222

THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.

Columns
with
Seated
Doves.

' Pillars
of the
House.'

Cult of

Dove

Goddess.

Baetylic
Trinity.

But of all these remains the highest religious interest attaches to
a terra-cotta group belonging to some religious structure on a larger scale
than the others. It consists of three columns on a common base, supporting
in each case, above their square ' capital', the round ends of a pair of beams
on which a dove is perched (Fig. 166, f).1 The square ' capital' itself and the
beam ends above it must here be regarded as the equivalent, in an epitomized
shape, of the roof beams and entablature of a building. In other words, they
are the ' Pillars of the House', and the cloves settled above them are the
outward and visible sign of the divine presence and protection. A clay sealing
with a similar device of a dove perched above roof-beams resting on a column,
itself set on an altar base as in the Lions' Gate scheme, has now come to

Fig. 167. Crystal Lentoid, Idaean
Cave. (§)

Fig. 168. Terra-cotta Votive Conch-shell
Trumpets from Shrine. (|)

light at Mycenae 2—a singular illustration of the Minoan source of its cult.

The doves—also coloured according to the polychrome scheme with
white and powdery red spots on a black ground—illustrate the antiquity of
the Minoan cult of the Dove Goddess. The ' dove vase ' of the M. M. I Period
has been interpreted above as a ritual vessel/' Dove amulets already
existed in Early Minoan times, and the miniature dove with white inlays,
from the Middle Neolithic stratum of Knossos, tends to show that the
dove cult itself, otherwise so widespread among the primitive population
of the East Mediterranean basin, goes back to a very much more remote age.

Of the columns themselves, each one may be regarded as a separate
religious entity, since in place of a common entablature the superstructure

1 In all, fragments of seven columns of
different sizes were found, besides the group.

2 From a well excavated by Mr. Wace in
1920 (to be published in the B.S.A.). The
column in this case had animal supporters,

apparently goats. The associated objects
(a bull's head ' rhyton', &c.) point to a date
more or less contemporary with the close of
the Palace period at Knossos.
3 See p. 146, Fig. 107.