Recent excavations at the archaeological site of the ancient city of Knossos find that during the early Iron Age, the city was rich in imports and was around 3 times larger than what was believed from earlier excavations.

“Knossos, renowned as a glorious site of the Greek Bronze Age, the leader of Crete and the seat of the palace of the mythical King Minos and the home of the enigmatic labyrinth, was the prosperous epicenter of Minoan culture,” said University of Cincinnati archaeologist Dr Antonis Kotsonas.

Archaeologists have studied Knossos’ Bronze Age remains for many decades, but more recent research has focused on the urban development of the city after it entered the Iron Age – in the 11th century BC – following the Bronze Age collapse of the Aegean palaces.

Scientists over the past decade have recovered a huge collection of artifacts dating back to the Iron Age. The relics were spread over an extensive area that was previously unexplored.

“This exploration revealed considerable growth in the size of the settlement during the early Iron Age and also growth in the quantity and quality of its imports coming from mainland Greece, Cyprus, the Near East, Egypt, Italy, Sardinia and the western Mediterranean,” Dr Kotsonas said.

“No other site in the Aegean period has such a range of imports. The imports include bronze and other metals – jewelry and adornments, as well as pottery,” he added.

“The majority of the materials, recovered from tombs, provide a glimpse of the wealth in the community, because status symbols were buried with the dead during this period.”

The artifacts were collected from fields covering the remains of dwellings and cemeteries.

“Distinguishing between domestic and burial contexts is essential for determining the size of the settlement and understanding the demographic, socio-political and economic development of the local community,” Dr Kotsonas said.

“Even at this early stage in detailed analysis, it appears that this was a nucleated, rather densely occupied settlement extending over the core of the Knossos valley, from at least the east slopes of the acropolis hill on the west to the Kairatos River, and from the Vlychia stream on the south until roughly midway between the Minoan palace and the Kephala hill.”

The findings were reported January 9 at the 117th Joint Annual Meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America and the Society for Classical Studies in San Francisco, CA.

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Antonis Kotsonas. 2016. Early Iron Age Knossos and the Development of the City of the Historical Period. Program of the 117th Annual Meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America and the Society for Classical Studies, p. 47