Athena Review, 3,3: Minoan Crete: Sir Arthur Evans and the Excavation of the Palace at Knossos Athena Review, Vol.3, no.3: Minoan Crete Sir Arthur Evans and the Excavation of the Palace at Knossos Before work began in Crete by the British archaeologist Evans at Knossos (1900), and his American contemporary Harriet Boyd at Gournia (1901-1904; see Box 1), knowledge of the Bronze Age Minoan culture was only faintly reflected in a few Classical Greek myths. By the time this pioneering work was finished several decades later, the Minoan periods on Crete had been defined well enough to identify them as a major civilization from ca. 1900-1300 BC. Evans was born in 1851 in Nash Mills, Hertfordshire, England. Studying history at the Universities of Oxford and Göttingen, Evans later became Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford.

During this period (1884-1908), he became interested in seals (tiny carved stones) as sources of inscriptions from ancient, pre-Classical Mediterranean civilizations. [Fig.1: Arthur Evans holding Minoan vase.] Evans was particularly drawn to Crete as one such source of seals containing undeciphered early inscriptions. The ancient town site of Kafala (Knossos) on the northern coast of Crete, next to the capital city of Herakleion, was well-known to local inhabitants, who plowed up ancient objects, including pottery, coins, and seals, as they cultivated their fields. Knossos had been occupied up through the Roman period, and during the Classical and Hellenistic eras (500-200 BC) had issued its own coinage, which interestingly showed pictures of labyrinths, Minotaurs, and Ariadne, the stuff of later interpretations (fig.2). First to excavate at Knossos was an Herakleion merchant and antiquarian, aptly named Minos Kalokairinos, who in 1878 uncovered foundations of store rooms filled with large pithos jars.

Documentation of Kalokairinos' work by William Stillman, US Consul in Crete at the time, identifies the finds as being from the west magazine of the palace. Stillman also (somewhat prophetically) provides a sketch of the "Labyrinth of Daedelus," a portion of the foundations also dug up by Kalokairinos, and later identified as the Throne Room (Shaw 1990). [fig.2: Classic-era silver coin from Knossos (425-330 BC). At left, the obverse shows a Minotaur, while the reverse at right shows the head of Ariadne, surrounded by a meander pattern representing the labyrinth (CNG; SG-3211).] Turkish landowners, however, soon stopped the Kalokairinos investigations. Shortly thereafter, the famed German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann, excavator of Troy and Mycenae, attempted to purchase the "Kefala hill" - actually a "tell," or artificial, mound caused by long-term occupations at Knossos since the Neolithic (see Macdonald , this issue) - but refused to pay prices he considered exorbitant.

Evans first visited Crete in 1894 to study and decipher two types of unknown scripts appearing on Cretan seals. A year later he published the results in the Ashmolean publication Cretan Pictographs and Prae-Phoenician Script (Evans 1895), therein identifying both the enigmatic Minoan hieroglyphs ("Pictographs"), and the syllabic or pre-alphabetic ("Prae-Phoenician") scripts, now called Linear A and B. Political fortunes then played a part in assisting Evans to excavate in Crete, after the island had won its independence from Turkey. In 1899, Evans used money from a family inheritance to buy the site at Kefala. Using a sizable local work force, Evans began large-scale, systematic excavations at Knossos in 1900, and by the end of 1903 had uncovered many of the foundations of the large, sprawling structures he designated as the Palace. Restorations and reconstructions of portions of the walls and foundations often used reinforced concrete (fig.3), with reconstructed timber frames and other wooden structures painted in a pink or buff color.

Numerous examples of the now famous frescoes, discovered mainly as small fragments, were boldly restored. Evans is also responsible for restoring many of the now famous rooms within the palace, such as the Throne Room, with its pair of griffins in a fresco flanking a gypsum stone seat. These restoration methods have been often criticized for both over-interpretation of sometimes scanty remains, and for using materials foreign to Minoan architecture. [Fig.3: Reconstructed pillars and shield fresco at Knossos (photo: Athena Review). In his decisive (and highly controversial) site interpretations, Evans drew heavily from post-Bronze Age, ancient Greek mythology to postulate the site as the palace of the legendary King Minos. This conclusion is now much disputed (as suggested in several of the articles in this section), but early on gained solid footing among many archaeologists as well as in the popular imagination (cf. Cottrell 1962). In legends from sources varying from Herodotus to Hellenistic coins, Knossos was thought to be the palace site of Minos, king of the Cretan Minoans whose labyrinth contained the mythic Minotaur.

Evans interpreted the complex layout of the palace at Knossos as "labyrinthine," and connected this with the double-axe symbol or labrys found engraved on columns at the palace. Thus, his identification of Knossos' civilization as Minoan made a compelling if (at times) somewhat strained metaphor, given the associated myths of King Minos, the labyrinth, and the Minotaur. Besides his pioneering work in excavating the main palace site, among Evans' most significant discoveries at Knossos was the recovery of about 3000 ancient Linear A and B writing tablets . Linear B eventually proved to be an early form of ancient Greek from a later, Mycenaean occupation of the site. Linear A, a script representing the language of the Minoans, still remains largely undeciphered. Evans continued his research until 1931, with an interruption for the First World War. He published his monumental work in four volumes entitled The Palace of Minos at Knossos (1921-1935).

When Arthur Evans died in 1941, the British School of Archaeology took up further investigations at Knossos, continued to this day (see Macdonald , this issue). Despite many detractors, Evans stands as a major archaeologist whose creative imagination, motivation, and scholarship led him from an initial interest in inscriptions on tiny, carved seals to the discovery and documentation of Knossos, largest site of the Minoan civilization. [Note: This is article appears in the printed issue of Vol.3, no.3 of Athena Review (p.19). Copyright 2003, Athena Publications, Inc.] Arthur Evans The British Archaeologist History Essay Arthur Evans The British Archaeologist History Essay Published: Last Edited: 23rd March, 2015 This essay has been submitted by a student. This is not an example of the work written by our professional essay writers. Arthur Evans was born in England and graduated from the Harrow School and Brasenose College, Oxford with first class honors in modern history. Initially, Evans was a reporter in the Manchester Guardian and covered the Balkan region.

