The Cretan system of picture-writing is inseparable from the area dominated by the Mycenæan form of culture. Geographically speaking it belongs to Greece." (_Jo. Hellen. Stud._, p. 317.) [Illustration: TABLE III] While, as remarked above, the hieroglyph-bearing stones are found only in Crete, examples of the linear character have been found at Mycenæ, Nauplia, and other prehistoric sites in Greece and Egypt. Moreover, as already noted, some of the signs have marked affinities with Cypriote, Hittite, and Semitic. Among the antiquities which make the Fayum so renowned a district are the remains of two cities; Kahun, which dates from the twelfth dynasty, _i.e._ 2500 B.C., and Gurob, which is some twelve centuries later, both sites yielding evidence of Asian and Ægean settlers. When digging there ten years ago Professor Flinders Petrie discovered fragments of Mycenæan, or, as he calls it, Ægean, pottery inscribed with characters resembling, and in some cases identical with, those found in Greece. Both the Professor and Mr. Evans agree that the relics unearthed at Kahun are as old as that city; while, speaking of the signs known to be in use 1200 B.C., in a place occupied by people of the Ægean and Asia Minor, Turseni, Akhaians, Hittites, and others, Professor Flinders Petrie remarks that "it will require a very certain proof of the supposed Arabian source of the Phœnician alphabet before we can venture to deny that we have here the origin of the Mediterranean alphabets." (_Ten Years' Digging in Egypt_, p. 134.) Conversely, scarabs of the twelfth dynasty have been found in Crete, notable among these being one in steatite with a spiral ornament peculiar to that period. Passing to excavations in the huge mound of Tell-el-Hesy, in Palestine, made up of the ruins of eleven different cities heaped up one above another, we have the discovery, amongst remains of the fourth city, dating about 1450 B.C., of potsherds inscribed with signs similar to the Ægean. While about twenty per cent. of the Cretan hieroglyphs approach those of the Egyptian in character, twenty out of the thirty-two linear signs there are practically identical with those found in Egypt. Mr. Evans adds that "the parallelism with Cypriote forms is also remarkable, some fifteen agreeing with letters of the Cypriote syllabary." [Illustration: Fig. 65 EGYPTIAN SCARABS, XIITH DYNASTY AND EARLY CRETAN SEAL-STONES] [Illustration: Fig. 66.--Signs on Potsherds at Tell-el-Hesy compared with Ægean Forms]