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The Two Labyrinths

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

H. R. Hall
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Extract

Perhaps the most salient feature of the recent development of knowledge in regard to prehistoric Greece is the peculiar connexion which has been shewn (chiefly by the discoveries of Dr. Arthur Evans) to have existed between the oldest Greek culture and the ancient civilization of Egypt. As far back as the time of the Hyksos and the XIIth Dynasty the connexion is certain. We now know that during the XVIIIth Dynasty (seventeenth to fifteenth century B.C.) Egypt maintained regular relations with the Cretan Mycenaeans of the great period of Knossos and Phaistos: the ‘Late Minoan’ period of Evans. This much the incontrovertible evidence of the Egyptian tomb-paintings at Thebes has told us, to say nothing of the numerous pieces of minor evidence from both Greece and Egypt. The corroborative evidence of the alabastron-lid of the Hyksos king Khian, and the figure of the Egyptian Abnub (who certainly lived during the Hyksos period), which have been found at Knossos, take us two centuries or more further back; and the remarkable parallels between the Cretan seal seal designs and the Egyptian scarab-designs of the Xlllth Dynasty, which Dr. Evans was the first to point out, shew us that the connexion was older than the days of the Hyksos.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 25 , November 1905 , pp. 320 - 337
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1905

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References

1 See Evans, , B.S.A. ix. p. 62 fGoogle Scholar.

2 Evans, , Pictographs, p. 105 ffGoogle Scholar. These Agios Onouphrios scarabs cannot be earlier than the XIIth Dynasty. If they are not XIIth Dynasty, they can only be early XVIIIth. And this would agree still less with the probable date of objects with which they were found. We can hardly assume that not merely in the islands, but in Crete itself, and within a stone's throw of Phaistos, there existed at the same time as the fully developed Minoan civilization a tribe which retained the culture of the sub-Neolithic period.

3 Petrie, Illahun, Pl. I. Dr.Mackenzie, says (Phylakopí, p. 261)Google Scholar that the polychrome (Kamáres) ware from Crete found in Egypt is ‘assigned by Flinders Pétrie in view of all the evidence to about 2500 B.C.’ In view of the evidence from Crete it is trae that the contem poraneity of the Kamáres ware found at ‘Kahun’ with the XIIth Dynasty town of Het-hetep-Senṷsret seems extremely probable, but when the polychrome fragments were found their discoverer was by no means convinced of their early date. On p. 43 of Kahun he says: ‘As they (the fragments of foreign pottery found at Kahun) were none of them on the floors of the chambers, or in unequivocally early positions, they may be later intrusions and dropped by chance passers, and some are almost certainly late.’ Cf. also p. 31. It was in view of this uncertainty expressed by Prof.Petrie, that four years ago I classed the Kahun evidence as weak (Oldest Civilization, p. 67)Google Scholar. But our present certainty that the polychrome ware was in use in Grete at a date long anterior to the Great Palace period (Third Phylakopí), which was contemporary with the XVIIIth Dynasty, shews that Prof. Petrie's. doubts were probably not justified.

4 Petrie, , Abydos ii. p. 38Google Scholar.

5 Egypt and Early Europe (Trans. R. Soc. Lit. xix. p. 61).

6 Like Uenuamen, , the Egyptian envoy to Phoenicia in the eleventh century (Oldest Civilization, p. 321)Google Scholar. But he was cast away on Cyprus only and the ship he sailed in was Phoenician. There were no Egyptian merchant-ships on the ‘Great Green’ sea.

