Knossos
Knossos is the largest Bronze Age site in Crete and the centre of Minoan civilisation, five kilometres south of Heraklion and about ninety minutes by road from Rethymno. The palace complex covers some 14,000 square metres of courtyards, storage magazines, staircases and workshops, occupied from around 1900 BC and destroyed in the fifteenth century BC. Sir Arthur Evans excavated it from 1900 and reconstructed parts in painted concrete, which is why Knossos looks unlike any other Greek archaeological site and why it divides opinion. The walk round takes about ninety minutes on uneven but mostly flat ground, and the original frescoes and finds are in the Heraklion Archaeological Museum, not on site.
At a glance
- Drive from Rethymno
- About 1 hour 30 minutes, roughly 80 km
- Location
- 5 km south of Heraklion
- Site walk
- About 90 minutes on uneven but mostly flat ground
- Occupied from
- Around 1900 BC, on a site inhabited since the Neolithic
- Excavated by
- Sir Arthur Evans, from 1900, who reconstructed parts in concrete
- Tickets
- Bought at the site; a combined ticket with the Heraklion Archaeological Museum is normally available and cheaper
What survives
The palace is organised around a large central court, with the residential quarters, the throne room and the ceremonial spaces on one side and the storage magazines, with their rows of enormous storage jars, on the other. The features worth slowing down for are structural rather than decorative: the light wells that carry daylight into rooms three storeys down, the drainage and water-supply channels, the grand staircase, and the sheer number of storerooms, which tell you more about how the place worked than the frescoes do.
Occupation began around 1900 BC on a site already inhabited since the Neolithic. The complex was rebuilt after damage more than once and destroyed for good in the fifteenth century BC.
Evans and the reconstructions
Arthur Evans began digging in 1900 and, over the following decades, rebuilt sections in reinforced concrete with reproduction frescoes painted in. Archaeologists have argued about it ever since: the reconstructions fix one interpretation in permanent material, and some details are certainly wrong. They also make the site legible to a non-specialist in a way that a field of foundations would not be. Both things are true, and it is worth knowing which parts you are looking at.
The museum
Almost everything portable from Knossos is in the Heraklion Archaeological Museum, twenty minutes away: the original bull-leaping fresco, the snake goddess figurines, the Phaistos Disc, the seals and the gold. Seeing the palace and then the museum, in that order, is the sequence that makes both work.
Practicalities
There is very little shade and the stone reflects heat, so early morning or late afternoon is much better than midday in summer. Tickets are bought at the site or online, and a combined ticket covering Knossos and the Heraklion Archaeological Museum is normally available and cheaper than buying the two separately. Neither ticket is included in tour prices from Rethymno.
Good to know
How far is Knossos from Rethymno?+
About 80 km east, roughly an hour and a half by car on the national road. A private day tour from Rethymno covering Knossos, the museum and Heraklion old town runs about seven hours.
How long do you need at Knossos?+
About ninety minutes for the site itself, at a gentle pace with stops. Add a further hour and a half if you are also visiting the Heraklion Archaeological Museum, which holds the original frescoes and finds.
Are the tickets included in a tour?+
No. Entrance to Knossos and to the Heraklion Archaeological Museum is paid separately at each site. A combined ticket covering both is usually available and works out cheaper than two individual tickets.
Is Knossos a reconstruction?+
Partly. Arthur Evans rebuilt sections in reinforced concrete and had frescoes repainted, so what you walk through mixes original fabric with an early twentieth-century interpretation of it. The reconstructions make the layout comprehensible; they are also, in places, disputed.
Is there shade at Knossos?+
Very little. The site is open stone with almost no cover, so visit early or late in the day in summer and bring water and a hat.
