Minoan art and archaeology

Although the Minoan site of Koumasa in southern Crete has played a prominent role in research for over a century, its topographical and regional significance has been less extensively studied. The analysis of the topography in and around Koumasa provides both a foundation for future contextual studies and a holistic, diachronic perspective on the networks in the Central Messara and the Asterousia region, at whose transition Koumasa is situated. The innovative application of GIS methods, combined with field surveys, yields new insights both into methodology and the significance of Koumasa during the Minoan period and its subsequent gradual decline.

This article presents a stratigraphical and typological study, contextualizing the deposits within Crete and beyond. Reframing previous opinions on hoarding at Knossos, these analyses provide three new insights: first, they identify unintentional and intentional depositions of bronze objects; second, they emphasize that the intentional depositions (hoards) include the same vessel types seen in LM II-IIIA funerary depositions in Crete and the mainland; third, they suggest that these hoards are not Neopalatial, but rather Final Palatial.

Fresco painting is one of the oldest and perhaps most enduring
forms of mural art, alongside mosaic art. This technique, however,
is now rarely practiced successfully on a large scale in contemporary
times. This review aims to present both historical and, more impor-
tantly, technical aspects of fresco painting that have been largely
forgotten due to various reasons. The study aspires to contribute,
as much as possible, to its academic revival, practical application,
and the clarification of ambiguous bibliographic references.
Fresco painting involves the application of pigments onto fresh
lime plaster on walls and ceilings. If the artist fails to complete
the painting before the plaster dries and sets, the work loses the
durability and technical advantages of true fresco and is reduced
to dry painting (a secco), which has significantly lower longevity.
In fresco painting, pigments are mixed with lime water or slaked
lime. The pigment mixture (i.e., pigments combined with lime
water) is applied directly onto the fresh plaster. To extend the
plaster's moist state and enhance its receptiveness to pigments, a
small proportion of organic materials must be introduced into the
lime-pigment mixture and/or the plaster. Additionally, the skillful
use of tools such as the trowel plays a pivotal role. The durability
and consistent luminosity of fresco works are primarily attributed
to the fact that the deposited pigments become integrated into
the "molecular" structure of the wall, rendering them relatively
inseparable from the substrate.
This article presents insights into fresco painting drawn from the
literature while also briefly highlighting the contribution of our
Fresco Team in providing and validating the included data.

The working hypothesis from which I started is the search for similarity of the graphemes represented in the Phaistos disc with graphemes of contemporary languages in the same geographical area. In particular, I turned my attention to the search for similarities between the graphic symbols of the Phaistos disc and those of the Egyptian hieroglyphic. This is because, imagining the Phaistos disc as a Cretan artefact, I wanted to assess whether the oldest language of the Aegean air, precisely the language of the ancient Egyptians, with whom the Minoan Cretans had a very close bond of commercial and cultural collaboration, could have influenced the language of the Phaistos disc. Below I report my deductions. Disc symbols from Phaistos

A neglected aspect of 'miniaturization' is the development of the so-called 'pictographic' or 'iconographic' writing systems. 'Picture-writing' is the term used to describe the beginnings of various scripts, whereby the initial inspiration for the visual rendering of the signs is suggested to have been an array of tangible objects, or parts thereof. This article investigates the 'miniaturization' of objects to script signs and the cognitive processes at play during most of the second millennium BCE in the Aegean. The Cretan Hieroglyphic, Linear A and Linear B had a standard and constantly renewed relation with this virtual 'borrowing' of object forms for the needs of the scripts themselves and the administrative systems that commanded them. This process ran parallel to other 'miniaturization' favourites of the same period, namely the 'miniaturization' of clay pots, animals and humans as well as representations of human activities. The eventual relations between these different 'miniaturizations' are also examined.

Unfortunately, I've been too busy to individually work on each draft alone, but I felt having this
compilation of recent work on LA online in a place easily seen was needed. Each might be updated or
fit together later. Some ideas have been updated in one, not the other.

