Evans, Arthur J.: The Palace of Minos: a comparative account of the successive stages of the early Cretan civilization as illustred by the discoveries at Knossos (Band 1): The Neolithic and Early and Middle Minoan Ages (London, 1921)

M.M. II: CONSOLIDATION OF KNOSSIAN PALACE 209

ways.

just referred to (Suppl. Pis. I, II), which, in the Southward direction, led Raised
towards an entrance porch supported by a central column (see below,
Figs. 158, 159).

A further point of correspondence is supplied by the fact that the lower
course of the wall that flanks the West Court in both cases is constructed of
the same upright or orthostatic blocks, at Knossos of gypsum, at Phaestos of
limestone showing traces of a coating of red coloured plaster. The later line
of the West wall at Knossos (Figs. 95 and 96)1 with its gypsum orthostats
appears, from the analysis of the sherds found within it, to have been built at
the close of M. M. I or the very beginning of M. M. II.

The outer wall-lines of the Southern front at Knossos, which are them-
selves an early element of the Palace, present some peculiar features.
There was here a decided slope, and, West of the Southern Entrance Porch

Double
Wall-line

—which, as we have seen, overlay the still earlier ' Hypogaeum'-—was a double of s
line of exterior walling (see Fig. 154). The outermost line, showing the
usual orthostatic arrangement of gypsum blocks on a limestone plinth, rose
at a lower level and thus served as a massive terrace wall for what appears
to have been an open verandah between it and the inner wall-line, along the
centre of which ran a causeway of gypsum paving. The inner wall-line, of
the same construction as the other, was itself guarded by the high outer
terrace wall, and it was found convenient to have narrow openings in it for
access to a series of magazines. This double line of walling, with the remains
of the central line of pavement between, is shown in Fig. 154.

A massive timber framework was from the first associated with the good
masonry of the Middle Minoan Age, an inheritance from the Early Minoan
buildings, of which the remains at Vasiliki supply the best example.2 In place, \>tone
however, of the wooden doorposts supported on gypsum bases, so generally in jambs,
use in the ensuing Age, the earlier builders often cut ledges and reveals for
the framework of the door in superposed limestone or gypsum blocks such as
will be seen in the door-jambs of the Long Corridor of the W. Magazines
(Suppl. PI. XI). These jambs, many of them incised with the double axe
mark, are of the same date as the neighbouring facade and the gypsum
pillars of the two crypts.3

A characteristic early feature at Knossos was the paving of both Courts
and interior spaces with thick limestone slabs of uneven shape and the under
side of which was often very irregular. From a certain resemblance to the

1 Many M. M. I sherds occurred, but no 3 For the distribution of the double axe sign
M. M. II. 'n Sanctuary Quarter see below, p. 449,

2 See above, p. 71. Fig- 322.

I P