Evans drew inspiration from the works of Archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann, who excavated Troy and important cities like Mycenae and Tiryns of the Mycenaean civilization, which was an Aegean civilization that succeeded the Minoan civilization. Evans was appointed the curator of the Ashmolean museum at Oxford in 1984, and had the chance to study antiquities. Evans developed a strong interest in Numismatics, the study or collection of currency, including coins, tokens, paper money, and related objects. During his work at the Ashmolean museum, Evans became drawn to seal-stones, which were tiny carved stones that contained various inscriptions and had a gem-like quality. The Cretan seal-stones were initially a gift to the Ashmolean museum in 1889. Evans managed to acquire a few more in 1893 at Athens and became curious about the undeciphered inscriptions on these stones. Seal-stones were already known to be sources of ancient Greek civilizations as several of them have been found at the citadel of Mycenae, resulting from the works of archeologists like Heinrich Schliemann.

Evans's interest in seals-stones brought him to Crete in 1894, in order to decipher the meaning of the hieroglyphic scripts in the stones. In 1895, Evans published the results in the Ashmolean publication Cretan Pictographs and Prae-Phoenician Script, where he identified the Minoan hieroglyphs and the syllabic scripts, which are now called Linear A and Linear B. Much of what is known today about Minoan art work, which was mostly miniature art, is because these seals were traced back to Crete by Evans. Most of the Cretan hieroglyphs, which are logograms that represented words using graphical figures, contained marine animals, the Minotaur, representations of bull-leaping etc. These ancient pictorials should have provided enough insight into a culture for Evans to pursue further excavations in that area to experiment on the possibility of the existence of a civilization. The First person to conduct excavation works at the city of Knossos was a Herakleion merchant and antiquarian, Minos Kalokairinos, in 1878.

Kalokairinos's work was disrupted by the Turkish landowners who were occupying the Cretan region at that time. The occupation of Turks also made it impossible for Heinrich Schliemann to work in the island as he was charged a massive fee to own the lands. Meanwhile, Evans was visiting Crete to work on Cretan hieroglyphs and in 1899, with the evacuation of Turks from the region, Evans was able to freely operate in the archaeological sites. Evans bought the site of Knossos with some family inheritance. With the assistance of Duncan McKenzie, who was a supervisor at the British school of archeology, Evans began digging at Knossos. The pair got immediate results as they were able to uncover the remains of a massive palace and several other artifacts including, clay tablets, a stucco relief, pieces of pottey, frescos etc. The decorations in the pottery and hieroglyphs in the clay tablets resembled that of the seal-stones. Initially, these findings were thought to have belonged to Mycenaean civilization. Also, the fact the Mycenaeans borrowed heavily from the art and architectural work of the Minoans made it difficult for Evans to distinguish the civilizations.

However, as the palace was being uncovered further, Evans was able to find enough distinctions between the two Aegean cultures. The most important evidence of the existence of an independent civilization was the presence of Cretan items, especially pottery, in Egypt. The items found in Egypt were dated before the origins of the Mycenaean civilization, suggesting a possibility of trade between Crete and Egypt. In 1903, Evans successfully completed the excavation of the entire palace at Knossos and began working on the surrounding areas. He named the pre-Mycenaean civilization Minoan, after king Minos. Evans's archaeological work at Knossos was exceptional considering the fact that radiocarbon dating and other chronological methods were unheard of at that time. Evans was able to bring back to light an entire lost civilization dating back 5000 years. Evans produced the chronological framework of the Minoan civilization with the early Minoans (3000 BC onwards) being mostly village farmers, while the middle and late Minoans (2200-1250 BC) being the highly civilized class.

The Minoan civilization is said to have reached its height during 2000-1450 BC. Evans suggested that most of Mycenaean art and architecture was inspired from Minoans and made claims that almost all of the Mycenaean artwork was produced by Minoan artisans. Evans concluded that the demise of Minoan civilization was around 1450 BC from the damaged frescos found at the scene of the excavation. Around this time, there is evidence of invasion from the Greek mainland noted by the presence of Mycenaean pottery, which Evans dubbed as "Decadent." His disdain for Mycenaean artwork results from his belief that Minoans had pioneered in most of the things that Mycenaeans borrowed. The archaeological significance of the Minoan civilization is further stimulated by the fact that they were a self-sufficient community that neither received nor borrowed from mainland or any other civilization for that matter. Apart from unearthing a massive palace and numerous building, Evans recovered about 3000 Linear A and B tablets. Linear A represented the language of the Minoans.

In addition to excavating the palace remains at Knossos, Evans spent a tremendous amount of money to restore and reconstruct portions of the palace. He used reinforced concrete to rebuild the wooden columns and decorated them to conform to Minoan decor. The fragments of frescos that remained were completed by Evan's artists. Initially, the reconstruction work was thought of as an effort to preserve the monuments to stand the test of time and natural disasters. But, it has received much criticism over the years. The fact that Evans did most of the restoration based on his assumptions and personal opinions of what he considered to be Minoan décor have forced critics to strongly disapprove his work. There exists a contention that, although, the sight of the restored palaces gives a detailed picture of the Minoan civilization, it is nevertheless a picture seen through Arthur Evans's eyes and not something that is open for an honest interpretation. Therefore, critics feel that his work has damaged the purity of the Minoan archaeological content. However, the criticisms cannot take away the significance of Evans's work and his discoveries. Very few times has one individual been responsible for unearthing an entire civilization. Most of what Evans published remains accurate till this date.

The fact that Evans was able achieve such accuracy at a time when modern chronological methods were unavailable suggests a great deal about Arthur Evans's potency as an archeologist. Knossos: Palace of the Minoans Knossos: Palace of the Minoans By Owen Jarus, Live Science Contributor | March 15, 2013 04:30pm ET MORE Credit: Andrei Nekrassov Shutterstock The Palace of Knossos is located just south of modern-day Heraklion near the north coast of Crete. Built by a civilization that we call the Minoans, it covers about 150,000 square feet (14,000 square meters) of space, the size of more than two American football fields, and was surrounded by a town in antiquity. The site came to prominence in the early 20th century when it was excavated and restored by a team led by British archaeologist Arthur Evans. The Palace of Knossos (Knosós) is near the modern-day city of Heraklion (Irákleion) on the island of Crete.