Linear Algebra over Linear A? The signs used for numbers in Linear A, an ancient writing system from Greece, are known because they are mostly simple dots & lines. Fractions are partly known, transliterated as A, B, C, etc., not fully known, but A is likely larger than B, B than C, etc. Some are certainly 1/2, 1/3, so a statistical approach was taken here: The mathematical values of fraction signs in the Linear A script: A computational, statistical and typological approach https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440320301357

DedicationWhen asked to write in honor of Donald Preziosi, I began rereading much of his scholarship. I started with Rethinking Art History: Meditations on a Coy Science,2 and it brought me back to the moment I purchased this book at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City as I prepared to attend graduate school at UCLA, where I would study Aegean art history under Donald. I also remember the fear that came upon me when I realized that, though I found the book interesting and very impressive, there was much that I did not understand. Having completed my undergraduate degree in art history, I had never thought about the history of the discipline, the influences of its origins, or the complexity of its practice. I had come to think of art history as a fairly tidy, albeit fascinating, story of the world told through art. I would offer that this was probably not atypical of the average undergraduate in art history in the early 1990s. That fear increased as I began Donald's Art His...

Rjabchikov, Sergei V., 2025. Several Minoan Inscriptions from Knossos, Crete. In: I.I. Ivanovskaya and L.A. Kuzmina (eds.) Fundamental'naya i prikladnaya nauka: Aktual'nye voprosy. Sbornik statey Mezhdunarodnoy nauchno-prakticheskoy konferentsii, sostoyavsheysya 22 sentyabrya 2025 g. v g. Petrozavodske. Petrozavodsk: International Center for Scientific Partnership "New Science", pp. 38-42.

Abstract: In this work Sergei V. Rjabchikov has studied several Minoan records from Knossos, Crete. They were directly related to the economy of the ancient civilisation. The social structure of this country was considered partly. The author used the methods of structural and contrastive linguistics.

Key words: Minoan, Linear A, Linear B, Crete, history, economy, religion, mythology, linguistics.

Аннотация: В настоящей работе автор исследовал несколько минойских надписей из Кносса на Крите. Они имели прямое отношение к экономике этой древней цивилизации. Социальная структура этой страны была частично рассмотрена. Автор применил методы структурной и контрастивной лингвистики.

Ключевые слова: минойский, линейное письмо А, линейное письмо Б, Крит, история, экономика, религия, мифология, лингвистика.

In this newly published paper, we decode a Mesopotamian-style seal as a recursive time device — not a decorative artifact, but a cosmological machine. At its center is a symbolic “dead Earth,” flung upward into the sky to seize a hook, tethering itself to a celestial axis. Below, a curved boat—formed from the sovereign’s own body—carries the burden of time across the solstice waters, while a leaping fish arcs over, marking the return of the stars. Through the LaPointe Tiered Resonance Method (LTRM™), each figure becomes a phase of transformation: kneeling king, serpent-holder, star-juggler, and reborn sovereign. The seal encodes not just myth, but structure: a time-anchored ritual of memory, collapse, and renewal. This paper proposes that ancient seals were not mere symbols but recursive cosmograms — Rube Goldberg machines of initiation, governance, and astronomical timing. If the Earth once reached for the sky, it did so with intent, balance, and a hook.

The Knossos bull-leaping fresco has long been treated as spectacle, explained away as ritual sport or palace ceremony. This study reveals it instead as a covenant star chart, a Bronze Age operating system of time written in pigment and plaster. What appears at first to be acrobatics becomes, under resonance vision, a precise astronomical instrument: the bull’s flank carries the Pleiades, its ghost-tail traces Draco and the pole star Thuban, its collapsing body encodes the winter half of the year. The leaper’s outstretched arms mirror Gemini rising as Taurus falls at the spring equinox, marking the hinge of renewal when winter ends and spring begins. Feet rupture solstice and balance equinox; sacks, crowns, and spirals serve as glyphs of covenantal law. Archaeology confirms erasures in the upper registers where constellations were scraped away, while comparative evidence from Mesopotamian seals, the Nebra Sky Disc, and Indus glyphs places the fresco within a global grammar of sacrifice, sovereignty, and seasonal timing. At its heart, the fresco embodies a physical principle we call Symbolic Physics: collapse is conserved, renewal requires sacrifice, and sovereignty is legitimate only when aligned with the heavens. To see the bull rightly is to recover what was veiled: a calendar, a covenant, and a proof that art, myth, and science were never separate in the ancient world.

