The Miniature Frieze in the West House: Evidence for Minoan Poetry?

The discovery of the Theran Miniature Fresco from the West House has provided new evidence on this very elusive and esoteric problem. It is above all the Homeric description of Achilles' shield (Iliad 18) which may be compared, with regard to specific motifs, as well as more basic elements, such as composition and the physical and mental perspective through which the world is viewed in both kinds of art. Here essential correspondences can be found which support the opinion that there was indeed a common background of subject as well as of style in both figural art and poetry.

Since it seems to be Minoan, rather than Mycenaean art which is related to Homer's description of Achilles' shield, the conclusion is inevitable that Homer's description of the shield must have been composed on the model of Minoan poetry. In favour of this view it can also be argued that the epic metre (hexameter) has been considered by philologists to have been taken from a non-Greek source (mainly Minoan). Apart from this, further examples for this kind of process can also be adduced from other cultures and periods.

INTRODUCTION

Minoan poetry, whatever it may have been, is totally lost. Even the most optimistic evaluation of archaeological and literary sources will not produce any hope that one day at least a small fragment of a Minoan poem, a song, or epos, or something else of this category will be at our disposal. It is in any case difficult to prove that Minoan poetry existed, though, unless Minoans were far behind their oriental neighbours, it must have. But all we have to attest to it are some illustrations proving that at least some kind of music existed; they show musical instruments and musicians represented on gems, frescoes and vases. Of special interest are individuals playing a kind of lyre (Aign 1963). Since purely instrumental lyre-playing seems to be a later development, it is a sound conclusion that these lyre-players are bards who use their instruments in order to accompany their songs. At that time, as still in Archaic Greece, poetry was always performed together with musical accompaniment, a rule which can also be shown to be valid for the Homeric poems (Wegner 1968, 35). (I do not know, by the way, what to say about the monkey playing the lyre on the fresco fragment from Thera, Xeste 3; but this may be another matter.) One of the first to express the idea that there existed some kind of Minoan epic poetry was A. Evans. When discussing the theme of the Town Mosaic from Knossos and the silver rhyton from Grave Circle A with the Beleaguered City he argued that 'this is not a conventional version of a traditional siege scene in general but a record of somewhat complicated episodes, either actually witnessed, or as graphically described in some epic source...' (Evans 1921-36, III, 89). 'There is', as he thought, 'good warrant indeed for concluding that we have here a version, coeval with the earliest palace of Knossos, of epic scenes, the later transformations of which may be detected not only in the Minoan reliefs referred to, but in the shields of Herakles and Achilles, as described by Hesiod and Homer. The theme of the beleaguered city... was to take immortal shape in the "tale of Troy divine".' (Evans 1921-36, III, 314.)

Apart from this A. Evans thought it 'natural to suppose that those small reliefs whether in metal-work or soft stone, were largely based on the fuller compositions supplied by the set of miniature wall paintings...' (Evans 1921-36, III, 101; cf. Warren 1979, 128.) This suggestion could hardly better have been shown to be correct than by the discovery of the West House Miniature Frescoes. Was A. Evans, so we feel forced to ask as a consequence, also right when he claimed a literary epic background for the theme illustrated by the Mycenae Silver Rhyton or the Town Mosaic? Today his most ingenious hypothetical interpretation of the faience plaques belonging to the composition of the Town Mosaic reads like a summarizing description of the remaining part of the North Frieze from the West House: 'The central feature, as already noted, consisted of the towers and houses of a fortified town. There were, however, also abundant remains of... trees and water, goats and oxen, marching warriors, spearmen and archers, arms and equipments, the prow of a ship, and curious negroid figures.' (Evans 1921-36, I, 302.)

