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The Byzantine basilica church at Knossos1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 October 2013

W. H. C. Frend  and
David E. Johnston
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Extract

The Hellenistic and Roman city of Knossos occupied a broad plateau extending northward of the Minoan Palace towards the sea. For nearly a mile from the Palace the fields are studded with the debris of occupation. One of the great Roman town houses was partly excavated before the War by Mr. R. W. Hutchinson and the work has been continued by Mr. and Mrs. Michael Gough, now of the British Institute in Ankara. A splendid series of second- to third-century mosaics has been discovered depicting the Dionysiac cult. The city, however, had a Christian community at least as early as about A.D. 170, for in that period Eusebius records the name of a Bishop Pinytus, who earned a reputation for being a zealous moral reformer, and was regarded as an influential figure among correspondents of Bishop Dionysius of Corinth. In the Patristic period Knossos continued to be an important Christian centre, its bishop being present at the Councils of Ephesus, 431, Chalcedon, 451, and Nicaea, 787. The see of Knossos is also mentioned in lists of sees drawn up in the reign of Justinian, and in the eighth century. Between 731 and 787 it seems to have ranked as Protothronos, or second senior bishop. On the Bulgarian episcopal list of 980 Knossos is still recorded among the Cretan bishoprics.

To judge from examples known from North Africa, such as Timgad, Djemila, and Tipasa, the main early Christian centre was likely to be outside the city walls where the cemeteries were located. There would be found the Christian area, and there, too, the earliest centre of worship. At Knossos it seems that a small stream which used to run in an east-westerly direction from the area of Fortetsa, until its course was altered to one slightly farther south when the new hospital was built, marked the boundary between the city and cemetery area.

Type
Research Article
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 57 , November 1962 , pp. 186 - 238
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1962

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References

2 Eusebius, , Historia Ecclesiastica (ed. Lake, Kirsopp) iv. 21 and 23. 7.Google Scholar Discussed by Nautin, P., Lettres et écrivains chrétiens des iie et iiie siècles (Paris, 1961) 20 ff.Google Scholar

Knossos may, of course, have been one of Titus's foundations (Tit. 15).

3 The evidence has been collected by Konidaris, G. I., ‘Αἱ Ἐπισκοπαὶ τῆς Κρήτης μέχρι καὶ τοῦ ι′αἰῶνος,’, Kritika Khronika vii (1953) 462 ff.Google Scholar

4 Ibid. 475.

5 Ibid. 478.

6 Monceaux, P., Timgad chrétien (Paris, 1911) 18 ff.Google Scholar

7 Allais, Y., Djemila (Paris, 1938), plan and pp. 29–30.Google Scholar

8 Gsell, S., ‘Tipasa’, Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire de l'École française à Rome xiv (1894) 294 ff.Google Scholar

9 See, for instance, the arrangement of marble paving in the churches of Byzantine period at Kato Sikyon, excavated by Orlandos, A. K., PAE 1954 (Athens, 1957) 222, fig. 4Google Scholar, and Thebes, , Soteriou, G. A., art. cit., AE 1929, 120.Google Scholar

10 A reasonable supposition is that it was at the east end of the chancel in front of the apse as in other Cretan churches of this period, but this part of the church was too badly ruined for firm conclusions to be arrived at.

11 Cf. for use in Algerian churches, for instance, Gsell, S., Monuments antiques de l'Algérie (Paris, 1901) ii. 139Google Scholar and 188 (Castiglione).

12 There were three main varieties, 13 cm. long with a square head 3·2 mm. broad; 7·5 cm. long, head 3·2 mm. broad; 4 cm. long, head 2 mm. broad.

13 The dimensions of these blocks were: 0·43 × 0·25 m., 0·50 × 0·38 m., 0·50 × 0·24 m. These were placed on end and supported two capstones, above which had been packed earth and rubble 0·30 m. thick, on which the mosaic floor was laid.

14 For instance, the church of Laurentikos Olympos, excavated by Kotzias, N. Kh., PAE 1952, 97Google Scholar, that at Dodona by Evangelidis, D., PAE 1929, 105Google Scholar and 1930, 56, pl. 1, and at Thebes, Soteriou, G. A., AE 1929, 118, pl. 163.Google Scholar

15 For instance, Sabratha, Church 3 (mid-6th-century phase), Archaeologia xcv (1953) 17–18.

16 Kalokyris, K. D., Ergon 1958 (Athens, 1959) 177 ff.Google Scholar, especially fig. 185.

17 Kalokyris, K. D., Kritika Khronika xiii (1959) 26–27.Google Scholar

18 Sample distributions showed 57–58 cubes to each 10-cm. square.

19 Cook, J. M., BSA xlv (1950) 287Google Scholar and pl. 28.

20 Orlandos, A. K., PAE 1954, 136, fig. 8.Google Scholar

21 Kraeling, C. H., Gerasa, City of the Decapolis (New Haven, 1938) 339–40Google Scholar and pl. lxxxiv, a.

22 Published in Clara Rhodos vii (1932–3) 560, fig. 9.

23 Some idea of what patterns may have been used may be gained from the floor of a 6th-century Christian building at Lechaion, near Corinth, illustrated in Ergon 1957 (Athens, 1958) 57 (fig. 59), where similar marble slabs were used.