The aim of this paper is to rethink the Minoan peak sanctuaries of East Crete from a walking perspective. Walking will be used as a mean of understanding and embodying the landscape of East Cretan peak sanctuaries, as the only way that someone could reach to a peak sanctuary was (and is) on foot. This relationship can be traced both on Minoan iconography, and on a group of findings from the peak sanctuaries of East Crete, the clay models of human lower limbs.*

Tara’s historical associations with the high kings of Ireland give it a unique role in Irish culture. This paper sets out to contextualise that role cross-culturally by drawing comparisons within a broader phenomenology of high-place shrines, particularly those that have royal associations. Presented here, therefore, are two casestudies: one archaeological (the mountain shrines of Bronze Age Crete, the Minoan peak sanctuaries) and one literary-historical (the bamoth high places of biblical Israel). The Minoan archaeological comparison obviously has no direct connection with Ireland, but it may illuminate some of the processes in the evolution and organisation of royal hill-shrines. The biblical casestudy may have other resonances, however, given that Irish medieval chroniclers made conscious efforts to create a biblical genealogy for the high kings who claimed Tara, and played upon its symbolism.

Rjabchikov, Sergei V., 2025. The Ritual Cup for the Minoan Mystery from Knossos, Crete. In: I.I. Ivanovskaya and L.A. Kuzmina (eds.) Nauka i obrazovanie segodnya. Sbornik statey III Mezhdunarodnoy nauchno-prakticheskoy konferentsii, sostoyavsheysya 15 sentyabrya 2025 g. v g. Petrozavodske. Petrozavodsk: International Center for Scientific Partnership “New Science”, pp. 113-118.

Abstract: In this work Sergei V. Rjabchikov has studied the Minoan record of Linear A on a ritual cup from the Knossian Palace, Knossos, Crete. This inscription tells of the sacred Bull (the Greek monster Minotaur) which was sacrificed. The queen (priestess; the Greek goddess Ariadne) performed certain cultic acts during this time. The author used the methods of structural and contrastive linguistics.

Key words: Minoan, Linear A, Linear B, Crete, history, religion, mythology, linguistics.

Аннотация: В данной работе автор исследовал минойскую надпись, выполненную линейным письмом А, на ритуальной чаше из Кносского Дворца, Кносс, Крит. Этот текст рассказывает о священном Быке (древнегреческом чудовище Минотавре), который был принесен в жертву. Царица (жрица; древнегреческая богиня Ариадна) совершала в это время определенные культовые действия. Автор применил методы структурной и контрастивной лингвистики.

Ключевые слова: минойский, линейное письмо А, линейное письмо Б, Крит, история, религия, мифология, лингвистика.

available in EN/DE/EL

Abstract (EN)
This preprint presents a fully intelligible Linear A inscription on the golden hairpin CRZf1 (GORILA IV, pl. 146). The reading conveys, in sense: “By me this engagement gift has been made for my girl.” We discuss the verbal stem WA ‘make, fashion’, the possessive -MI ‘my’, and the demonstrative I-JA adnominal to QA-KI-SE-NU-TI ‘engagement gift’. Typologically, the language shows clear Indo-European structure. We provisionally classify it as early Indo-European, possibly a late PIE dialect, and interpret the salient Balto-Slavic parallels as shared archaisms rather than close subgrouping. Linear A thus belongs among the earliest written Indo-European languages. A precise genealogical assignment is deferred to the author’s forthcoming main publication.
Abstract (DE)
Die goldene Haarnadel CRZf1 trägt eine kurze, vollständig verständliche Inschrift in Linear A. Sprachtypologisch weist das Kretische klare indoeuropäische Strukturen auf. Vorläufig ordnen wir es als frühes Indoeuropäisch ein – möglicherweise als späten Dialekt des Proto-Indoeuropäischen (PIE). Die weitreichenden Übereinstimmungen mit baltoslawischen Archaismen verstehen wir nicht als unmittelbare genealogische Nähe, sondern als Ausdruck eines archaischen Kontinuums; insbesondere Inselsprachen können extrem konservative Stadien sehr lange bewahren. Die Linear-A-Inschriften zählen damit zu den frühesten schriftlich überlieferten indoeuropäischen Sprachen. Eine präzise genealogische Einordnung bleibt der Hauptpublikation vorbehalten.

