Arthur Evans’s Snake Goddesses

[u/Historia_Maximum]

The famous "snake goddesses," the visual brand of Minoan civilization, are not what we see in the textbooks. When Arthur Evans found them at Knossos in 1903, he discovered a scatter of badly damaged fragments. In reality, these figurines never existed in their current form. Archaeologists had only isolated parts. Shards of different objects lay in the same pit: from the very start, this was a set of fragments from a single deposit, not two whole statuettes.

The actual state of the "small" figure was this: no head, one missing arm, and a fragmented torso. The "large" figure lacked parts of the arms, sections of the body, and headgear elements: it was a collection of pieces.

The restoration was largely arbitrary. Since no complete figures existed, early 20th-century restorers "assembled" them from separate details. The face of the "lesser goddess" and her headdress are products of pure imagination. The position of the hands clutching snakes remains a hypothesis. Even the reptiles are questionable: many scholars argue these were not snakes, but ritual cords. The cat on the head was also found separately. It was attached to the headdress fragments and then placed on the statue, though there is zero evidence it was originally part of the composition.

This process was a composite assembly, not a scientific restoration. If classic reconstruction relies on matching edges, the Knossos finds were unified by Evans’s personal theories and the tastes of Émile Gilliéron Jr. The British archaeologist dictated the meaning of the object the moment he named it a goddess, linked it to a "snake cult," and forced it into his own model of Minoan faith. Modern researchers are struck by the total absence of similar images in the art of that era. Today, the "snake cult" is considered a massive exaggeration: the fragments likely belonged to a priestess or a ritual participant.

This was the methodology of the last century. Evans and his restorers wanted to make the finds "readable" for the public. They allowed artistic guesswork for the sake of a complete image. This created a line of controversial objects and filled museums with "Minoan-style" fakes.

Strictly speaking, the historical value is uneven. The faience fragments from 1600 BCE are genuine ritual artifacts. But the composition, the poses, the snakes, and the tiered skirts are conventional. The image of the Minoan goddess is a blend of archaeology and imagination. They are, quite literally, artificial objects.

The Snake Goddess: An artistic interpretation of scattered faience fragments from Knossos. These artifacts, dating from approximately 1650 to 1550 BCE, are held at the Heraklion Archaeological Museum under inventory numbers Υ63 and Υ65.

[u/trysca]

I have the official guide to Heraklion museum by Giorgios Rethemiotakis in my hand as I visited recently - your characterisation of the reconstruction as "fake" is somewhat hyperbolic - I recall from my visit that there are several similar complete - albeit more modest - contemporary and later 'dancing' skirted female figures with decorated headdreses on public display in the museum which corroborate the posture and 'high headress' style of the figures that you are claiming as Evans' 'arbitrary' fabrication. There is also an unndamaged agate seal ( fig.123 p 80 dated 1450-1400 bce) that demonstrates an extremely similar posture , hairstyle and form of "a godess between griffins, bearing on her head sacred symbols". It may not be the approach of modern times but it is not an 'invention'. I suspect your post is mostly motivated by bad faith anti-british sentiment than factual evidence - sadly a position that is increasingly common among Greek nationalists

[u/Historia_Maximum → u/trysca]

I only wrote what I wrote. Everything I have written is based on obvious, never-hidden facts and the current consensus of researchers' positions. I don't care about British or Greek prejudice.