Credit: CIA World Factbook The chronology of the palace is a matter of scholarly debate. Construction of the palace appears to have begun around 1950 B.C. although there may have been structures predating it. This first palace was damaged (likely by earthquakes) and around 1700 B.C. a second palace was built on top of it. Crete was hit with a catastrophe (of some form) around 1450 B.C., with sites being destroyed across the island and a people called the Mycenaeans occupied Knossos until the palace itself was destroyed, probably sometime before 1300 B.C. When the palace was first constructed “it must have been a remarkable sight, quite unlike anything seen on Crete before,” writes J. Lesley Fitton in her book "Minoans" (British Museum Press, 2002). She notes that although other settlements on Crete around this time built palaces of their own, none was as large as Knossos.

“Knossos perhaps began as a ‘first among equals,’ and the relationship between the powerful groups that built the palaces may not have been entirely friendly.” The position of Knossos was not accidental, and Fitton notes that it lines up with a sanctuary located at Mount Juktas to the south. The first palace Although the remains of the first palace mostly lie underneath the second, archaeologists have been able to put together a rough picture of what it looked like in antiquity. The first palace was built around a central court and contained numerous storage areas including magazines to the west and northeast. On the northwest side of the central court was a room that researchers refer to as the “early keep” and near that another section referred to as the “initiatory area.” The initiatory area contains a “lustral basin,” which consists of a square tank, sunk into the ground, with a staircase descending on two sides, writes Arnold Lawrence and Richard Tomlinson in their book "Greek Architecture" (Yale University Press, 1996). They note that several of these basins were built in the palace.

“For lack of any better explanation, the original use is assumed to be religious, in connexion with some ritual of anointing, but there would have been no drawback to using the basin as a shower-bath provided the water was mopped up quickly.” The walls of the first palace were bulkier than those built later on. “On the whole, the structure of the earlier Palace was bulkier, more massive, than that of the later Palace in general layout and in individual details,” writes researcher John McEnroe in his book "Architecture of Minoan Crete" (University of Texas Press, 2010). He notes that the column bases and pavement were made of stones of different colors. The development of the palace coincided with the appearance of a written language at Knossos known today as “Cretan Hieroglyphs.” It has yet to be deciphered. Also in this early period the different regions of Crete maintained their own distinct style of pottery and material culture, an indication that the island was not unified. The second palace The first palace suffered damage (likely from earthquakes) and by 1700 B.C., a second palace was being built over its remains.

“In the second Palace, much of the monumental bulk of the earlier building would be lightened through structural innovations and intricate details, and the taste for colored stone would be partly replaced by representational wall paintings,” writes McEnroe. Again, a good portion of the palace was used for storage, including a western section dedicated to magazines. In this period, the pottery styles and material culture of Knossos would be used across the island, indicating that people acknowledged the hegemony, or at least influence, of the site. The palace in this period contained four entrances, one from each direction, and a royal road running to the north of the palace. McEnroe notes that the entranceway to the south offered a particularly grand arrival, leading the visitor through a narrow corridor lined with a fresco depicting a procession. Their final destination would have been the central court, which may have been used for religious ceremonies. “After the narrow confines of the twisting, dark corridor, the broad, brilliant Central Court offered sudden expansion and release,” writes McEnroe.

Indeed it’s an entranceway not dissimilar to that of a labyrinth, a key idea in Greek literature (found in stories like Theseus and the Minotaur) and something that was on Arthur Evans' mind when he interpreted the site. He thought he had uncovered the palace of the mythical Crete King Minos, who in legend kept a Minotaur in a labyrinth, demanding that the city of Athens feed it young men and women. This idea of the palace belonging to Minos was so powerful that Evans named the people of the civilization “ Minoans .” This central courtyard provided access to several areas, including a throne room, a central palace sanctuary and a residential quarter, which may have housed royal apartments. The throne room was entered through an anteroom and offered an impressive sight. “Two double doors lead into the Throne Room with gypsum benches on three sides and the magnificent throne in the centre of the north wall flanked by the reconstructed Griffin fresco,” writes a team of British School at Athens researchers in an online virtual tour article of the site. Whether an actual king or queen sat in the throne room is a matter of debate.

“It has recently been proposed that the Throne was for the epiphany of the Goddess who would enter from the Inner Sanctuary and be seen from the Anteroom,” writes the British School at Athens team. To the south of the throne room is an area that researchers refer to as the Central Palace Sanctuary. McEnroe notes that a small tripartite shrine was reconstructed by Evans and behind it is an area that many scholars see “as the religious heart of the Palace,” containing the temple repositories. They were “found filled with pottery and a range of remarkable objects such as the famous faience Snake Goddesses now in the Herakleion Museum.” On the southeast side of the central court is an area referred to as the residential quarter. Its rooms may have served as royal apartments, used for living by the palace’s rulers. The British School at Athens researchers note that a grand staircase, made of gypsum, leads down to it. It contains a “hall of the colonnades” encircling a light-well. To the south is an area known as the “Hall of the Double Axes” which “takes its name from the Double Axe Mason's Mark signs carved on the limestone ashlar wall blocks,” the British School at Athens researchers write.

McEnroe notes that this hall received light from three directions and had partitions, allowing the palace inhabitants to determine how much light got in at any one time. Another key feature in the residential quarters is an area that Evans called the “queen’s megaron.” It features a reconstructed fresco depicting blue dolphins swimming above a doorway. McEnroe notes that it has two light wells along with partitions. Its features include a possible bath, storage areas and toilet. “My guess is that it served as a bedroom,” he writes. While there may have been some disruption at Knossos associated with the eruption of Thera around 1600 B.C. , it did not bring about the end of the palace, which occurred a few centuries later. The queen's megaron at the Palace of Knossos features a reconstructed fresco depicting blue dolphins swimming above a doorway. Credit: ">Karel Gallas Shutterstock The end of Knossos Around 1450 B.C., a cataclysm hit Crete. Fitton notes that all the palaces on the island, with the exception of Knossos, were destroyed. What exactly happened is a matter of debate.

One idea is that a series of natural calamities, such as earthquakes, hit the island. Another idea is that Crete was invaded by a people called the Mycenaeans, whom researchers know came to occupy Knossos. The Mycenaeans were a Greek-speaking people who apparently moved to Crete from the mainland. They wrote in a language we call “linear B,” and thousands of inscribed clay tablets bearing the script, and baked from fire, have been found at Knossos. “Several parts of the Palace, mostly on the upper story, were involved in administrative record keeping,” writes McEnroe, adding that they indicate that Knossos was a center of economic activity on the island at this time. McEnroe also notes that the Mycenaeans embarked on a program to rebuild parts of the palace and create new frescoes. Compared to the earlier frescoes the range of motifs “is remarkably narrow,” he writes. “There are no fanciful nature scenes with exotic animals or scenes of fashionable women joyously participating in outdoor ceremonies. Instead the fresco program was stripped down to a few bare essentials.