Περίληψη (EL)
Η χρυσή περόνη μαλλιών CRZf1 φέρει μία σύντομη, πλήρως κατανοητή επιγραφή στη Γραμμική Α. Τυπολογικά, τα Κρητικά παρουσιάζουν σαφή ινδοευρωπαϊκή δομή. Προσωρινά την κατατάσσουμε ως πρώιμη ινδοευρωπαϊκή — ενδεχομένως ως όψιμη διάλεκτο της Πρωτοϊνδοευρωπαϊκής (PIE). Τις εκτεταμένες αντιστοιχίες με βαλτοσλαβικά αρχαϊκά χαρακτηριστικά δεν τις ερμηνεύουμε ως άμεση γενεαλογική εγγύτητα, αλλά ως έκφραση ενός αρχαϊκού συνεχούς· ιδίως οι νησιωτικές γλώσσες μπορούν να διατηρούν εξαιρετικά συντηρητικά στάδια για πολύ μεγάλο διάστημα. Οι επιγραφές της Γραμμικής Α ανήκουν έτσι στις αρχαιότερες σωζόμενες γραπτές μαρτυρίες ινδοευρωπαϊκών γλωσσών. Μια ακριβέστερη γενεαλογική κατάταξη παραπέμπεται στην κύρια δημοσίευση.

Based on our current awareness, there are three distinct primary sources of alkali flux in the ancient Egyptian faience making: natron, soda rich plant ash and the so-called 'mixed alkali fluxes'. Whereas the nature and origin of the first two types are identified to some extent, there are more questions regarding mixed alkali fluxes. In an attempt to provide further clarification on the latter source, a series of replication experiments on the production of Egyptian faience by the cementation glazing method were conducted using cattle dung ash as the source of alkali flux. After firing at 980 °C, the appearance of the faience objects, the microstructure and the chemical composition of selected samples obtained using scanning electron microscopy/energy-dispersive spectroscopy (SEM-EDS) were investigated. The discussion has primarily focused on cattle dung ash as the most, or one of the most, available sources of ash in ancient societies and its possible use as a source of alkali flux in the production of Egyptian faience, at least by the cementation glazing method.

In cementation glazing, for various reasons, there are significant differences between the composition of the glass phases present in the faience microstructure and the glazing powder composition. Furthermore, in this glazing method, the glazing powder should perform more functions, which are: producing a shiny and smooth glaze coating, producing a firm capsule surrounding objects entirely (to prevent adhesion between sintered glazing mixture and the melting glaze coating), and, finally, producing a porous and friable sintered glazing mixture for safe and easy removal of buried objects. It is obvious that these functions also have significant effects on the glazing powder composition and constitution. Therefore, analytical data on faience glass phases are very unlikely to reflect the strict composition and constitution of the original glazing powder properly. Accordingly, the composition and constitution of cementation glazing powder have remained obscure for a long time. These data are particularly crucial factors for cementation replication experiments and, consequently, for our awareness of the ancient faience production. In this paper, a series of cementation replication experiments have been conducted in an attempt to provide further clarification of these issues. In addition, as a comparative indicator for alkali and copper vaporisation, a small piece of rock quartz was placed separately above the glazing powder. After firing, the appearance of the faience objects and quartz pieces and the microstructures and chemical compositions of a select group of samples, obtained using Scanning Electron Microscopy e Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (SEM-EDS), were investigated. The discussion has focused mainly on issues such as the raw materials and their contribution in the glazing process, the criteria for determining the faience glazing methods, the necessary quantity of alkalis for a successful cementation glazing, and, particularly, the glazing mechanism.

The aim of this paper is first to present the ceramic data of two contexts (Space 8.8 – MM IIA and Room 4.5 –MM IIB) from the site of Sissi in NE Crete, in terms of fabrics, wares, and shapes with relevant comparanda, and to discuss the nature, content and possible function of both deposits. It also provides some technological and morphological-stylistic criteria on which the chronological attributions are based. Finally, it discusses the links between Sissi and its immediate and more distant regions.

The aim of this paper is to open the discussion on cooking practices under a new
theoretical framework, that of fragmentation, in view of the fragmented nature of evidence
we have in the Aegean contexts. In particular, we aim to discuss the characteristics for the
identifi cation of cooking practices in the archaeological record, with a focus on Minoan contexts,
as well as the reasons for their fragmented state. We would like to question the indicators in
the archaeological record (architectural, spatial and material) leading to the identifi cation of a
‘kitchen’ — if this term can be used in the Minoan contexts — and the role of the cooking
vessels in our understanding of Minoan cooking practices. Furthermore, we will highlight how
the belated interest in the study of culinary practices and the fragmented nature of evidence have
led to fragmentary archaeological records and interpretations. In order to further discuss Minoan
cooking practices, this paper off ers an investigation of both the cooking vessels and the cooking
areas. Case studies of well-preserved archaeological contexts related to cooking are presented,
in particular from the palatial site of Malia, dating to the Middle and Late Bronze Age (1900-
1450 BCE). This presentation of data will allow a reassessment of how cooking practices were
identifi ed through space and objects in Minoan contexts and will eventually refi ne our diachronic
understanding of them.