7 Mycenaean Tree and Pillar-Cult (J.H.S. xxi.) p. 109, n. 6.

8 Sergi, Mediterranean Race.

9 Kretschmer, op. cit.

10 In articles in B.S.A. viii. p. 125 ff. and x. p. 115 ff. Mr. R. S. Conway supposes that the Eteocretan tongue, as shewn on the ‘nomos,’ ‘barxe,’ and ‘neikar’ inscriptions from Praesos, is Indo-European, and suggests that an Indo-European language was spoken by the Minoans. In effect his article is an apology for Aryanism in respect of the ‘Minoans’ and so indirectly for the Aryan character of Minoan civilization. This goes against all the archaeological evidence, which gives a non-Aryan impression of the Minoans. Mr. Conway does not believe in Kretschmer's theory that the Asianic languages were non-Aryan; but at the same time says ‘I know nothing about Lyciau.’ The arguments for the non-Aryan character of the prae-Hellenic language-stratum in Greece (the existence of this Mr. Conway fully admits) rest chiefly on the apparently nou-Aryan character of Lycian (in conjunction with the ethnological evidence), yet their critic admits that he knows nothing about that language. On his pp. 154, 155 Mr. Conway does not disprove Kretschmer's theory with regard to the non-Aryan origin of the Greek words in -νθ(ος): he merely says he has ‘never been able to see any ground’ for accepting it. The only answer is that others have been able to see many grounds for doing so. Mr. Conway notes as a most interesting fact that the -νθ- words (other than place-names) such as ἕλμινς, πείρινς, βόλυνθος, κήρινθος, ὔλυνθος, ἐπέβινθος, τεπέβινθος, λέβινθος, ἀδάμινθος, ἀψίνθιον, κόρυνθος, αἴγινθος, are ‘all earthy uf the soil; they represent exactly the type of words which come into language from the speech of the countryman, adscriptus glebae.’ They are, as he says, the words that the Achaean warriors learnt ‘from their Mycenaean servants and tenants’ after the conquest. But they are for him of Indo-European origin. Were this so, we should expect these words of the peasants to resemble words of the same signification in other Aryan tongues. If Mr. Conway can shew us that they do he will have proved a point in favour of his view. Meanwhile, one may he pardoned for believing that these are examples of non-Aryan words in Greek. Κήρινθος, ἐρέβινθος, αἴγινθος may be instances of Indo-European words with the -νθ termination added, though in the case of the two last the Indo-European origin of ἐρέβ- and αἴγ- seems open to question.

