[ΚΕΝΟ]



Fresco with olive tree

Τ36Β
Plaster
Fragments on plaster of Paris backing.
Height: 36.3 cm. Width: 36.7 cm.
Knossos
East Wing of the palace
Late Bronze Age. Neopalatial period, Late Minoan IA period.:
1600-1500 BC:
Gallery:
VI
Case:
54
Exhibition thematic unit:
Late Bronze Age - Neopalatial period (1700-1450 BC). Private and public life. Bread and circuses
Daily life. Diet and food preparation
Description
Fragments of a fresco depicting an olive tree against a blue-green background. The fragments come from the excavations in the East Wing of the palace of Knossos and would have formed part of a larger naturalistic composition. Landscape scenes were common in the fresco decoration of the Minoan palaces and villas, the crowning example being the relief fresco of the olive tree and bull adorning the North Entrance of the Knossian palace. Then as now, the olive tree was an essential element of the Cretan landscape, of great dietary and economic value, depicted from the Early Minoan period onwards in various material expressions of Minoan culture (vase-painting, jewellery).
Bibliography:
Cameron, M.A.S. A general study of Minoan frescoes with particular reference to unpublished wall paintings from Knossos. PhD thesis, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, 1974. Chapin, A. “Frescoes.” In Ε.H. Cline (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Bronze Age Aegean (ca. 3000-1000 BC), New York, 2010, 223-236.
Author:
G. F.


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