Previous First Next

SALAMIS IN THE ISLAND OF CYPRUS.
BY ALEXANDER PALMA DI CESNOLÀ, F.S.A.,
page 39

and have a slight tunic round the loins; their hands being raised above and behind them. The prisoners are not bearded, and their short costume shows that they are enemies, of the white or Libyan race, rather than of the Semitic nations. Before the king stands the god Ra, or the Sun, hawk-headed, wearing the Sun's disk, draped in a shenti, or tunic, stretching out his right hand, in which he has probably held the khepsh or scimetar, and holding his left hand pendent, as though he were holding a symbol of life. This action intimates that victory is accorded to the monarch by the Sun God, the Phœnician Baal Reseph, or Reseph Mical, a form afterwards converted by the Cypriotes to the Apollo Amy-claios. The prisoners or enemies of the king are, as in Egyptian style, of smaller proportions.. So also is the attendant of the monarch who stands behind him facing in the same direction, but he is not in purely Egyptian costume. Around his loins is a short garment, perhaps a kind of ' silenti ' or Egyptian tunic; but he wears on his head a pointed helmet like the Assyrian, or the cap pointed like the Persian kidaris, or as it is called in the Cypriote dialect, the kittaris. His left hand holds a bow, his right is placed upon, his breast as if he held an arrow. At his left side a quiver is slung. In the exergue of this scene is a representation of something, but it is difficult to say what it is. The whole of this belongs to the category of Phœnician art. "Separated by a funicular border, the frieze or scene running round centre offers more relation with Greek art, although it is treated in the Egyptian manner. It is, however, Cypriote in some respects; entertainments and similar diversions being represented on other cups of the kind published by M. Ceccaldi, and belonging to the collection of General di Cesnola. The triclinium, or repast, dance, music, song, and offering, form a kind of Dionysiac scene mixed with erotic subjects; the men are shorn and draped in short tunics like the Phœnicians on the Egyptian monuments. The women are either naked or in very transparent garments, and their hair is in the Egyptian style. It is difficult to make out the due sequence of the scene, which offers a representation of Cypriote sensualism. The central figures may, however, be considered those which are seated or reclining, at an entertainment, on couches and chairs. To the right a man, recumbent on a couch, facing right, addressing a draped female seated on the couch, and drinking with a cup in his right hand; under the couch is a footstool; at the foot of the couch is a Krater on a stand; behind the Krater an oinochoos, or youth, serving wine with a jug, oinochoe, in his right hand. He stands at the foot of another couch, the figure of which is indistinct; behind this couch is a draped female with a child, seated on a chair. Behind the seated group, and recumbent on the couch on the left, is a man seated on a chair and drinking out of a cup, then a stand, following which is a man carrying a female; a couch with footstool, and recumbent figure on the couch; and two men looking back, carrying a kind of bucket, or situlus, on a pole. These are figures connected with a symposium, and of which they are the accessories. Behind the seated figure on the left are figures also connected with a symposium, chiefly the musicians; the first, a female holding her hands down; the second, a man with hands raised, perhaps, a musician, but imperfect; the third, a man holding up an ornament or uncertain object; the fourth, a female holding or playing on a tambourine; the fifth, is a female in Egyptian style holding a cup and lotus flower; behind her is a water plant This cup, no doubt, possesses in some of its aspects an erotic sentiment, like the Greek symposia which are found not uncommonly depicted on the later vases of the Basilicata, of which the date may he placed about b.c. 300." There is also â very ancient pipe of remarkable form, furnished with rings by which some of the holes may be shut off if necessary. It is about twenty inches long, perforated in eleven holes on the one side, and three on the other side (fig. 67). I am indebted to Mr. William Chappell, F.S.A., the author of The History of Ancient Music, for the following notes on this flute. " The Greek bronze flute discovered

Previous First Next