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Abstract
The ancient complex of Knossos, Crete, has a built history spanning nine millennia. The most recent manifestation includes highly contested, twentieth-century reconstruction works. Knossos occupies an important place in the ancient history and architecture of the Mediterranean. Despite this, Knossos, nor any ancient Minoan site, is not inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List (WHL). While demonstrating the “Outstanding Universal Value” of Knossos, this paper proposes that a new submission to inscribe the “Minoan Palatial Centres” on UNESCO’s WHL would be strengthened by outlining Sir Arthur Evans’ reconstruction work and architectural speculation c.1900–1935. This paper will explore why Evans may have connected mythology and monarchy to Knossos, and why the connection is still being used to enhance the heritage value of the sites today. The proposal for the “Minoan Palatial Centres” to be included on the WHL need not rely on Evans’ theories and reconstructions (many which have since been disproven), but nor should they be hidden. The inconvenient history of the “Evansian Period” of Knossos and the Minoans is an indelible element of Knossos’ historical narrative and could ameliorate this proposal to inscribe sites of great importance to the ancient built environment.
Notes
1. Alexandra Karetsou, “Knossos after Evans: Past Interventions, Present State and Future Solutions,” British School of Athens, Vol. 12, Knossos: Palace, City, State (2004): 547.
2. John C. McEnroe, Architecture of Minoan Crete: Constructing Identity in the Aegean Bronze Age (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010), 9.
3. Joan Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” Archaeology 3, no. 3 (September 1950), 136. Evans employed Christian Doll as the architect for his reconstructions.
4. Arthur Evans, “Work of Reconstitution in the Palace of Knossos [Read 9th December 1926],” The Antiquaries Journal 7, no. 3 (July 1927), 258–67.
5. Philip G. Duke, The Tourists Gaze, The Cretans Glance: Archaeology and Tourism on a Greek Island (Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press, 2007), 67–92.
6. UNESCO, World Heritage Convention, “Minoan Palatial Centres (Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, Zakros, Kydonia),” “Tentative Lists,” World Heritage List, http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
7. UNESCO, WHC, 33rd Session of the Committee, “Nominations to the World Heritage List,” http://whc.unesco.org/archive/2009/whc09-33com-8Be.pdf.
8. UNESCO, WHC, 33rd Session of the Committee, “Tentative Lists submitted by States Parties as of 15 April 2009, in conformity with the Operational Guidelines,” http://whc.unesco.org/archive/2009/whc09-33com-inf8B1ADDe.pdf.
9. UNESCO, “Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, World Heritage Committee, Thirty-Third Session, Seville, Spain. 22–30 June 2009,” 2. A State Party is any organisation attending to the submission of potential sites to World Heritage List inscription. In the case of the “Minoan Palatial Centres”, the State Party is the Permanent Delegation of Greece to UNESCO.
10. greeka.com: The Greek Island Specialists, “News and Events,” “Knossos rejected by UNESCO,” July 8, 2009, http://www.greeka.com/crete/heraklion/news/news/751.htm.
11. UNESCO, World Heritage Convention, “Minoan Palatial Centres (Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, Zakros, Kydonia),” “Tentative Lists,” World Heritage List, http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
12. Ilsa Schoep, “The State of the Minoan Palaces or the Minoan Palace-State?” in Monuments of Minos: Rethinking the Minoan Palaces, eds. Jan Driessen, Ilsa Schoep and Robert Laffineur, Aegaeum, 23 (2002), 16–17.
13. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
14. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
15. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
16. UNESCO, “Introducing UNESCO,” http://en.unesco.org/about-us/introducing-unesco.
17. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.; see also Duke, The Tourists Gaze, 98; see also “American Expedition to Krete under Professor Halbherr,” The American Journal of Archaeology and the History of the Fine Arts 9, no. 4 (October–December 1894), 538–44; see also D.G. Hogarth, “Excavations at Zakro, Crete,” The Annual of the British School at Athens 7 (1900/1901): 121–49; see also Edward H. Heffner, George A. Barton, A.W. Van Buren, Robert W. Rogers and E.P.B., “Archaeological News,” American Journal of Archaeology 30, no. 1 (January–March 1926), 96–124.
18. The chronology mentioned here is just one of many sets of proposed chronologies that can used for Minoan scholarship.
19. John C. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos and the Reconstruction of Minoan Identity (c.1750–1490 BC),” in Architecture of Minoan Crete (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010), 69.
20. Donald Preziosi, Minoan Architectural Design: Formation and Signification, eds. Thomas A. Sebeok, Roland Posner and Alain Rey, Vol. 63, Approaches to Semiotics (Berlin: Mouton Publishers, 1983), 92.
