Category Archives: minoans

Priestesses

Posted on by

From the frescos, the statuary and other artworks, we know women had a lot of power in Bronze Age Crete. Seals show a female figure as several times the size of the male figure; that is assumed to be a representation of a Supreme Goddess with a less important consort or son beside her.

Other works show figures in the traditional clothing: the short, tight short-sleeved jackets and long skirts, with elaborate headdresses. Two very famous statues show these women holding snakes (which were sacred.) These, it is theorized, are the Priestesses.

In many cultures, women were expected to know prayers/spells and make regular offering to the Gods to safeguard their homes and families. The Bronze Age was an age when many women died in childbirth (estimates rise as high as half) and miscarriages and stillbirths were common. Women employed amulets, prayers, and appeals to wise women to help them attract their love, inspire pregnancy, make the birth easy, keep the baby safe and more. These practices continued up through Roman times.

Christianity does not have priestesses. The only formal avenue for women in their worship is to become a nun. The spells, love potions, amulets and so one went underground, to women who became feared as witches.

In Ancient Crete, women would have been responsible for the prayers and sacrifices to keep their homes safe. Clearly, as shown by the above statue, there were other women whose responsibilities were far greater.

In In The Shadow of the Bull,

I imagined a class of Priestesses who lived separately and were responsible for all the rituals involving appeals to the Goddess. This was their profession. I suspect these women would have also attained a high degree of political power as well so, in my reconstruction of the world, I made the female ruler also the High Priestess with the others below her.

I will be taking a break for the next few weeks but I will return the last week of October.

Women’s work in Ancient Crete

Posted on by

Women have always worked. And up until the modern era, their jobs they’ve done remained fairly consistent.

First and foremost, the care of children. The work that women have done has been tasks that can be scheduled around childcare.

Across cultures, women have been responsible for food production – babies can be brought to the garden – and clothing their families. Although men did some farming, they owned oxen, most of the crops they relied upon were not cereals but orchard crops such as olives and grapes.

Weaving, up until modern times, has always been one of a woman’s primary jobs. Without the textiles the women made, there would be no cloth. Flax – and linen – known since Neolithic times, was joined by wool. Wool is easy to work with since it has a little more stretch than linen. Wool comes in a variety of shades, black gray, cream and more. It takes dyes easily as well How can we be sure they were weavers? Spindles and looms weights have been discovered in the excavations. I saw them myself in Akrotiri, a town buried by ash and now being revealed.

The Minoan men traded these textiles all over the Mediterranean.

The designs were very complicated, so complicated we can only assume a long learning curve, especially if the patterns had to memorized. One of the popular patterns consisted of heart spirals set point to point with red diamonds in the center. Colored spirals were another favorite. How do we know this? Statuary and wall painting depict gorgeously clad women in elaborate clothing dancing, picking saffron, and more. And not just in Crete either. The patterns have been recorded by Egyptian artists.

No wonder Nephele, Martis’s mother is horrified when Martis refuses to become a weaver.

It was not until the Industrial Revolution and mechanization of weaving that hand weaving ceased to be an in-house task and a profession.

Next time: Priestesses.

Dyes in Bronze Age Crete

Posted on by

First, a note. My website went down on Friday for some as yet unknown reason. However, after a discussion with Bluehost, it is now working again. So, this is the blog I would have written on Thursday.

This Bronze Age civilization was the pinnacle of sophistication and culture in the Mediterranean. Their art – the paintings, mosaics, sculpture, jewelry – even their pottery – was much sought after. Excavations on mainland Greece, Turkey and Egypt have found remnants of these trade goods.

They were also noted for their textiles, especially a purple dye. The murals, sculptures, and sculptures reveal clothing dyed many colors. Indigo was known. (In fact, our name for this blue comes from the Greek name – which went into Latin – for Indian. The dye was originally exported from India. Madder was also known, although the Minoans also knew of the cochineal beetle for scarlet.

But the dye for which they are known is Tyrian purple, a deep color extracted from tens of thousands of murex snail shells. The dye was so expensive that it became known as Royal purple.

The one color they did not have was green unless they overdyed blue and yellow. A green dye was discovered in the 1800’s, but since it was made with copper arsenide, it was incredibly toxic.

Makeup, Hairstyles and Clothing for Minoan Women

Posted on by

What do we know about the cosmetics used by the women in Ancient Crete and the clothing they wore? Because we have no written records, archaeologists (and writers like me) are forced to rely on interpretations of murals, statuary and other art work.

Cosmetics were commonly used in the Ancient World: Egypt, the Middle Ages, and Asia. In Egypt and Mesopotamia, they were used by both men and women and all classes. Kohl was the most commonly used cosmetic. Kohl was made from galena, a dark gray ore and crushed charcoal, mixed with gum or water to make a paste. Cosmetics were so important cosmetic palettes were found buried in gold with the deceased’s grave goods.

Kohl was used for lining the eyes, like modern eyeliner. It offered health benefits in the form of protection from disease, bugs and sun rays. Red ochre clay was ground up and mixed with water to create a paste to paint on the lips and cheeks.

