Talk:Minoan civilization/Archive 4

Confusion between Minoan and Eteocretan?
I noticed that there are confusing linkages on Wikipedia between Eteocretan and Minoan. It seems that Eteocretan (written in Greek-like letters) and true Minoan (written earlier in linear script A) is being hopelessly confused. Look it, folks. The business of Minoan history is confusing enough without making it harder for everyone to obtain the information they need. I changed some text under "Language and writing" but it seems that when you type in Minoan into the search field to the left, it will wisk you straight to Eteocretan. This is absolutely nuts. Just not the same thing! --Glengordon01 07:31, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Early in the article, in a section on what the Minoans may have called themselves, reference is made to Homer calling the inhabitants of Crete "eteocretans" (which means simply "people coming from Crete, rooted in Crete") and that those, as Homer knew them, may have been descendants of the Minoans. Partly descendants that is: the Mycenaeans and others had lived in the siland and ruled it for hundreds of years too. But with "#Homer" - historical person or not - we are down in the 8th century, six  hundred years arter the end of the high Minoan age. I really don't see the relevance of bringing in that designation in a section that deals with possible bronze age names for the Minoan people. Strausszek (talk) 22:34, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Minoan Plumbing?
Has anyone looked into adding some information about that to the Minoan civilization page? I heard about it first here : http://www.theplumber.com/crete.html

I've recently watched a show on the History Channel and the pipes were made of clay and were found on the islands of Crete and Thera. Three story houses have been found at the Thera site with cold and heated plumbing. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.64.224.227 (talk) 17:59, 17 March 2011 (UTC) --Royboyjoytoy2 (talk) 15:43, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Politics section
dear god! if we can't reform it, can we delete it until it is rewritten? Novium 07:37, 25 August 2006 (UTC) -- Hmm, when you say "dear god!", could it be the feminist extremism that makes you cringe? But why oh why can you not believe that the Minoans were pie-in-the-sky, peace-loving vegans? :P Perhaps it's the androphobic absolutes like the following that make you sick to your stomach:


 * "Whereas depictions exist of men showing deference to women, not one shows women deferring to men."
 * "Unlike their contemporaries, who possessed obvious “strong-man” male rulers, the Minoans show almost no trace of male rule at all."

Yes, surely not one! No trace at all! We cannot let the males dominate! Oogabooga.

You see, this is why 99% of the human population must be destroyed (oops, did i say that?). Most people are just interested in fluff they read in sci-fi books. Any critical analysis or infusion of, say, ethnological evidence (or lack of) of such societies, well, just throw that out the window. It's those damn males making trouble again. What do we do when, as with some subjects, crackpot authors outnumber serious adults 1400-to-1? The whole goddamn Aegean studies are being screwed by this stupidity and Wikipedia's relativism just isn't going to help us.

So when will it be the "right time" to finally kick the WP:NPOV cult in its ass, strap the loonies to a bed and force-feed medication? Hmm? --Glengordon01 17:28, 25 August 2006 (UTC) -- Okay that was my rant. Now constructivity. I would say that this article is an example of confusing the matrifocal religion and visual symbolisms with the actual everyday life of Minoans. So we need to get rid of those silly man-hating absolutes and start talking about substantial stuff. When I hear "Minoan politics", I daydream about silly things like:


 * Palace hierarchy and economy
 * Development of beaurocratic administration
 * Interrelationship of cities such as Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, etc
 * The trade relationship between Keftiu and other kingdoms (Egypt, Greece, Anatolia)
 * Oh, and of course, man-hating vegans

--Glengordon01 17:41, 25 August 2006 (UTC) -- I think the whole section is rather absurd. I mean really, what could we say if we avoided resorting to sheer fantasy? "Palaces" like knossos may or may not have been palaces. they may or may not have been political or religious in nature. they may or may not have etc etc etc. If we wanted to stick to fact, we'd be left with extremely dry descriptions of the architecture and etc. Basically, we'd have a site report. I'm rambling. What I maen is, I think the politics section is useless because we know so little about the minoans, anything we write on their politics will be little better than historical fiction (in that even the most plausible theories rely on the most ambigious evidence) Novium 18:16, 25 August 2006 (UTC) -- Somewhere in the middle is the truth. So we're both pessimistic. Congratuations, you've joined the dark side with me! :) But I also know that there is some information that we can talk about here. Politics can be both internal and external. So the internal stuff has to be stuff explaining what the palaces are for (centers of commerce and religion most likely). How did the different cities exchange goods or distribute those goods? Labrys as symbol of "divine authority" of the king or chief could be another topic.

