GALATAS - 2001

Galatas. G. Rethemiotakis (ΚΓ’ ΕΠΚΑ) reports on continuing excavation focused in front of the north-west entrance of the palace.

Building 4 was completely excavated. It consists of two small rooms with entrances to the north, where there is a large courtyard with a central hearth. The small quantity of diagnostic pottery gave a Late Minoan IIIA2-B date. The east room contained a large pithos and a chlorite seal. Under the building’s foundations lay part of a paved courtyard and a street which gave access to the north wing of the palace from the west. The street that gave access to the west wing of the palace was found to have a causeway.

Building 3, a large structure of at least 230m2, was completely excavated. The central part dates to Middle Minoan IB. The building was reused and extended in Middle Minoan IIIB-LM IA. The walls of the initial building were strongly built from large superficially worked blocks. Room 2, the door of which was blocked prior to the Neopalatial period, had a plaster floor, small walls around all four sides that may have supported benches and a rectangular construction opposite the entrance. To the right of the entrance was a figurine consisting of a series of conjoined miniature animals in a bundle. In the east were Middle Minoan IB pots of the Kastelli style. Room 3 also had Middle Minoan IB pottery above its paved floor, but a large built ‘kasela’ in its north part contained Neopalatial conical cups and a jug. Corridor 5, paved in the Protopalatial period, was cleared in the Neopalatial and contained a large stone lamp. The excavators suggest that originally, in Middle Minoan IB, corridor 6 was an early version of the kind of balustraded rooms found in some Knossian buildings (as the House of the Chancel Screen). In its Neopalatial phase it was used for storage. Its Late Minoan IB destruction layer contained pithoi, metal finds, a rock crystal dagger pommel and a chlorite seal. The Neopalatial extension on the north, east and west had thinner walls. One wide external entrance was blocked in Late Minoan IB. Other changes in the course of the Neopalatial period include the abandonment of a double entrance between Middle Minoan IIIB and Late Minoan IA and the building of a raised exedra in one room in Late Minoan IA. In room 1 the destruction layer contained utilitarian vessels and a large stirrup jar. In room 4, used for storage in Late Minoan IB, the destruction layer had high quality pots, including jugs, cups, braziers, cooking pots, kadoi, and a rhyton. There were also at least two pithoi, stone vessels, a ceramic potter’s wheel and gold leaves.

Excavations between buildings 2 and 3 revealed a Neopalatial layer, beneath which lay Middle Minoan IB rooms, and beneath those Early Minoan I pottery in the bedrock.