The two vases (Figs. 234, 235) are of the oldest dates, and are decorated purely in the oldest form of geometric ornament. The one with the handle is particularly good in form, and has the decoration incised like sgraffito work. Fantastic shapes of animals made as vases and drinking vessels were very common in Cyprus. Although not many of them can be called beautiful, still it required considerable skill and knowledge to model them (Fig. 236). The goat-shaped vessel is very lifelike. The bowl or crater (Fig. 237) has the lotus flower and geometric bands and divisions for its decoration; it is painted with light brown and red on a cream-coloured ground. The decoration from a cup is more elaborate, it has a new element in the shape of some kind of water bird arranged Assyrian-like on each side of the sacred tree, and has a sun sign filling up a space close to one of the bird’s legs (Fig. 238). Another very interesting and beautiful vase is the Œnochoé (Fig. 239). Another bird is painted on this, and at the same time the geometric checkers and lines still cling to it as part of the decoration. On this vase, also, may be seen two moon signs, and the sacred sun sign, the fylfot, or swastika, repeated four times. These sacred signs are often found on Cyprian pottery. The latter vase in shape and decoration is more Greek in feeling than most Cyprian vases. The larger Œnochoé (Fig. 240) has the human figure with some kind of water fowls; it has a sacred sign on its lips. Though the subject recalls Egypt, the design and execution might have been done by a clever Greek artist. The style of execution and drawing on these vases may be a little archaic, but the design and bold manner of execution is eminently correct and could not be better for the decoration of pottery. [Illustration: Fig. 236.—Vessel in the Shape of a Goat. (P. & C.)] [Illustration: Fig. 237.—Bowl in the Piot Collection, height 6¾ ins. (P. & C.)] The discovery of glass making has been attributed to the Phœnicians, but this is not correct; the Egyptians made glass articles, and used glass in their vitreous enamelled tiles and bricks long before the Phœnicians had any connection with Egypt. It was most likely because the Phœnicians traded so much in glass, and for the reasons also that they had large glass manufactories at Tyre and other places, that they have received the credit from early times of being the inventors of glass. The oldest dated glass bottle or vase in the world is one from Egypt, and now in the British Museum. It bears the name of Thothmes III. (B.C. 1600). The body is turquoise blue with yellow details of decoration and hieroglyphics; the handle is dark blue with yellow and white markings. The Phœnicians at a later period were extensive makers of glass articles, and made glass of three kinds, the clear and transparent, but always with a slight greenish hue, the coloured and transparent, and the opaque.