11 In J.H.S. xxi. (ii.) pp. 268–274Mr.Rouse, W. H. D.Google Scholar makes a vigorous attack on these conclusions. Since (in a footnote to p. 268) he has mentioned me personally as having adopted them, perhaps I may be allowed the license of a somewhat lengthy note in which to comment upon some of his arguments. Vigorous criticisms of this kind are both useful and salutary, but they lose much of their force when they do not take account of all the evidence, (i) Mr. Rouse says that ‘no attempt is made to analyse the word Labyrinth, to explain the ending, to explain the metathesis of υ which is unexampled.’ This must have been written without due regard to Kretschmer's work, although a reference to it was given by Mr. Evans. Why the metathesis of υ should be important when we are dealing in the case of λαβύρινθος with a prae-Hellenic word surviving in Greek, and in the cases of λάβρυς and Λάβραυνδα with Carian words more or less imperfectly transcribed in Greek characters in comparatively modern times, is not apparent. The difference is remarkably slight; and those, who from a certain knowledge of Semitic tongues have learnt the true unimportance of vowels in the construction of words, will not be able to see that whether the word is written λαβύρινθος or λαβρύνθος makes much odds: the important things are the λ-β-ρ and the νθ- or νδ-, and their collocation in this particular instance when taken in conjunction with the fact that both at Knossos and at Labraunda the double-axe occurs and is the symbol of a god. (ii) Mr. Rouse does not believe that the double-axe was specially venerated at Knossos or by the Minoans generally. He makes merry over the idea of ‘Greeks’ venerating a symbol at all: ‘the Greeks,’ he writes, ‘would be as likely to worship a trident or a bunch of grapes as to worship a pair of top-boots; and to regard these things as symbolically sacred would be to worship them. Savages may make a fetish of a collar-stud or a knife, but there is no reason to doubt that such exaggerated superstition was alien to the Greek intellect. Isolated indications of the ruder superstition cannot outweigh the general tendency of Greek worship towards sanity and away from symbolism.’ The ‘isolated indications’ are quite sufficient to give Mr. Rouse's case away. The fact is that there was in Greece as much underlying barbarism as anywhere else: even the ‘Aryan’ Greeks were savages once. But, apart from this, Mr. Rouse begs the question when he assumes that the Greeks who built. Knossos were those idealized paragons who would have turned with graceful loathing from the commission of so unintel lectual an act as the veneration of a double-axe as the symbol of the divine power. It seems most probable that the Minoans were not ‘Greeks’ in Mr. Rouse's sense at all, but a non-Aryan race with religious ideas akin to those of the Egyptians or the Canaanites; of their religious ideas many traces survived in the religions of later Greece and Asia Minor. All arguments against the worship of the double-axe by the Minoans which are based on the supposition that their mental type was identical with that of the later Greeks are beside the mark. The fact that the double-axe was actually venerated by the Minoans is shewn by (among other things) the discovery of a scene of its being worshipped, on a sarcophagus from Agia Triada. This being so, Dr. Evans's conclusion that it was the emblem of a god, who is the same as the god of Labraunda, is evidently entirely justified. The Carian god was identified with Zeus: the great god of Crete was Zeus. The double-axe god of the Labyrinth was the later Zeus Kretagenes, just as the double-axe god of Labraunda was the Karian Zeus, (iii) Mr. Rouse does not believe that the double-axe had any particular connexion with Knossos or that the Knossian palace has any special claim to the title of ‘House of the Double-Axe’: other signs besides the axe occur on its walls, the signs were all possibly never intended to be seen, having been covered with plaster, and the double-axe occurs at Phaistos and at other places as well as at Knossos: there ought therefore to be ‘Houses of the Double-Axe’ and ‘Labyrinths’ too. Other signs certainly occur at Knossos: but the continued excavations shew that the double-axe is the commonest, and from the way in which it is inscribed it seems to have a special significance there which the others have not. That the signs were in many cases originally covered up with plaster or gypsum slabs is very probable, but this would not affect the argument. They must have been intended to mean something, or they would not have been cut on the blocks at all. It seems to me (as I pointed out in Nature, Nov. 20, 1902) very probable that the sign was cut on these blocks as an intimation to the quarrymen or masons as to the destination of the blocks in question—they were intended for the ‘House of the Double-Axe’—just as in Egypt blocks intended for the temple called ‘House of Millions of Years,’ or (at Deir el-Bahari) Nefer-renpṷt, ‘Beautiful of Years,’ would have the signs or what not painted on each as an intimation to the masons. This may well be one of the many small points in which Minoan practice resembled the Egyptian. But I do not quite gather from Dr.Evans's, report on the excavations for the year 1901 (B.S.A. vii. p. 112)Google Scholar whether he considers that the fine limestone wall at the western end of the ‘Megaron of Double-Axes,’ on which the double-axe is most in evidence, was ever masked by gypsum-slabs or plaster at all. In B.S.A. viii. p. 66, in dealing with the distaff signs on another similar wall, he inclines to the view that they had been covered with plaster, as at, Phaistos. The pillar illustrated in Mycenaean Tree and Pillar-Cults (Fig. 5) and other gypsum pillars and door-jambs which are inscribed with the double-axe sign were surely, however, never covered up by facing-slabs or plaster any more than were the gypsum pavements. As regards Mr. Rouse's denial of the exclusive claim of Knossos to be a ‘place of the Double-Axe,’ certainly Phaistos, for instance, may just as well have had its shrine with the emblem of the common god of the Cretans as any other Cretan city or palace, and this may have been called its labraunda or labyrinth, its ‘pince of the Double-Axe.’ But the Labyrinth of the Greeks was ‘in the Cnossian territory’; Minos, the king who owned the Minotaur (Dr. Evans compares the bull-frescoes of Knossos), was king of Knossos: Knossos was traditionally the chief city of the island and the centre of the Minoan thalas-socracy, therefore it was probably also the chief centre of the worship of the God of the Double-Axe, Zeus Kretagenes, wherefore Dr. Evans is again justified in regarding it as the ‘Place of the Double-Axe’ κατ᾿ ἐξοχήν, the Labyrinth par excellence. That there may also have been confusions with the Gortynian cave, which may have been called the ‘Labyrinth’ on account of its many windings, and become regarded as the true Labyrinth of the Minotaur, is possible. Mr. Rouse quotes from Strabo (viii. 369) a catacomb near Nauplia which was called ‘the Labyrinth,’ so that the name was evidently generally used in late times for labyrinthine caves, just as it might be now. Mr. Rouse says that the Knossian palace is neither mazy nor labyrinthine, but I for one have found it satisfy all reasonable demands in this respect: there is much more at Knossos than ‘fine open courtyards and straight corridors,’ as a glance at the plan will shew. A point on which Mr. Rouse seems, however, to have some justification for his criticism is in respect of the pillars of the Pillar-Rooms. He denies their sacred character: that may pass, though most of us will think Dr. Evans is right on the point; but his contention that they did not stand free, but, whether also cult-objects or not, in every case performed an architectural function in upholding the roof, seems extremely probable.

12 Orientalistische Litteraturzeitung, Dec. 1900, pp. 447–449.

13 J.H.S. xxi. 109, n. 6.

14 Ne-maat-Rā would have heen pronounced something like *Nemarîe, as Neb-maat-Rā, the praenomen of Amenhetep III, was, we know, pronounced *Nimmarîe (Babylonian form Nimmurἱya), and the interchange of n with l is usual: cf. e.g. nas tongue; Coptic las.

15 Denkmacler, i. 47, 78; Text ii. p. 11 ff.

16 Hawara, Biahmu, and Arsinoe, p. 4 ff.

17 Its size may be judged from Prof. Petrie's remark loc. cit. p. 5) that ‘all of the temples on the east of Thebes [all Karnak and Luxor, that is] and one of the largest on the west bank [the Ramesseum] might be placed together on the one area of the ruins at Hawara.’

