² AR 19 (1972–73), 50–61; Popham, M. R.et al, The Minoan Unexplored Mansion at Knossos (Oxford, 1984).Google Scholar

³ Cameron 1984. Catalogue numbers refer to those assigned there.

⁴ Ibid., 130, 147.

⁵ Ibid., 129.

⁶ Ibid., 132.

⁷ The following comments on the fragments are based on Cameron's fresco catalogue and on first-hand observation of the fragments in the Stratigraphical Museum at Knossos made in 1993.

⁸ The Pantane Color and Black Selector 747 XR(Moonachie, NJ, 1988) was chosen over the Munsell Book of Color (Baltimore, 1976) because it offers more colours and shades for matching (over 7,000 Pantone colours compared to approximately 1,500 Munsell colours), and because the Pantone colours can be precisely understood and reproduced by printing companies—a feature which is helpful in publication, even though it is not relevant to this reconstruction. The colours on the fresco fragments were visually measured by matching them with samples from the Pantone Color and Black Selector 747 XR when viewed under natural lighting conditions in which sunlight filtered through the high windows of the Stratigraphical Museum.

⁹ No. 13 is associated with two fragments: the larger piece is here designated ‘13 a’ while the smaller is ‘13 b.’

¹⁰ Cameron 1984, 133, 134.

¹¹ Ibid., 129. Cameron, however, contradicts his own explanation of colour change by suggesting that the original pre-fire colour of the fresco's ground may have been white, which subsequently burned to buff and grey (Ibid., 132). Apart from the difficulty of painting white ‘anemones’ on a white ground, white paint survives on the burnt fragments depicting ‘anemones’ and is easily distinguished from the buff and grey grounds. Additionally, white paint appears as an upper border stripe on a fragment preserving buff ground. It therefore seems highly unlikely that the pre-fire colour of the buff and grey grounds was white.

¹² Ascertaining the exact pre-fire colour of the grey ground, however, is difficult without scientific testing, but the blue reeds preserved on nos. 6, 11, 12 b, and 13 a demonstrate that the grey was not produced from burnt blue paint. White, red, pink, buff, brown, and tan are also clearly preserved on other fragments, along with a pale green-blue and a yellow ochre that are found on the multicoloured rocks. Given that the limited palette of Aegean painting is well represented in the colours preserved on the Floral fresco fragments, it seems highly likely that the grey fragments were originally painted grey and that the damage to colour by fire may not be as great as previously believed.

¹³ Cameron 1984, 135, no. 23.

¹⁴ Following Cameron, the three separate fragments comprising no. 24c are all labelled ‘24c.’

¹⁵ Cameron 1984, 135.

¹⁶ Doumas, C., The Wall Paintings of Thera (Athens, 1992), pl. 36.Google Scholar

¹⁷ PM ii., 111; Shaw, M., The Painted Pavilion of the “Caravanserai” at Knossos, BSA (forthcoming).Google Scholar

¹⁸ Cameron 1984, 129.

¹⁹ Ibid., 136, no. 28, citing references to the Monkeys and Blue Birds fresco from the House of the Frescoes at Knossos (Cameron, M., ‘Notes on some new joins and additions to well known Frescoes from Knossos,’ Europa: Studien zur Geschichte und Epigraphik der frühen Aegaeis. Festschrift für Ernst Grumach (Berlin, 1967), figs. 2 b, 5Google Scholar) and to the ‘Nature’ fresco from Ayia Triada (Smith, W. S., Interconnections in the Ancient Near East (New Haven and London, 1965), fig. 109).Google Scholar

²⁰ Cameron 1984, 136, no. 31.

²¹ Ibid., 132, 136, 147.

²² Smith (n. 19), fig. 109.

²³ PM i. 536–7, col. pl. vi.

²⁴ Cameron, , Kadmos 7 (1968), 97–9, fig. 2Google Scholar; Cameron 1975, 183–4, 725–9 (esp. 728), slide 34.

²⁵ PM II, 461; Cameron 1967 (n. 19), 59.

²⁶ Doumas (n. 16), pls 85–6.

