Studies in Aegean Art and Culture by Robert B. Koehl;

Author:Robert B. Koehl;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Ancient / General
Publisher: Casemate Publishers & Book Distributors, LLC
Published: 2019-05-30T00:00:00+00:00

Figure 7.2. Middle Minoan III pottery with landscape scenes: (a) Kommos (C 2376), Herakleion Archaeological Museum; (b) Knossos (Betancourt 1985, pl. 12:I), Ashmolean Museum; (c) Phaistos (F. 4491), Herakleion Archaeological Museum; (d) Phaistos (F. 5599), Herakleion Archaeological Museum; Shank 2001, fig. 1.

Around the same time, or slightly later, in MM III/LM I, seals be gin to show river scenes with water, animals, and river plants growing from their banks (Krzyszkowska 2005, figs. 258–261). On two seals from Knossos (Krzyszkowska 2005, figs. 258, 261), water is depicted in small, parallel curving segments, which help to convey a sense of movement. On these two seals, the water serves as a type of groundline upon which geese and nautili respectively sit. When water is part of a floral landscape (Krzyszkowska 2005, fig. 259), the plant’s stem, in this case a flowering papyrus, becomes the groundline, with the water depicted below as short, parallel, diagonal marks, and a pair of geese above.

The earliest miniature Aegean wall paintings on which water can positively be identified are friezes from Hagia Eirene, Kea, and Akrotiri, Thera, dated to LM/Late Cycladic (LC) I. The fragments from Hagia Eirene, which belong to a large room in the Northeast Bastion of the town, depict landscapes, boats in the sea by a town, and activities on the shore (Abramowitz-Coleman 1970; 1973; Abramowitz 1980; Morgan 1990; 1998; Morgan, ed., 2005, 31, figs. 1.17, 1.18, pl. 15.2:1). Some fragments may depict the actual view visible from the windows of the bastion overlooking the harbor, whose boats are decorated with dolphins and festive bunting and appear to bob on the water (Fig. 7.3). Indeed, small, non-joining fresco fragments positioned near one boat have added white paint on the blue sea, presumably to show sea-foam or the white-capped crests of waves. In either case, the movement of water is deliberately rendered. On the shore, at least one large building rises from the groundline. Men walk along the coast; some carry cauldrons. While its theme of a group event, including men transporting large vessels, has parallels with the miniature paintings from the inland site of Tylissos (Shaw 1972, fig. 13), at the coastal site of Hagia Eirene the setting also includes images of water.

Figure 7.3. Reconstruction of a boat, the sea, a building, and male figures, Hagia Eirene (Morgan 2013, fig. 1). Courtesy L. Morgan.

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