32 



I)ISCovi:hv 



have been sjiecially cliaracteristic of very early limes ; 

 through it primitive man expressed his veneration 

 of womanliood. The Cretan Mother Goddess holds 

 an exalted position. She wields the supreme power 

 over all Nature ; is associated with doves, which 

 symbolise her power in the air ; is accompanied by 

 lions, the strongest animals of the earth ; brandishes 

 snakes, that live under the earth. Among the various 

 " cult objects," or ritualistic forms used in worship, 

 found in her shrines are included representations of 

 cows with calves, goats with suckling kids and the like. 



There was a god as well as a goddess in Minoan 

 religion, but he was of relatively little importance. 

 Velchanos, the Cretan Zeus — if we may assume that 

 the Minoan god was the original of this figure of the 

 Greek legends — was represented as both the son and 

 the husband of Mother Nature. He was suckled, so 

 the tradition ran, by Amalthea the goat in the cave 

 of Dikte, and brought up by his mother Rhea on the 

 slopes of Mount Ida. His insignificance in compari- 

 son with the female deity appears from the fact that 

 he was drawn on a smaller scale whenev^er represented 

 in her company. The two deities probably con- 

 stituted, as Mr. Hogarth has suggested, a " Double 

 Monotheism " — a double godhead, that is, worshipped 

 to the exclusion of all minor deities. If this was the 

 case, the various Cretan prototypes of later Greek 

 divinities must be regarded as variant forms of the 

 Mother Goddess herself. Aphrodite, for instance, the 

 goddess of Love, was worshipped generally in the 

 Levant, being known in Canaan as Ashtaroth-Astarte, 

 and in Egypt as Hathor ; her Cretan name is unknown. 

 The Greek Artemis, goddess of the Wild Beasts, was 

 foreshadowed in the Cretan Dictynna. 



One great difference between the Cretan and the 

 Hellenic Zeus was that the Cretan Zeus was mortal, 

 and was said to have died on Mount Juktas. The mor- 

 tality of their gods was one of the striking conceptions 

 which differentiated the Southern peoples of the Near 

 East from the later Greeks, who came from the North. 

 The Egyptian Osiris, for instance, could die, but not 

 any of the Greek gods. The Cretan Mother Goddess 

 is depicted on seal stones and rings dressed like an 

 earthly queen, while Velchanos is seen descending 

 from the heavens to the earth, a young warrior with 

 a spear and an enormous sliicld. 



Another difference between Cretan and classical 

 Greek religion was that, as far as one can see, Cretan 

 religion did not give rise to any great temples, nor 

 did it leave behind any more substantial traces of its 

 activity than the small figures of the Earth Goddess 

 to whom I have referred. It may be sound to regard 

 the palace of Knossos as itself a temple, and it is true 

 that legend makes of Minos a High Priest as well as 

 a King. There seems, however, to be little room for 



doubt that the only places set aside specifically for 

 worship were small private shrines used for family- 

 worship. All the evidence tends to indicate that it 

 was the family idea that predominated in Cretan 

 worship. Private houses had their shrines, and the 

 Knossian palace-temple itself had its lesser family 

 shrines. These sanctuaries were always distinguished 

 by a sort of sacred pillar, a sign which in Minoan 

 art is often used as the only indication of a sacred 

 place. There is an example of it on a fresco painting 

 found at Knossos. Another emblem associated with 

 the cult is that of sacred trees, which on rings and 

 seal stones usually form the background for the choros, 

 or dance. The actual dance, no doubt, would be 

 performed iVi sacred groves. 



Many cult-objects have been found in the shrines, 

 the commonest being the mysterious Double Axe. 

 The fact that this emblem was also specicdly asso- 

 ciated with the Carian Zeus at Labraunda has led to 

 a generally accepted theory that the Cretan " Laby- 

 rinth " corresponds to the Carian " Labraunda," or 

 place of the " Labrus " or Double Axe ; for the 

 Knossian palace must have been, in fact, the chief seat 

 of the cult. 



Side by side with the Double Axe one finds the con- 

 stantlj^-recurring sign of the Bull, an animal which 

 was sacred not only because of its great physical 

 strength, but also because of its use in sacrifice. A 

 sarcophagus or coffin of terra-cotta, found at Hagia 

 Triada, contains a picture of a sacrificial bull following 

 a procession of women priests. In view of the 

 prominence given to the Bull in Minoan worship, one 

 need not seek very far for an explanation of the 

 Cretan legend of the Minotaur, a monster half man, 

 half bull, which lived in the labyrinth and exacted its 

 human victims. Nor is it impossible that the dan- 

 gerous and cruel sport of bull-fighting ' formed part of 

 the same cult. Bulls' heads were made in pottery and 

 used as votive offerings, and were sometimes made of 

 gold. The horns of the bull — Horns of Consecration 

 — are found in shrines among ritual objects. 



Cult-objects were usually of a rude and inartistic 

 kind, a striking exception to the general rule being 

 afforded by some brilliantly-coloured figures of ware 

 which if it were modern would be called " faience,'' 

 belonging to the M.M. Ill period. Perhaps the best 

 example of this ware is a group consisting of the 

 Snake Goddess and her votaries, which \\as found by 

 Sir Arthur Evans in 1903. and which was used in a 

 shrine of the ro\-al household. 



There was a specially important clement in Cretan 

 religion reserved for the cult of the dead. 



It is obvious, from the many tombs that have been 

 exca\ated, that in very early times it was the practice 

 ' See Discovery, .\ugust 1920, p. 249. 



