Myth in Pre-Classical Art

Abstract

ing on Greek or pre-Greek religion, or from archaeologists, although occasionally it was suggested that the subject of a gem, or of an engraved ring, might be mythological. Professor M. P. Nilsson, in the 2nd edition of his Minoan-Mycenaean Religion, the best general work on pre-classical religion in Crete and Greece, listed a few objects that were considered to be representations of Greek myth, but he accepted only two as proven.' His chapter-six pages in all constitutes the longest contribution to the subject. Outside it, there is no special study of the problem, and whatever interest it evoked was incidental to an interest in classical myth. Pre-classical myth always was a subordinate subject, that is, merely a means towards a better understanding of classical myth. In the light of a recent article, to which we owe new data, I should like to submit some remarks on the problem. The article I am referring to is Mr. Ventris' tentative interpretation of some of the clay tablets found in Pylos and in Knossos and written in Linear Class B script.2 According to this interpretation, the language of the Pylos and Knossos tablets is an early Greek dialect. As a result of Mr. Ventris' research I believe