²⁷ Cameron, , ‘Unpublished Paintings from the “House of the Frescoes” at Knossos’, BSA 63 (1968), figs, 3f, 8b, 11c, pl. B 1.Google Scholar

²⁸ Doumas (n. 16), pls 85–7.

²⁹ Ibid., pls. 85–6.

³⁰ PM ii. fig. 275a; Cameron 1967 (n. 19) fig. 20, 4; Cameron 1968 (n. 27), figs, 4c, 8a.

³¹ Bietak, M., ‘Die Wandmalereien aus Tell el-Dab'a/Exbet helmi. Erste Eindrücke’, Ägypten und Levante, 4, (1994), pls. 15a, 16, 17bGoogle Scholar; ‘Connections Between Egypt and the Minoan world: new results from Tell el-Dab'a/Avaris’, in Davies, W. V. and Schofield, L. (eds), Egypt, the Aegean and the Levant: Interconnections in the Second Millennium BC (London, 1995). pls 2, 3.1.Google Scholar

³² The published drawing of fragment no. 39 (Cameron 1984, pl. 47) indicates that the rockwork is blue in colour with black spots. The rockwork is actually half blue and half yellow ochre with black spots.

³³ Cameron 1984, 132.

³⁴ This new reconstruction was produced with the assistance of a calculator and a photocopy machine. Cameron's renderings of the fresco fragments, while drawn to scale, are published in different sizes, so all drawings of fragments were first enlarged to 50% lifesize. Cameron's reconstruction was also enlarged to 50% lifesize so that his completed floral motifs were reproduced on the same scale as the fragments. The new reconstruction could therefore be produced easily by working with Cameron's drawings on tracing paper and then rendering the new design in ink on vellum. Running the completed drawing through a copy machine produced the final black and white line drawing at approximately 50% of the size of the original composition. This design process was employed because it seems to offer the greatest degree of accuracy and consistency within a limited time schedule.

³⁵ Smith (n. 19), fig. 110.

³⁶ Doumas (n. 16), pls 66–71.

³⁷ Platon, N., Zakros. The Discovery of a Lost Palace in Ancient Crete (New York, 1971), 163–9Google Scholar; Marinatos, S., Kreta, Thera, und das Mykenische Hellas (Munich, 1973), pls 108–10.Google Scholar

³⁸ Cameron 1984, 132.

³⁹ Ibid., 129; Thera IV, 20–5, 49–53, pls A–C; Doumas (n. 16), pls. 66–71.

⁴⁰ Cameron 1984, 130, 134; Thera VI, col. pl. 7; Morgan, L., The Miniature Wall Paintings of Thera (Cambridge, 1988), 18, pl. 16Google Scholar; Doumas (n. 16), pl. 28.

⁴¹ Thera VII, 14, pl. 15a–b; Doumas (n. 16), pl. 151.

⁴² Davis, E., ‘The Cycladic Style of the Thera Frescoes’, in Hardy, D. A. (ed.), Thera and the Aegean World III, 3 vols. (London, 1990), I, 221–2. Thin washes of colour can be observed in the transparent garments of the young women of the Adyton fresco from Xeste 3 (Doumas [n. 16], pls 100–8) and in the terrain and the sea of the Flotilla fresco on the south wall of room 5 in the West House (Doumas (n. 16), pls 35–48). It is assumed here that Davis's identification of a ‘Cycladic style’ should be understood as the definition of a regional school of art.Google Scholar

⁴³ Lucie-Smith, E., The Thames and Hudson Dictionary of Art Terms (London, 1984), 168.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ For a recent evaluation of various attempts to identify individual hands in Aegean art, see Cherry, J., ‘Beazley in the Bronze Age? Reflections of attribution studies in Aegean prehistory’, in Laffineur, R. and Crowley, J. (eds), ΕΙΚΩΝ: Aegean Bronze Age Iconography: Shaping a Methodology. Proceedings of the 4th International Aegean Conference / 4^e Rencontre égéenne internationale, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia, 6–9 April 1992 (Aegaeum8Google Scholar; Liège, 1992), 123–44.

