This brings us back to a surprising series of pieces of painted pottery from the Royal Tombs of the Ist Dynasty ([Fig. 63]). The forms are Aegean; the material, the facing, the colouring, the varieties of pattern, all belong distinctively to the Aegean. The opinion of Professors Furtwängler and Wolters is that these belong to the earliest type of Island pottery. Certainly there is nothing like them found in Egypt, except the confessedly Aegean pottery of later times. One prehistoric Egyptian vase has been compared with them, but it has no resemblance in form, material, facing, or colouring, and only an approximation to one of the patterns. They stand unquestionably in line with other Aegean ware. These pieces are found scattered in several of the Royal Tombs; and those from the earlier tombs are of an earlier style. Thus there is no absolute proof, but only a strong presumption, that these belong to the age of the tombs of the Ist Dynasty.
Further evidence is, however, given by a portion of the original tomb offerings of King Zer, which were left untouched by all the plunderers and destroyers. In one corner-chamber of his tomb were an alabaster vase of regular Ist Dynasty type, four pottery jars of the same age, and nine jars of foreign ware, different in forms, in material, and in facing, from any Egyptian pottery of that age, but agreeing in all these characteristics with Aegean pottery, and including a vase of the same nature as the painted pottery, but without decoration. The whole group was cemented together by the burning of the unguents which had been buried in the jars.
Fig. 63.—Pottery of earliest Aegean style. From Royal Tombs of the Ist Dynasty, Egypt.
Here is then a case like that of the Kamares pottery at Kahun. The evidence is clear, there is no visible loophole for avoiding the archaeological conclusion. And the only argument against it is that no such pottery has been found in Greece, but only more advanced styles of such fabric under later conditions. Now that the Knossos finds have led all those who see their value to grant a connection in the IIIrd or IVth Dynasty, we may soon see the fighting frontier pushed over to include this great and distinctive group of the early Ist Dynasty.
Ist Dynasty, Cretan.
Nor does this stand alone. This year another class of foreign pottery has been found in the ruins of the temple of Abydos, of the Ist Dynasty, and perhaps somewhat before it ([Fig. 64]). The material is unlike any in Egypt, a dense black pottery; the facing of it is usually highly burnished, unlike Egyptian of that age; the forms are wholly un-Egyptian, the long pointed amphora with curved neck, and the hollow feet to vases, being unmistakably of the Greek family. Exactly similar pottery in material and finish, is found in fragments of the later Neolithic period at Knossos; a piece from Egypt and one from Knossos when seen side by side seem as if they had been broken from the same jar. The forms of the Cretan examples are not yet re-established, but some at least are the same as the Egyptian examples. As most of the cups of this type at Abydos had contained a brilliant red haematite paint, it is very likely that the pottery came over as vehicles for trade products.
Yet again in the Ist Dynasty deposit of ivory and glazed objects in the temple of Abydos, was a cast copper figure of foreign style which is of the same family as the copper figures found in the Diktaean cave.
Fig. 64.—Polished black pottery of Cretan origin. Temple of Abydos. Dyn. I.