Bulls, tribute-bearing processions, heraldic devices and decorative friezes form of the bulk [of the decorations],” he writes. Knossos appears to have been destroyed sometime before 1300 B.C., apparently by fire. The Mycenaeans would see their civilization collapse around 1200 B.C. as a series of population migrations, possibly spurred by environmental problems, swept across Europe and the Near East. In the period after this collapse the people of Crete took to the hills, living in elevated settlements in hopes of surviving the calamity that had befallen the ancient world. Minotaur : Sir Arthur Evans and the archaeology of the Minoan myth / | University of Toronto Libraries Minotaur : Sir Arthur Evans and the archaeology of the Minoan myth / Joseph Alexander MacGillivray. New York : Hill and Wang, 2000. description viii, 373 p. : ill. ; 24 cm. ISBN New York : Hill and Wang, 2000. isbn Includes bibliographical references (p. [331]-351) and index.

A Look Inside First Chapter Introduction Like most visitors to Knossos who want to see the remains of the earliest civilization in Europe, I first looked at the Greek archaeological site in a photograph. The fierce brown bull charging between dark columns on the stone bastion towering above the North Entrance Passage was projected onto the wall of a makeshift classroom in my Montréal junior college. "This is the evidence," the young lecturer informed us, "which Sir Arthur Evans discovered at Knossos, to prove the facts behind the myth of the Minotaur and the Labyrinth which Daedalus built for King Minos in Crete." He expected us to remember it only long enough to pass the quiz at the end of the week, but I've never forgotten it. Six years of university and graduate school in archaeology passed before I stood in the Palace of Minos at Knossos and shared, like millions of tourists each year, that moment of enlightenment when you first see the downward-tapering, sooty-black painted columns and the richly grained beams in the great halls and dark passages.

But then you reach out and touch, not the warmth of natural wood but the eerie chill of cement or, more precisely, reinforced concrete, once coated with a brilliant gloss but now cracked and chipped, or blown away, leaving only a dull hint of faded grandeur. But whose grandeur, and from when? On the heels of this jarring encounter with the cold, hard facts followed bewilderment and disappointment mixed with a sense of betrayal and shame. I looked at the walls around me and realized I couldn't tell which ones were modern and which were ancient. And if I was confused, what about all those visitors who hadn't studied archaeology as I had? If Evans had literally constructed much of the palace, how much more had he fabricated? I became Knossos Curator of the British School at Athens in 1980, three years after my first visit to Crete, and I began to re-examine Evans's work in detail, starting with his excavation of the earliest palace beneath the huge complex of state and store rooms set around the Central Court, now so familiar to tourists.

My investigation concentrated on tangible artifacts like pottery and walls, but, as I worked through the excavator's notebooks and publications, I came to know the man who had done so much to reveal and revive Knossos. As I completed a technical manuscript for a report on the earliest palace at Knossos, I began to read Evans's personal letters and testimonials and entered the maze of social, political, religious, and artistic movements stretching back to a time long before his birth and culminating in his dazzling discoveries on the threshold of the twentieth century. The myths that the ancient Greeks "literally believed and reverentially cherished," including the "fabulous incidents attached to the name of Minos," wrote the British member of Parliament and historian George Grote in 1846, in his universally accepted twelve-volume History of Greece , were "in the eyes of modern inquiry essentially a legend and nothing more." Five years later, Arthur Evans was born to prove him wrong.

"We know now that the old traditions were true," Evans declared almost a century later, standing beneath a bronze bust of himself, placed to mark his achievement in the western courtyard of the Palace of King Minos, the palace he had discovered on the site of the Knossian Labyrinth that Daedalus built to house the Minotaur--the monstrous result of Queen Pasiphae's lust with the Greek god Zeus in the guise of a bull. "It is true that on the old Palace site what we see are only the ruins of ruins," he conceded, "but the whole is still inspired with Minos's spirit of order and organisation and the free and natural art of the great architect Daedalos." Evans opened the twentieth century with the revelation that Knossos had really existed: he found it in March 1900 in Crete, buried under the low hill where Greek tradition placed it. Excavating on and off for the next thirty years, he gave the world a new chapter in its ancient history, one he called Minoan. Arthur Evans was "a man of paradoxes ... flamboyant and oddly modest: dignified and loveably ridiculous ...

extravagant, yet by no means self-indulgent and in some things austere ... always loyal to his friends," Joan Evans eulogized in Time and Chance , a biography of her half-brother forty years her senior. "He lived as the genius he was," her praise continued, "and a genius is a man whose mind works in so unusual a fashion that his truth to that vital working must be the only criterion of his life." Evans's genius was to notice something unusual about a place or thing and to let his unfettered imagination raise it from the mundane to the eternal. His childlike enthusiasm and stubborn insistence on revealing the truth blended perfectly with his willful independence and propelled his longing to substantiate the folklore and early myths of Greece. Where did this longing come from, and why was it so important for Evans and his society? Born the first son of John Evans, a successful British paper manufacturer, in Herefordshire in 1851, Arthur John Evans was a "rich man's son," and so he could do largely as he pleased, but the source of the wealth that his freedom depended upon was also the cause of his yearning for something fantastic.

Evans grew up in a dull and sullied landscape of industrial England, where the random harmonies of nature had been replaced by man's geometry and harnessed to satisfy society's arrogant need to control its resources in the name of progress. He was surrounded by communities that, he felt, were enslaved by their nation's greed, by a delusive urgency to create a surplus, and by a mechanistic, materialistic world. The people who lived there had forgotten what it was like to live in the natural world, as the clock replaced the sun and the calendar the moon, as water came from a pipe and light from a wire. Evans shunned "modern conveniences," using electric light and the telephone sparingly--unless, like the automobile and airplane, they saved him time, a commodity he was obsessed with. Evans refused to join his father's world of merchants and manufacturers, and he escaped from his social and familial responsibilities into his own world of adventure and discovery whenever possible. In spite of nearsightedness and total night blindness, and fear of water--"that uncertain element" which made crossing the English Channel so arduous for him--he loved exploring new places and meeting strangers.