⁴⁵ Surveys of Italian Renaissance painting, for instance, typically distinguish the ‘Central Italian’ or ‘Florentine’ style of painting from the ‘Venetian’ style through their division into chapters on painting in Florence, Rome, and Venice. See Freedberg, S. J., Painting in Italy 1500–1600, 2nd edn. (Harmondsworth, 1983), 14Google Scholar; Hartt, F., History of the Italian Renaissance, 2nd edn. (Englewood Cliffs and New York, 1979).Google Scholar As another example, Cycladic korai are differentiated from Attic korai on the basis of their variations within the Archaic idiom of Greek sculpture (Ridgway, B. S., The Archaic Style in Greek Sculpture (Princeton, 1977), 95–108).Google Scholar

⁴⁶ The movement of both art objects and artists is clearly evident when Aegean products appear outside the Aegean. Minoan pottery, for instance, is known in Egypt, and Aegean fresco painting has been discovered recently at both Avaris, the Hyksos capital in Lower Egypt, and at Tell Kabri in the Western Galilee. Kemp, See B. and Merrillees, R. S., Minoan Pottery in Second Millennium Egypt (Mainz, 1980)Google Scholar; Bietak (n. 31); Niemeier, W.-D., ‘Minoan artisans travelling overseas: the Alalakh Frescoes and the Painted Plaster Floor at Tel Kabri (Western Galilee)’, in Laffineur, R. and Basch, L. (eds), Thalassa, L'Égée préhistorique et la Mer. Actes de la troisième rencontre égéenne internationale de l'Université de Liège, Station de recherches sous-marines et océanographiques (StaReSO), Calvi, Corse (23–25 avril 1990), (Aegaeum7Google Scholar; Liège, 1991), 189–201.

⁴⁷ Davis, E. (n. 42), 215–18, 225–6, cites a number of Cycladic landscapes painted on coloured grounds, including frescoes of white lilies painted on red grounds that were found both in Xeste 3 of Akrotiri (Them VI, 17, pl. 24 cGoogle Scholar) and among the frescoes from Phylakopi on Melos (PM iii. 132, fig. 87). Additionally, the frieze of Blue Birds from Ayia Irini sets the birds against a coloured ground, and even the miniature fresco from Ayia Irini utilizes blue and yellow grounds (Coleman, K., ‘Frescoes from Ayia Irini, Keos, Part I’, Hesperia, 42 (1973), 286 93, pls 54–6Google Scholar; Abramovitz, K., ‘Frescoes from Ayia Irini, Keos, Parts II–IV’, Hesperia, 49 (1980), 57–76, 85, pls. 3–10a, 12c).Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Davis (n. 42), 218, 225–6.

⁴⁹ Marinatos, N., Art and Religion in Thera (Athens, 1984), 96.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ N. Marinatos 1984 (n. 49), 85–9; Minoan Religion. Ritual, Image, and Symbol (Columbia, S.C., 1993), 149–51.

⁵¹ Thera IV, 49–52; N. Marinatos 1984 (n. 49), 94; Immerwahr, S. A., Aegean Painting in the Bronze Age (University Park and London, 1990), 47.Google Scholar

⁵² Foster, K. P., ‘A Flight of Swallows’, AJA 99 (1995), 409–25Google Scholar.

⁵³ Doumas (n. 16), 100.

⁵⁴ Hollinshead, M., ‘The Swallows and Artists of Room Delta 2 at Akrotiri, Thera’, AJA 93 (1989), 339, 351.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ The abandonment of construction is evidenced by the unlevelled floors found in some ground level rooms. Popham, M., ‘The Excavation’, in Popham, M. R.et al, The Minoan Unexplored Mansion at Knossos (Oxford, 1984), 2.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ M. Popham, ‘Summary and Conclusions’, in Popham (n. 55), 261.

⁵⁷ D. Smyth, ‘The Architecture’, in Popham (n. 55), 114.

⁵⁸ Smyth (n. 57), 114–15.