The Phaistos Disc, discovered in 1908 at the Minoan palace of Phaistos, remains one of the most enigmatic artifacts of the Bronze Age Aegean. While its signs have resisted linguistic decipherment, this project pursued an alternative line of inquiry: that the Disc encodes knowledge not as a script but as a mnemonic cycle of governance responsibilities, integrating agricultural, ritual, protective/defensive, and maritime activities.
The purpose of this supplementary report is to provide the technical basis for that interpretation. Whereas the main article presents the hypothesis in synthetic and comparative terms, this document details the dataset, coding protocol, analytical procedures, results, and limitations. The goal is transparency: any reader should be able to reproduce the steps taken from raw group data to interpretive conclusions.

Our recent research has used historical accounts of piracy to briefly examine pirate leadership, pirate culture and social organization, feasting activities, and studies of pirate geography to propose an interpretive framework for understanding the migration of the Sea Peoples as, inter alia, pirate tribes who plundered some of the great centers of the Mediterranean at the end of the Bronze Age. We suggest that as Mycenaean control over trade routes collapsed with the destruction and/or eventual abandonment of the Mycenaean palaces, Crete became particularly vulnerable to piracy, because of certain geographical and topographical features that characterized its coastlines. Unless defended, rocky coastlines, natural harbors, promontories, and river valleys were susceptible to piratical activity, as we shall discuss. Historical records indicate that piracy resulted in a desolation of coastlines, as coastal settlements and coastal plains might be attacked at night, with villages burnt a...

C'est à Monthey, en Valais, que Denis Woeffrey et Geneviève Bonnard ont construit leur maison-atelier. Le contexte dans lequel ils ont choisi d'implanter leur bâtiment semble à première vue sans qualité. Une zone peu définie comme on en trouve beaucoup en périphérie des villes ou des villages. Un paysage mi-agricole, miindustriel, parsemé de villas, d'entrepôts, de petits immeubles locatifs, … Autant de volumes posés ou déposés au hasard du parcellaire quadrillant le territoire. Chaque volume respectant les distances légales suffisantes pour ne pas déranger celui d'à côté. C'est un lieu que l'on traverse, mais où l'on ne s'arrête pas. En passant par la route reliant Collombey à Monthey ou comme passager d'un train, on peut alors percevoir furtivement ce volume étrange, vert foncé. Je ne crois pas que l'on comprenne d'emblée de quoi il s'agit. Mais si on s'arrête, on s'aperçoit que le volume suit la même logique que les villas alentour, sa forme naît de la surface constructible au milieu d'une parcelle. Le résultat est un parallélépipède rectangle déformé offrant une face parallèle à la route, deux grandes façades latérales et une plus petite à l'arrière. Le bâtiment, bien que fortement unitaire, semble ainsi se déformer pour se mettre en relation avec la rue. Seul un creux dans cette façade forme un espace couvert, une entrée. Devant l'édifice se trouve un parking qui s'installe un peu dans ce creux et prolonge l'univers de la route jusqu'à la porte d'entrée. Le volume reste pourtant abstrait, sculptural. Cette impression se concrétise lorsque l'on observe le traitement précis de son enveloppe. Toutes les faces sont recouvertes de tôles d'aluminium anodisées vert foncé. De grands vitrages prenant toute la hauteur d'un étage se placent dans le même nu que le reste de la façade. La composition entre ces verres et la tôle est telle qu'un rapport d'échelle particulier au volume lui-même est créé. Ceci est d'autant plus fort que les fenêtres ne possèdent pas d'ouvrants. Le volume est clos, sa peau est lisse comme une carapace. Le bâtiment paraît ainsi, tour à tour, suivant la lumière changeante du jour ou celle, électrique, de la nuit, extrêmement introverti ou extrêmement extraverti. Les espaces intérieurs révélés par la lumière sont alors parfois comme projetés à l'extérieur. Pourtant, il y a réunis ici un atelier d'architecture et un appartement. Ces différentes activités nécessitent, bien entendu, des degrés d'intimité différents. Le choix de placer l'atelier au premier étage et le logement au second procède déjà d'une réflexion dans ce sens. Le rez, en relation directe avec la rue et le parking contient quant à lui des archives et des locaux techniques borgnes. Ce sont, encore une fois, les ouvertures qui dans leurs proportions et leur positionnement par rapport aux différents espaces vont déterminer ce que l'on montre et ce que l'on cache. Ce que l'on voit du dehors depuis dedans. Le plan, lui ne varie pas. Il est composé de trois espaces, deux longitudinaux et un parallèle à la rue et se répète sur les trois niveaux. Dans une économie de matériaux, ces trois « alvéoles » sont en béton brut. On retrouve ainsi à l'intérieur la volonté de simplification et d'abstraction de l'extérieur. Mais, sur le gris uniforme, la lumière se reflète, colorée. C'est qu'il y a dans chaque alvéole un espace de service séparé des tables de travail par une paroi de plexiglas brought to you by CORE View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk

