Heraklion Archaeological Museum - CollectiveAccess System : Gold/silver objects : Gold signet ring with cult scene. "Ring of Minos" [Χ-Α1700]

Gold signet ring with cult scene. "Ring of Minos"

Χ-Α1700

Metal (Gold)

Intact

Bezel length: 3.55 cm.Bezel width: 2.45 cm.Inner hoop diameter: 1.65 cm.

Knossos

Area of the Temple Tomb

Late Bronze Age. Final Palatial period, Late Minoan II period.:

1450-1400 BC:

Gallery:

VIII

Exhibition thematic unit:

Late Bronze Age - Neopalatial period (1700-1450 BC). Minoan religion. Palace cult

The epiphany cycle - Gold rings

Description

Gold ring with epiphany scene on the large oval bezel. On the left side of the composition, a female figure is gently shaking a tree branch emerging from a built stepped enclosure or sanctuary. In the centre, a kneeling man is pulling a tree branch with his right hand while holding a fruit in his left, picked from the tree growing from a wooden enclosure with cross-hatched decoration on the fa?ade. The man appears to be offering the fruit to a female figure seated on a built stepped platform. This iconographic type of a seated female figure on a stepped structure is identified as a goddess in Minoan iconography. Her divine nature is reinforced by a small hovering figure of a goddess visible to her right, descending from above. The lower part of the scene, which is divided from the tree cult scenes by a row of oval rocks, is occupied by a scene of a goddess sailing on the sea in a boat. The goddess is standing and rowing, while inside the boat is a stepped wooden altar crowned with horns of consecration. The sea is indicated by lozenge patterns with a central dot. The scene, unique in Minoan iconography, is a synopsis of the Minoan conception of the divine and the unity of the universe. The presence of the goddess in the air as a floating symbol, on land as a personified seated female form, and at sea in a boat, symbolises her various aspects and her dominion over the celestial, terrestrial and marine worlds. The tree cult scenes are associated with the epiphany process, heightening the strong semantic charge of the scene.

Bibliography:

Evans, A.J. The Palace of Minos: A Comparative Account of the Successive Stages of the Early Cretan Civilization as Illustrated by the Discoveries at Knossos. Volume IV. London, 1935, 947-956. Dimopoulou, Ν. and G. Rethemiotakis. The Ring of Minos and Gold Minoan Rings. The epiphany cycle. Athens, 2004.

Author:

S. M.

Photographs' metadata