DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.809#0258
HARBOUR TOWN OF KNOSSOS 231
There is no evidence that this Minoan maritime outlet extended over Candia, a
the area since occupied by the town of Candia. Candia itself was an arti- j^iftaiy
ficial military creation of the Saracens, who shifted over their centre of Founda-
power from Gortyna, where the Romans had fixed it, so that they might
better oppose a bulwark against efforts from the Constantinople side.
Their entrenchment, indeed, known as Khandax, gave the name of Candia,
also applied to the whole Island. It was from this, too—mightily aggrandized
and embattled by the Venetians to be for a while the bulwark of Christendom
against the Turk—that it gained the local name, Megalokastron,' the Great
Camp', emphasizing its military character, which clung to it down to quite
recent times. The shallow port—for all its ' galley houses '—was unapproach-
able in Northern gales, and the evidence of land subsidence given below x
shows that in Minoan days it must have been a mere sandy cove, for the most
part high and dry. The massive limestone blocks visible in the lower
courses of the Western mole do not seem to be of Minoan work.
About a mile West of the Canea gate of Candia, however, there are Minoan
traces of a considerable Minoan settlement scattered along the bluff that n^en^s" w.
overlooks on that side the mouth of the Platyperama stream,2 the upper ofCandia.
waters of which have been mentioned in connexion with the transit route
across the centre of the Island. That this ancient haven must have offered
an alternative outlet to Knossos is clear from the fact that owing to the con-
formation of the country the one practicable route linking the Minoan capital
with Western Crete would have passed immediately above it. Connected,
moreover, probably, with a cross line of communication, are some remains
dating from the close of M. M. Ill3 that have come to light a little South
of the extreme angle of the Candia enceinte on that side.
The sandy flat that stretches beyond the Platyperama mouth is
traversed successively by two streams, the Xeropotamos, along the upper
course of which the modern road to the Mesara Plain runs, and the
Gazanos, by the mouth of which a low mound is visible marking what may
have been the central point of another Minoan maritime station. Remains
of pithoi abound, belonging to the close of the Middle and the beginning of
the Late Minoan Age. Some of these contained skeletons, and a good
painted example of such from this site, of M. M. Ill date, found by Dr.
Hatzidakis has been illustrated above.4 It is highly probable that
1 See below, p. 232 seqq. mouthpiece and a prominent ring round the
2 Locally known here as the Geophyros. collar.
3 Amongst these was part of a limestone 4 P. of M., i, pp. 584, 585 and Fig. 428.
' rhyton' of the pear-shaped type with separate Cf. 'Ap\- AeXriov, 1918, pp. 60, 61 and PI. VI.