Sacred Gate found at Minoan palace of Archanes

The excavation of the Minoan palace of Archanes in Crete has unearthed a sacred gate, the first example of its kind ever discovered in a Minoan palace. It is located south the main entrance to the palace and contains four altars and two arms of a stone platform with a pyramidal base on one arm and the partially-preserved base on the western arm.

The revelation of the building system of a Holy Gate at the entrance of the palace with the altars and the arms of the stone structure, which framed a platform and two more altars – the large oblong and the stepped altar – which had been revealed in earlier excavation periods was the most interesting. […]

Also of interest is a stone base, uncovered under the massive stones to the south of the entrance with the four altars. The plinth had fallen from an upper floor together with remains of burnt wood and four distinctive bronze objects/hooks, a finding leading to the hypothesis that they were links to a wooden plinth resting on it. This is an element that shows that the upper floor of a room to the east of the courtyard had a sacred character.

The remains of the Minoan palace were first discovered in the upper village of modern-day Archanes in 1964. The great royal palace of Knossos of labyrinth and minotaur fame, the largest of all Minoan palaces, is just five miles north of Archanes. The Archanes palace was built around 1900 B.C., likely as a dependant satellite of Knossos, its purpose to oversee the fertile arable and administer the major religious sanctuaries in the town. The excavations since its discovery have uncovered the remains of a three-storey building with a main entrance, a theater and sanctuaries. Hundreds of objects, many of them religious (altars, ritual vessels, figurines) have been found there, underscoring the palace’s religious significance.

The embankment of massive fallen stone blocks with evidence of a fire that destroyed part of the palace dates to the Mycenaean period (ca. 1750 – 1050 B.C.). The Mycenaeans from the Greek mainland took over the older Minoan civilization on Crete around 1450 B.C. They repaired and reused Minoan monumental architecture, including its palaces. The artifacts from this occupation layer were few and fragmentary, attesting to how destructive this event was.

* This article was originally published here