Heraklion Archaeological Museum - CollectiveAccess System : Clay objects : Kados-shaped vessel with decoration of bucrania and double axes [Π3378]

Kados-shaped vessel with decoration of bucrania and double axes

Π3378

Clay

Incomplete, mended and restored.

Height: 28.5 cm. Rim diameter: 19 cm.

Palaikastro

Block Δ 18

Middle Bronze Age. Neopalatial period, Middle Minoan ΙII period.:

1700-1600 BC:

Gallery:

Case:

Exhibition thematic unit:

Late Bronze Age - Neopalatial period (1700-1450 BC). The New Palaces. The zenith of Minoan civilisation

Settlements of East Crete

Description

This bucket-shaped vessel from Palaikastro, cylindrical with a biconcave profile, is unique in many respects. At two points under the handles it bears pierced quatrefoil ornaments with large discs between the leaves. These render it non-functional from a practical point of view, as it could not be used to store or transport solids or liquids. The outer surface has a solid brownish-red background, strikingly decorated in white paint, which is largely flaking. Bands, rows of discs and tortoiseshell ripple below the rim and above the base define the main decorative zone. Clusters of flowers spring from the pierced ornaments and the handles. On the two main surfaces is a bucranium (bull’s head) with a double axe between the horns. The impracticality of the vessel and the bucrania indicate that it was used as a cult vessel. The bull was a symbol of strength and fertility for the inhabitants of Minoan Crete from the Early Bronze Age onwards. Depictions of bulls increase in the Neopalatial period, when they are frequently seen in frescoes and on seals. The theme is rarely found on Cretan vases, although it appears in relief on a few vessels of special use, dated to around the same period as the vessel from Palaikastro. The most common Creto-Mycenaean bull scenes involve the capture or sacrifice of the bull, animals fighting and the sport of bull-leaping. Bucrania combined with the double axe, the main ritual instrument of the sacrifice of the bull, may be an implicit reference to the bull sacrifice ritual. Bull’s-head rhyta are in the same spirit of “a part referring to the whole”. This vessel with its pierced ornaments may have had a similar function to the rhyta, offering libations in the context of Minoan ceremonial practice.

Bibliography:

Bosanquet, R.C. and R.M. Dawkins, The Unpublished Objects from the Palaikastro Excavations: 1902-1906. The British School at Athens. Supplementary Papers 1. London, 1923, 19-21, pl. XII.

Author:

I. N.

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