But the farther he journeyed from his native land, the more difficult it became for him to reassimilate upon his return. Eventually, Evans created a world of his own, which was "exactly to his taste," as Joan Evans acknowledged, "set in a beautiful Mediterranean country, aristocratic and humane in feeling: creating an art brilliant in colour and unusual in form, that drew inspiration from the flowers and birds and creatures that he loved ... a world which served to isolate him from a present in which he had found no real place." It was the perfect antidote to industrialized Europe and America, which, he felt, was trapped in the pessimism and anxiety about the future that prevailed then and were expressed in the works of Henry James, Joseph Conrad, and H. G. Wells, and in Decadence by Arthur Balfour, leader of the British Conservative Party and prime minister from 1902 to 1905. Crete was where Evans needed to go to heal his wounds. The death of his mother when he was six years old left a vacuum in his life that was never filled, not even by his wife, who also died prematurely and left him bereft; they had no heir.

Minoan Crete was no Garden of Eden, where women were guilty of introducing all that was evil, but a place where the sexes were equal; men controlled the affairs of state, but women ruled the hearts and beliefs of a society at peace with itself and its neighbors. Evans's Minoans, then, worshiped the Great Mother of all creation, and when destruction came it was at the hands of a masculine society, Homer's Achaeans, dominated by their vengeful patron--Zeus. Evans's Minoans are an example of how an archaeological discovery occurs first in the mind, born of the thinker's need to prove something of vital importance to himself. Finding proof in the dirt is the final stage of a process of wish-fulfillment. We're rarely aware of archaeologists' inventiveness and creative ability. It's only with hindsight that we can guess at the abstract origins of an archaeologist's discoveries, which otherwise appear to be surprising and fortunate. Joan Evans attributed Arthur's brilliant discovery of Minoan culture to his being in the right place at the right time.

"He had set out to find a script," she romanticized, "but Time and Chance had made him the discoverer of a new civilization." Nothing could be further from what I believe about how Evans discovered Knossos or how archaeological excavations work. I maintain that every detail in an investigation must be treated as a deliberate and relevant part of a greater picture; otherwise we would limit our study to selected material that fits a preconceived notion or research plan. When, however, we allow for chance, we impose another kind of limitation, because we acknowledge that accidents occur and that some things are beyond explanation, and thereby we draw a line between what we decide is worth examining and what is beyond our interest or grasp. Accidents appear to be chance only until we explain them, at which point they cease to appear fortuitous. There is no such thing as a random encounter or a lucky find, then. If such a thing did exist, we'd have to abandon all hope of ever explaining anything. When Joan Evans rationalized her half-brother's discoveries as luck, she excused herself from having to investigate the most important aspect of her study: Evans's active work in conceiving and discovering Minoan civilization.

Most archaeologists take comfort in being impartial observers using scientific techniques, which, they believe, reasonably protects them from anything but a passive involvement with their discoveries. For them, archaeology is the process of delivering the past into the present; they are the messengers, and the artifact is the message. But this separation is an illusion. Evans was no simple errand boy; the message he communicated was as much from him as by means of him. Archaeologists are the progenitors as well as the midwives at the birthing process we call excavation. To understand this process, I should like to examine the connection between Evans, appointed by his society to search for certain specific and tangible truths, and the material evidence that came into his hands in Crete. The heart of what I call relative archaeology is complex; that is, the study of the origins of this association between an artifact and its creator or finder is quite elaborate. I treat all archaeological discoveries as creative in their origin, rather like Michelangelo Buonarroti's views of his own sculpture; he believed he was liberating figures trapped in the stones of the Carrara marble quarries (images that were submerged or repressed aspects of his own personality) when he tangibly created them.

I suspect that the great archaeologists, like Heinrich Schliemann at the site he believed was Troy, do something similar when they gaze beneath the earth's mantle in search of clues to their desired history. Much of this creative process is dismissed as archaeological intuition, but what does this mean? To intuit is to receive knowledge by direct perception without reasoning, but this presumes that the knowledge is absolute in its truth. To say that Evans was intuitive about Knossos is to assume that what he found was an absolute truth. I think that what he found was a relative truth, relative primarily to himself and then to those who wanted it most and who engaged him and his colleagues to uncover it, and it was truthful only for as long as the facts he delivered were necessary to support the desired history. Archaeologists create a version of history, which in turn guides the archaeology in a circular motion that, ideally, is ever changing as each new discovery causes a new appraisal of the history. New discoveries change the direction of archaeology, which in turn produces new artifacts and new histories, which send the archaeologists in new directions, so that they never cover the same ground twice.

There is no stasis in such a dynamic, no fixed point, and therefore no absolute historical truth. Instead, a succession of relative truths occurs, with relative histories that satisfy a set of changing requirements for a while. When Evans formulated his notion of what Minoan culture in Crete had been, he blocked this succession by insisting on an absolute and fixed history. Because of his exalted status, this history was largely accepted, but until after his death in 1941 it hampered the learning process. And he didn't restrict himself to antiquity: Evans was also a powerful and willful designer of modern nations, as his involvement in the creation of Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia during the First World War demonstrated. Evans's great discovery of the Bronze Age civilization of Crete, the Minoan civilization, earned him a place in history. But what of the Minoans themselves? They have become such an important element in so many conflicting ancient and modern political, social, and spiritual agendas that we seem to have lost sight of who these early inhabitants of Crete were.

They're still classed as pre-Hellenic--a label that tells nothing about them, leaving them in a state of suspense, waiting to become something recognizable to us as "Hellenic." They're presented as the last bastion of matriarchal rule and as worshipers of the Mother Goddess--believers that nature is a loving mother fertilized by a heavenly father (Evans's early theory recently revised). This view holds that the Minoans survived into "proto-historical" times, when their conquest by bloodthirsty "Indo-Germanic" ancestors of a European male-dominated society ended their civilization. Recent scholarship relegates them to an even more fantastic realm than that of Minos: Plato's lost continent of Atlantis. Some suggest that Atlantis was Crete, submerged at the height of its power by a tidal wave from an eruption from the nearby island of Thera, a volcanic crater whose most recent and most devastating explosion, in the fifteenth century B.C., had extinguished Minoan civilization.

