘Minoan Tombs’ beside the bridge over the ‘modern road’ in PM ii, fig. 131 A, opp. p. 230. Cf. ADelt 2 (1916), 168. The cup is Herakleion Museum No. 405 (unpublished). The ‘silver vessels and pottery’ from this group of tombs are ascribed by Evans to the ‘beginning of the Late Minoan Age’ (PM ii. 235). I am very much indebted to Mr. S. Alexiou for these references.

page 88 note 1 Schachtgräber no. 313: Shaft-grave IV. Now on view again in the National Museum at Athens.

page 88 note 2 Bisson de la Roque, F., Contenau, G., Chapouthier, F., Le Trésor de Tôd (Docs. de Fouilles de l'Inst. Fr. d'Arch. du Caire t. xi (1933) pl. xvii and passim).Google Scholar

page 88 note 3 Schmidt, Schliemanns Sammlung, no. 5817.

page 88 note 4 ActArch. xx (1949) 260, fig. 4. This similarity is the more pertinent in view of the remarks on pp. 262 f.

page 88 note 5 The base is figured in Evans, Ancient Bronze Implements of Great Britain 408, fig. 509.

page 88 note 6 ‘The Early Bronze Age in Wessex’; PPS N.S. iv (1938) 95.

page 88 note 7 PAE 1933, 35 f. for an account of the excavations; ibid. 1934, 29 f., figs. 1–3 for the gold cup; ibid. 1935, 101, fig. 5, and 105, fig. 6a, for a plan of the tomb. Cf. AA 1935, 179, figs. 10–11. I am grateful to Mr. D. Smollett for bringing this reference to my notice in the first instance. The pottery from the tomb was examined by DrStubbings, F. H. in the National Museum at Athens before the war (BSA xlii (1947), 7).Google Scholar He has generously placed at my disposal his notes made at the time. The pottery was ‘very poor (and ill-preserved)’. The few complete or nearly complete vases included ‘a very flat and broad alabastron with extraordinarily thick walls’; fragments of a large ?jug with a vertical wavy stripe design (akin to Furumark's MP no. 67, 9–10 (Myc. IIIA)); also fragments of large kraters and three-handled amphorae with stripe and/or wavy band decoration. Dr. Stubbings kindly informs me that he would now admit an earlier date for the pottery than he was inclined to suggest in BSA xlii. But in any case, as he points out to me, the gold cup may well be considerably earlier than the clay vases in the tomb, even if they were all placed in the tomb on the same occasion of burial, which is not certain.

page 88 note 8 Mochlos 89, fig. 26A. This L.M. I burial with the gold signet ring and the cups was above the earlier tomb IX.

page 88 note 9 The other two cups according to Seager were ‘shallow bronze bowls of much the same size, unengraved and of very thin metal’.

page 88 note 10 Schachtgräber no. 213, pl. clxviii; no. 519, pl. cxxvii. Somewhat similar, but with riveted handle, is the silver cup ibid. no. 509, pl. cxxvii. Cf. the silver cup from the King's Grave in the tholos tomb at Dendra (Dendra RTs 33, no. 6, fig. 29); also the cup with inlaid heads from Mycenae tomb 24 (AE 1888, pl. 7. 2). Less comparable are the silver ‘bowl’ from the Vapheio, tomb (AE 1889, 153, pl. 7. 15)Google Scholar and the cup from the South House at Knossos (PM ii. 387, fig. 221)Google Scholar: these have markedly everted rims like the large bronze ‘basins’ from Knossos discussed below, and are reminiscent of the shallow clay cups with high handles and everted rims imitating metal originals, which correspond to Furumark's type 237 (Myc. I–IIB).

page 89 note 1 PM ii. 642, fig. 402, 407a, b. These basins are of course all much larger than our cups; the largest has a rim D. 0·39 m. Similar bronze basins were found in a Basement Cell by the Stepped Portico associated with an L.M. IA vase (PM ii. 632, fig. 395). Cf. the basin, presumably of metal, depicted on a Linear B tablet (ibid. 633, fig. 397).

page 89 note 2 T do A 19, no. 4e, fig. 31: D. 0·25 m. Another example, but with a decorated rim and riveted handle analogous to the bronze basins from the Northwest Treasure House, was found with the great cache of bronze vases in the ‘Tomb of the Tripod Hearth’ (Prehistoric Tombs 39 and 36, fig. 33b). Evans assigned this tomb to L.M. II (PM ii. 635 f.); but the tall-stemmed bronze kylix and the sword of Furumark's type c 2 should belong to L.M. III. Furumark is inclined to date the tomb later, on the grounds that the kylix is of a type ‘probably corresponding to the later part of Myc. IIIA2’ (MP 58, n. 6). Another similar handled ‘basin’, compared by Persson to those from Knossos, was found with the group of metal vessels in the pit below the floor of Chamber Tomb I:5 at Asine (Persson, Asine 394, no. 6, fig. 257).

