Chapter 17 Lecture Two of Two Crete ©2012 Pearson Education Inc

Chapter 17Lecture Two of Two

Crete

©2012 Pearson Education Inc.

ARCHAEOLOGY AND CRETAN MYTH


Archaeology and Cretan Myth

• Crete between Greek and trade routes to the east, Egypt, and the west



• First people from Anatolia (7000 B.C.)– First script pictorial– Second: Linear A– Later, the Mycenaeans adapted Linear A for use in

their own language. This script called Linear B



• Minoan power ends in 1450• Cnossos rebuilt but now occupied by

Mycenaeans• Second destruction: 1400 B.C.• Third and final: 1200 B.C.



• What can we know about the Minoans?• Ancient Greeks wanted to know too and used

their myths as guide to history– Thucydides

• Arthur Evans (1899)– Uncovered Minoan material culture at Cnossos


Fig. 17.6Reconstructed portion of the Minoan palace at Cnossus.


Author’s photo


• Minoans were vigorous, pleasure-loving, seafaring, with a taste for vibrant, naturalistic art

• Palaces not fortified– A thalassocracy?

• Relationship with Athens perhaps a historical truth– Theseus and the Minotaur



• Minoan Religion– Worshipped a Great Mother goddess– The “Snake Goddess”– Ariadnê (“the very holy one”)– Ariadnê Aphrodite– Bull as the symbol of male fertility and Zeus?

• Bull jumping as human sacrifice to the god?


Fig. 17.7The snake-goddess


Heraklion Museum, Crete; © Giraudon/Art Resource, New York


• Athenian youths given to the Minotaur perhaps an image of child-sacrifice

• Double axe– Used to sacrifice the bull?– Labys < Labyrinth “house of the double axe”?

• Pasiphaë and the bull a reflection of sacrifice of young women to the god?– modified to a sexual surrender


Fig. 17.8 Bull-Vaulting Fresco


Heraklion Museum, Crete; Marie Manzy/Art Resource, New York


• Minoan myth preserved by the Greeks who emphasized the lurid and licentious about the Cretans– Pasiphaë– Phaedra– Megara



• The story of Theseus appears to be a folktale that resembles a male’s initiation into adulthood– In Athens, young men (18–20 ) who were ephebes

alluded to the model of Theseus in their oath



Theseus Male Initiation

Journey to a far land Driven from native land

Victory over death and a monster

Mock death and demons

Amorous adventure Sexual experience

Becomes king Return to society with full privileges



• Daedalus, the trickster, also underlines the folktale quality of Minoan myth

• Prototype of the passionate artist– Daedalic style of art


End


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Chapter 17 Lecture Two of Two Crete ©2012 Pearson Education Inc