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Phaistos , also transliterated
Transliteration

Transliteration is the practice of transcribing a word or text written in one writing system into another writing system or system of rules for such practice....
 as Phaestos, Festos and Phaestus is an ancient city on the island
Island

An island or isle is any piece of land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls are called islets....
 of Crete
Crete

Crete is the largest of the Greek islands and the List of islands in the Mediterranean largest island in the Mediterranean Sea at 8,336 km? ....
. Phaistos was located in the south-central portion of the island, about 5.6 kilometres from the Mediterranean Sea
Mediterranean Sea

The Mediterranean Sea is a sea or Ocean off the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Europe, on the south by Africa, and on the east by Asia....
. It was inhabited from about 4000 BC. A palace, dating from the Middle Bronze Age
Bronze Age

The Bronze Age is, with respect to a given prehistory, the period in that society when the most advanced metalworking included smelting copper and tin from naturally-occurring outcroppings of copper and tin ores, creating a bronze alloy by melting those metals together, and casting them into bronze artifact s....
, was destroyed by an earthquake
Earthquake

An earthquake is the result of a sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes are recorded with a seismometer, also known as a seismograph....
 during the Late Bronze Age. Knossos
Knossos

Knossos , also known as the Knossos Palace is the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete and probably the ceremonial and political center of the Minoan civilization and culture....
 along with other Minoan
Minoan civilization

The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age civilization which arose on the island of Crete. The Minoan culture flourished from approximately 27th century BC to 1450 BC; afterwards, Mycenaean Greece culture became dominant at Minoan sites in Crete....
 sites was destroyed at that time.






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Phaistos , also transliterated
Transliteration

Transliteration is the practice of transcribing a word or text written in one writing system into another writing system or system of rules for such practice....
 as Phaestos, Festos and Phaestus is an ancient city on the island
Island

An island or isle is any piece of land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls are called islets....
 of Crete
Crete

Crete is the largest of the Greek islands and the List of islands in the Mediterranean largest island in the Mediterranean Sea at 8,336 km? ....
. Phaistos was located in the south-central portion of the island, about 5.6 kilometres from the Mediterranean Sea
Mediterranean Sea

The Mediterranean Sea is a sea or Ocean off the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Europe, on the south by Africa, and on the east by Asia....
. It was inhabited from about 4000 BC. A palace, dating from the Middle Bronze Age
Bronze Age

The Bronze Age is, with respect to a given prehistory, the period in that society when the most advanced metalworking included smelting copper and tin from naturally-occurring outcroppings of copper and tin ores, creating a bronze alloy by melting those metals together, and casting them into bronze artifact s....
, was destroyed by an earthquake
Earthquake

An earthquake is the result of a sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes are recorded with a seismometer, also known as a seismograph....
 during the Late Bronze Age. Knossos
Knossos

Knossos , also known as the Knossos Palace is the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete and probably the ceremonial and political center of the Minoan civilization and culture....
 along with other Minoan
Minoan civilization

The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age civilization which arose on the island of Crete. The Minoan culture flourished from approximately 27th century BC to 1450 BC; afterwards, Mycenaean Greece culture became dominant at Minoan sites in Crete....
 sites was destroyed at that time. The palace
Palace

A palace is a grand residence, especially a royal residence or the home of a head of state or some other high-ranking dignitary, such as a bishop or archbishop....
 was rebuilt toward the end of the Late Bronze Age.

Archaeology

Phaistos was first excavated by Italian archaeologists Federico Halbherr
Federico Halbherr

Federico Halbherr was an Italian archaeologist and epigrapher, known for his excavations of Crete....
 and Luigi Pernier
Luigi Pernier

Luigi Pernier was a leading Italian archaeologist and academic now best known for his discovery of the Disc of Phaistos....
. Further excavations in 1950-1971 were conducted by Doro Levi
Doro Levi

Doro Levi was an archaeologist who practiced in the Mediterranean countries in the 20th century. Specifically, Levi conducted excavations in Italy, Greece, and Turkey....
.

The Old Palace was built in the Protopalatial Period
Minoan pottery

Minoan pottery is more than a useful tool for dating the mute Minoan civilization. Its restless sequence of rapidly-maturing artistic styles reveal something of Minoan patrons' pleasure in novelty while they assist archaeologists assign relative dates to the Archaeology of their sites....
, then rebuilt twice due to extensive earthquake damage. When the palace was destroyed by earthquakes, the re-builders constructed a New Palace atop the old.

Several artifacts
Artifact (archaeology)

In archaeology, an artifact or artefact is any object made or modified by a human archaeological culture, and often one later recovered by some archaeological endeavor....
 with Linear A
Linear A

Linear A is one of two linear scripts used in ancient Crete before Mycenaean Greek language Linear B. In Minoan Civilization times, before the Greek Mycenaean dominion, Linear A was the official script for the palaces and the cult and Cretan Hieroglyphs were mainly used on seals....
 inscriptions were excavated at this site. The name of the site also appears in partially deciphered Linear A texts, and is probably similar to Mycenaean 'PA-I-TO' as written in Linear B
Linear B

Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean language, an early form of Greek language. It predated the Greek alphabet by several centuries and seems to have died out with the fall of Mycenaean Greece civilization....
. Several kouloura
Kouloura

A koulara is a circular shaped subsurface pit found in certain Human settlements within Ancient Greece. Examples of koulouras from the Minoan civilization period have been found, for example, at Phaistos....
 structures (subsurface pits) have been found at Phaistos. Pottery has been recovered at Phaistos from in the Middle and Late Minoan periods, including polychrome
Polychrome

Polychrome is one of the terms used to describe the use of multiple colors in one entity. Most often, the term is used in conjunction with certain styles of architecture, pottery or sculpture in multiple colours....
 items and embossing in imitation of metal work. Bronze Age works from Phaistos include bridge spouted bowls
Bridge spouted vessel

A bridge spouted vessel is a particular design of pitcher originating in antiquity; there is typically a connecting element between the spout and filling aperture, and the spout is a completely independent aperture from the usually smaller central fill opening....
, eggshell cups, tall jars and large pithoi
Pithos

Pithos is the ancient Greek language word for a large storage jar of a characteristic shape. Originally used by western classical archaeologists to mean the jars uncovered by excavation in Crete and Greece, it has now been taken into the American English language as a general word for a storage jar from any cultural horizon....
.

In 1908, Pernier found the Phaistos disc
Phaistos Disc

The Phaistos Disc is a disk of fired clay from the Minoan civilization palace of Phaistos, possibly dating to the middle or late Minoan Bronze Age ....
 there. This artifact is a clay disk, dated to between 1950 BC and 1400 BC and impressed with a unique sophisticated hieroglyphic
Cretan hieroglyphs

Cretan hieroglyphs are found on artifacts of Bronze Age Minoan civilization Crete . Symbol inventories have been compiled by Evans , Meijer , Olivier/Godart ....
 script.

See also

  • Amari
    Amari

    Amari is a province on the island of Crete in Greece. Much of the history of Crete took place near the Psiloriti Range within Amari. One of the major geographic features of Amari is the Amari Valley, a landform of high elevation known for olive cultivation....
  • Ieropotamos River
    Ieropotamos River

    The Ieropotamos River is a watercourse in southern Crete in Greece. This river was a source of water supply for the ancient Minoan civilization Human settlement of Phaistos....
  • Kalyvia
    Kalyvia, Heraklion

    This article is about a settlement on Crete; for other uses see Kalyvia.Kalyvia is a village in the Heraklion Prefecture on southern Crete in Greece....
  • Kamares, Crete
  • Monastiraki, Crete


External links