Note on the Potnia Taurōn

Abstract

IN a recent article W. Technau has discussed the classical representation of the goddess on the bull, including the Europa myth, and has shown that this type is nothing else than one of the numerous survivals of the great omnipotent mother goddess of old Aegean tradition.' Among the iconic types, in which this goddess has survived in later art, the most common is that of the bull-riding goddess, probably a direct inheritance from Minoan religious art. Another variety, with the goddess standing on the bull, is preserved in a geometric bronze disc from Tegea 2; it is clearly derived, by whatever intermediary source, from Hittite art. A third type is that visible on a seventh-century bronze slab found in Kolophon and published in a learned article by Ch. Picard (fig. 1).3 Picard has pointed out the significance in all