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Pseira ( el, Ψείρα) is an islet in the
Gulf of Mirabello Mirabello Bay (also ''Bay/Gulf of Mirabello/Mirabella'') is an embayment of the Sea of Crete on the eastern part of Crete in present-day Greece. It is the largest bay of the Greek islands and the fifth largest in the Mediterranean Sea. The touri ...
in northeastern
Crete Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cypru ...
with the archaeological remains of Minoan and
Mycenean civilisation Mycenaean Greece (or the Mycenaean civilization) was the last phase of the Bronze Age in Ancient Greece, spanning the period from approximately 1750 to 1050 BC.. It represents the first advanced and distinctively Greek civilization in mainlan ...
.


History

The island was explored in 1906–1907 by Richard Seager and partially documented by Halvor Bagge in ink and watercolors based on photographs (University Museum, University of Pennsylvania, 1910), and more minutely examined in 1984–1992 by Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras, for
Temple University Temple University (Temple or TU) is a public state-related research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1884 by the Baptist minister Russell Conwell and his congregation Grace Baptist Church of Philadelphia then called ...
. Archaeological materials in this seaport, sited above its harbor, to which it was connected by cliffside stairs, span the period from the end of the Neolithic in the 4th millennium to the Late Bronze Age, with the cultural high point being Early Minoan to Late Minoan IB. At that time the prosperous town of some 60 buildings was ranged round its open square (''plateia''), with a single large building that occupied one side. Like many contemporary Late Minoan IB sites, it was violently destroyed,  1550–1450 BC. A remnant of its population cleared spaces in the rubble and for a time continued to dwell in the ruined town.


Minoan civilisation

A Minoan seal-stone from the site representing a ship is a reminder that the harbour was essential. The Minoan community supported itself by fishing and subsistence agriculture: They deeply tilled and terraced agricultural sites where they
manure Manure is organic matter that is used as organic fertilizer in agriculture. Most manure consists of animal feces; other sources include compost and green manure. Manures contribute to the fertility of soil by adding organic matter and nutrie ...
d the thin limy soil with human waste from the settlement. They did not enclose their planting sites, as the island's much later
Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
practice was, a sign that goats did not roam free in Minoan Pseira; neither were pigs kept. Dams collected seasonal run-off, for water was scarce on the island, though the Aegean region was less dry in the second millennium BCE than now.


Minoan cemetery

Consistent with the long period of occupation, burials in the necropolis west of the town are of five kinds: Neolithic rock shelter burials;
cist A cist ( or ; also kist ; from grc-gre, κίστη, Middle Welsh ''Kist'' or Germanic ''Kiste'') is a small stone-built coffin-like box or ossuary used to hold the bodies of the dead. Examples can be found across Europe and in the Middle East ...
graves built of vertical slabs with
Cycladic The Cyclades (; el, Κυκλάδες, ) are an island group in the Aegean Sea, southeast of mainland Greece and a former administrative prefecture of Greece. They are one of the island groups which constitute the Aegean archipelago. The na ...
parallels; small rock-built tombs; jar burials; and tombs imitating houses. Artifacts from the necropolis included clay vases, stone vessels, obsidian, bronze tools and jewelry. Burials broke off in
Middle Minoan The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age Aegean civilization on the island of Crete and other Aegean Islands, whose earliest beginnings were from 3500BC, with the complex urban civilization beginning around 2000BC, and then declining from 1450B ...
, before the town underwent its
Late Minoan The Minoan chronology dating system is a measure of the phases of the Minoan civilization. Initially established as a relative dating system by English archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans between 1900 and 1903 based on his analysis of Minoan pottery d ...
expansion. The Late Minoan I building that occupies the northern side of the ''plateia'', cautiously identified as a "civic shrine", featured painted stucco
bas-relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...
s in its upper floor and retains a fresco fragment of two women in Minoan dress of complicated woven design who face one another. Excavations at Pseira have been clouded by successive development in prehistoric stages obfuscating respective earlier stages, in contrast with more clearly defined strata in Knossos, for example.