⁵⁹ Though Evans was the first to postulate a religious function for the pillar (Evans, A., ‘Mycenaean tree and pillar cult’, JHS 21 (1901), 99–204)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, M. Nilsson examines more than a dozen examples of pillar ‘crypts’ but is unable to determine whether or not the crypts were sacred (The Minoan-Mycenaean Religion and its Survival into Greek Religion, 2nd edn. (Lund, 1950), 236–48).Google ScholarPlaton, N. expanded the study of the pillar room in his typological survey of 45 structures ‘Τὰ Μινϊϰὰ οἰϰιαϰὰ ίερά’, KrChron 8 (1954) 428–83)Google Scholar, and B. Rutkowski updates the analysis and concludes that while some pillar rooms evidently were religious in function, others seem to have served as storage and domestic spaces (Rutkowski, B., Cult Places of the Aegean (New Haven and London, 1986), 21–45).Google Scholar The need to evaluate each pillar room on an individual basis is supported by Gesell, G. and Marinatos, N. (Gesell, G., Town, Palace, and House Cult in Minoan Crete (SIMA 67;Göteborg, 1985), 26–9Google Scholar; Marinatos, N., Minoan Religion 1993 (n. 50), 87–98).Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Rutkowski (n. 59), 37–45; G. Gesell (n. 59), 26–9; N. Marinatos 1993 (n. 50), 88.

⁶¹ Popham (n. 55), 21.

⁶² Ibid., 16–21.

⁶³ Ibid., 261.

⁶⁴ PM ii. 527,538–40.

⁶⁵ Rehak, P., ‘The use and destruction of Minoan stone bull's head Rhyta’, in Laffineur, R. and Niemeier, W.-D. (eds), Politeia: Society and State in the Aegean Bronze Age. Proceedings of the 5th International Aegean Conference / 5^e Rencontre égéenne internationale, University of Heidelberg, Archäologisches Institut, 10–13 April 1994 (Aegaeum 12; Liège, 1995), 439.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Hatzaki, E., ‘Was the Little Palace at Knossos the “Little Palace” of Knossos?’, in Evely, D., Lemos, I., and Sherratt, S. (eds), Minotaur and Centaur. Studies in the Archaeology of Crete and Euboea presented to Mervyn Popham (BAR International Series 638; Oxford, 1996), 36.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Rutkowski (n. 59), 33, 42; contra Gesell (n. 59), 27–8, and Evans, , PM ii. 525–7Google Scholar, who believe that the crypts were cult rooms on the basis of an architectural comparison with the central court sanctuary at Knossos. For a recent reevaluation of the Basement Pillar Crypt Complex that casts additional doubt on the hypothesized sacred character of the pillar rooms, see Hatzaki (n. 66), 36–7.

⁶⁸ Hatzaki (n. 66), 37.

⁶⁹ Additional discussion of the functions of the rooms within the Unexplored Mansion is provided by Poblome, J. and Dumon, C., ‘A Minoan Building Program? Some Comments on the Unexplored Mansion at Knossos’, Acta Archaeologica Lovaniensia, 1988, 26–7, 69–73.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ N. Marinatos 1984 (n. 49), 89–96; 1993 (n. 50), 148–52, 193, 195; Walberg, G., ‘Minoan Floral Iconography’, in Laffineur, R. and Crowley, J. (eds) (n. 44), 241–6.Google Scholar

⁷¹ Cameron 1984, 129.

⁷² Sfikas, G., Wild Flowers of Crete (Athens, 1987), 58.Google Scholar

⁷³ Sfikas (n. 72), 58; Huxley, A. and Taylour, W., Flowers of Greece and the Aegean (London, 1977), 79Google Scholar; Polunin, O. and Huxley, A., Flowers of the Mediterranean (London, 1965), 69–70, pl. 24.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Sfikas (n. 72), 64; Huxley and Taylour (n. 73), 80, pl. 53.

⁷⁵ PM ii. figs. 276a, 279.

⁷⁶ The differences are so striking, moreover, that it seems possible that the star ‘anemones’ may actually be representations of the Pancratium lily or sea daffodil (Pancratium maritimum), which they resemble much more closely (see Sfikas (n. 72), 276, 279). The dots encircling the flower head painted on the sherd from Knossos could refer to the anthers which, in the Pancratium lily, project beyond the rim of the flower. Additionally, both examples of ‘anemones’ from Minoan vase painting include long, tubular buds that are similar to the unopened buds of the Pancratium lily. If, however, they are to be understood as ‘anemones’, then there evidently was no accepted formula for the depiction of the floral type. Hogarth, D., ‘Bronze-Age Vases from Zakro’, JHS 22 (1902), 336–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar, however, argues that the motif appearing on the jar from Zakro is an Aegean interpretation of the Egyptian waterlily (Nymphaea stellata), but the buds and mature petals are too broad in dimension to make the identification tenable.