Besides the fragment of a steatite rhyton from Knossos showing an 'archer apparently disembarking from a boat', and the inlaid dagger from Vapheio with swimniers which Evans himself compared to the above mentioned artefacts (Evans 1921-36, III, 106, Fig. 59; 126, Fig. 81; cf. Warren 1969, 473; S. Marinatos 1927), and besides the West House fresco there has appeared one more important piece of art since A. Evans's day which also testifies that a kind of common theme was behind these representations: the fragments belonging to a serpentine rhyton from Epidaurus (Sakellariou 1971). And it was P. Warren who, in the conclusion of his profound study of all these related documents of art, finally wondered whether 'we should not see these exquisite yet silent works as the visual counterparts of oral poets.' (Warren 1979, 129.)

Is there, however, any good evidence on which we can base a convincing answer? I think that it can be provided less by the theme as such, namely the familiar story of booty raids starting from the sea and threatening coastal towns, for this may be too generalized a comparison: events like these are too widespread in space and time to be regarded as firm grounds for proving anything. More reliable conclusions should refer specifically to the particular kind of composition, of visual and mental perspective and also of what may be called the symbolic background or the metaphoric content. Nonetheless the choice of motifs which were used by both painter and poet may also be compared.

MOTIFS

Starting with single motifs we may remember that it was again A. Evans who showed that 'from the first an analogy has been drawn between the gesticulating-women on the walls and parapets of the stronghold as seen on the silver "rhyton" and similar episodes on the shields of Achilles and Herakles as described by Homer and Hesiod.' (Evans 1921-36, III, 101.) To this very characteristic motif of 'Teichoskopie' the West House Frescoes have added some more comparable details which also closely resemble the Homeric description of Achilles' shield. Thus we may cite the ladies from the Miniature Frieze looking out of the windows of their houses; in this they recall Homer's female spectators standing in front of their house-doors (Iliad 18, 495ff.), a motif which is also at home in Minoan iconography, as can be seen from the famous Verghi crater (Vermeule and Karageorghis 1982, II, 12f.). Likewise we find, on the North Frieze, scenes of war both next to buildings and combined with a pastoral environment - a situation which is again repeated in Homer's shield description (Iliad 18, 509ff.). A further important motif is the river which passes near the town (Iliad 19, 521ff.), as in the so-called Departure Town on the West House South Frieze (and as is also the case with Simioeis and Skamandros near Troy). We hear of lions roaming through the open landscape and chasing other animals (Iliad 18, 579), as can also be observed on the West House paintings. Some more scenes which are comparable to episodes on Achilles' shield appear in other Minoan works of art, e.g. the 'basileus' in the midst of his workmen (Iliad 18, 550ff.) on the famous 'Harvester Vase' from Ayia Triada (Hood 1977, 145, Fig. 138). Further parallels are provided by high-ranked men holding sceptre-like staffs in their hands as symbols of status (cf. Iliad 18, 557; Hood 1977, 144, Fig. 137; 229, Fig. 234; Niemeier 1987), young men carrying daggers at their sides (cf. Iliad 18, 598; Hood 1977, 103, Fig. 85), the two jumping dancers (Iliad 19, 605; Hood 1977, 228, Fig. 231) to cite only some of the more obvious examples.

COMPOSITION

The single motifs, some of which we have mentioned above, are 'formulae,' ready for being composed, as it were. When we look at the way in which they are combined we find, in both artistic media, the same loose juxtaposition of several motifs which stand one beside the other without being joined by a clear, continuous string of narration. An interest in typical events obviously overwhelms the narrative context. The single scenes are grouped together in a simple sequence, one following the next in Homer's description, just as they are juxtaposed on the frescoes. On the latter this has caused certain problems of interpretation as to the sequence of events, or their mutual reference to each other.

