Gold fish bead, Minoan, 1600-1400 BC
from The Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Crete
Gold signet ring inscribed with Linear A writing, Minoan, 1700-1600 BC
from The Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Crete
I'm going to start making individual posts about what's being posted to the AITNISTS Patreon now, okay? I worry that they're kind of getting lost in the weekly round-ups and I put far too much effort into them for that. lmao
So today I posted a historical blog about Minoan seals and how they enter into Asterion's story.
They're very beautiful and one of the most common forms of Minoan art we've found, so I definitely wanted to incorporate them into this book!
Photo. Ilias Iliadis, From the Land of the Labyrinth: Minoan Crete, 3000-1100 BC
So my wife and I had our honeymoon on Crete recently and in the museum of Heraklion we saw her:
So basically the Minoan civilization was one of the first civilisations in Europe and we know very little about them and what we know of them comes largely from the fact they were really talented artists, to the point where they have been hired by the Egyptian Pharos. They had a lot of cults on the Greek island Crete and built big labyrinth like "Palaces" there, which we by now know, probably weren't palaces at all. Most often they are assumed to have been temples, but it is subject of ongoing debate. Unrelated to the snake goddess (probably?) they found a cave on Crete filled with double edged axe heads of varying sizes, probably for religious reasons(?) because some of these sizes don't make sense as weapons or tools.
Why did Greek mythology tumblr not tell me about this?
Anyway I bought myself a tiny figure and a T-Shirt (picture below) of the snake goddess and am planning to become a collector of her merchandise now.
Anyway, I have been reading up on the Minoan culture on wiki and I advise other history or mythology nerds to do the same.
my minoan character, Malia, wearing the famous bee pendant (wiki: Malia pendant) \( ´ ꒳ ` )/ ♡
More of my minoan art: click.
Gold mounted lapis lazuli seal, Minoan, 1500-1450 BC
from The Heraklion Archaeological Museum
Gold bull's head beads, Minoan, 1375-1350 BC
from The Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Crete
Unknown, Figures, Crete: First Palace Period The Classical World, Pre-Hellenic Era, Crete, First Palace Period, Middle Minoan Ib, II Man and woman votaries; man wearing cod-piece cloth and belt drawn tight to accentuate the slim waist, triangular dagger hanging from belt; hands raised before chest, elbows out; woman wearing bell-shaped skirt, high elevated collar, large developed "breton" on head. Pendelbury describes such figures as follows: The flesh of the women is painted dull white and that of the men red or dark brown after the Egyptian convention. It is possible that the thick padded cod-piece was necessary as a kind of primitive truss, for violent effort with an artificially constricted waist is very productive of rupture. He speaks of the fact that in Eastern Crete the use of the early triangular shape ought to have died out by the time of these figurines and fails to consider the possibility that this may be an illustration of the persistence of older forms in ritual use long after they have been abandoned for more evolved forms in daily use.
Carnelian stamp seal featuring a kitty, Minoan, 1900-1600 BC
from The Metropolitan Museum of Art
i often think about bringing the minoan fresco women back to life through drawing
For your perusal and enjoyment; Minoan sealstones from Knossos, seeming to show an Artemis or an Atalanta sort of figure.
Or, well, some completely different lady archer with nice cans motif we don't understand because we can't read Linear A.
This is from an early 1900s copy of Arthur Evans' books on his excavations at Knossos. He's a sucker for incredibly obvious fakes like the Boston snake goddess, and really reaches to see scenes from later Greek myth in seal-stones- but he shows a lot of material that seems to have fallen out of circulation in later books that just seem to summarise each other.
I had the immense privilege of going to Greece earlier this summer. I took 400 pictures of ancient pottery and came home inspired to put octopodes on everything.
1. My octopodes on some tiny vases and a cup
2. My reference photo of a Mycenean amphora with an octopus in the Minoan Marine Style, 1500s BCE. (National Arcaelogical Museum, Athens)
3. My bird jug with printed reference photo
4. Bird-shaped vessel from Crete, 2700 - 1900 BCE (Heraklion Archaelogical Museum, Heraklion)
Carnelian bead necklace, Minoan, 1400-1300 BC
from The Ashmolean Museum
4: Rhea, Demeter, and Kore
Drawn after the ivory triad from Mycenae, fourteenth or thirteenth century BCE. It has been interpreted as two goddesses and a divine child. I have a version of this in my comic Destroyer of Light as well.