⁷⁷ Cameron 1984, 130.

⁷⁸ Ibid. On Crete, the dwarf iris was formerly identified as a separate species, Iris cretica or Iris cretensis (Sfikas (n. 72), 280).

⁷⁹ Sfikas (n. 72), 146–7; Huxley and Taylour (n. 73), 106–7, pls 169, 171.

⁸⁰ Sfikas (n. 72), 146. White flowers are also found in C. salvifolius and C. monspeliensis, both species native to Crete.

⁸¹ Thera VII, 14, pl. 15; Doumas (n. 16), pl. 151.

⁸² Cameron 1984, 131.

⁸³ Polunin, O., Trees and Bushes of Europe (London, 1976), 35–6.Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Rackham, O., ‘The Flora and Vegetation of Thera and Crete Before and After the Great Eruption’, in Doumas, C. (ed.), Thera and the Aegean World, I (London, 1978), 756.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ Doumas (n. 16), pls 30–2, 34; Morgan (n. 40), 19.

⁸⁶ Hogarth (n. 76), 333.

⁸⁷ Thera VII, 14–15.

⁸⁸ Morgan (n. 40), 49–54; N. Marinatos 1984 (n. 49), 61–2; 1993 (n. 50), 152–5.

⁸⁹ Cameron 1968 (n. 27), 1–31.

⁹⁰ Immerwahr (n. 51), 42–6; Shaw, M., ‘The Aegean Garden’, AJA 97 (1993), 668–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar; N. Marinatos 1984 (n. 49), 92; 1993 (n. 50), 194–5; Morgan (n. 40), 21–4, 29–32, 66–7; Walberg (n. 70); Warren, P., ‘The Fresco of the Garlands from Knossos’, in Darcque, P. and Poursat, J.-C. (eds), L'Iconographie minoenne. Actes de la Table Ronde d'Athènes (21–22 avril, 1983) (BCH-Suppl. XI) (Paris, 1985), 199–207.Google Scholar

⁹¹ The plant preserved on the fresco fragment sketched in PM ii. fig. 266d, for example, seems to combine a papyrus-like flower with both a reed-like stem and miniature lily-like leaves growing from the base of the plant. The plant fragments pictured in PM ii. fig. 275c likewise combine papyrus-like flowers with reed-like stems but additionally add radiating floral designs that recall marguerites.

⁹² PM ii. fig. 275a, d, e, h, i, k; Cameron 1968 (n. 27), 11.

⁹³ Warren (n. 90), 193.

⁹⁴ Ibid., 193, 204, citing Thera VII, 36–7, pl. 65; Reusch, H., Die zeichnerische Rekonstruktion des Frauenfrieses im böotischen Theben (Berlin, 1956)Google Scholar, pls. 2, 11, 14, 15.

⁹⁵ Contra Walberg (n. 70), 245.

⁹⁶ PM i. 605, fig. 445a–b; PM ii. 469–71, figs. 276h, 277.

⁹⁷ Walberg (n. 70), 245.

⁹⁸ Rare motifs are not necessarily excluded from connections with cult practice, however, as demonstrated by a fragmentary MM III B/LM I A plaster tripod offering table from Palaikastro painted with an unusual floral motif identified as a ‘narcissus’. MacGillivray, J. et al. , ‘Excavations at Palaikastro, 1990’, BSA 86 (1991), 137, fig. 15, pl. 14c–d.Google Scholar

⁹⁹ Cameron 1984, 130, 135.

¹⁰⁰ Walberg, G., Tradition and Innovation. Essays in Minoan Art (Mainz, 1986), 10.Google Scholar

¹⁰¹ Ibid., 73.

¹⁰² Gombrich, E., Art and Illusion. A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation (Princeton, 1960), 71–4.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ Similarly, the more schematic an image remains, the more difficult it may be for the viewer to identify.