A century after Evans's discoveries at Knossos, the time has come to reconsider the circumstances in which this early Cretan society was reborn, if only to clarify the origins of much of what we still call Minoan. To do so, we must start with Evans himself, the product of his genes and his life experiences, and with his own search to explain aspects of himself--such as his explosive temper, which his mother called his volcanic nature, and his frequent and playful references to beastly lairs. Evans identified with the mythical Minotaur--an allegory for the monster in men--but what was his particular monster, which he worked so hard to contain in its lair and hide from public view? I suspect that it may have been the repressed "beastliness" of his homosexuality, which gave his life part of its powerful creative drive until he lost control of it in his later years. But Evans didn't exist in a vacuum, and so we must also reconstruct the social, political, and intellectual climate in which he developed and that compelled him to excavate Knossos. This study in relative archaeology is a radical departure from the common view of how archaeology and archaeologists work.

It requires us to change our perceptions of the field dramatically. In my view, archaeologists must cease to believe that what they are doing is to sort objectively through a confusion of facts to sustain a historical truth, and they must become much more aware of their truly creative interpretative work. They must be conscious of their active participation in the formative and recovery stages of the archaeological process. In the twenty-first century, they must ask more penetrating questions than their predecessors in the twentieth century did, both about their discoveries and about themselves. This is only part of a wider review of the bigger question of how we relate to the past from the only fixed point in time we know: the present. Copyright © 2000 Joseph Alexander MacGillivray. All rights reserved. Full Text Reviews Appeared in Choice on 2001-02-01: Influenced by Schliemann's search for Homeric Troy, Evans (1851-1941), a mediocre British journalist assigned to the Balkans, turned to archaeology, becoming curator in Oxford's Ashmolean Museum and, in 1896, postulating that Mycenaean civilization on the Greek mainland originated in Crete.

From 1900 to 1907 he excavated the ruins of the Bronze Age city of Knossos, Crete, including a 5.5-acre labyrinth-like palace; he interpreted the site as the capital of King Minos and lair of the mythical minotaur, naming the civilization "Minoan." Professional archaeologist MacGillivray, who has worked in Crete since 1980, offers a delightful, highly readable yet scholarly assessment of Evans's preconceptions, excavation strategies, and the significance of his intellectual interpretations (some problematic). Evans, a pompous, energetic Victorian adventurer with a single-minded arrogance and streak of Teutonic racism, played a little-known role in the politics of Crete and the Balkans. This compelling biography of Evans's professional and private life also documents archaeology's transformation into a scientific discipline, and provides an engrossing account of intellectual and sociopolitical history, 1880-1930. Eighty-six well-chosen illustrations, 633 endnotes, 380 references, Evans's 129-item bibliography, and 19-page proper noun index supplement the narrative.

This essential volume for all collections has appeal well beyond Mediterranean archaeology. C. C. Kolb; National Endowment for the Humanities Appeared in Library Journal on 2000-06-15: Archaeology in the late 19th and early 20th centuries mounted large excavations that produced astounding discoveries. In an age when archaeologists were often larger than life, Sir Arthur Evans was a towering figure. MacGillivray, who has worked on Crete for 20 years, amply illustrates the qualities that vaulted Evans into the spotlight and kept him there following his 1900 discovery of the "Palace of Minos." Evans was arrogant, self-assured, bigoted, single-minded, prone to hyperbole, and quick to judgment. His opinions, once formed, rarely wavered. But though Evans originally scorned Schliemann's adherence to Greek myth and narratives, he too adopted their themes as a framework. Through his excavations, Crete was validated as a potent force in the ancient Aegean. MacGillivray's engaging narrative nicely balances the personal and professional sides of Evans, an intense and driven man from the romanticized past of archaeology.

Strongly recommended for public and academic libraries.DJoyce L. Ogburn, Univ. of Washington, Seattle (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. Appeared in Publishers Weekly on 2000-05-29: On the most obvious level, this splendid, multilayered book is a biography of Sir Arthur Evans, the archeologist most responsible for the excavation of the palace at Knossos on Crete, the center of Minoan civilization in the second millennium B.C. Evans's life and work provide a fascinating example of the private and professional lives of those Victorians whose superb education, nonconformist brilliance, determination and diligence resulted in major discoveries that continue, even today, to define dialogue concerning the origins of civilization in Western Europe. But this book by MacGillivray (an archeologist who has worked on Crete) is much more than a biography of the right man at the right place at the right time.

It was in the late 19th century that archeology moved from being essentially an international treasure hunt financed by wealthy individuals (as was the case with Schliemann and Troy) to a scholarly discipline with well-defined expectations for the conduct of an excavation, preservation of finds and publication about ancient sites. Evans was among a number of prominent archeologists who recognized the need for change and helped to make it possibleDbut only, it seems, grudgingly. The book's appeal, however, should reach far beyond readers interested specifically in Minoan civilization or in the process of archeological discovery. This richly detailed and engrossing account also illuminates the social, intellectual and military/political history of the give-and-take among the great European powers and the Ottoman Empire. It will also appeal to readers of travel literature as Evans and those around him were always on the move and insatiable sightseers. 24 pages b&w illus. not seen by PW (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC.

All rights reserved Reviews HistoryWiz Books: Minotaur, Sir Arthur Evans and the Archaeology of the Minoan Myth HistoryMaker Arthur Evans It was in the late 19th century that archeology moved from being essentially an international treasure hunt financed by wealthy individuals (as was the case with Schliemann and Troy) to a scholarly discipline with well-defined expectations for the conduct of an excavation, preservation of finds and publication about ancient sites. Evans was among a number of prominent archeologists who recognized the need for change and helped to make it possible, but only, it seems, grudgingly. The book's appeal, however, should reach far beyond readers interested specifically in Minoan civilization or in the process of archeological discovery. This richly detailed and engrossing account also illuminates the social, intellectual and military/political history of the give-and-take among the great European powers and the Ottoman Empire. It will also appeal to readers of travel literature as Evans and those around him were always on the move and insatiable sightseers. 24 pages b&w illus. not seen by PW (June) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal Archaeology in the late 19th and early 20th centuries mounted large excavations that produced astounding discoveries. In an age when archaeologists were often larger than life, Sir Arthur Evans was a towering figure. MacGillivray, who has worked on Crete for 20 years, amply illustrates the qualities that vaulted Evans into the spotlight and kept him there following his 1900 discovery of the "Palace of Minos." Evans was arrogant, self-assured, bigoted, single-minded, prone to hyperbole, and quick to judgment. His opinions, once formed, rarely wavered. But though Evans originally scorned Schliemann's adherence to Greek myth and narratives, he too adopted their themes as a framework. Through his excavations, Crete was validated as a potent force in the ancient Aegean. MacGillivray's engaging narrative nicely balances the personal and professional sides of Evans, an intense and driven man from the romanticized past of archaeology. Strongly recommended for public and academic libraries--Joyce L. Ogburn, Univ. of Washington, Seattle Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Amazon.com Arthur Evans leapt into the public imagination with his 1900 discovery of Crete's Palace of Knossos, interpreted as the lair of the mythical Minotaur. Though his findings were a crowning achievement of archaeology's golden age, then, as now, questions have been raised about Evans's excavations and the conclusions he reached. In the richly detailed Minotaur, Joseph Alexander MacGillivray, who has himself excavated Crete, suggests that the man who gave us the very term Minoan provides a prime example of "how archaeological discovery occurs first in the mind." By examining Evans's life and work through his actions and correspondence, MacGillivray shows that Evans's evidence was "fully, even exaggeratedly exploited" but rarely reviewed. Adventurous, energetic, and highly observant, Evans also displayed "single-minded arrogance," "pomposity and manifest racism"--traits that invited misinterpretation, MacGillivray writes. The book also incorporates an interesting history of war-torn Crete and the Balkans as well as Evans's involvement in the region's politics.

