[49] For a reproduction of the seal, see Sayce, "Trans. Soc. Bibl. Arch.," Vol. V., p. 442.
[50] For the sealings, see Heuzey, "Rev. d'Assyr.," IV., pp. 3 ff. The points of contrast presented by the Cyprus seal may be summarized: (1)The signs employed in the inscription are not of Narâm-Sin's period, but of the time of the First Dynasty. (2)The presence of the Storm-god, the number and nature of the religious emblems, the arrangement of the design dictated by the horror vacui, and the engraving of the seal itself with its undisguised employment of the drill, are all Syro-Cappadocian in character; they are in striking contrast to the beauty of proportion and restrained design of the figures arranged on a plain field by the early Semitic seal-engravers of Akkad. (3)The deification of Narâm-Sin is of course no proof that he was dead (see above, p. [251]). But it should be noted that on seals of Narâm-Sin's period, which mention the reigning king or a member of his family, the royal name is included in order to indicate a delegation of authority. The text is always couched in the second person, in the form of an address, and the royal name is invariably mentioned first. Had Mâr-Ishtar, the owner of the seal, been a contemporary of Narâm-Sin, the inscription on the seal would have run: "O Narâm-Sin, God of Akkad (or King of Akkad), Mâr-Ishtar, the (here would follow the title of his office), is thy servant." As a matter of fact, the inscription runs: "Mâr-Ishtar, son of Ilu-bani, servant of the god Narâm-Sin." Here Mâr-Ishtar's name comes first, then that of his father, and lastly that of his patron deity. Narâm-Sin is no longer the living God of Akkad, but is just an ordinary deity, and occupies an ordinary deity's place upon the seal. The survival of his name as that of a god in the period of the Western Semites is paralleled by the occurrence of the name of Bûr-Sin I., King of Ur, as that of a deity in the Moon-god's suite, on a god-list of the seventh century B.C.; see above, p. [299].
[51] For a reproduction of the seal, see Bezold, "Zeits. für Keilschrift.," II., pp. 191 ff.; cf. also Myres and Ohnefalsch-Richter, "Catalogue of the Cyprus Museum," pp. 15, 134.
[52] Of the Enkomi cylinder-seals, for example, only two are purely Babylonian (of the First Dynasty), and the others, with the exception of a few rude specimens of native Cypriote workmanship, are Syro-Cappadocian and Hittite importations.
[53] See Winckler, "Die Euphratländer und das Mittelmeer," in "Der Alte Orient," VII., 2 (1905), p. 10.
[54] See Burrows, "The Discoveries in Crete," p. 9.
[55] Op. cit., p. 134.
[56] See Sayce, "Archaeology of the Cuneiform Inscriptions," p. 181, Burrows, "The Discoveries in Crete," p. 139, and Hall, "Proc. Soc. Bibl. Arch.," XXXI., p. 225.
[57] For the evolution of Minoan writing, see Evans, "Scripta Minoa," I., pp. 19 ff., 28 ff.