Minoan Chronology - Evans and Knossos

Evans and Knossos

Arthur Evans began excavating on a hill called tou tseleve he kephala, "the headland of the chieftain", some three miles (5 km) from the north coast of Crete, on March 23, 1900. Two of the palace storerooms had been uncovered by Minos Kalokairinos in 1878, whose work ceased at the demand of the land owners. Simultaneously, coins and seals inscribed with a mysterious script were also discovered. These came to Evans' attention as the curator of the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, a position he held from 1884 to 1908. The area was rumored to have been the site of the ancient city of Knossos.

Evans examined the site on March 19, 1894. Nothing further could be done at that time, but in 1898 Crete became an independent republic. In 1899 Evans purchased the land with his own funds (his family had been factory owners in industrial Britain) and decided to set up an excavation. In the first two weeks he discovered the Linear A tablets, a streak of luck exceeded only by Carl Blegen's legendary first day's dig at Pylos, when he uncovered the Pylos tablets, written in Linear B, a script also found at Kephala and named by Evans.

Attacking the site with crews of hundreds of diggers, Evans uncovered most of the site's 6 acres (24,000 m2) within 6 seasons. By 1905 he had named the civilization whose traces he found there Minoan, after the legendary king Minos, and had created a detailed chronology of the serial phases of the pottery styles in Minoan Crete, based on what he found at Knossos. Subsequently he concerned himself mainly with restoration, an activity frowned upon by archaeologists of today. He continued to excavate there and elsewhere and to restore until 1935.

Evans was knighted in 1911 for his work. In 1921, the first edition of his monumental work, Palace of Minos, was released, which became indispensable for any department of classical archaeology. On Evans' death in 1941, the British School of Archaeology assumed responsibility for the excavation, later turning the property over to the Greek government, while retaining excavation rights.