24 Cf. Isings, C., Roman Glass from Dated Sites (Groningen, 1957), no. 105.Google Scholar I owe this reference to Mrs. G. Weinberg of the American School of Archaeology at Athens. In a Roman cemetery, 5 miles north of Ochride in southern Jugoslavia, glass vessels of completely identical type were found with a fibula of Constantinian type. (In the Narodni Musej, Ochride, catalogued 259 A and 260 A. To be published by their discoverer, Dr. V. Lahtov.)

25 Dimensions: 0·72 × 0·51 m.; 0·43 × 0·50 m.; 0·50 × 0·30 m.; slab: 0·40 × 0·41 m.

26 There was no stain in the loam below the hole which offerings, liquid or otherwise, would have caused. Worshippers may possibly have used sticks to touch the bones of the saint.

27 See Ergon 1955 (Athens, 1956) 109 f., where the tomb is illustrated (111, fig. 106). Also, PAE 1955 (Athens, 1960) pl. 127 b, and p. 328, fig. 1.

28 Eunapius, , Lives of the Philosophers 472 (ed. Wright, W. C., 424)Google Scholar, concerning Egyptian monks.

29 See Sketch Plan of Chersonesos Harbour, no. 16, in Leatham, J. and Hood, S., BSA liii–liv (1958–1959) 266.Google Scholar

30 Orlandos, A., Ergon 1959 (Athens, 1960) 148–53.Google Scholar For the building of churches over the tombs of saints at this period, see in general Grabar, H., Martyrium (1946) i. 438–61.Google Scholar

31 Though the ruined state of this section renders attempts at accurate reconstruction futile, it may be significant that fragments of one slab were found among the rubble at the north end of the screen and of the other at the south end.

32 Kraeling, C. H., Gerasa, pl. 80.Google Scholar

33 Kotzias, N. Kh., PAE 1952 (Athens, 1955) 114, pl. 14.Google Scholar

34 Clara, Rhodos vii (1932–1933) 564, figs. 15Google Scholar and 17.

35 The difference in level between the north and south sides of the apse was 0·85 m.

36 Brusin, G. and Zervatto, B. C., Monumenti paleocristiani di Aquileia e di Grado (Udine, 1957) fig. 53.Google Scholar

37 Allais, Y., Djemila pl. iv.Google Scholar

38 Ward-Perkins, J. B. and Goodchild, R. G., ‘The Christian Antiquities of Tripolitana’, Archaeologia xcv (1953) pl. 5cGoogle Scholar and e.

39 Soteriou, G. A., PAE 1954, 150, pl. 7.Google Scholar

40 Tiles of a similar pattern were used in paving the surround of a large tomb found below floor-level in the Byzantine church (Basilica ‘A’) at Chersonesos (Orlandos, A. K., PAE 1955, 330, fig. 3Google Scholar and pl. 127 a).

41 Dimensions: 0·57×0·89×0·21 m.; 0·33×0·97×0·23 m.; 0·57×0·95×0·19 m.; 0·50×0·93×0·21 m.

42 Crowfoot, G. M. and Harden, D. B., ‘Early Byzantine and later Glass Lamps’, JEA xvii 197–208.Google Scholar

43 Kotzias, N. Kh., PAE 1952, 125, fig. 23.Google Scholar

44 G. A. Soteriou, Basiliké, no. 16, fig. 20.

45 The skeletal remains found in the 1955 season were studied by Dr. J. C. Trevor, Lecturer in Archaeology and Anthropology in the University of Cambridge. But those found subsequently still require detailed identification.

46 Awaiting identification.

47 These could have held supports, and this stone may perhaps have been used as the base for an altar, though it must be emphasized that it was not in position when found.

48 One might draw attention to the excavation of the great cemetery at Qumrân, where the excavators comment that ‘no object was found with male bodies’, and ‘only occasional poor ornaments’ with the female. de Vaux, R.; ‘Fouilles de Khirbet Q'umran’, Revue Biblique lxiii (1956) 572.Google Scholar

49 Dimensions: 0·35 m. thick, 0·72 m. long, 1·25 m. broad

0·29 m. thick, 0·68 m. long, 1·02 m. broad

0·28 m. thick, 0·50 m. long, 1·00 m. broad

0·15 m. thick, 0·25 m. long, 0·58 m. broad

50 This tomb was more in character with the burials in Area B than with those in Area A.

51 To be published. Now in Herakleion Museum.

52 See s.v. ‘Area’ in Dictionnaire d'archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie i, cols. 2787 ff.

52a For a Tunisian example of a church being built over a cemetery in use during the mid-third century, and apparently deliberately orientated so as to follow the line of the graves, see Fendri, Mohammed, Basiliques chrétiennes de la Skhira (Publications de l'Université de Tunis, Archéologie-Histoire, viii (1961) 17–18.Google Scholar M. Fendri remarks that ‘l'absence totale de mobilier funéraire et le choix même de cet emplacement pour y édifier une église plaident en faveur de sépultures chrétiennes’.