House of the Rhyta

Excavation at the House of the Rhyta disclosed evidence for some Minoan cult practice that add to our understanding of some Minoan rites, though the core meaning they evoked escapes us. In three different structures cult activity involved the use of rhyta, drinking vessels in several forms, all with a hole at the base, a bull-shaped vessel,
triton Triton commonly refers to: * Triton (mythology), a Greek god * Triton (moon), a satellite of Neptune Triton may also refer to: Biology * Triton cockatoo, a parrot * Triton (gastropod), a group of sea snails * ''Triton'', a synonym of ''Triturus'' ...
shells, and
chalice A chalice (from Latin 'mug', borrowed from Ancient Greek () 'cup') or goblet is a footed cup intended to hold a drink. In religious practice, a chalice is often used for drinking during a ceremony or may carry a certain symbolic meaning. R ...
s, and a large number of cups. "Cult practices involving large numbers of rhyta continued into successive periods in the Late Bronze Age, as is demonstrated by an interesting religious structure at Ugarit (modern Ras Shamra, Syria) with 15 rhyta, including Mycenaean and Minoan examples," Betancourt observes. Chemical traces in a rhyton suggest barley, beer, and wine. All of these ritual vessels were stored in between their periodic seasonal use, when large groups would gather in upper-floor rooms that had lime-washed and painted stucco reliefs on the walls and a floor that was ritually whitewashed (in the building fronting the ''plateia'') or paved with stone slabs (House of the Rhyta). In the House of the Rhyta, there was a kitchen space below, too substantial for the occupants of the building alone; it had a corner hearth, a mortar built into bedrock in the opposite corner, and grinding rocks. The drinking rites that were observed in the upper room were apparently accompanied by feasting.


Hoard

A hoard found by Seager near the lower harbor included a rhyton in the shape of a basket decorated with double axes, pear-shaped rhyta decorated with dolphins, a bull-shaped vessel, and a jar decorated with
ivy ''Hedera'', commonly called ivy (plural ivies), is a genus of 12–15 species of evergreen climbing or ground-creeping woody plants in the family Araliaceae, native to western, central and southern Europe, Macaronesia, northwestern Africa and ...
— which in a Greek context would indicate the presence of Dionysus — among other goods.


Archaeological publications

The meticulous modern excavations by Betancourt and Davaras resulted in several highly specialized publications, all from INSTAP Academic Press: *''Pseira: A Bronze Age Seaport in Minoan Crete'' Philip P. Betancourt *''Pseira I: The Minoan Buildings on the West Side of Area A'', Philip P. Betancourt, ed. *''Pseira II: Building AC (the “Shrine”) and Other Buildings in Area A'', Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras, eds. 1997 *''Pseira III: The Plateia Building'', Cheryl R. Floyd 1998 *''Pseira IV: Minoan Buildings in Areas B, C, D, and F'', Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras, eds. 1999 *''Pseira V: Architecture of Pseira'', John C. McEnroe *''Pseira VI: The Pseira Cemetery I: The Surface Survey'', edited by Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras 2003 Topography and methodology. *''Pseira VII: The Pseira Cemetery II: Excavation of the Tombs'' edited by Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras 2003 *''Pseira VIII: The Pseira Island Survey, Part 1'' by Philip Betancourt, Costis Davaras and Richard Hope Simpson *''Pseira IX: The Pseira Island Survey, Part 2: The Intensive Surface Survey'', edited by Philip Betancourt, Costis Davaras and Richard Hope Simpson * Costis Davaras 2003. Führer zu den Altertümern Kretas, Athens, pp. 300–302. An introductory CD-ROM for a broad public audience was also produced.


See also

*
List of islands of Greece Greece has many islands, with estimates ranging from somewhere around 1,200 to 6,000, depending on the minimum size to take into account. The number of inhabited islands is variously cited as between 166 and 227. The largest Greek island by a ...


References


External links

* http://www.minoancrete.com/pseira.htm {{Authority control Islands of Crete Landforms of Lasithi Ancient cemeteries in Greece Neolithic sites in Crete Minoan sites in Crete Populated places in ancient Greece Former populated places in Greece Islands of Greece