itself continued to preserve the hegemony which may reasonably be ascribed to it at an earlier age must remain doubtful. It is certain that towards the close of this third and concluding Late Minoan period in the island certain mainland types of swords and safety-pins make their appearance, which are symptomatic of the great invasion from that side that was now impending or had already begun.
Principal Minoan Sites.
It will be convenient here to give a general view of the more important Minoan remains recently excavated on various Cretan sites.
Cnossus.—The palace of Cnossus is on the hill of Kephala about 4 m. inland from Candia. As a scene of human settlement this site is of immense antiquity. The successive “Minoan” strata, which go well back into the fourth millennium B.C., reach down to a depth of about 17 ft. But below this again is a human deposit, from 20 to 26 ft. in thickness, representing a long and gradual course of Neolithic or Later Stone-Age development. Assuming that the lower strata were formed at approximately the same rate as the upper, we have an antiquity of from 12,000 to 14,000 years indicated for the first Neolithic settlement on this spot. The hill itself, like a Tell of Babylonia, is mainly formed of the debris of human settlements. The palace was approached from the west by a paved Minoan Way communicating with a considerable building on the opposite hill. This road was flanked by magazines, some belonging to the royal armoury, and abutted on a paved area with stepped seats on two sides (theatral area). The palace itself approximately formed a square with a large paved court in the centre. It had a N.S. orientation. The principal entrance was to the north, but what appears to have been the royal entrance opened on a paved court on the west side. This entrance communicated with a corridor showing frescoes of a processional character. The west side of the palace contained a series of 18 magazines with great store jars and cists and large hoards of clay documents. A remarkable feature of this quarter is a small council chamber with a gypsum throne of curiously Gothic aspect and lower stone benches round. The walls of the throne room show frescoes with sacred griffins confronting each other in a Nile landscape, and a small bath chamber—perhaps of ritual use—is attached. This quarter of the palace shows the double axe sign constantly repeated on its walls and pillars, and remains of miniature wall-paintings showing pillar shrines, in some cases with double axes stuck into the wooden columns. Here too were found the repositories of an early shrine containing exquisite faience figures and reliefs, including a snake goddess—another aspect of the native divinity—and her votaries. The central object of cult in this shrine was apparently a marble cross. Near the north-west angle of the palace was a larger bath chamber, and by the N. entrance were remains of great reliefs of bull-hunting scenes in painted gesso duro. South of the central court were found parts of a relief in the same material, showing a personage with a fleur-de-lis crown and collar. The east wing of the palace was the really residential part. Here was what seems to have been the basement of a very large hall or “Megaron,” approached directly from the central court, and near this were found further reliefs, fresco representations of scenes of the bull-ring with female as well as male toreadors, and remains of a magnificent gaming-board of gold-plated ivory with intarsia work of crystal plaques set on silver plates and blue enamel (cyanus). The true domestic quarter lay to the south of the great hall, and was approached from the central court by a descending staircase, of which three flights and traces of a fourth are preserved. This gives access to a whole series of halls and private rooms (halls “of the Colonnades,” “of the Double Axes,” “Queen’s Megaron” with bath-room attached and remains of the fish fresco, “Treasury” with ivory figures and other objects of art), together with extensive remains of an upper storey. The drainage system here, including a water-closet, is of the most complete and modern kind. Near this domestic quarter was found a small shrine of the Double Axes, with cult objects and offertory vessels in their places. The traces of an earlier “Middle Minoan” palace beneath the later floor-levels are most visible on the east side, with splendid ceramic remains. Here also are early magazines with huge store jars. At the foot of the slope on this side, forming the eastern boundary of the palace, are massive supporting walls and a bastion with descending flights of steps, and a water-channel devised with extraordinary hydraulic science (Evans, “Palace of Knossos,” “Reports of Excavations 1900–1905,” in Annual of British School at Athens, vi. sqq.; Journ. R.I.B.A. (1902), pt. iv. For the palace pottery see D. Mackenzie, Journ. of Hellenic Studies, xxiii.). The palace site occupies nearly six acres. To the N.E. of it came to light a “royal villa” with staircase, and a basilica-like hall (Evans, B.S. Annual, ix. 130 seq.). To the N.W. was a dependency containing an important hoard of bronze vessels (ib. p. 112 sqq.). The building on the hill to the W. approached by the Minoan paved way has the appearance of a smaller palace (B.S. Annual, xii., 1906). Many remains of private houses belonging to the prehistoric town have also come to light (Hogarth, B.S.A. vi. [1900], p. 70 sqq.). A little N. of the town, at a spot called Zafer Papoura, an extensive Late Minoan cemetery was excavated in 1904 (Evans, The Prehistoric Tombs of Knossus, 1906), and on a height about 2 m. N. of this, a royal tomb consisting of a square chamber, which originally had a pointed vault of “Cyclopaean” structure approached by a forehall or rock-cut passage. This monumental work seems to date from the close of the Middle Minoan age, but has been re-used for interments at successive periods (Evans, Archaeologia, 1906, p. 136 sqq.). It is possibly the traditional tomb of Idomeneus. (For later discoveries see further Cnossus.)