The murals also show the hairstyle fashionable at that time. Locks of hair were brought over the front of the shoulders. Most of the hair was drawn back from the forehead and decorated with pearls, gold beads or gems. Both sexes wore their hair in this manner.

Note in the graphic above the white ribbon at the back of the women’s necks. This was a sacral knot worn by the priestesses.

Finally, the murals and statuary depict a certain style of dress. All the women wear long skirts, usually ruffled or arranged in tiers, with a short short-sleeved jacket. Opinions vary about what women wore under the jacket. Were they nude or did they wear a blouse? It is difficult to tell from the artifacts available to us.

Below, a statue of a goddess or priestess holding snakes.


Minoan statue

Notice the elaborate belt around her wasp waist. Apparently, tiny waists were also the fashion and tight belts were worn to accentuate it. These wasp waists and tight belts were worn by men as well as by women.

This is the setting I use for In The Shadow of the Bull, a mystery set in Bronze Age Crete. Martis’s preference for more comfortable clothing, and only a loincloth when she is bull leaping, is frequently mentioned. As she grows up, she too adopts the tiered skirt with its tight belt and the short-sleeved jacket.

Why is Martis so young?

Posted on by

One of the questions I’ve been asked consistently is why Martis is so young. Martis is a fifteen year old-aspiring bull leaper, When her sister dies at the altar on her wedding day, and Martis is told by her sister’s spirit that she was murdered, Martis takes on the responsibility of investigating.

Isn’t a fifteen year old too young? We would certainly think so. But the average lifespan then, and through most of human history, was only about forty.

This is a somewhat misleading statistic since the average lifespan was brought down by maternal death during childbirth. Illness and accidents, and of course war injuries, account for significant mortality. Still, a few of the bodies disinterred from graves, even from this time, indicate some people survived to their sixties or even their seventies. But that was not common.

All of life’s milestones were earlier. Women married in their teens and were grandmothers in their thirties. Many of the seasoned warriors described in the Iliad were barely in their twenties.

The other factor is that any bull leaper would have to be young: fast, agile and strong. Even now, with all the benefits modern health has to offer, sports figures in their forties are a rarity. I make a point of emphasizing that most of the bull leapers age out of the sport by their late teens. At fifteen, Martis is already facing the end of her career as a bull-dancer.

Santorini andAkrotiri

Posted on by

The volcano underneath Santorini is not extinct. It has continued to erupt and spew lava.

The small volcanic island off Santorini’s coast is made up of the cooled lava coming from beneath the ocean.

We hiked up to the top of this island, and it was really hot too. Since it is being added to, this little piece continues to grow.

When the volcano exploded in approximately 1450 B.C.E., it spread ash as Far East as Turkey. Archaeologists discovered a city on Santorini that had been buried in ash. Akrotiri is currently being excavated. Unlike Pompeii where entombed bodies have been discovered, no bodies have been found. So far, anyway. It is thought that they had enough warning to escape.

Labyrinths, part 2

Posted on by

Is there a kernel of truth to the legend of the Minotaur? We already know there are many theories regarding the location of a labyrinth as described in the Greek myth. One theory mentioned previously is the complicated floor plan of the Knossos palace complex. Many of the Achaeans, the early mainland Greeks, would have come from halls with much fewer rooms so it is possible they saw the complicated and many roomed palace and were overwhelmed.

. A fragment of a floor with a labyrinth has been found during the excavation at Knossos. Was it decoration? Or something more? No one knows.

Or perhaps the maze as described in the myth hasn’t been found. Pieces of tablets from Knossos, talk about a place with a labyrinth. So far, no one knows where that might be. Or even if it was a different location.

What about the minotaur, a bull-headed man? Considering the number of ancient cultures who used masks to represent animals and/or Gods, it doesn’t take much imagination to guess a man wearing a mask played the part of the Minotaur in religious rites. Bulls were very important; sacred in fact in this Bronze Age culture.

Finally, we come to the core of the Theseus and Minotaur myth. The tribute of young men and women were chased through the labyrinth and consumed. The Minoans have the reputation for being a peaceful society. It is probably true that, because they were an island with an excellent Navy, they were well defended from outside invaders. But certain finds have suggested this society was not as peaceful as it appears to us now. Bones of children mixed in with the bones of bovines and sheep, and bearing the same cut marks, suggest they were eaten as the animals were. Were these ancient Cretans cannibals? Was eating human flesh part of their religious rites?

Another finding suggests human sacrifice. Three bodies, crushed by falling debris during an earthquake, seem to indicate the sacrifice of a young man by a priest. Many cultures sacrificed to appease the Gods. However, if they were sacrificing this young man to prevent an earthquake, they left it to late.

Labyrinths

Posted on by

The word labyrinth is from Bronze Age Crete. Labrys refers to the double-headed axe used in religious rituals. It definitely was not a tool. Labyrinth did not refer to a maze. (Perhaps to a place of labors?)