This paper presents an archaeological material science study of pottery production and use at the Bronze Age Minoan town of Palaikastro, east Crete, from Middle Minoan IIA to Late Minoan IIIA2, through petrographic analysis of thin sections and wavelength dispersive X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy. The compositions of 288 archaeological samples are compared with geological references collected from the site and its adjacent hinterland. The results of this study indicate that throughout this period the majority of the archaeological pottery assemblage was probably produced using materials from a small number of geological outcrops local to the town; however, the manner in which these resources were utilised changed significantly over time, particularly between the Proto-and Neopalatial periods.

Episode 3 of the podcast series on THE DECIPHERMENT OF MINOAN LINEAR A shows that the inscriptions on Libation Tables found in Minoan Peak Sanctuaries all over Crete are prayers to the Holy Trinity of Tešub (the Hurrian Storm God and Head of the Hurrian Pantheon), his wife Ḫebat and their son Šarru(m)ma.This episode continues the  interpretation of the Linear A Libation formulas as Hurrian prayers.
The inscription TL Za 1 on a marble ladle from Troullos provides evidence that Tešub in his role of Eni Attanni 'God the Father' has the function of 'bringing life', whereas Šarru(m)ma has in the same text the function of 'bringing childbirth'. We know that Tešub was called 'Tešub of life' in cuneiform texts from the Near East and Anatolia. This evidence offers a very significant link between the Minoan society and religion and the Hurrian society and religion in the Near East and Anatolia.

This four-part dissertation considers Minoan frescoes in their own right for a first time, with reference to unpublished paintings and nearly fifty new restorations, with a view to providing a new basis for historical reconstruction drawn from that source. Earliest developments begin with ...

The Acts of the Apostles report an earthquake that hit Philippi (NE Macedonia, Greece), a region of low seismicity, during the imprisonment of Apostles Paul and Silas after the first Christian community was established in European land circa AD 50. This earthquake, famous in the Christian religious tradition, is described as a miracle that led to the liberation of the Apostles. However, the seismological significance of this information is a matter of debate. This article presents new literary, historical, and archaeological evidence that the whole scene of the Philippi earthquake reported in the Acts, known as the scene of prison escape, resembles the prison scene of the ancient Greek tragedy Bacchae by Euripides. Furthermore, the prison in Philippi was described as similar to the prison of St Peter in Rome ("Tullianum"), while a cistern built about 100 years later is indicated by tradition as the prison of St Paul in Philippi. These results, in combination with the textual differences of the surviving Codices of the Acts and their inferred history, imply that the Philippi earthquake reflects a later editorial change in the original manuscript, not unusual for an ancient Codex, and of no seismological significance. This result has important implications for many other earthquakes described as a divine intervention ("providentialism"). The seismological evaluation of such cases requires: (i) the study of earthquake information within their context, and in combination with the available commentaries; (ii) the study of the ancient sources as a function of time; and (iii) the examination of editorial selections to produce a compound text using the various surviving Codes which differ from each other because of scribe errors and addition or removal of small or large parts of texts, and because of poor preservation of ancient manuscripts.

Highlights
• An earthquake at Philippi during the imprisonment of Apostle Paul, important for Christianity, is a matter of debate.
• The whole scene of the earthquake reminiscent of Euripides' tragedy Bacchae and St Paul's imprisonment in Rome.
• Implications for providentialism-type earthquakes derived from ancient Codices, modified during copying by scribes.

