'In 1901,' says Dr. Evans,
'I discovered that certain tablets had been abstracted from the
excavations, and had shortly afterwards been purchased by the museum
at Athens. It further appeared that one of our workmen--a certain
Aristides--had left the excavation about the same time for Greece, and
had been seen in Athens offering "antikas" for sale under suspicious
circumstances. On examining the inscriptions on the stolen tablets
I observed a formula that showed that some or all of the pieces
belonged to a deposit found in Magazine XV. A reference to our
daybooks brought out the fact that the same Aristides had taken
part in the excavation of this particular magazine a little before
the date of his hasty departure. On his return to Crete, some months
later, he was accordingly arrested, and the evidence supplied by the
Minoan formula was accepted by the Candia Tribunal as a crowning
proof of his guilt. Aristides--"the Unjust"--was thus condemned to
three months' imprisonment.' Few criminals attain to the dignity
of being convicted on evidence 3,500 years old.
Certain of the tablets contain lists of persons of both sexes,
apparently denoted by their personal names, the signs which appear
to stand for the name being followed in each case by an ideograph
which is the determinative of 'man,' or 'woman,' as the case may
be.
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