Knossos

Knossos is the largest Bronze Age site on Crete, a Minoan palace complex of about fourteen hundred rooms five kilometres south of Heraklion. Much of what you walk through is Arthur Evans's painted concrete reconstruction, begun in 1900.

Overview

The palace was built around 1900 BCE, rebuilt after an earthquake two centuries later, and abandoned by about 1350 BCE. Evans rebuilt columns, stairs and roofs to show how the ruins had stood, which archaeologists still argue about; without it the site would read as a field of foundations, and with it you cannot always tell Minoan from Edwardian. Every fresco on site is a copy, and the originals are in the Heraklion Archaeological Museum.

Highlights

See the museum in Heraklion on the same day, ideally first, so the frescoes and pottery you meet here as copies already mean something. The throne room, the grand staircase and the storage magazines with their giant pithoi are the three things to find. Go at opening; the site has almost no shade and the coach groups arrive mid morning.

Overview

Highlights

Location