53 Gsell, S., ‘Tipasa’, Mélanges de l'École française à Rome xiv (1894) 290 ff.Google Scholar, and Grégoire, M., ‘Sainte Salsa’, Byzantion xii (1937) 213–24.Google Scholar

54 Monceaux, P., Timgad chrétien 37.Google Scholar

55 See above, p. 196.

56 See, for instance, Toynbee, J. M. C. and Perkins, J. Ward, The Shrine of St. Peter (London, 1956), pl. 1.Google Scholar

57 Note, for instance, the local legend that Caiaphas was buried on a spot now crossed by the main Herakleion-Knossos road, just west of the Sanatorium, i.e. within the same cemetery area. See Knossos Survey, no. 23, for position, and Socrates, Hist. Eccl. vii 38.

58 Kalokyris, K. D., Kritika Khronika xiii (1959) 27.Google Scholar

59 Soteriou, G. A., Basiliké nos. 1–3, figs. 2, 3, and 4.Google Scholar The writer is grateful to Professor Soteriou as Curator of the Byzantine Museum at Athens for his permission to use unpublished material and to quote from the reference catalogue of the Museum.

60 I should like to acknowledge with gratitude the assistance received in identifying and classifying this sculpture from Mr. Roger Crowhurst, Student of the British School of Archaeology, Athens.

61 In illustrating this Section I have used some of the drawings made by Gillian and John Youngman, whose work is gratefully acknowledged below. I should also like particularly to thank Mr. John Boardman, who has kindly shown me his excellent comparative material from Chios before publication, and who has given me invaluable advice in the study of late Roman wares generally.

62 Another fragment similar to no. 8 was found in 1960 in the robber trench along the line of the west wall of the tower, and one similar to no. 9 was found in the rubble above the courtyard to the north of the church.

63 Stevenson (1947) 37–38, and pl. 21, nos. 14 and 15.

64 Xyngopoulos (1953) pl. 205, no. ii. A3 (e).

65 The drawings of nos. 6–9 are by Miss Gillian Youngman.

66 Waagé (1948) 58.

67 e.g. Waagé (1948) pl. 4, no. 132K.

68 Waagé (1933) 23, no. 128u.

69 Jones (1950) 182.

70 A sherd of stamped B ware is given in Fig. 13, no. 13, and discussed among the decorated wares.

71 Waagé (1948) 47 ff. and (1933) 281, nos. 36–38, &c., but cf. pl. 10, no. 267.

72 Robinson (1959) pl. 71, no. 350.

73 Waagé (1948) pl. 10, no. 913K.

74 For pottery of this period from Visari, see Kalokyris, K. D., Kritika Khronika xiii (1959) 36, pl. 1A.Google Scholar

75 J. W. Hayes, Student of the British School at Athens, has drawn my attention to similar pottery from the early Christian basilica at Brauron in Attica, dated to mid-6th century (published in PAE 1954, 123–9). This pottery was associated with Late Roman B and C wares, and clearly the type enjoyed a long popularity.

76 i.e. nos. 38, 39, 42, 46, 49, 51, 52, 58, 64, 65, 69 (Figs. 16, 17); 76, 77, 79, 83, 84, 89, 95, 97, 101 (Figs. 18, 19). Body-sherds of identical wares were found with mortar adhering, or actually built into the walls of the church.

77 Jones (1950) 170, 179, 202, &c.

78 Stevenson (1947) 33.

79 Homann-Wedeking (1950), especially 185, fig. 28.

80 Waagé (1948) pl. 11, no. 937.

81 Rice (1958) fig. 22B.

82 Also found among unpublished pottery from Brauron (information from J. W. Hayes).

83 Kritika Khronika xiii (1959) 36, pl. 1A.

84 e.g. Stevenson (1947) pl. 16, no. 29.

85 The exception is the pottery from the hearths in the tower, which was of a characteristic harder, deeper red than the rest.

86 This pottery was drawn by Mrs. D. Blackman, to whom I am very grateful.

87 Excavations at Dura-Europos. Ninth Report, part ii, pls. 47 and 51.

88 I owe these references to Dr. D. B. Harden, Director of the London Museum.

89 For the probability that these small bronzes with monogram of Christ date to Theodosius II rather than to Theodosius I, see Cohen viii 151.