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<< Our Photo Pages >> Phaistos - Ancient Palace in Greece in Crete

Submitted by Klingon on Monday, 09 February 2015  Page Views: 9108

Neolithic and Bronze AgeSite Name: Phaistos Alternative Name: Φαιστός, Phaestos, Faistos
Country: Greece
NOTE: This site is 2.667 km away from the location you searched for.

Region: Crete Type: Ancient Palace
Nearest Town: Vori
Latitude: 35.051220N  Longitude: 24.813817E
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
3 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
5 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
4 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
4

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I have visited· I would like to visit

SolarMegalith visited on 25th Apr 2018 - their rating: Cond: 3 Amb: 4 Access: 5

43559959 visited on 22nd Apr 2013 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 5 Access: 4

davidmorgan visited on 1st Mar 1982 My second visit - 37 years later. What a wonderful site! Minoan palaces are intriguing, with shared features among them.

Klingon visited - their rating: Cond: 3 Amb: 5 Access: 4

Kuba visited - their rating: Cond: 3 Amb: 5 Access: 4



Average ratings for this site from all visit loggers: Condition: 3.25 Ambience: 4.75 Access: 4.25

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by Klingon : (Vote or comment on this photo)
Ancient Palace in Crete.
The original palace was built in the Proto-Palace Period (around 2000 BCE). It was rebuilt twice after natural disasters.

Destroyed by invading Achaeans in around 1400 BCE.

Note: Translating the Phaistos Disc: A hymn to the Mother goddess of Crete?
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Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by SolarMegalith : Part of the West Magazines with large pithoi. These 11 magazines constitute the northernmost part of the West wing of the palace (photo taken on April 2018). (Vote or comment on this photo)

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by 43559959 : The grand stairway you walk down when you enter Phaistos. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by 43559959 : Storeroom at Phaistos. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : Pillar Shrine. Almost the whole south part of the West Wing was dedicated to the shrines of the New Palace. The main architectural types of shrine are the "Bench Shrine" and the "Lustral Basin". There is a third type of Minoan shrine in the SE part of the shrine wing. It is a room with central pillars, thought to be a cult area, similar to the "Pillar Crypts" of the palace of Knossos, where ... (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The processional way across the western courtyard.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The columned hall next to the royal megarons.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The monumental stairway at Phaistos is a wonderful feature.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The view from the entrance to the site.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by SolarMegalith : Remains of the Propylaea. In the New Palace (1700-1450 BC) this was the main entrance (photo taken on April 2018).

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by SolarMegalith : The West Court and the Theatral Area. Although most of the ruins visible today in Phaistos are remains of the New Palace (1700-1450 BC), the West Court existed already in the Old Palace (1900-1700 BC), its level was raised in the New Palace (photo taken on April 2018).

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by SolarMegalith : One of the kouloures ("rings") located south of the West Court. The function of these circular structures remains unclear, although it is speculated that they were used as granaries or depositories of offerings (photo taken on April 2018).

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The Queen's Megaron.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by Klingon :

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by Klingon

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by Klingon

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by 43559959 : New excavations below Phaistos on the east side.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by 43559959 : Theatral Area and the West Court.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by 43559959 : Stairway to the snowcapped Psiloritis.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by 43559959 : Area close to the Prince's room on the east side of the site.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : A pithos in one of the magazines.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The Kouloures.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The Northern Complex.

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : The Lustral Basin area adjoining the King's Megaron. (2 comments)

Phaistos
Phaistos submitted by davidmorgan : Looking down on the Queen's Megaron.

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Phaistos disc – a step towards understanding by bat400 on Monday, 09 February 2015
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The world famous baked clay disc discovered in 1908 at the Minoan palace of Phaistos on the Aegean Island of Crete, has defied all attempts at decipherment. However, Dr. Gareth Owens of the Technological Educational Institute of Crete (TEI), who carried out a six year study of the Phaistos Disc suggests the message it carries is actually a prayer or hymn to “mother,” and in particular the mother goddess of fertility.

In 1878, Minos Kalokairinos carried out pioneering excavations in the West Wing of the Palace of Knossos and discovered the first Linear B tablet. In the first month of excavations at Knossos in 1900, Arthur Evans discovered 3 Bronze Age scripts thus bringing Minoan and Mycenaean Crete into the historical period:
Minoan “Cretan Hieroglyphic“
Linear A, and
Mycenaean Linear B

Rulers, priests, scribes and bureaucrats of Knossos used these writing systems for approximately 800 years to keep such things as tax archives, list personnel, agricultural products and record religious offerings.

The decipherment of Mycenaean Linear B (ca. 1400-1200 BCE) in 1952 by Michael Ventris (Ventris & Chadwick, Documents in Mycenaean Greek) added seven centuries to the history of the Hellenic language. Using Linear B it is possible to begin to approach an understanding of the Minoan script and language found on the Phaistos Disc.

This disc has puzzled specialists for over a century both to its purpose and also the meaning of its symbols. It is tentatively dated to c.1700 BCE, and displays the written depiction of a language stamped with symbols on both sides. Specifically, the disc is covered with a total of 241 “pictogram” segments created from 45 individual symbols.

A leading expert in these scripts, Prof. John Younger from the University of Kansas – who was not involved in the present report – explained,

“there are four scripts in prehistoric Crete that write at least two languages. The four scripts are those on the Phaistos Disc and on documents written in Cretan Pictographic/Hieroglyphic, Linear A, and Linear B. The languages are Greek in the Linear B documents and whatever language or languages that were written on the Disc and on the Cretan Pictographic and Linear A documents.

“Linear B is a syllabary consisting of some 86 signs, and records the earliest Greek texts. It is obvious that these signs were adapted from those in the earlier script Linear A, which was in use in Crete from about 1900 to 1500 BCE, both use abstract signs, most of which do not resemble any object.

“Many of the Linear A signs developed from the slightly earlier Cretan Pictographic script, and most of these Pictographic signs are obviously schematic drawings of real objects (persons, animals, man-made objects like an axe, and plants like a tree or branch).”

Dr. Gareth Owens feels that the most stable word that he has ‘discovered’ is “mother”. The following video lays out the process by which he arrived at this conclusion:

Owens says there is one complex of signs found in three parts of one side of the disc spelling I-QE-KU-RJA, with I-QE meaning “great lady of importance” while a further key word appears to be AKKA, or “pregnant mother,” according to the researcher.

The TEI website noted that as there are 45 different signs on the disc; too many to constitute an alphabet and too few to constitute a truly ideographic script, such as Chinese. Scripts that can be described as syllabic in nature, are often used for administrative and religious purposes.

Owens feels that his approach has identified the Minoan language as a separate but distinct branch of the Indo-European family of languages dating from the first half of the second millennium, with connections to Sanskrit, Armenian and Greek. His research (which has yet to be fully published for peer review at this time) for gender, noun and verb endings, and items of vocabulary, are all indicative of a language of an Ind

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