The labyrinth in Knossos was made famous in the Theseus and Minotaur myth. To recap, Athens was required to send fourteen kids (seven girls and seven boys) to Crete to be consumed by the bull-headed monster the Minotaur. The monster is confined to a maze underneath the city so that neither he, nor the tributes, can escape. Theseus, the son of the Athens’ King, is included in one of the tributes. Ariadne, King Minos’ daughter, falls in love with Theseus and gives him a ball of string and a sword. Theseus successfully kills the Minotaur and uses the string to find his, and the other captives, out of the maze.

Was there a maze under Knossos? It is true that Crete is a nation of mountains and caves. Perhaps there was, exactly as the myth describes, and through the years the earthquakes and of course the volcanic explosion of Thera on Santorini has erased it.

Another theory posits that the interlocking rooms of the palace in Knossos, which comprised workshops, storage rooms, meeting rooms as well as apartments, was the original labyrinth.

Current excavations, however, have turned up a floor mosaic of a maze, as well as a fragment of pottery decorated with a maze. So, mazes were important to this society.

This is not unlikely, Mazes have been found in other long ago societies. A maze carved into rock has been found near Tintagel, Cornwall and spirals carved into rock at Newgrange. One author makes the claim that Glastonbury Tor is a maze.

Why Mazes? Were they a metaphor for birth and renewal? A quest to reach the center as a symbol of finding enlightenment? Or did the mazes in Ancient Crete have some religious purpose we don’t yet know?

On thing we can be sure of: a Minotaur did not sit at the center to eat the tributes for Athens.

Status of women in Bronze Age Crete

Posted on by

One of the topics that came up regularly in my research concerned the status of women. Was this a matriarchal society that worshipped a Goddess? Did the women enjoy high status?

Here is what we know. The murals and the seals portray many women and on the seals the female figure is several times larger than the male figure.

As one might expect, scholars differed on the question. Some of the early archaeologists assert that women could not have had such high status because, well, they were women. How then to explain the prevalence of women in the murals? How to explain the large female figure in the seals?

One explanation is that this culture worshipped a Goddess, along with other Gods such as Poseidon and Dionysus. But the worship of a feminine Goddess did not translate into high status for women in general.

The discussion continues today with the disagreement over the gender of the bull leapers. A famous mosaic depicts both white and red figures jumping over the bull. Some scholars posit that the white figures were female, following the Egyptian fashion of painting male and female figures different colors. This theory is supported by the Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur in which seven girls and seven boys are sent to Knossos from Athens as tribute.

In my opinion, and based on the evidence offered by the mosaics, the seals and the myth ( the mainland Greeks tried to portray the Minoans in as negative light as possible), I believe women enjoyed a high status in this culture. Goddess worship is almost universally accepted.

Right or wrong, that is how I envision this culture in my mystery, In the Shadow of the Bull.

Ancient Crete and the Minotaur

Posted on by

While researching Bronze Age Crete and Greece for my mystery series: First book – In the Shadow of the Bull – I spent a lot of time reading the Greek myths.

Most of us have at least a passing knowledge of the Greek myths. These are from the Classical period, a millennia at least from the heyday of Bonze Age Crete. That does not mean, however, that Crete was not hugely influential in these myths.

Take the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur, for example. Here’s the backstory. The Greeks revered Zeus. Poseidon wanted to be honored too so he sent a white bull to Minos, the King of Crete. Minos’s wife Parsiphae fell in love with the bull. She tasked Daedalus (yes, the inventor with the wax wings whose son was Icarus) to build a special wooden box in the shape of a cow. Once inside the box, she had intercourse with the bull. Nine months later she bore a half-man, half-bull. The Minotaur.

The myth reeks of patriarchy and a desire to, in modern parlance, throw shade on Cretan beliefs.

First, in Crete Zeus was not the primary God. He was an upstart, more akin to a harvest God, who died and was reborn.

We also don’t know if Crete had a King. Certainly it was a goddess centered, matrilineal culture. Many archeologists have assumed Crete had kings, but for decades these archeologists were men. Men, moreover, who lived with a strongly patriarchal structure. It is possible the Priestess’s consort acted as a wanax, or governor. Kingships came with the Mycenaeans, i.e. the mainland Greeks who finally occupied Crete.

Several ancient cultures revered the bull or, in Indo-Europe (the steppes) the horse. One of the rites was mock intercourse with this symbol of fertility by the Queen/Priestess. This act was supposed to guarantee good crops, lots of livestock and of course healthy children for the coming year.

But what about the Minotaur?

Well, many many ancient and not so ancient cultures employ masks in religious rites. Animals are a frequently the subject.  Is it so far a stretch to believe that the Minotaur is a masked man involved in a religious rite? I theorize that a rite performed in ancient Crete involved intercourse between the High Priestess’s consort who wore a bull mask.

Besides painting Theseus as a hero (which I dispute but more about that later), this myth spins Crete as decadent and deserving of conquest. By the Myceneans, naturally.