18 xvii. 1. 37. Πεποιῆσθαι δέ φασι τὰς αὐλὰς τοσαύτας, ὅτι τοὺς νομοὺς ἔθος ἦν ἐκεῖσε συνέρχεσθαι πάντας ἀριστίνδην μετὰ τῶν οἰκείων ἱερῶν καὶ ἱερείων, θυσίας τε καὶ δικαιοδοσίας περὶ τῶν μεγίστων χάριν.

19 Cf. Griffith, , Äg. Zeits, xxxiv. (1896) pp. 49, 50Google Scholar: ‘On substantive compounds formed with adjectival ’ Ne-maat-Rā would mean ‘Possessing the justice of Rā,’ like Nekau (Νεχαώ); ‘Possessing Doubles.’ Maatn-Rā’ would mean ‘Justice of Rā’ simply. It is more than probable that the name was in later times often read Maat-n-Rā or simply Maal-Rā, ‘Justice of Rā’ (*Ma-Rîe, Μάρρυς, Μοίρις) as well as Ne-maat-Rā, ‘Possessing the Justice of Rā’ (*Nemarἱe, Νάμαρις, Λάμαρις).

20 Mendes is a confused interpolation like that of the name of the pharaoh Sheshonk (Shishak of the XXIInd Dynasty) into the list of XIIth Dynasty kings as ‘Sesongosis,’ instead of the true name Sesostris (Senusret I). Strabo's name for the king, Maïmdes or Imandes, is the same: he calls Memnon (Amenhetep III) also Smandes. The original of this name is the later king Nesi-ba-neb-dad (pron. *Nsvindidi?) of the Tanite XXIst Dynasty.

21 On the probable influence of the Herodotean authority on later writers see J.H.S. xxiv. ‘Nitokris-Rhodopis.’

22 Hist. Eg. i. p. 178.

23 The neighbouring pyramid of Usertsen II at IIIahun was raided for stone as early as the time of Ramses II.

24 I am assuming that much of the plaster coating of the stuccoed gypsum walls which were uncovered had disappeared in antiquity as now. But not all the gypsum blocks were covered up with stucco, apparently. Many of the fine facing-slabs cannot have been, nor can most of the pillars; while the gypsum pavements were certainly never plastered. It is true that Diodorus, speaks of the Cretan labyrinth having wholly disappeared ἀλλ᾽ ὁ μὲν κατὰ τὴν Κρήτην ἠφανίσθη τελέως, εἴτε δυνάστου τινὸς κατασκάψαντος εἴτε τοῦ χρόνου τοὖργον λυμναμένου· ὁ δὲ κατ᾽ Aἴγυπτον ἀκέραιον τὴν ὃλην κατασκευὴν τετήρηκε μέχρι τοῦ καθ᾿ ἡμᾶς βίου, i. 61)Google Scholar, but the tradition of its characteristics had evidently survived and, since the site was always kept clear of later buildings (B.S.A. x. p. 51), bits of the palace may have been seen from time to time. Diodorus's statement is a curious reversal of the actual facts. Now it is the Egyptian labyrinth which has totally disappeared, while the Cretan one has been discovered and proves to be comparatively well preserved.

25 The Minoan King may also have been high-priest of the Pelasgian Zeus of the Double Axe.

26 B.S.A. viii. Fig. 3.

27 ib. p. 6; ix. Pl. IV. 4.

28 Phylakopí, Figs, 8, 9.

29 B.S.A. vii. 131.

30 ib. viii. 316.

31 That some considerable work was done at Gîza under the XIIth Dynasty which involved the destruction of more ancient buildings there is proved by the fact that fragments of a lintel and walls bearing the name of Khāfrā (whose statues were found thrown down a well of the Sphinx Temple) were used in the construction of the southern pyramid of Lisht. And a theory has lately been put forward which argues that the face of the Great Sphinx is a portrait of Amenemhat III. This king was extremely fond of sphinx making, and it is well known that the strange sphinxes found at Tanis, which used to be considered to belong to the Hyksos period, have now been proved by M. Golenishtchev to be undoubtedly the work of Amenemhat III. It is by no means impossible that not only the Labyrinth, but also Kasr es-Sagha, the Temple of the Sphinx, and even the Great Sphinx itself, are all the work of this great king. His sphinxes at Tanis, his conception of the Labyrinth, as well as his work in connexion with Lake Moeris, shew that he was a man of original mind, and it may be that he had some puritanical ideas of his own on matters pertaining to religious art, which led him to insist on an entire absence of inscriptions from the walls of the temples which he built, as well as to strike out an unconventional and peculiar line in his sphinxes.

32 Few fragments of inscriptions have been found, but enough to shew that the Labyrinth was not so entirely uninscribed as the Temple of the Sphinx. In comparison with the Ptolemaic and Roman temples, however, it probably seemed simple and unadorned.

33 Cf. Plin., N.H. xxxvi. 75Google Scholar.