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. Ill: THE DOMESTIC QUARTER

the South area of the Queen's Megaron, Fig. 153 above, where the blocks
show a distinct clay interval. A fine M. M. Ill example is presented by the
light-court of the Hall of the Double Axes, Fig. 250.

The wall of this, the closely compacted blocks of which were incised
with the Double Axes that have given it its name, is limestone masonry
backed by rubble construction. The wooden beam above its fourth
course was tied by rounded cross-pieces to another on the Western face of
the wall just above the gypsum dado.1 These beams with their round
insets might naturally suggest a decorative mask or frieze of rosettes
such as runs through this whole system. In the covered part of the Hall
the practice, already known in Early Minoan times, of dividing the stone-
work of the interior walls into sections by the interposition of upright posts
tied together by horizontal and transverse beams emerges once more into Timber
prominence. This method offered advantages in dealing with the blocks WOTk 0f
derived from the ruins of earlier structures, as also in systematizing door ^^or

and window frames and it came now generally into vogue in the interior of M. M.

. Ill

Palace walls. The lower part of the walls was at the same time masked by Fabric,
a gypsum dado.

An excavation made into the base blocks of the interior of this light-
well wall at its S.W. corner showed that the latest sherds it contained were
M M. II b. It had therefore been built at a time when the remains of that
Period were already stratified. But the organic connexion of the core of
this structure, including its horizontal beam, with the Lower East-West
Corridor enables us, as will be seen, to be still more definite. The charac-
teristic panelled masonry of the adjoining South wall of this Hall moreover
confirms the result of these comparisons.

Fig. 251 gives a view of a part of the South wall of the same S. Wall of

Ha.ll of

Hall showing its construction as visible above the irregular edge of Double
the gypsum dado, the upper part of which was here broken away. The Axes'
intervals left by the upright and horizontal timbering are clearly marked,
and when first opened out were largely filled with carbonized material.
Attached to the masonry are seen in places patches of coarse plastering
that had supplied a backing for the finer painted stucco, which seems
to have formed its original decoration before it was covered with a gypsum
dado. Above this runs a horizontal beam, the charred remains of which
were partially preserved.

1 The tubular casings left by the decay of Report, 1901, p. 213) that the cross-pieces
these in the interior of the wall showed the projected into the light-well so as to support
daylight through in places. The idea (Knossos, a gallery is unwarranted.