L. Morgan, in her well-documented study of the West House Miniature Friezes has very clearly observed and expressed this phenomenon: '...rather than presenting a sequence of events through a period of time -in the manner of true narrative - the artist has suggested a number of events, defined by an approximate time span, but occurring in different places... The locality of the scenes is, however, consistent.' (Morgan 1988, 164.) The Homeric shield description, or rather its composition, could be characterized in the same words. And it seems applicable to both the literary and the figural work when L. Morgan says that 'the inclusion of genre scenes recalling typical rather than specific events, as well as the use of symbolic ideas, precludes the paintings from being described as true narrative'; it is indeed 'the more potent juxtaposition which enables us to read the ideas - the themes - behind the images.' (Morgan 1988, 164.)

There is, however, a main theme which is evoked in the very first lines of the Homeric poem under discussion: this is the two towns, the one of which is living in peace whereas the other is threatened by war. In some way this recalls the basic difference between what is illustrated on the North and the South Frieze in the West House: here again war is opposed to peace (since nothing prevents us accepting that the Ship Procession, whatever its precise subject, also symbolizes the peaceful aspect of the world). In Homer the dichotomy between peace and war is above all reflected by the fate of the towns, but it is to some degree also repeated in the rural landscape surrounding them. In the West House friezes a river landscape is set between the friezes on the north and south walls; we will come back to this aspect later.

PHYSICAL AND MENTAL PERSPECTIVE

There are, as has been shown, common motifs and closely corresponding elements of composition, and also obvious parallels between the predominant subjects in Homer's shield and the West House friezes. One more general conformity results from the specific way in which the world is viewed. Physically the world is seen from a distant and elevated point of view: who is able to see, at the same time, two towns in contrasting situations? What is spread before us by the painter as well as by the poet is a vast panorama - a kind of 'world-landscape' which includes typical events as they may occur at several places. Homer's poetry 'hebt uns', as J.W. Goethe has asserted, 'wie ein Luftballon mit dem Ballast, der uns anhängt, in höhere Regionen und lässt die verwirrten Irrgänge der Erde in Vogelperspektive vor uns entwickelt daliegen' (Schadewaldt 1959, 368), an observation which seems especially true for the verses of the shield description. Is this, we have to ask, the very kind of perspective which the early Greeks used, to draw their picture of the world? As B. Schweitzer (1926; Schadewaldt 1959, 130ff.) saw many years ago, this kind of perspective is more closely related to Minoan fresco-paintings than to the basically object-bound Greek mode of mental perception and figural reproduction.

Turning to the mental attitude, it may be remembered that the Homeric shield has sometimes been felt as a piece of poetry which is, to some extent, alien to the rest of the poem and to the context where it is inserted (Schadewaldt 1959, 370 n. 2, 371 n.1). Not only does it hamper and interrupt the main line of epic narration, it is, in particular, not specifically heroic as to its general content; though war occurs, it seems neither of central interest nor is it glorified. The same can be said of the West House paintings and Minoan art as a whole.

METAPHORICAL ELEMENTS

We may perhaps still go one step further. If L. Morgan is right, a metaphoric element is present in the West House frescoes. She has drawn our attention to two points where such metaphoric elements become apparent. One is the emblems of the ships, the other is the river landscape of the East Frieze. As to the former, she has observed 'that the lion images have been applied to the ships so that the vessels might be infused with their power and thus be able to conquer the waves, and the warrior-occupants of the ship may be inspired with the valour of the "king of beasts".' (Morgan 1988, 49.) The East Frieze, on the other hand, complements, as an interlude between the North and South Friezes 'the larger theme, acting somewhat in the nature of a metaphor for the human preoccupations of warfare and aquatic activity implicit in the surrounding scenes.' (Morgan 1988, 161.)