It finally outlines modern theories on Minoan civilization, though the "Palace and surrounding buildings are crumbling as fast as Evans's intellectual reconstruction," so that solid proof of any thesis is increasingly problematic. Fascinating as a portrait of the man who "gave the world a new chapter in its ancient history" and for its portrayal of the developing discipline of archaeology, Minotaur also poses some important questions about whether archaeologists are ever impartial observers. --Karen Tiley Arthur Evans Arthur Evans Sir Arthur John Evans (July 8, 1851  July 11, 1941) was a British archaeologist. He is best remembered for uncovering the civilization he dubbed "Minoan", which had been a dim mythic memory. Evans was the son of Sir John Evans, a paper manufacturer and amateur archaeologist of Welsh descent. Educated at Harrow, at Brasenose College, Oxford, and at the University of Göttingen, and having inherited his father's interest in archaeology, Arthur was curator of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford from 1884 to 1908.

Evans' special interest was the Greek island of Crete, and he was largely responsible for the excavations of the palace-city of Knossos, chief centre of the Minoan civilization , which uncovered the site that is open to visitors today. Not only did he discover these remains and publish them in four volumes The Palace of Minos at Knossos (19211935), a classic of archaeology, but he substantially restored and partially reconstructed them, using some foreign materials like concrete that are offensive to purists but help the average visitor "read" the site. While many of his contemporaries were interested in removing items of interest from the sites they uncovered, Evans wanted to turn Knossos into a museum where Minoan culture could become tangible, as he was far more interested in building a whole vision of the past than simply displaying its riches. Though deciphering and translating the scripts found on the site always eluded him, Evans recognized that they were in two scripts, which he dubbed " Linear A " and " Linear B ". He  correctly, as it turned out  suggested that Linear B was written in a language that used inflection.

Evans, however, should also be remembered for his own irrationally obstinate Creto-centrism, which led to unfriendly debate between himself and the mainland archaeologists Carl Blegen and Alan Wace. Evans' insistence upon a single timeline of development, climax, and decay for Bronze-Age Greek civilization based upon his dating of Knossos and other Minoan palaces ran contrary to Wace's dating of Mycenae , which saw its heyday in the midst of Knossos' decline, as well as Blegen's discovery of Linear B tablets at Pylos , which he (correctly) speculated were, in fact, Greek. Nevertheless, Evans generated strange and convoluted explanations for these findings, and in enmity, he actually used his influence to have Wace removed from his tenured position at the British School of Archaeology in Athens. Evans was knighted in 1911 for his services to archaeology, and is commemorated both at Knossos and at the Ashmolean Museum. The excavation at the site of Knossos (which he purchased in order to preserve it), has been continued to the present day by the British School of Archaeology, Athens.

Retrieved from "" BBC - Archive - Chronicle: Archaeology on Television - Chronicle | The Last Days of Minos Chronicle: Archaeology on Television | Excavations and reports from Sutton Hoo to Machu Picchu Chronicle | The Last Days of Minos Myth and history merge in this account of archaeological discovery on Crete and Santorini. FIRST BROADCAST | 23 December 1967 DURATION | 48 minutes 33 seconds FIRSTBROADCAST 1967 Synopsis Was the legend of the Minotaur inspired by the worship of bulls at Knossos on Crete? Does the volcanic island of Santorini provide clues about the fabled city of Atlantis? Magnus Magnusson investigates through a detailed tour of Knossos and its archaeological finds, which date from 1700 to 1380BC. He also explores the extraordinary life of Sir Arthur Evans, the archaeologist who discovered Knossos and the Minoan civilisation. Did you know? While excavating this site, Sir Arthur Evans lived at the nearby Villa Ariadne.

At one point during World War II, this villa was the headquarters of a German commander, General Kreipe, prior to his kidnap at the hands of Greek guerrillas, who were assisted by writer and soldier Patrick Leigh Fermor. (The fascinating story of the villa was told by writer and critic Dilys Powell in her book 'The Villa Ariadne', published in 1973.) The building has seen more peaceful and scholarly activity recently as the Cretan base of the British School of Athens. Contributors Arthur Evans - Phantis Arthur Evans Sir Arthur John Evans ( July 8 , 1851 – July 11 , 1941 ) was an English archaeologist. Evans uncovered the civilization he dubbed "Minoan," which had been a dim mythic memory. He was the son of Sir John Evans, a paper manufacturer and amateur archaeologist of Welsh descent. Educated at Harrow and Brasenose College, Oxford and the University of Göttingen and having inherited his father's interest in archaeology, Arthur was curator of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford 1884 – 1908 .

Evans' special interest was the Greek island of Crete , and he was largely responsible for the excavations of the palace-city of Knossos , chief center of the Minoan civilization , which uncovered the site that is open to visitors today. Not only did he discover these remains and publish them in four volumes The Palace of Minos at Knossos (1921–1935), a classic of archaeology, but he substantially restored and partially reconstructed them, using some foreign materials like concrete that are offensive to purists but help the average visitor "read" the site. While many of his contemporaries were interested in removing items of interest from the sites they uncovered, Evans wanted to turn Knossos into a museum where Minoan culture could become tangible, as he was far more interested in building a whole vision of the past than simply displaying its riches.

