Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/451

 394 Primitive Greece : Mycenian Art. Here the soft, flabby mass of the polyp — and a gigantic polyp it is — would represent plastic clay, and thus symbolize matter which, under the action of salt water, teeming with life, is changed into all manner of animals. The curves which, like a network, surround the entire soft mass, would indicate the powerful and manifold effluvia belched forth by this generating body, the. eddying of the flood which it emits after having drawn it in and fecundated it. The cluster of spirals in place of eyes would stand for gyrating motion. The filaments that fringe the outlines would represent the dawn of organisms just as they begin to settle and emerge from the mass. This creation, or rather transformation, is effected on several points of the funnel- like body, whence the cuttle-fish continually sends forth fresh water on its bronchia or gills, as well as in the curling wavelets produced by the motion of the tentacles on the surface of the water. Of the animals floating amidst the feelers of the polyp, some, notably on the left, borne along by the current induced by the rhythmic contractions of the respiratory apparatus, receive their definitive form whilst passing through what may be termed the central focus, when the operation has failed to take place within the liquid mass. Such creatures as are already complete, geese or flamingoes, are seen to wing their way towards free air, infinite space, where they will unfold their pinions ; special types having been selected to make plain the idea of the artist. On the left appears an actinia, or sea-nettle, which has just been detached from the polyp, and is starting on an existence of its own. A porcupine, lately a sea-urchin, appears on the right ; he is now provided with paws to enable him to move on the earth. Near to him there is a horse, with as yet only the fore-quarters ; then comes a hippocampus {hippocampus antiquoruni), a small fish abounding in the Mediterranean, and on the high-road to being turned into a quadruped. M. Houssay would ascribe the same intent to the decoration on the external face of a vase from Crete, which was evidently used as a receptacle for human bones (Fig. 481). Here, too, the scene is laid in the liquid element, for actinia are seen at the bottom of the water, above which float sea- weeds ; fish swim around large clustering leaves whereon ducks are perched. These leaves play the part which superstition attributes to cirriped shells or limpets {lepas anatifera). Three of the leaves have just opened, and given passage to as many