Introduction

Knossos is a symbol. Part of the appeal of Knossos, the principal city of bronze age Crete, lies in that symbolic nature. Like the Acropolis, Stonehenge, or the Pyramids, it stands powerfully for an entire ancient culture. Older by far than Athens, the Knossos Labyrinth was first built in the reign of Sesostris II, a Middle Kingdom Egyptian pharaoh; it is sobering to reflect that the sarsen monument at the heart of Stonehenge was little more than a century old when the first Labyrinth was raised at Knossos in 1930 BC. It was from the start the focus of a strange, glittering, artistic and exotic culture, its people honouring lithe and virile boxers, athletes and bull-leapers, revering mysterious snake goddesses and other animal deities, earnestly worshipping their gods and goddesses on mountain tops and in caves, delighting in every aspect of nature.