The nature of metaphor, though applicable to figural art, is a primarily literary, or rather poetic one. Only when it occurs in contemporary poetry may its precise meaning also be grasped in figural representations. As to ships, L. Morgan has cited a passage from a Sumerian poem where Enki's boat is compared to a lion (Morgan 1988, 49). That a strong metaphoric relation existed between lion and king in Egyptian literary and figural arts was pointed out long ago by A. Perrson when he compared an engraved gem from Dendra showing a lion attacking a bull with corresponding similes in Homer. He wrote: 'In der Literatur jedoch wird "der Löwe" zur gewöhnlichen Bezeichnung für Pharao erst mit der XVIII Dynastie, also nach 1580, dann aber begegnet er umso häufiger. Einige Beispiele: Thotmes III wird auf einem Skarabäus als ein über einem hingestreckten Feinde stehender Löwe dargestellt, mit der Inschrift: "der Löwe als Herrscher, ein wild blickender Löwe, wenn er die Feinde erblickt, die seinen Weg übertreten;" er belagert eine Stadt, heisst es, "wie ein Löwe der auf der Lauer liegt". An einer anderen Stelle heisst es von ihm, er sei "als ein wild blickender Löwe, der die Feinde in ihren Tälern zu Leichen macht". Sein Nachfolger Amenophis II wird "der Löwe der Könige" genannt - hier ist Löwe gleichbedeutend mit König. Es gibt ein Bild von Amenophis III, das ihn als Löwen zeigt, der seine Feinde zertritt, mit der Inschrift: "der alle Länder niedertritt" .'(Perrson 1939, 386f.) Minoan and Egyptian figural art are different in many respects, - particularly with regard to the representation of the ruler, which is extremely important for the latter, whereas it is more or less absent in the former. On the other hand there are - as, e.g., the theme of the Nilotic landscape shows - some common traits and, to some degree, Egyptian influence on Minoan art is undeniable (Schachermeyr 1967, 43ff.; Helck 1979, 80ff., 93ff.); they will not necessarily have been limited to formal elements but could also have extended to abstract ideas, foremost amongst them the simile discussed above, of lion and king, or rather of lion and warrior.

A MAJOR DISCREPANCY OF MOTIFS

On the whole, the parallels between, what we may call the 'traditional' features of Minoan representational art and the Homeric description of Achilles' shield seem to be close enough to allow the hypothetical conclusion that, as A. Evans has already argued, they reflect to some extent lost Minoan poetry. It is, however, only natural to suppose that Homer's description of Achilles' shield, if it really has its background in Minoan poetry, reflects this source only in a greatly fragmented way. There is not only an enormous gap of time between the West House paintings and Homer, but two different artistic media are compared. To some extent this may explain a major discrepancy which is inherent in this comparison: the sea, which is of great importance in the West House frescoes, is almost totally absent from the shield description, at least as far as concerns the single events which are depicted; only in the first and the last verses is it mentioned by Homer as being part of the cosmic frame. On the whole, a mainland spirit prevails. We can only speculate about the reason: perhaps the original poem, if Minoan, was composed during a period when sea-faring was not yet of central interest; this may have arisen only together with the Minoan thalassocracy (Blavatskaja 1975). That comparable naval episodes were not unknown to epic poetry is shown by a number of Homeric references to sea-raid episodes (Morgan 1988, 209 n. 44). And since, as far as we know, no real sea battles were fought during the Aegean Bronze Age, battles on land and sea-raids are not mutually exclusive but rather complementary themes. In Minoan art sea-shore attacks may have become topical only when Minoans went in greater numbers to islands like Thera, Milos and Kea. This did not happen before the 16th century BC (E. Schofield, J.L. Davis, R. Barber, in Hägg and Marinatos 1984).

A QUESTION OF LANGUAGE

The question of language remains a greater problem for the assumption of a Minoan background to Homer's shield description. After all Homer is Greek. Minoans, quite obviously, were not. If we accept that Minoan poetry is reflected by the West House Miniature Frescoes as well as by the description of Achilles' shield, it must have been translated from Minoan into the Greek language.