21. Donald Preziosi and Louise A. Hitchcock, Aegean Art and Architecture, 92–109.
22. Preziosi and Hitchcock, Aegean Art and Architecture, 92–109; see also Louise A. Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis, 74.
23. Preziosi and Hitchcock, Aegean Art and Architecture, 92–109.
24. Preziosi and Hitchcock, Aegean Art and Architecture, 92–109.
25. Preziosi and Hitchcock, Aegean Art and Architecture, 92–109.
26. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73.
27. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73; see also Hitchcock and Koudounaris, “Virtual Discourse,” 44; see also Donald Preziosi, Minoan Architectural Design: Formation and Signification, 93.
28. Louise A. Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis, 30.
29. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73.
30. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73.
31. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73.
32. Karetsou, “Knossos after Evans: Past Interventions, Present State and Solutions,” 547; see also McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 79.
33. Karetsou, “Knossos after Evans: Past Interventions, Present State and Solutions,” 547; see also John Papadopoulos, “Inventing the Minoans: Archaeology, Modernity and the Quest for European Identity,” Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 18, no. 1 (2005), 88.
34. Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis, 31.
35. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 79.
36. Arthur Evans, “Work of Reconstitution in the Palace of Knossos [Read 9th December 1926],” The Antiquaries Journal 7, no. 3 (July 1927), 258–67.
37. UNESCO, WHC, “Minoan Palatial Centres (Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, Zakros, Kydonia),” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
38. UNESCO, WHC, “The Criteria for Selection,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/criteria/.
39. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
40. UNESCO, “The Criteria for Selection,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/criteria/.
41. UNESCO, “The Criteria for Selection,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/criteria/.
42. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres (Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, Zakros, Kydonia),” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
43. Duke, The Tourists Gaze, 67.
44. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
45. Ellen N. Davis, “Art and Politics in the Aegean: The Missing Ruler,” in The Role of the Ruler in the Prehistoric Aegean, ed. Paul Rehak, Aegaeum 11, 11–12.
46. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73; see also Davis, “Art and Politics in the Aegean,” 12–13.
47. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 73; see also Davis, “Art and Politics in the Aegean,” 12–13.
48. Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis, 80–1; see also Davis, “Art and Politics in the Aegean,” 12.
49. Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis, 80.
50. Davis, “Art and Politics in the Aegean,” 12.
51. Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis, 81.
52. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 134.
53. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 134.
54. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 135.
55. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 134–5.
56. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 134–9. It is interesting to note that Schliemann has been branded a “psychopath”, a fraudster and a “naïve romantic” for behaving in very similar ways to that of Evans. Perhaps we have been quicker to denounce Schliemann’s crimes against archaeology due to his tendency to dig through and destroy rather than build up and conceal? David A. Traill, “Schliemann’s Acquisition of the Helios Metope and his Psychopathic Tendencies,” in Myth, Scandal, and History: The Heinrich Schliemann Controversy and a First Edition of the Mycenaean Diary, eds. William M. Calder III and David A. Traill (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1986); see also David A. Traill, “Schliemann’s Discovery of ‘Priam’s Treasure’: A Re-Examination of the Evidence,” The Journal of Hellenic Studies 104 (1984): 96–115.
57. J.L. Myres, “Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society,” The Royal Society 3, no. 10 (December 1941), 942–4.
58. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 136.
59. Myres, “Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society,” 944.
60. Myres, “Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society,” 944–5.
61. Myres, “Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society,” 944–5; see also Yannis Hamilakis, “Introduction: What Future for the ‘Minoan’ Past? Rethinking Minoan Archaeology,” in Labyrinth Revisited: Rethinking ‘Minoan’ Archaeology, ed. Yannis Hamilakis (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2002), 5; see also John Bennet “Millennial Ambiguities,” in Labyrinth Revisited: Rethinking Minoan Archaeology, ed. Yannis Hamilakis (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2002), 214–26.
62. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 136.
63. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 136.
64. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 136–7.
65. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 136.
66. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 134–9.
67. Hans Robert Jauss, “Literary History as a Challenge to Literary Theory,” translated by Elizabeth Benzinger, New Literary History, A Symposium on Literary History 2, no. 1 (Autumn 1970), 7–37.
68. Jauss, “Literary History as a Challenge to Literary Theory,” 7–37.
69. Jauss, “Literary History as a Challenge to Literary Theory,” 7–37.
70. Jauss, “Literary History as a Challenge to Literary Theory,” 7–37.
71. Davis, “Art and Politics in the Aegean: The Missing Ruler,” in The Role of the Ruler in the Prehistoric Aegean, ed. Paul Rehak, Aegaeum 11, 12.
