Some time ago I wrote about the possibility that Minos, who is a god and not a mythical king, is a Moon god. It turns out, that's only one of his many fascinating aspects.
There's precious little about him in the garbled fragments of Minoan myth that survived into classical times. The stories mostly talk about him being a king, and a horrid one at that. But the tidbits of information that led us to view him as a Moon god also point to his connection with the Minoan sacred calendar. More on both of those aspects shortly.
I was recently asked a question during an interview, and I've been thinking about it ever since. The question: What kinds of people seek out Modern Minoan Paganism, and why?
The first part of that question spans the gamut of not just the modern Pagan world but the modern population in general: Wiccans, Hellenic Pagans, Druids, former Christians seeking polytheistic spirituality, former atheists and agnostics who have felt the call of the deities...
The photo above (image CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons) shows two full faience figurines and one partial one from Knossos as displayed at the Heraklion Archaeological Museum. You're probably already familiar with at least the two full ones in the middle and on the left.
What you might not know is that they weren't found in such a complete state, and at least one of them may have been reconstructed incorrectly.
You may have heard of Kamares ware - the beautiful polychrome (multicolored) pottery produced in the Minoan temple at Phaistos during the Bronze Age. But did you know that this type of vessel gives us a window into the lives of the ancient Minoans?
Kamares ware was incredibly popular and was produced for centuries, from about 2100 to 1450 BCE. Its bold red and white designs on a black background remind me of the folkloric dinnerware that was popular in the 1960s and 70s:
Snake tube. What an odd name for a Bronze Age artifact from Minoan sites. That's what Sir Arthur Evans called these cylindrical ceramic objects that were decorated with wavy serpentine shapes running up and down them. You can see a few on the bottom row of the image at the top of this post.
Evans called them "snake tubes" because he thought the Minoans kept pet snakes in their temples and homes, and these tubes were their little houses. I mean, they're decorated with snakes, so why not?
There's a lot of argument in the Pagan community about what constitutes a "valid" tradition. Some people are only comfortable with reconstructionist traditions that can provide an ancient text reference for every portion of their spiritual practice. Others only want to participate in traditions that can claim to have unbroken practices going back generations, even centuries.
Janet Boyer
I love the idea of green burials! I first heard of Recompose right before it launched. I wish there were more here on the East Coast; that's how I'd l...
Victoria
I would say as neopagans we are constructing our futures rather than reconstructing THE future. I'm not sure if we are in the process of becoming a tr...
Steven Posch
Not so sure about "culty," though.Many--if not most--peoples with a collective sense of identity have a term for the "not-us people": barbaroi (non-He...
ty!