Though deciphering and translating the scripts found on the site always eluded him, Evans recognized that they were in two scripts, which he dubbed " Linear A " and " Linear B ." Evans, however, should also be remembered for his own irrationally obstinate Creto-centrism, which led to unfriendly debate between himself and the mainland archaeologists Carl Blegen and Alan Wace. Evans' insistence upon a single timeline of development, climax, and decay for Bronze-Age Greek civilization based upon his dating of Knossos and other Minoan palaces ran contrary to Wace's dating of Mycenae , which saw its heyday in the midst of Knossos' decline, as well as Blegen's discovery of Linear B tablets at Pylos , which he (correctly) speculated were, in fact, Greek. Nevertheless, Evans generated strange and convoluted explanations for these findings, and in enmity, he actually used his influence to have Wace removed from his tenured position at the British School of Archaeology in Athens . Evans was knighted in 1911 for his services to archaeology, and is commemorated both at Knossos and at the Ashmolean Museum.

The excavation at the site of Knossos (which he purchased in order to preserve it), has been continued to the present day by the British School of Archaeology , Athens . See also The Palace of Minos at Knossos in Ancient Crete Throne Room, Palace of Knossos, Crete, Greece. Ed Freeman / Getty Images Updated June 27, 2016. The Palace of Minos at Knossos is one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world. Located on Kephala Hill on the island of Crete in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Greece, Knossos palace was the political, social and cultural center of the Minoan culture during the Early and Middle Bronze Age. Founded at least as early as 2400 BC, its power was greatly diminished, but not completely dissipated, by the eruption of Santorini about 1625 BC.

What's perhaps more important, perhaps, is that the ruins of Knossos Palace are the cultural heart of the Greek myths Theseus fighting the Minotaur , Ariadne and her ball of string, Daedalus the architect and doomed Icarus of the wax wings ; all reported by Greek and Roman sources but almost certainly much older. continue reading below our video Test Your General Science Knowledge The earliest representation of Theseus fighting the minotaur is illustrated on an amphora from the Greek island of Tinos dated 670-660 BC Palaces of the Aegean Culture The Aegean culture known as Minoan is the Bronze Age civilization that flourished on the island of Crete during the second and third millennia BC. The city of Knossos was one of its main cities--and it contained its largest palace after the shattering earthquake that marks the beginning of the New Palace period in Greek archaeology, ca. 1700 BC . Palaces of the Minoan culture were likely not simply residences of a ruler, or even a ruler and his family, but rather held a public function, where others could enter and use (some of) the palace facilities where staged performances took place.

The palace at Knossos, according to legend the palace of King Minos, was the largest of the Minoan palaces, and the longest-lived building of its type, remaining throughout the Middle and Late Bronze Ages as the focal point of the settlment. Knossos Chronology In the early 20th century, Knossos excavator Arthur Evans pegged the rise of Knossos to the Middle Minoan I period, or about 1900 BC; archaeological evidence since then has found the first public feature on Kephala Hill--a deliberately leveled rectangular plaza or court--was constructed as early as the Final Neolithic (ca 2400 BC, and the first building by Early Minoan I-IIA (ca 2200 BC). This chronology is based in part on that of John Younger's plain-jane Aegean chronology , which I highly recommend.

Late Helladic (Final Palatial) 1470-1400, Greek take over of Crete Late Minoan/Late Helladic 1600-1470 BC Middle Minoan (Neo-Palatial) 1700-1600 BC (Linear A, eruption of Santorini, ca 1625 BC) Middle Minoan (Proto-Palatial) 1900-1700 BC (peripheral courts established, heyday of the Minoan culture) Early Minoan (Pre-Palatial), 2200-1900 BC, court complex started by EM I-IIA including the first Court building Final Neolithic or Pre-Palatial 2600-2200 BC (first central courtyard of what would become the palace at Knossos begun in FN IV) The stratigraphy is difficult to parse because there were several major episodes of earth-moving and terrace building, so much so that earth moving must be considered a nearly constant process that began on Kephala hill at least as early as EM IIA, and probably starts with the very end of the Neolithic FN IV.

Knossos Palace Construction and History The palace complex at Knossos was begun in the PrePalatial period, perhaps as long ago as 2000 BC, and by 1900 BC, it was fairly close to its final form. That form is the same as other Minoan palaces such as Phaistos, Mallia and Zakros: a large single building with a central courtyard surrounding by a set of rooms for various purposes. The palace had perhaps as many as ten separate entrances: those on the north and west served as the main entry ways. Around 1600 BC, one theory goes, a tremendous earthquake shook the Aegean Sea, devastating Crete as well as the Mycenaean cities on the Greek mainland. Knossos' palace was destroyed; but the Minoan civilization rebuilt almost immediately on top of the ruins of the past, and indeed the culture reached its pinnacle only after the devastation. During the Neo-Palatial period [1700-1450 BC], the Palace of Minos covered nearly 22,000 square meters (~5.4 acres) and contained storage rooms, living quarters, religious areas, and banquet rooms.

What appears today to be a jumble of rooms connected by narrow passageways may well have given rise to the myth of the Labyrinth; the structure itself was built of a complex of dressed masonry and clay-packed rubble, and then half-timbered. Columns were many and varied in the Minoan tradition, and the walls were vividly decorated with frescoes. Architectural Elements The palace at Knossos was renowned for its unique light emanating from its surfaces, the results of the liberal use of gypsum (selenite) from a local quarry as a building material and ornamental element. Evans' reconstruction used a grey cement, which made a huge difference to the way its seen. Restoration efforts are underway to remove the cement and restore the gypsum surface, but they have moved slowly, because removing the greyish cement mechanically is detrimental to the underlying gypsum. Laser removal has been attempted and may prove a reasonable answer. The main source of water at Knossos initially was at the spring of Mavrokolymbos, about 10 kilometers away from the palace and conveyed by way of a system of terracotta pipes. Six wells in the near vicinity of the palace served potable water beginning ca.

1900-1700 BC. A sewer system, which connected toilets flushed with rainwater to large (79x38 cm) drains, had secondary pipelines, lightwells and drains and in total exceeds 150 meters in length. It has also been suggested as the inspiration for the labyrinth myth. Prev

Question: The British archaeologist Arthur Evans was responsible for the excavation of which ancient Minoan palace-city?
Answer: KNOSSOS