page 89 note 3 Schachtgräber no. 855, pl. cxxxiv. Another metal vessel bearing a similar design of spirals above arcades, although entirely different in style and much inferior in execution, is the bronze bowl with omphalos base from tomb 47 at Mycenae, (AE 1888, pl. 9. 28.Google Scholar Cf. Tsountas and Manatt, The Mycenaean Age 73, fig. 20; MP 158, n. 6). The silver cup from Enkomi has inlaid arcades below the bulls' heads (Schaeffer, , Enkomi–Alasia i. 379 f.).Google Scholar

page 89 note 4 PM ii 645 f., fig. 411. Cf. Evans, Shaft Graves and Beehive Tombs 29, for the suggestion that both jugs might come from the same workshop. Evans compares the jugs to the picture of one carried by an envoy of Keftiu in the tomb of Senmut, vizier of Hatshepsut.

page 89 note 5 MP 158, and Motive no. 66.

page 89 note 6 PM ii. 472, fig. 278a; MP 158, n. 5. Evans had interpreted this design as ‘bulbous plants linked together in a conventional manner’!

page 89 note 7 MP 158, n. 7; BSA xvii (1910–11), pl. 11. 140.

page 89 note 8 Bosanquet, and Dawkins, , The Unpublished Objects from Palaikastro (BSA Suppl. i) 43, fig. 32.Google Scholar The design is compared by the authors with that of the newly discovered Kakovatos amphora.

page 92 note 1 MP Motive no. 66 (Myc. IIA), citing (1) Kakovatos, : AM xxxiv (1909)Google Scholar, pl. xvii; (2) Berbati: ILN 15/2/36, 279, fig. 13.

page 92 note 2 In a somewhat degenerate form divorced from spirals the same design appears on a Palace Style amphora from the Isopata Royal Tomb (MP 183, n. 11; Prehistoric Tombs 159) fig. 144; PM iv, fig. 291); and on a jug from Mycenae dated by Furumark Myc. IIA late (Chamber Tombs, pl. iii. 2).

page 92 note 3 An L.M. IB date for our cup has been suggested by Platon, (K Ch vii (1953) 487).Google Scholar

page 92 note 4 For ‘candlestick’ centres, see PM i. 579.

page 92 note 5 PM iv. 1011.

page 92 note 6 T do A 28, fig. 39 a and b.

page 93 note 1 The back of the stone is smooth and appears to show no signs of wear, as if it had not been exposed to damage, by contrast with the engraved face. This might suggest that the engraved face was worn outwards.

page 95 note 1 The solitary clay cup from the Vapheio tholos tomb is classified by Furumark as Myc. IIA, contemporary on his system with L.M. IB (MP 629–30, no. 262: 5).

page 95 note 2 PM iv. 851. Cf. Prehistoric Tombs 110: Zafer Papoura cemetery; BSA xlvii (1952) 255, &c.: Hospital site and Ayios Ioannis tombs.

page 95 note 3 K Ch iv (1950) 109, nos. 355 and 357. One found at Thebes in Egypt is described by Naue, who regards it as an import from the Aegean (Naue, , Die vorrömischen Schwerter (1903) 10).Google Scholar

page 96 note 1 Prosymna 336 f. But that from tomb III, which closely resembles our 7, was found in a context which would appear to permit a date in L.H. II (ibid. 184). The inlaid dagger blade from this tomb was admittedly of L.H. II date.

page 96 note 2 The ‘later’ type of dagger of this shape with a flanged pommel is included by Biegen in his type d; there were three examples from Prosymna of these daggers with a flanged pommel besides the two like our 6 and 7. For other examples see (1) Naue, op. cit. 10, pl. v, 3, 3a: from Corinth; (2) Montelius, , La Grèce préclassique i. 153, fig. 481Google Scholar: from the Athens Acropolis hoard; (3) ibid. pl. 13, 1–4, 7–9: from Crete, Rhodes, Mycenae, and Dodona; (4) AE 1904, 30, fig. 7: two from Mouliana (Crete) tomb A; (5) ADelt 1919, 118, fig. 34: two from the same tomb in Cephallonia; (6) Dendra RTs 97, no. 23, pl. xxxiii: two from the pit below the door in chamber tomb 2;(7) Dendra NTs 55, fig. 35. 1: shaft V in tomb 7.

page 96 note 3 Dendra RTs 37, no. 18.

