Gestures in the arts of Bronze Age Crete

米诺斯艺术描绘了广泛的手势曲目。从印章戒指和宝石上的图像，到礼拜者和神灵的雕像，再到壁画，做出手势的男性和女性、人类和超自然生物的重要性渗透到米诺斯克里特岛的各种文化和社会生活背景中。鉴于书面资料不能为我们提供任何有关相关目的、意义和情况的信息，这些图像尽管具有公式化的性质，但提供了最有希望的证据来说明米诺斯人的行动和互动的人、时间和地点。然而，直到今天，米诺斯考古学才对绘画媒体上的手势进行了系统的研究。这个项目的目的是对中晚期和米诺斯晚期艺术(约公元前1700年至公元前1100年)所描绘的手势进行第一次一般性研究。与以前的研究不同，它将涵盖各种描绘人类在行动中和交流互动中的图像媒体。将符号图像学分析与语境分析相结合的方法将应用于语用结构方法，在青铜时代克里特岛及相关地区的图片和物理语境中使用手势。为此，不仅将从图画场景中提取背景数据，还将从考古发现背景中以及手势人物图像出现在其上的物体的制作和使用中获取背景数据。通过追踪每一种手势在媒体、空间和时间上的出现模式，目的是重建个人手势的背景，并查明在米诺斯文化生活和社会实践的某些情况下促使手势表演的环境。一个既包含物体目录，又包含图片单位描述以及它们之间关系的数据库将构成重建与每个单独手势相关联的关系组的基本工具。由此产生的网络将被可视化为概念图，作为一种新的启发式工具引入，以加强实体和关系网络的组织、表示和分析。概念图将用于主要分析手势及其结构和语用嵌入青铜时代克里特岛及相关地区的图片和位置上下文中。在从图像、物体和上下文中推导出的空间和概念关系的抽象水平上，将创建对人、物体、情况、位置、动作和与米诺斯艺术中的手势制作相关的互动的深刻理解。在最后一步，将评估总体概念结构的有效性，该结构代表了米诺斯人生活中手势和仪式的联系，用于解释描绘人类手势的选定个体物体，说明该项目在理解米诺斯手势方面取得的进展。

Minoan art depicts a broad repertoire of gestures. From images on signet rings and gemstones to figurines of worshippers and deities through to wall-paintings, the importance of gesture-making male and female, human and supernatural beings permeated a variety of contexts of cultural and social life in Minoan Crete. Given the fact that written sources do not provide us with any information about related purposes, meanings and circumstances, these Images, their formulaic nature notwithstanding, offer the most promising body of evidence to address the who, when and where of Minoan action and interaction. However, a systematic study of gestures across the pictorial media has not been undertaken in Minoan archaeology until this day. The aim of this project is to carry out the first general study of gestures depicted in late Middle and Late Minoan art (c. 1700 to 1100 BC). Other than previous studies, it will cover all kinds of pictorial media depicting humans in action and communicative interaction. A methodology combining semiotic iconographic analysis with a contextual approach will be applied in a pragmatic structural approach to the use of gestures in both pictorial and physical contexts of Bronze Age Crete and related areas. To this end, contextual data will be drawn not only from pictorial scenes but also from archaeological find-contexts and from the production and usage of the objects on which the images of gesturing figures appear. By tracing the patterns of appearance of each gesture through media, space and time, the aim is to reconstruct the contextualization of individual gestures and to pinpoint the circumstances which prompted the performance of gestures within certain situations of Minoan cultural life and social practice. A database containing both an object catalogue and descriptions of pictorial units and relations between them will form the basic tool to reconstruct the groups of relationships connected to each individual gesture. The resulting networks will be visualized as concept maps, which are introduced as a new heuristic tool to enhance the organisation, representation and analysis of networks of entities and relations. The concept maps will be used in the main analysis of gestures and their structural and pragmatic embedding within the pictorial and locational contexts of Bronze Age Crete and related areas. Working on the abstract level of spatial and conceptual relations deduced from images, objects and contexts, a profound understanding of people, objects, situations, locations, actions and interactions associated with gesture-making in Minoan art will be created. In a final step, the validity of the overall conceptual structure representing the nexus of gestures in Minoan life and ritual for the interpretation of selected individual objects depicting gesturing humans will be assessed, illustrating the advances in understanding Minoan gestures resulting from this project.