This study applies Social Network Analysis (SNA) to Cretan Hieroglyphic seals of the Protopalatial period (c. 1900–1700 BCE) in order to investigate the interplay between their material and textual features as indicators of social identity and administrative roles. By modeling three- and four-sided prisms as proxies for individuals, the analysis reveals patterns of clustering based primarily on the number of sequences, seal material, and inscription readability. The results challenge earlier models of a strictly hierarchical administrative system mirrored by the differences between hard- and soft-stone seals, instead suggesting the coexistence of both vertical and horizontal forms of social differentiation. The study highlights the value of SNA for understanding how the physical and textual properties of undeciphered inscriptions worked together as active communicative strategies within the social landscape of Protopalatial Crete.

The date of the destruction of the palace at Knossos on Crete has been one of the key problems of Aegean prehistory since the palace was excavated at the beginning of the 20th century. The excavator Arthur Evans argued for an LM II date as he presumed that the inscribed tablets found in the palace destruction layers must have been written by the people who had produced the large and richly adorned Palace Style jars which he dated to the LM II period. After his death Evans’ date has been questioned, keenly debated and finally lowered to early LM IIIA:2. Nobody, however, has studied the amount and distribution of the latest pottery of LM IIIB date found in the palace, its connection to the inscribed tablets and its presence in the surrounding houses, town and cemeteries. The LM IIIB pottery in Knossos is here scrutinized through the Day and Note Books of the excavation, the original excavation reports in the Annual of the British School at Athens and the published sherds and complete vases. Finally the close connections between the two largest LM IIIB towns, Knossos and Kydonia—currently the only ones in Crete with Linear B tablets—are highlighted.

This paper explores the metrical relationships between key decorated open tableware shapes at Knossos between LM IB - LM IIIA1, arguing that they reflect a rapidly changing etiquette. Although mainland style vessels, such as the goblet, are present in large numbers, the overall data questions the extent to which there is a direct emulation of "Mycenaean" (or Mainland) dining habits.

In the spring of 1900, British archaeologist Arthur Evans began to excavate the palace of Knossos on Crete, bringing ancient Greek legends to life just as a new century dawned amid far-reaching questions about human history, art, and culture. Knossos and the Prophets of Modernism relates the story of Evans’s excavation and its long-term effects on Western culture. After the World War I left the Enlightenment dream in tatters, the lost paradise that Evans offered in the concrete labyrinth—pacifist and matriarchal, pagan and cosmic—seemed to offer a new way forward for writers, artists, and thinkers such as Sigmund Freud, James Joyce, Giorgio de Chirico, Robert Graves, and Hilda Doolittle. Assembling a brilliant, talented, and eccentric cast at a moment of tremendous intellectual vitality and wrenching change, this book paints an unforgettable portrait of  the birth of modernism in the crucible of war.

This contribution presents an excerpt from an ongoing study of over 1000 LM representational soft stone seals, collectively known as the “Cretan Popular Group”. Despite having been rather neglected in Aegean archaeology, these seals hold insights into social change during the Late Bronze Age. Analysis of their imagery, morphology, and distribution reveals two main production phases in the Neopalatial and Final Palatial Period, with a notable gap suggesting significant societal changes. Their unique Minoan pedigree and ability to evoke a shared past may have contributed to their significance in shaping social and political interactions. The seals, with their representational imagery and connection to the human body, likely served as carriers of social messages, expressing and influencing interpersonal relationships in an increasingly centralized and stratified society. The study challenges previous assumptions that considered the seals simple products of low-ranking social units, proposing instead an affiliation with sub-elite strata of Minoan society.

CHIC #294 (Archaeological Museum of Athens, inv. n. 8915) is the first seal written in Cretan Hieroglyphic script ever published. Since 1870, it was the subject of a long exegetical history but remains an unresolved conundrum among the Minoan inscribed glyptic. First interpreted as tessera gladiatoria datable to III sec. a.C. or later by Albert Dumont, it was regarded as written with ‘fully developed conventionalised picto- graphs’ by Evans and, finally (but wrongly), as the first hymn of the Greek literature ever known, written in a form proto-Greek, by Paul Faure. Some of the most sticking features of this four-sided prism are the frequent repetitions of signs or sign-sequences (notably in CHIC’s faces α and δ), the exceptional length of its faces and some special features in the execution technique of its signs. This paper aims to critically discuss the analyses proposed for this document and to provide a hint of novelty in the inter- pretation of the unique inscription it bears.

