From the myth of Daedalus based on Ovid's poem "Metamorphoses":
Knossos is an ancient city on the island of Crete (near Heraklion) - the main city of the island during the Minoan civilization. In Greek mythology, Knossos is associated with the name of the legendary Cretan king Minos. According to legend, in its vicinity was the labyrinth of Daedalus, where the Minotaur was imprisoned.
The excavations of Knossos continue intermittently to this day, and their results are among the most significant in world archeology. The opening of the legendary Palace of Knossos belongs to the British archaeologist Arthur John Evans. Starting excavations of Knossos in 1900, Arthur Evans discovered a culture that he named after King Minos - Minoan. From the Minoan culture originated the culture of mainland Greece, which existed for a significant period in the 2nd millennium BC.
According to Evans, the territory of Greece was just a Cretan colony. British archaeologists found a large number of written documents among the ruins of the Palace of Knossos, which allowed Evans to distinguish three different interconnected writing systems among these monuments: hieroglyphic (pictographic, drawing) and the so-called Linear A and Linear B.
They are called linear because, unlike hieroglyphics (the signs of which were in the form of plastically executed images), here the signs were depicted only by means of contour lines.
A unique monument of writing from the Minoan culture of the Middle or Late Bronze Age is the Fest disc, exhibited in the Archaeological Museum of Heraklion.
Its exact purpose, as well as the place and time of its manufacture, are not known for certain. The Phaistos disc is the oldest printed text known to science, its conditional dating is 1700 BC. Until now, the fest disc has not been decrypted.
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The palace of Knossos, which appeared during the excavations of Evans, revealed to the world the Cretan culture, traces of which, after 3.5 thousand years of "silence", testified to the existence in ancient times of a huge city that belonged to the highly developed civilization of the Aegeis.
The Palace of Knossos is an architectural monument of a completely different character than the Mycenae and Tiryns discovered by Schliemann. The palace of Knossos never had any defensive structures. The complex of his buildings was concentrated around the central courtyard. It was a gigantic 5-storey palace - a labyrinth with a huge number of rooms and passages. Initially, the word "labyrinth" was derived from the Cretan word "labrys", meaning a double ax - a symbol of the political power of Knossos, with various images of which archaeologists met in many rooms of the palace. Visitors from the mainland, this "labyrinth" ("house of the double ax") seemed to be a structure so intricate that its name became a Greek word for a place of wanderings.
Centuries of development, albeit disrupted from time to time by natural disasters, allowed Crete to emerge as a thriving Mediterranean power of paramount importance, competing culturally and economically with the two main centers of civilization of the time - Egypt and Mesopotamia.
In 1645 BC. - 1500 BC (according to various estimates) there is an eruption of the Santorini volcano in the Aegean Sea. As a result of the eruption, the crater of the volcano "collapsed" and a huge caldera (funnel) was formed. After filling the mouth of the volcano with water, it evaporated and an explosion of enormous force, causing a tsunami with a height of 100 to 200 meters. A giant tsunami wave swept away all the harbors on its way and flooded vast areas of the Mediterranean coast.
It was at this time in Crete that the sudden destruction of almost all significant centers of Minoan culture occurs. Judging by the archaeological and geological data, the eruption of Santorini coincides in time with the death of the Cretan-Minoan civilization.
At the same time, the complete and final death of the Cretan civilization was not the result of an earthquake and a giant tsunami that struck the cities of northern Crete. Such disasters could not destroy civilization throughout the island. Researchers believe that the reason for the complete destruction of the Cretan-Minoan civilization was different. Tons of ash ejected by the Santorini volcano 200-1000 km away were blown into central and eastern Crete and made it impossible for vegetation to grow on the island for decades. In-depth studies carried out near the coast of Crete found layers of ash from a volcanic eruption on the seabed, the layer of which could be about 20 cm in central Crete, and 1 meter in the east of the island. The first great civilization on the territory of Europe has sunk into oblivion.