72. Evans, “Sir Arthur Evans and Knossos,” 136; see also Donald Preziosi, “Archaeology as Museology: Re-thinking the Minoan Past,” in Labyrinth Revisited: Rethinking Minoan Archaeology, ed. Yannis Hamilakis (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2002), 31–9; see also Myres, “Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society,” 942–4.
73. Preziosi, “Archaeology as Museology: Re-Thinking the Minoan Past,” 31.
74. Papadopoulos, “Inventing the Minoans,” 95.
75. Claude Lévi-Strauss, “Structuralism and Myth,” The Kenyon Review 3, no. 2 (Spring 1981), 64.
76. Papadopoulos, “Inventing the Minoans,” 92.
77. Odysseus, Hellenic Ministry of Culture, “Administrative Information,” http://www.yppo.gr/1/e1540.jsp?obj_id=66.
78. Odysseus, “Knossos,” http://odysseus.culture.gr/h/3/eh352.jsp?obj_id=2369; author’s own emphasis.
79. UNESCO, WHC, “Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/conventiontext/.
80. Schoep, “The State of the Minoan palaces or the Minoan palace-state?,” 16–17.
81. UNESCO, WHC, “Success Stories,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/107/.
82. UNESCO, WHC, “Angkor: Managing Success,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/news/1095/.
83. UNESCO, WHC, “Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention,” July 2013, http://whc.unesco.org/archive/opguide13-en.pdf.
84. UNESCO, WHC, “FAQ,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/108#world_heritage.
85. UNESCO, WHC, “World Heritage List Nominations,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/nominations/.
86. UNESCO, WHC, “Global Strategy,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/globalstrategy/.
87. It is now more commonly assumed that Knossos was a multifunctional centre existing for the purposes of commerce, administration, cultic and/or ritual practice, habitation and labour.
88. Mark Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” Log 21 (Winter 2011): 128–9.
89. Papadopoulos, “Inventing the Minoans,” 99; see also Hitchcock and Koudounaris, “Virtual Discourse,” 46.
90. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
91. UNESCO, “Minoan Palatial Centres,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5860/.
92. John Papadopoulos, “Inventing the Minoans: Archaeology, Modernity and the Quest for European Identity,” Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 18, no. 1 (2005), 94–5.
93. UNESCO, “The Operational Guidelines,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/guidelines.
94. UNESCO, “Tentative Lists,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/.
95. UNESCO, “Tentative Lists,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/.
96. UNESCO, WHC, “Advisory Bodies,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/advisorybodies/.
97. IUCN, “World Heritage Programme,” http://www.iucn.org/about/work/programmes/wcpa_worldheritage/.
98. ICOMOS, “Introducing ICOMOS,” http://www.icomos.org/en/about-icomos/mission-and-vision/mission-and-vision.
99. ICCROM, “World Heritage,” http://www.iccrom.org/priority-areas/world-heritage/.
100. IUCN, “World Heritage Programme,” http://www.iucn.org/about/work/programmes/wcpa_worldheritage/; see also ICOMOS, “Introducing ICOMOS,” http://www.icomos.org/en/about-icomos/mission-and-vision/mission-and-vision; see also ICCROM, “World Heritage,” http://www.iccrom.org/priority-areas/world-heritage/.
101. UNESCO, “World Heritage Nominations,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/nominations/.
102. Arthur Evans, “Work of Reconstitution in the Palace of Knossos [Read 9th December 1926],” The Antiquaries Journal 7, no. 3 (July 1927), 258.
103. John Papadopoulos, “Inventing the Minoans: Archaeology, Modernity and the Quest for European Identity,” Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 18, no. 1 (2005), 91.
104. William Logan and Keir Reeves, Places of Pain and Shame: Dealing with “difficult heritage” (Oxford: Routledge, 2009), 1.
105. Mark Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” Log 21 (Winter 2011): 125–35.
106. Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” 125.
107. Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” 125.
108. Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” 127.
109. Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” 125.
110. Mark Jarzombek, “Disguised Visibilities: Dresden/‘Dresden’,” Log 6 (Fall 2005): 78.
111. Jarzombek, “Disguised Visibilities: Dresden/‘Dresden’,” 81.
112. Jarzombek, “The Metaphysics of Permanence: Curating Critical Impossibilities,” 125.
113. McEnroe, “The Second Palace at Knossos,” 79.
114. Odysseus, Hellenic Ministry of Culture, “Knossos,” http://odysseus.culture.gr/h/3/eh352.jsp?obj_id=2369.
115. UNESCO, WHC, “Babylon – Cultural Landscape and Achaeological City,” http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/1837/; see also Lawrence J. Vale, “Mediate Monuments and National Identity,” The Journal of Architecture 4, no. 4, 391–408.