page 96 note 4 See BSA xlvii (1952) 256, apropos of the similar spear heads AJ (4) and I (11). Cf. ibid, xxxvii (1936–7) 187 f.

page 96 note 5 BSA Suppl. i. 116, type K (pl. xxiv, P(error samll caps), Q, R): ‘solidly made pointed daggers’. The description alleges a ‘definitely marked midrib’; but from the photos these blades appear to be like ours.

page 96 note 6 Mochlos 75, fig. 45, tomb XX. 9: L. 0·13 m. Seager observes that this blade ‘has a very late look and might well be classed as of M.M. III date’; he believed that there was nothing later than M.M. III in this tomb.

page 96 note 7 Schachtgräber no. 749, pl. xci: L. 0·12 m.

page 96 note 8 e.g. BSA xlvii (1952) 269. III (13) and n. 135.

page 96 note 9 But the ‘staples’ might still come from a figure-of-eight shield if the stitching that appears in representations like the Shield Frescoes from Knossos and Tiryns was of metal wire (e.g. PM iii. 301 f., pl. xxiii). Alternatively the ‘staples’ might have belonged to a helmet or a coat of armour. Armour composed of leather scales appears to be mentioned on tablets from Nuzi of about 1400 B.C. (Starr, , Nuzi i. 541).Google Scholar For remains of metal scale armour of the Late Bronze Age from the Aegean see Blegen, Troy iii, fig. 297, 34–389, 34–400, 35–368 and p. 23, 297: from a late Troy VI context. Cf. Starr, , Nuzi i. 475, pl. 126Google Scholar; Woolley, , Alalakh 278, pl. lxxi.Google Scholar

page 96 note 10 Such a helmet might have been composed of scales, or of strips like that depicted on the vase from Isopata tomb 5 (T do A 27, fig. 37b).

page 96 note 11 BSA xlvii (1952) 271. III (15), fig. 12, pl. 53b.

page 96 note 12 Prehistoric Tombs 117.

page 97 note 1 Like that illustrated in Prosymna, fig. 606: Tomb XXVIII.

page 97 note 2 Prosymna 332 f.

page 97 note 3 Schachtgräber 222 f.

page 97 note 4 Ibid. 156, 140, fig. 57: no number. Cf. esp. no. 422, pl. xcviii: Shaft-grave IV; no. 931, pl. xcvi: Shaft-grave VI. There were several other similar ‘razors’ from Shaft-grave IV, and others from Shaft-graves II, V, and VI; but none apparently from the women's graves I and III.

page 97 note 5 VTM 28, no. 1196 from Koumasa tholos B; ibid. 108, no. 1905, from Platanos: Xanthoudides refers to four in all of this type, ‘thin tongue-like blades all of the same shape, with two or three rivets by the straight base’. L. 0·09–0·11 m.

page 97 note 6 Mochlos 49, fig. 45: tomb IV. 18. L. 0·155 m. Described by Seager as a ‘curious knife blade of almost oval shape’, and dated by him to M.M. III.

page 97 note 7 Montelius, , La Grèce préclassique i, pl. 16, 22–23.Google Scholar

page 97 note 8 Prehistoric Tombs 70, fig. 78.

page 97 note 9 PM ii. 629, 630, fig. 393 g, h.

page 97 note 10 AE 1889, 158. pl. 8. 7.

page 97 note 11 VTM 108, pl. lvi no. 1941. The blades from the Vapheio tomb and from Platanos have tangs. A short tang-like projection appears on many leaf-shape ‘razors’ like our 15. Evans (Prehistoric Tombs 117) points out the curious fact that ‘leaf-shape razors with a tang are only found again, longo intervallo, in the British Isles’.

These British razors are discussed by MrsPiggott, (PPS, N.S. xii (1946) 121 f.Google Scholar: her Class I). They are smaller than our ‘razors’, and normally but not invariably have tangs. Those without tangs have rivet-holes at the base of the blade, and closely resemble Aegean ‘razors’ like our 15. Mrs. Piggott assigned these Class I razors to the British Late Bronze Age (c. 800 B.c. onwards), and thought it likely that they originated in the British Isles as a development of some of the tanged and double-edged flint blades of the local Early and Middle Bronze Age.

But Mr. Jay J. Butler and Miss Isobel Smith (‘Razors, Urns and the British Middle Bronze Age’, Inst. of Arch. Annual Report for 1955) have shown that (1) these Class I razors were already in use during the Middle Bronze Age in the British Isles (c. 1400 B.C. onwards); (2) there are potential relatives for the British Class I razors in the Middle Bronze Age Tumulus Culture of South and North-west Germany.

It is therefore not impossible that the British leaf-shaped razors of Class I are ultimately derived from Aegean models, whether directly or through the medium of early Central European razors of similar shape.