The Achaeans achieved dominance over Knossos without resorting to a destructive military invasion, but only as a result of the weakening of the political and economic power of Crete, caused by the eruption of the Santorini volcano. Around 1450 BC the Achaeans occupied the huge palace of Knossos - a labyrinth, numbering about thousands of rooms, which continued to maintain its former layout with a wide courtyard, magnificent walkways and staircases, a vast complex of various structures, including four-story buildings, as well as amazing fresco paintings and technically perfect household amenities …
Having established themselves in Knossos, the Achaeans in the second half of the 15th century. BC. captured a significant part of Crete and remained the owners of the Palace of Knossos until its final destruction. Knossos was the most significant center of Mycenaean culture outside mainland Greece. Around 1380 BC due to circumstances not yet clarified, already Mycenaean Knossos, the ancient city of the Cretan kings, finally disappears from world history.
Decline of Knossos around 1380 BC had a number of other consequences. Although Knossos had become Achaean 70 years before this date, the ancient Cretan traditions persisted here later, and continued to greatly influence mainland Greece, which was culturally and politically dependent on Crete. This point of view is confirmed by some ancient sources, mainly mythological.
Let's remember the legend about the Athenian prince Theseus. According to the myth, the son of Minos Androgeus was killed in Attica, for which the Athenians had to send seven young men and seven girls to Crete every nine years as a sacrifice to the Knossos monster with the body of a man and the head of a bull - the Minotaur. Being among the seven Athenian youths, Theseus, with the help of the Knossos princess Ariadne, killed the Minotaur in the Labyrinth and freed Athens from the shameful dependence on Knossos. Theseus gathered the Athenians who lived scattered throughout their country into a single community and became the actual founder of Athens. The great history of Attica began with Theseus in the 11th century.
Mysteries of the Labyrinth of Knossos
The king-priest of Knossos, who bore the title "minos", every nine years expected seven young men and seven girls from Attica, who were sent "as a sacrifice" to the Minotaur bull from the Knossos Labyrinth. Researchers believe that "sacrifice" meant the initiation of young people of noble birth in the mystery of the Labyrinth of Knossos.
Plutarch wrote about the Mysteries of Knossos as follows: “the king appointed a competition where his commander Taurus (“bull”) was to oppose Theseus. And just because Theseus won, Minos released all fourteen young men and women to their homeland."
The ancient mysteries in the Labyrinth are evidenced by the fresco preserved in the Palace of Knossos depicting the competition mentioned by Plutarch, as well as the traditional graphic representation of the Labyrinth in the form of a spiral dance floor.
The initiation began on the day of Aphrodite (April 24). Theseus was the leader of fourteen Attic "sacrifices" to the Minotaur. Mysteries in the Labyrinth began in the evening with a game with a bull in the courtyard of the Knossos Palace. Playing with the bull required skill, determination and dexterity. Everything occult took place at night in the Labyrinth, on a circular platform surrounded by a high wall. According to legend, the Labyrinth consisted of two spiral turns and a round central platform open on top.
The participants in the mysteries entered the Labyrinth through a narrow low door, with their heads lowered, in a bent position, moving in a dance backwards and holding on to a rope smeared with blood, which was pulled with force by the leading mystagogue (priest who initiated the mysteries during the mystery). This rope was the "red thread" of Ariadne. In the outer round of the myst (initiates), assistants in animal masks, mainly "wolves," awaited, and took away their food and clothing. The dance - jumping with knees thrown high, continued under the animal roar and wolf howl.
This is how the preparation for the metamorphosis proceeded. Then the priestess of Knossos in the underground sanctuary received each myst separately, fumigating him with incense. Initiates passed through various states of consciousness. Everyone told what they saw, heard and experienced in the Labyrinth. For memory or as a sign of participation, the priestess presented each initiate with Knossos bull horns or an image of the Minotaur. Theseus received a statuette of Aphrodite. This was the end of the mysteries of the Knossos Labyrinth.
Author: Valentina Zhitanskaya