Bull and Olive Tree
We arrived in Crete late last night. Dinners are very long – 2 to 3 hours. My butt gets sore. Especially when we don’t start dinner until after 8. We spent much of the day on the Minoans. We visited Knossos Palace and the local art museum with much of the discovered Minoan art. The Minoans had an amazing civilization. It’s quite obvious that the mysterious people in Akrotiri started out as Minoans, and equally obvious they surpassed the Minoans in their culture.
Minoan Palace Water Pipe
We know very little about the Minoans because we haven’t been able to decipher their written language, which we call Linear A. In addition, when the Minoan civilization fell they never revived. There is no later civilization with writings referring to their ancestors. We don’t even know what they called themselves. The only thing we can do is guess from the ruins and artwork that they left behind.
Throne Room
For example, we saw this throne room. The archaeologist who excavated Knossos, Arthur Evans, used primitive techniques. He reconstructed the palace with cement, and he wasn’t afraid to use his imagination when filling in the details. We don’t know whether the Minoans had a single ruler, whether he was a king, the chief land owner, or something else.
Man Leaping Over Bull
Minoan art shows the same free forms and open expression found at Akrotiri. This painting shows a man literally grabbing a bull by the horns, throwing himself over the bull’s back, then landing on his feet behind the bull. (This fresco is a reproduction.) But we don’t know whether the Minoan’s actually did this or whether it was some kind of idealized mythical story. We do get glimpses of their civilization, but there are plenty of tantalizing questions.
Man Leaping over Bull
Here are a couple of more pics. This is a depiction of a man in the air, probably the man in the fresco as he does his bouncing handstand off the bull’s back. I’ll put a couple of more pics below.
Swinging Man. Looks playful, doesn’t he?
Woman’s Head
Bull’s Head