Arthur John Evans, Archeologist
The First Man to Decipher Minoan Linear Script
Arthur John Evans was born in Nash Hill, Hertfordshire in 1851. He was the son of Sir John Evans, who was an amateur archaeologist and an eminent authority on British prehistory and coinage. His mother was a member of the Dickinson paper manufacturing family. Evans was to follow in his father’s footsteps with his love of archaeology but unlike his father, he was destined for much greater things, spending much of his life excavating the island of Crete.
Evans was educated at Harrow school and from there continued his studies, reading Modern History and receiving a First Class degree at Brasenose College, University of Oxford. He also studied at the University of Gottingen, Germany.
Arthur Evans, Accused of Espionage
Evans was able to pursue his interest in archaeology whilst travelling across Eastern Europe in his employ as the Balkan correspondent for the Manchester Guardian Newspaper (first published on Saturday 5 May 1821). Unfortunately his travels had to be curtailed when he was accused of spying whist in Herzegovina and as a result he was subsequently banned from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Leaving his career in journalism, Evans became curator of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, Britain’s oldest public museum, between 1881 and 1908. During his time here, Evans developed an interest in engraved gems and coins and his studies detected previously unseen signatures of artists on some of the coins.
The Excavation of Minoan Sites in Crete
1893 was a significant year for Evans. It brought grief and sadness with the death of his wife Mary from tuberculosis but also great excitement with the discovery of a Mycenaean system of writing, dating back some four thousand years.
The following year Evans travelled to Crete in order that he might collect more examples of the unknown engraved script he had been working on. Whilst living and working amongst the local people, he discovered that many of the clay tablets bearing the examples of writing that he sought were in private hands.
It had long been known that an ancient city called Knossos had existed in the region. Local farmers often dug up artefacts as they cultivated their ploughed fields. During this time, the huge site was being excavated by Minos Kalokairinos, a merchant of Iraklion, who had uncovered two of the palace storerooms, but his work came to an abrupt end when the Turkish government intervened.
Just a year later, Evans was able to publish his findings following his attempts to decipher the script in a work entitled ‘Cretan Pictographs and Prae-Phonecian Script.’
With the declaration of the island as an independent state some six years later, Evans returned to Crete in 1900 to begin a systematic excavation of the five-acre site of the Palace. In spite of the task ahead, work continued quickly and much of the Palace had been excavated within three years. The exposure of the structure showed that it had been constructed in astonishing splendour. The walls were covered in exquisitely lavish frescos. Many artefacts were discovered, often depicting pictures and carvings relating to the Cretan religious cult of the Bull. Amongst the discoveries were items imported from as far away as Egypt and Mesopotamia as well as many inscribed clay tablets.
Such was the pace of work that within nine weeks of the start over two acres of the site had been uncovered. Evans was to call the newly discovered civilisation *Minoan.
Evans continued his studies at the site until 1931, only interrupted by for the duration of the First World War. During this time, approximately three thousand clay tablets were discovered. They bore inscriptions written in two scripts, later called Linear A (or Minoan script) and Linear B (an early Greek dialect).
The 'Everest' of Greek Archaeology
Unlike the hieroglyphs of ancient Egypt, which were deciphered with the help of the Rosetta Stone (which bares the same script written in three different languages, Egyptian, demotic and Greek,) Linear B is one of a limited number of ancient scripts which have been deciphered though internal structural analysis.
The decipherment of Linear B was to be called the ‘Everest of Greek archaeology. It’s decipherment changing forever our understanding of civilisation at the dawn of European history’. The decipherment was to be published in the second volume of Scripta Minoa, volume one was published in 1909.
Evans received a knighthood in 1911 but was never to see the completion of his life’s work. He died shortly after his ninetieth birthday on 11th July 1941 in Youlbury, Oxford. Volume 2 of Scripta Minoa was completed in 1952, nine years after Evan’s death and was completed by a young British Architect, Michael Ventris.
*Sir Arthur Evans named the Minoan civilisation after King Minos of Crete. The culture was divided into three periods: Early Minoan (c.3000 B.C. –2200 B.C.) this period saw the rise from Neolithic to a people capable of the importation of metals and the development of hieroglyphic writing. Middle Minoan (c.2200 B.C. – 1500 B.C.) brought the construction of vast palaces at Knossos and Phaestus, the destruction of the palace of Knossos following an earthquake and invasion, its rebuilding prior to its final destruction in C.1400 B.C. the pictographic script Linear A, the development and manufacture of ceramics, ivory carving and metalwork. Minoan maritime expertise enabled them to venture across the Mediterranean and the development of a new script, Linear B, which hints at the presence of a Greek influence. The Late Minoan period (c.1500 B.C. – 1000 B.C.) saw the culture begin to break down before fading into poverty and finally disappearing.
Sources
- AncientScripts.com
- Britannica online
- Encyclopaedia.com
- Ashmoleum Museum
- BBC History on line
Ashmolean museum
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