Page:History of Art in Sardinia, Judæa, Syria and Asia Minor Vol 2.djvu/269

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Glyptic Art. 251 Fig. 385. Cylinder. Hemat. St. Elme Gautier. the field is occupied by a worshipping scene. On the left is a winged genie, with a human body and the head of a bull ; he holds in his right hand a fish, which does not seem to be intended as an offering, but apparently introduced that it might take part in the religious performance. The central figure holds a palm ; then comes a second genie, with a human face, and two other personages, turned away from the scene, with flowers in their hands. There is not a single instance of a fish or a bull-headed genie in the Eyuk and Boghaz-Keui carvings ; the physiognomy they bear here at once recalls the extreme East.^ The three principal figures, however, are clad in short tunics, and the central one, the king, perhaps, has a cap which closely resembles the Cappadocian tiara. The shoes are not curved. Our last specimen was seen at Aidin by M. Sorlin-Dorigny. Its owner, however, would not part with it, but he allowed an impression to be taken, which for the purposes of science is as good as the original. It is a seal of the nature of scores of our clay in- taglios ; and consists of a central disc surrounded by a broad zone or border, and both divisions are occupied by characters badly drawn, several of which, however, may be identified with those which occur in the inscriptions at Carchemish, Hamath, etc. It would have been an easy matter to give greater extension to the list of cylinders, cones, and seals which may be referred to Hittite influence. That Syro-Cappadocia had engravers is proved by numbers of intaglios bearing upon them the stamp of its peculiar art, along with characters which are now acknowledged as proper to the early tribes that occupied the soil.^ Nevertheless, Fig. 386. — Showing the whole Decoration of the Cylinder. St. Elme Gautier. ' Menant, ii. pp. 49-54 ; Le Mythe de Dagon,

  • We have purposely omitted from the list of Hittite monuments of Western Asia

Minor a stone found at Ak Hissar, ancient Thyatira, by M. A. Fontricr. It is pyramidal in form, and serves as pediment to a wooden pillar of the local khan. Like Professor Sayce, I fail to recognize as Hittite the characters of the inscription in the f)hotograph sent me by the discoverer. On the other hand, M. Oppcrt has identi*