Phaestus.—The acropolis of this historic city looks on the Libyan Sea and commands the extensive plain of Messara. On the eastern hill of the acropolis, excavations initiated by F. Halbherr on behalf of the Italian Archaeological Mission and subsequently carried out by L. Pernier have brought to light another Minoan palace, much resembling on a somewhat smaller scale that of Cnossus. The plan here too was roughly quadrangular with a central court, but owing to the erosion of the hillside a good deal of the eastern quarter has disappeared. The Phaestian palace belongs to two distinct periods, and the earlier or “Middle Minoan” part is better preserved than at Cnossus. The west court and entrance belonging to the earlier building show many analogies with those of Cnossus, and the court was commanded to the north by tiers of stone benches like those of the “theatral area” at Cnossus on a larger scale. Magazines with fine painted store jars came to light beneath the floor of the later “propylaeum.” The most imposing block of the later building is formed by a group of structures rising from the terrace formed by the old west wall. A fine paved corridor running east from this gives access to a line of the later magazines, and through a columnar hall to the central court beyond, while to the left of this a broad and stately flight of steps leads up to a kind of entrance hall on an upper terrace. North of the central court is a domestic quarter presenting analogies with that of Cnossus, but throughout the later building there was a great dearth of the frescoes and other remains such as invest the Cnossian palace with so much interest. There are also few remaining traces here of upper storeys. It is evident that in this case also the palace was overtaken by a great catastrophe, followed by a partial reoccupation towards the close of the Late Minoan age (L. Pernier, Scavi della missione italiana a Phaestos; Monumenti antichi, xii. and xiv.).
About a kilometre distant from the palace of Phaestus near the village of Kalyvia a Late Minoan cemetery was brought to light in 1901, belonging to the same period as that of Cnossus (Savignoni, Necropoli di Phaestos, 1905).
Hagia Triada.—On a low hill crowned by a small church of the above name, about 3 m. nearer the Libyan Sea than Phaestus, a small palace or royal villa was discovered by Halbherr and excavated by the Italian Mission. In its structure and general arrangements it bears a general resemblance to the palace of Phaestus and Cnossus on a smaller scale. The buildings themselves, with the usual halls, bath-rooms and magazines, together with a shrine of the Mother Goddess, occupy two sides of a rectangle, enclosing a court at a higher level approached by flights of stairs. Repositories also came to light containing treasure in the shape of bronze ingots. In contrast to the palace of Phaestus, the contents of the royal villa proved exceptionally rich, and derive a special interest from the fact that the catastrophe which overwhelmed the building belongs to a somewhat earlier part of the Late Minoan age than that which overwhelmed Cnossus and Phaestus. Clay tablets were here found belonging to the earlier type of the linear script (Class A), together with a great number of clay sealings with religious and other devices and incised countermarks. Both the signet types and the other objects of art here discovered display the fresh naturalism that characterizes in a special way the first Late Minoan period. A remarkable wall-painting depicts a cat creeping over ivy-covered rocks and about to spring on a pheasant. The steatite vases with reliefs are of great importance. One of these shows a ritual procession, apparently of reapers singing and dancing to the sound of a sistrum. On another a Minoan warrior prince appears before his retainers. A tall funnel-shaped vase of this class, of which a considerable part has been preserved, is divided into zones showing bull-hunting scenes, wrestlers and pugilists in gladiatorial costume, the whole executed in a most masterly manner. The small palace was reconstructed at a later period, and at a somewhat higher level. To a period contemporary with the concluding age of the Cnossian palace must be referred a remarkable sarcophagus belonging to a neighbouring cemetery. The chest is of limestone coated with stucco, adorned with life-like paintings of offertory scenes in connexion with the sacred Double Axes of Minoan cult. There have also come to light remains of a great domed mortuary chamber of primitive construction containing relics of the Early Minoan period (Halbherr, Monumenti Antichi, xiii. (1903), p. 6 sqq., and Memorie del instituto lombardo, 1905; Paribeni, Lavori eseguiti della missione italiana nel Palazzo e nella necropoli di Haghia Triada; Rendiconti, &c., xi. and xii.; Savignoni, Il Vaso di Haghia Triada).
Palaikastro.—Near this village, lying on the easternmost coast of Crete, the British School at Athens has excavated a section of a considerable Minoan town. The buildings here show a stratification analogous to that of the palace of Cnossus. The town was traversed by a well-paved street with a stone sewer, and contained several important private houses and a larger one which seems to have been
