186

LIMITATIONS OF INTAGLIO TECHNIQUE

Limita-
tions of
intaglio
techni-
que.

almost superhuman strength, but the Minoan artist, while giving full play to
his extraordinary skill
in the portrayal of the
noblebeast.has rendered
the performer quite dis-
proportionately small.

Apart from the
greater interest that the
engraver seems to have
taken in animal repre-
sentations—which was
generally the case—the
reason for the extreme
disproportion of the
human figure in this
case may doubtless be
found in the different
space conditions within
which his work was con-
fined. In the original stucco relief that we may suppose to have.suggested
this design a considerable wall-space was available above, in which to supply
an adequate rendering of the legs and body of the leaping youth, whose
downward plunge is shown by his upward streaming locks.

This masterpiece of the Minoan gem-engraver's skill in which, while
the full proportions of the bull are reproduced with all their sinewy details,
the principal actor in the scene is deliberately stunted, is in fact of great value
as pointing to the source of the whole design in a work of the larger Art.
For its full development the oblong field should have been stood on end
with the major axis perpendicular, but this would have unduly reduced
the figure of the bull. The normal height of the walls of the Palace
Halls and Corridors at Knossos is somewhat over four metres, which
would have left a space of quite two metres above the bull's head for the
leaping youth.

Similar limitations of space, with conventional abbreviations resulting
from them, may be traced in many intaglio types based on more spacious
models. To this must be added, moreover, the general economy both of

Fig. 129. Bull grappled by Man while drinking at
Cistern ; on Flattened Cylinder of Onyx. (J)

beginnt, von einem Manne iiberrascht'. So
far from being ' in the act of leaping the boun-
dary hurdles', the bull's hind legs are sta-

tionary, and the man is not tossed up but, as
his streaming locks show, descends.