Contribution to Enkomi I, Text, Preliminary Report on the Cyprus Department of Antiquities excavations at Enkomi, The Bronze Statue of a Horned God, annotated and commented by SchaefferPorphyrios Dikaios and Claude Frédéric-Armand Schaeffer

126.

In addition to all this pottery, which indicates the filling contained on the one hand IC1 and on the other LCIII/ an Egyptian scarab of Thutmes III (1504-1450) which agrees with the IC I date (1482 on Pl. XLII, 5) and also a most significant domed seal representing a Philistine wearing a feathered crest and holding a round shield (Pl. XLII, 4). [handwritten: LXXV, 5)] We know that the Philistines attacked Egypt about 1200 B.C. before they settled in Palestine and that they were defeated by Ramses III, who had them represented at Medinet Habu (2). This seal together and the fragments of Mycenean IIIC: 1 wares give the date for the FIII: [handwritten: somewhere] somewhere in the twelfth century B.C. This is in perfect agreement with the date indicated for the [handwritten: of the building] erection/ by the material on the earliest floor (V)

(1) Mr. I.E.S. Edwards of the British Museum to whom I sent a cast of the scarab writes (29th December 1949) as follows: "The scarab is of the type published in Hall's catalogue under No.1090 on p.107 and therefore may be contemporaneous with Thutmesis III. The same type is also shown on Pl.XXX of Newberry's scarab (No.4)". M. E. Drioton, Director of the Antiquities Service, Cairo, to whom I showed a picture of the scarab at a recent visit to Cairo is of similar opinion but he notes that the scarab possesses certain peculiarities not strictly Egyptian. To both the above mentioned scholars and to Prof. L. Kettner (who gave me advice on certain points) my thanks are due.

(2) Hall, The civilization of Greece in the Bronze Age 1927, 240 Fig.168 and 320. A Philistine with similar headdress appears on one of the sides of the Enkomi ivory box, Cf. Murray and others, Excavations in Cyprus Pl.4, right hand corner of top figure; also Hall, op.cit. 229. The ivory box and the other ivory objects from Enkomi are attributed to the twelfth century B.C.; cf. Demargne, Crete Dédalique, 196; [illegible] quoting E. Gjerstad, AJA XL, 95.