Rjabchikov, Sergei V., 2025. The Decipherment of two Records of Linear A on the Ivory Mirror from Knossos, Crete. In: I.I. Ivanovskaya and L.A. Kuzmina (eds.) Tendantsii i problemy razvitiya sovremennoy nauki. Sbornik statey IV Mezhdunarodnoy nauchno-prakticheskoy konferentsii, sostoyavsheysya 18 avgusta 2025 g. v g. Petrozavodske. Petrozavodsk: International Center for Scientific Partnership “New Science”, pp. 100-106.

Abstract: In this work Sergei V. Rjabchikov has studied two inscriptions on an ancient Cretan mirror. It was an important cult object which once belonged to a priestess. She and other young men and young women took part in a colourful mystery in which a sacred Bull appeared in the Knossian Palace as an embodiment of the paramount deity. These records had the meaning of the liturgy: one day certain vessels of wine were brought, figs and other fruits were brought, and the Bull came and was presented with a certain portion of wheat. The author used the methods of structural and contrastive linguistics.

Key words: Linear A, Linear B, Crete, history, religion, mythology, linguistics.

Аннотация: В данной работе автор исследовал две надписи на древнем критском зеркале. Это был важный культовый предмет, который когда-то принадлежал жрице. Она с другими юношами и девушками участвовала в красочной мистерии, в которой в Кносском дворце появлялся священный бык в качестве воплощения верховного бога. Данные надписи имели смысл литургии: однажды были принесены определенные сосуды с вином, принесены фиги и другие фрукты, приходил бык, которому преподносили определенную порцию пшеницы. Автор применил методы структурной и контрастивной лингвистики.

Ключевые слова: линейное письмо А, линейное письмо Б, Крит, история, религия, мифология, лингвистика.

In this book, based on the proceedings of a two-day workshop on experimental archaeology at the Irish Institute of Hellenic Studies at Athens in 2017, scholars, artists and craftspeople explore how people in the past made things, used and discarded them, from prehistory to the Middle Ages. Experimental Archaeology: Making, Understanding, Story-telling is based on the proceedings of a two-day workshop on experimental archaeology at the Irish Institute of Hellenic Studies at Athens in 2017, in collaboration with UCD Centre for Experimental Archaeology and Material Culture. Scholars, artists and craftspeople explore how people in the past made things, used and discarded them, from prehistory to the Middle Ages. The papers include discussions of the experimental archaeological reconstruction and likely past experience of medieval houses, and also about how people cast medieval bronze brooches, or sharpened Bronze Age swords, made gold ornaments, or produced fresco wall paintings using their knowledge, skills and practices. The production of ceramics is explored through a description of the links between Neolithic pottery and textiles, through the building and testing of a Bronze Age Cretan pottery kiln, and through the replication and experience of Minoan figurines. The papers in this volume show that experimental archaeology can be about making, understanding, and storytelling about the past, in the present.

Various types of birds are engraved on Negev Desert rock art in the form of flying birds, tri-finger symbols, water birds, or anthropomorphic figures with wings and beaks (see Fig. 1). Such a symbol in rock art implies a being of a godly character. Birds' symbolic significance across cultures relates to both life and death. In many cultures, bird symbols appear in afterlife scenes attached to a variety of mental tricks to soften death's impending finality by associating it with renewal, transformation, and rebirth. The bird is the most fitting transcendence symbol awarded to them by their unique ability to travel freely between all worlds including the underworld, earth, and heaven. This applies even more to water birds dwelling in water or alternately in the underworld. They can traverse through the three realms and therefore play a very important role in afterlife-related myths since they are capable of flying high and therefore can complete the soul journey to the afterworld.

The double-headed axe, or labrys, stands from the dawn of time as an emblem of extraordinary power and sanctity, weaving in its harmonious form the dualism of the cosmos and the primordial energy of the feminine. Far from being merely a weapon or practical tool, it carries meanings that span across cultures, testifying to the pivotal role of women in ancient civilizations and spiritual practices.

"Myth, Ritual, Symbolism and the Solar Goddess in Thera". This paper was published in 2016. Because of copyright agreements, it could not be uploaded to Academia before now. At this point, I would like to make some small additions in this appendix.

The paper argues for the unity of the various forms of the Goddess appear on the wall paintings of Xeste 3, Thera. It is concluded that she is a solar goddess who generates life in animals and plants. The author is indebted to A. Vlachopoulos and I. Papageorgiou for pictures and discussions.