page_title: Warfare in Minoan Art
section_title: Frescoes
hierarchical_section_title: Warfare in Minoan Art / Frescoes
caption_attribution_description: English: The bull-leaping fresco, original. Found in Knossos palace, Crete, Greece. It dates around 1600 - 1450 BCE. Part of a five-panel composition, the iconic Toreador Fresco depicts an acrobat at the back of a charging bull. A second figure prepares to leap, while a third waits with arms outstreched. The event may have resemnled the Course alandaise of modern southwest France. Bulls feature centrally in Knossian icongraphy and may have acted as a symbol of Knossian power. The central court may have served as an arena for bull-sports, although it was barely large enoughFrançais&#160;: La fresque de tauromachie, original. Trouvé au palais de Cnossos, Crète, Grèce. (1600 - 1450 BCE ) Heraklion Archaeological Museum &#160;&#160;Native nameΑρχαιολογικό Μουσείο ΗρακλείουLocationHeraklion, GreeceCoordinates35°&#160;20′&#160;22.34″&#160;N, 25°&#160;08′&#160;14″&#160;E &#160;Established1883Web pageheraklionmuseum.gr&#160;Authority control : Q636972 VIAF:&#8201;158400708 ISNI:&#8201;0000 0001 2260 1622 ULAN:&#8201;500300551 LCCN:&#8201;n89629636 GND:&#8201;2068055-7 WorldCat institution QS:P195,Q636972
context_page_description: Minoan civilization in the Bronze Age was located on the island of Crete. Focusing on the palatial periods between c. 1900 and c. 1300 b.c. Art that focuses on just scenes of war alone is impossible as there are many other references that can be made not relating to war at all. There are various meanings that can be interpreted from different perspectives and that is what Molloy wants readers to understand. There could be an overlap of religion, politics, social meanings added to an iconography of warfare. “Practitioners of violence” are called warriors, just an identity who performed their social acts depending on their society. These social acts ranges from bull-leaping, boxing, hunting, sports, combat, fighting and more. Malloy divides the art relating to warfare in Bronze Age Crete into four categories “glyptic art circulating in both social and administrative contexts; stone and ceramic portable art for repeated intimate consumption; coroplastic/bronze figural art for religious activity; and frescoes and relief mouldings fixed in architectural settings”.
context_section_description: Frescoes are bright wall paintings There were very few images of war in fresco art, however, the city of Knossos had many figural frescoes that could explain some form of war.
  Bull leaping fresco from Knossos is the most well known piece of artwork. As mentioned above, bull leaping was a sort of activity Minoan men did as a past time and it showed the interaction between the bull and man.
caption: Bull leaping was an activity for warriors
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