There are two points which make this, at first sight perhaps strange, idea more plausible. One is the nature of the hexameter verse. According to a (not unquestioned but at least) traditional view which has the authority of A. Meillet and K. Meister behind it, the hexameter is originally alien to Greek poetry and must therefore have been borrowed from elsewhere. This opinion has recently been repeated by C.J. Ruijgh who thinks of a Minoan origin. He writes: '... il est tentant d'accepter l'argumentation de Meister (1921, 56-58) et de Meillet (1923, 57-63), qui concluent que les Grecs ont emprunté ce vers à un autre peuple, parce qu'il n'a aucun pendant parmi les vers védiques. On pense, naturellement, aux Minoens de l'île de Crète, dont la civilisation a exercé une influence dans la culture matérielle qui se reflète dans le vocabulaire grec. Ainsi, on rencontre a-sa-mi-to 'baignoire' à Cnossos, mot d'origine nettement préhellénique, qui survit dans des formules homériques mais ne subsiste plus dans l'usage courant au premier millénaire. C'est également aux Minoens que les Grecs Mycéniens ont emprunté l'écriture syllabique. Plus bas, nous rencontrerons une formule nom-épithète remplissant un hexamètre holodactylique entier et qui doit remonter à la phase initiale de l'époque mycénienne. Dans ces conditions, l'hypothèse de l'origine minoenne de l'hexamètre dactylique est fort séduisante: l'on sait que précisément au debut de l'époque mycénienne (XVIe et XVe s.), l'influence de la civilisation minoenne était particulièrement forte à Mycènes.' (Ruijgh 1985, 150; cr. Labarbe 1981, 43; Baurain 1987.) The verse referred to by C.J. Ruijgh where a traditional formula consisting of noun and epithet, fills in a complete hexameter, is: Μηριόνης άτάλαντος 'Ενυαλίω άνδρειφόντη or, in its original form: Μηριόνάς hατάλαντος Ένύαλίω άνrχwόντα (Iliad 7, 166 etc.) (Ruijgh 1985, 162; cf. also Promponas 1980, 46ff.). It remains to be stressed in this connection that Meriones is not only the famous owner of the boar's tusk helmet (Iliad 10, 251ff.), itself a Mycenaean heirloom in Homer; he is, moreover, a native Cretan; and the name of Enyalios is attested as e-nu-wa-ri-jo already in the Linear B-texts from Knossos (KN V 52; cf. Gérard-Rousseau 1968, 90). Is the verse in question itself a Greek translation from a Minoan poem written in same metre?

We should by no means exclude the possibility that poetry was translated from one language into another. The poem of Gilgamesh was transferred from Sumerian into Accadian and Hittite. It is also well known how deeply Roman poetry is indebted to its Greek models, from which it borrowed a great range not only of its themes but also of its main poetic forms. In the period of the West House Miniature Frescoes, the possible relation of which to poetry we have discussed above, we hear about attempts to transcribe Minoan names into Egyptian hieroglyphics. A writing tablet dating from the reign of Thutmoses III is entitled: 'The making of Keftiu-Names' (Helck 1979, 101f.; Haider 1988, 19f.). And Minoan prayers were also written down, although obviously untranslated and in their original form - possibly because this was regarded as essential to their result.

Either in the early 18th dynasty or, at the latest, the reign of Amenophis III, the text of the London medical papyrus was redacted which comprises the magical spell: santi kapupi wayya ajamanta rakukara (Helck 1979, 193f.; Haider 1988, 21). C.M. Bowra, in his late book on Homer, said that this 'could sound like a hexameter'; we must, however, admit, as he has added, that 'magical spells, especially when quoted by Egyptians, are hardly reliable evidence.' (Bowra 1972, 94.) There is, however, good evidence for a Minoan descent of the seven-stringed instrument called κίθαρις or φόρμιγξ (both of which are non-Greek expressions). It is therefore tempting to accept that, as stated in the most recent book on this subject (Maas and Snjder 1989, 3), 'in the case of the Mycenaeans, these earliest Greeks seem to have adopted the Minoan instrument as their own'. Likewise, not only did Lydian music make its impact on Greek music: it has also been shown that Lydian verse metre was borrowed by Archaic poets (Eichner 1986, 21).

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