Page 278 - The Art & Architecture of the Ancient Orient_Neat

NOTES
ii. At Hama in north Syria a stone head was apparently introduced into Asia by Middle Minoan
found in early, allegedly chalcolithic, layers. It is trade were ancestral to all those used afterwards in
rather rough and badly preserved. It wears the that area. *
conical cap. The eyes were inlaid and the head 23. F. Bisson dc la Roeque, G. Contenau, F. p. 13S
formed part of a statue completely carved in stone, Chapouthier, Le Trisor de Tod (Institut Francis
two features which suggest a more advanced stage d’archeologic orientale, Documents dc Fouillcs, xr,
of sculpture than the figures from Brak. Moreover, Cairo, 1953)-
the figures from Hama (there were four) were al- 24. q^ cj(, platc xxxi, bottom right.The Aegean
most lifcsizc. See Harold Ingholt, Rapport prelinii- features of the hoard have been studied in detail by
noire stir sept companies dc fouillcs <1 Hama (Copen- chapouthier.
liagcn, 1940), 25 and plate vii, 1. The closest parallels 25. Furumark’s refusal, in Opuscula archaeologica,
to the head published there arc found in such Early vi (Lund, 1930), to acknowledge Aegean influence
Dynastic sculptures as I illustrated in Sculpture of when running spiral patterns occur unless exact
the Third Millennium, plate 30, c and d, but the
Aegean parallels arc known, is unwarranted. The
Hama sculptures were covered with a coating of
unending running spiral patterns differ in essence
painted plaster.
from those used normally in Ancient Near Eastern
12. Max von Oppenheim, Tell I-Ialaf (London decoration. Moreover they have notliing to do with
and New York, 1933), 226-52, plates lxii-lxiii. the spectacle spirals which arc an obvious embcllish-
Most of the comparisons made and conclusions ment t0 the workcr itl mctal (aC Ur> Hissarlik, and
reached arc baseless. elsewhere), or with the isolated imitations of num-
13. Encyclopedic photographique de l'art, 1, 204. mulites or ammonites on prcdynastic Egyptian
14. Contenau, Manuel d'Archcologic Orientale, pots. The running spiral appears, in Egypt as well
673, figures 467-8. as in Asia, for short periods during which intcr-
p. 136 15. A basalt object which can bc called either course with the Aegean is proved to have existed by
stele or statue was found at Tell Brak. It is 1*45 m. importation of pottery and other objects. It is
high, and the rounded top is made to resemble the perverse to deny that the running spiral decoration,
hair surrounding a face of which nose and eyebrows, which is not universal but has certain well-defined
and drill-holes for eyes, arc indicated. It recalls the areas of popularity in the old and the new worlds,
limestone stele from the first city of Troy (p. 112); made an intermittent appearance in Western Asia
but crude works made in out-of-the-way places and Egypt as a result of contact with one of its
arc not necessarily very ancient. Sec Syria, xi (1930), centres of distribution, namely the area stretching
360-4. from the Danube southwards to Crete.
16. See J. A. Wilson, in American Journal of 26. H. E. Winlock, The Treasure of Three
Semitic Languages, lviii (1941), 225-36; S. Smith, Egyptian Princesses (New York, 1948), plate xxiv.
Alalakh and Chronology (London, 1940). 27. ivory inlays of a somewhat later period were
P- >37 17. Contenau, Manuel d*Archcologie Orientale, found at El-Jisr, in Palestine. They also show strong
2296, figure 1304. Schaeffer, Ugaritica, 11, plate xxii. Egyptian influence while remaining quite un-
18. Pierre Montet, Byhlos et l'£gyptc (Paris, Egyptian. See Quarterly of the Department of An-
1928). Objects which have probably the same tiquities in Palestine, xii (1946), 31-42 and plate 14.
provenance in Bulletin du Music de Beyrouth, 1 (Paris, 2S. On terra-cotta figurines from Byblos, see
I937). 7-21, plates i-iv.
Maurice Dunand, Fouillcs de Byblos (Paris, 1939),
19. F. W. von Bissing, Ein Thebanischer Grabftmd plates xlvii-li. On a gold-covered bronze fig urc
aus dent Anfang des Neuen Reichs. from Ras Shamra, sec C. F. A. Schaeffer, The Cunei-
2°. G. Karo, Die Schachtgrdber von Myhcnac, firm Texts from Ras Shamra Ugarit (Schweich
plates xci-xciv and 132-42, where other examples Lectures, 1936), plate 33.
ound on the Greek mainland arc mentioned. Karo 29. The nearest parallel is the head-dress of the
ignore tic act that the niello technique was known Muu-danccrs at Egyptian funerals. See Journal of
muc car >et in Syria. Sec Helene J. Kantor, The Egyptian Archaeology, xi (1925), plate v; E. Brunner
an 1 lC ricnt *H ^ie Second Millennium B.C., Traut, Dcr Tanz ini alten Agypten (Gliickstadt,
1928), 43, 53-9; J. Vandicr, in Chronique d’Egypte,
21. Kantor, op. cit., 18-21. 1944, 35 ff.
M. Rrntor, op. cit., 77 states rightly: ‘It would be 30. It is quite inadmissible to ‘read’ such decora­
oversimplification- to assume that the spirals tions as if they told a story, as is done by R. Dus-

249