¹⁰⁴ Gombrich's example of a Chinese artist's rendition of an English countryside demonstrates clearly that the artist selected only those elemets of English terrain which corresponded most closely with his set of schemata learnt from conventions of Chinese landscape representation and disregarded those features which did not fit the learnt pattern. Gombrich (n. 102), 84–6, fig. 63.

¹⁰⁵ For a catalogue of fresco finds, see Cameron 1975, 671–781. For a mention of the fragments from Kommos, see Shaw, J., ‘Campaign Resumed at Kommos’, ASCSA Newsletter, 28 (Fall, 1991), 1Google Scholar; for Miletus, see Gates, M.-H., ‘Archaeology in Turkey’, AJA 100 (1996), 302, fig. 17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁰⁶ PM ii. 2, frontispiece pl. XIV.

¹⁰⁷ Cultural convention may have influenced the development of the more familiar floral motifs, since many of the most commonly represented plants in Aegean art also seem to have associations with cult practice. See above, n. 90.

¹⁰⁸ As reported by Cameron 1975, 713–37, houses with landscape fresco fragments dating to LM I B or earlier include the Caravanserai, ‘Hogarth's Houses’, the House of the Frescoes, the South House, the South East House, and the Unexplored Mansion. Additionally, the Royal Road excavations (1957–61) uncovered many landscape fresco fragments. Houses lacking landscape frescoes are the House of the High Priest, the House of the Chancel Screen, the House of the Sacrificed Oxen, the Little Palace, the North-West Treasury, and the Royal Villa. More recent excavations at the Stratigraphical Museum at Knossos uncovered the Fresco of the Garlands which, while not constituting a landscape, does nonetheless include unusual floral motifs. See Warren (n. 90), 187–208.

¹⁰⁹ Unusual floral types include the wild pea or vetch, the rose, and the common mallow (see above, n. 92). Additional floral varieties may possibly be identified as ‘rockrose,’ ‘convolvulus,’ ‘honeysuckle,’ and a ‘flowering rush’ (PM ii. 464–6), but other new motifs cannot be identified (Ibid., fig. 275 d, e, h, i, k).

¹¹⁰ PM ii. 111, 113. Möbius, M., ‘Pflanzenbilder der minoischen Kunst in botanischer Beobachtung’, JdI 48 (1933), 20Google Scholar, disputes the dittany identification and argues for the caper (Capparis spinosa L.), though M. Shaw (n. 17), prefers to recognize the plant as an acacia tree (Acacia nilotica). P. Warren (n. 90), 194, identifies dittany in garland 2 of the Fresco of the Garlands from Knossos.

¹¹¹ PM i. 537, fig. 390.

¹¹² Cameron 1975, 717, pl. 109 B 6.

¹¹³ Ibid., 728, pl. 112 a, slide 33. Cameron 1975, plates, 99, identifies the plant as Ruscus aculeatus, described in Polunin and Huxley (n. 73), 218, no. 234.

¹¹⁴ Boulotis, C., ‘Προβλήματα της Αιγαιαϰής ζωγραφιϰής ϰαι οι τοιχογραφίες του Αϰρωτηρίου’, in Doumas, C. (ed.), Αϰρωτηρι Θήρας. Είϰοσι χρόνια ήρευνας (1967–1987) (Athens, 1992), 58–7.Google Scholar

¹¹⁵ PM i. 425–30; Graham, J. W., The Palaces of Crete (Princeton, 1969), 56–7.Google Scholar

¹¹⁶ PM ii. 266.

¹¹⁷ Though the study of artistic hands in Minoan painting is in its infancy (see above n. 44), Cameron assigned numerous frescoes to various ‘schools’ or workshops. Working in the LM I A period at Knossos, Cameron identified a ‘Caravanserai School’ which produced both the Partridge and Hoopoe frieze from the Caravanserai and the ‘flowering reeds’ and mice of the South East House; a ‘School I’ which created the Monkeys and Blue Birds fresco and the Crocuses and Goats fresco from the House of the Frescoes; and a new atelier which painted the Floral fresco from the Unexplored Mansion (Cameron, 1975, 352–5; Cameron 1984, 148). Though these attributions are unpublished and have not undergone public scrutiny, they do suggest that different hands were at work at the same time creating these varied motifs.