80 THE WONDERS OF ANCIENT CRETE 



people, though we have plenty of inscriptions ; and it 

 is not improbably their alphabet which gave rise to 

 that of later Europe. But the frescoes, statues, and 

 works of art generally yield a sufficient picture of a 

 peaceful and merry and refined life, in which woman 

 seems to have been the equal of man. There are no 

 war pictures, which are so abundant in Egypt and 

 Babylonia. The great fleet of the Cretans defended 

 the island-kingdom, and there is no trace of fortifica- 

 tions. But there seem to have been rival kings or 

 princes at the two palaces, and it is plain that the 

 great palace of Knossos was taken and destroyed. In 

 the end, indeed, the whole civilization was wrecked 

 by the Greeks, as we shall see presently. 



Such courts suggest feudal monarchies of a powerful 

 and fairly ancient character, but more recent explora- 

 tion has added to our knowledge. The ruins of small 

 towns have been excavated, and in these we get a 

 glimpse of the life of the people. It seems to have 

 been surprisingly good for so early a date. Even the 

 houses of artisans — a full set of a carpenter's bronze 

 tools was found in one — had sometimes six or eight 

 rooms. Other houses, presumably those of the 

 bourgeois, have double the number. The remains 

 suggest a general comfort, and in the middle-class 

 houses a high standard of refinement. These towns 

 also belong to 3,500 years ago. 



Small as Crete was, it spread its civilization far 

 and wide over the region. As everybody knows, 

 a German archaeologist named Schliemann excavated 

 fifty years ago the ruins of what was believed to be 

 ancient Troy, and found the remains of seven cities 

 in so many successive layers. In the second city 

 from the bottom— a city belonging to about 4,000 