I know what you're saying about "historical fiction". It makes me cringe too but in the end, isn't history in one way or another a matter of interpretation? Bite my tongue! The whole goal for me is to find an explanation of history that takes everything into account and leaves no stone unturned. On the topic of Minoans, we're lucky if an author leaves us with a pile of rubble. I guess I'm just gonna have to write my own books which no one will buy to avoid those Original Research baffoons on Wikipedia >:P

The "matriarchal theory" on this article can be explained and then smashed (since ethnologists have never found a provenmatriarchy anywhere in the world). If I recall Marija Gimbutas is a majormost culprit in that regard but I don't think she's the epitome of feminist evil either. I would say there's something to gain from her perspective if handled right. But personally, I'm suspecting that the "Creatrix goddess" is merely the deity that the king marries in a "sacred marriage" to legitimize his authority to rule the peasants. Similar to US politics, hehe.

External politics would be about relationships with known trading partners. We know that Crete was trading across the Eastern Mediterranean and there are Egyptian records talking about their relationship with Keftiu. So there's something there, even if it's not a Minoan-centric perspective. If you can translate the Linear A tablets, be my guest. But even without the Linear A tablets to help we can still find something to talk about without going totally sci-fi. We gotta think like Encyclopedia Britannica, which will be, like, a billion times better than sucky Wikipedia will ever be :P --Glengordon01 01:23, 26 August 2006 (UTC) --

I've cut the politics section, as no one seemed inclined to tackle that beast. If someone wants to rewrite it, or create a new section, or put it back, be my guest. But it really was dragging the article down. Novium 06:52, 6 September 2006 (UTC) -- Yeah, it's an icky situation, I agree. I need to make a safari to the university anyways. I was just there, darnit, I coulda looked that up but I was too busy with the interrelationship of Etruscan and Babylonian myth. Sigh. Average public libraries, even in major cities (or at least Canadian ones) are completely useless when it comes to Minoans, Etruscans or any other people that have been unfortunate enough to be labeled "obscure". Many authors just like to make them into "metaphysical mysteries" so that their latest book becomes a best-seller coffee-table book. Anything connected to Atlantis and tarot cards is an automatic hit at Chapters. >:P --Glengordon01 22:18, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

-- Can we at least have some information about the Minoan government/political system? I have to qrite a report about Minoan government and I came to wikipedia only to find that there was no informnation available at all. I really need this information. --&Mu;79_&Scaron;p&euro;&ccedil;&iacute;&aacute;&int;&iacute;&scaron;&dagger; tell me about it 01:07, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Next time you have to write a report, don't use Wikipedia. It's not a reliable source. --Akhilleus (talk) 02:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Unless you want a report full of wakko Troy in the Fens bollocks. --5telios 12:17, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

-- I also find the now cut politic section too speculative. However most of the facts presented there are missing now and its a shame. My point is, it is interesting stuff (with sources to back the claims). The way the article is read now is that women may have had equal rights. The way the politics section was: the women probably dominated the society. I believe this is a valid point of view. I also believe the article is worse off without it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.255.254.243 (talk) 00:14, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Warfare once again
I moved the following self-referent contention here:
 * "The Minoans had a rich repetoire of weaponry and images with strong martial symbolism and active combat from many of the palatial sites. Academic investigations into this interesting field are changing our perceptions of this important society, but there are people who dogmatically deny the presence of violence in this society to the degree that they silence debate by deleting any mention of this topic in Wikipedia.  As a prehistoric society, the Minoans shared much with the wider prehistoric world they interacted with and it is both unprecedented and contrary to the factual evidence to state that Minoans never engaged in combat or warfare."

The "combat" may be a reading of the boys-boxing frescos. Or it may not actually refer to anythging in particular. The martial symbolism is more than vague: in what medium? one would ask for a start. The "academic investigations" should go into References, for a beginning, with a concise report on the moot areas worked into the article. A remark like "the Minoans shared much with the wider prehistoric world they interacted with..." is no substitute for information. --Wetman 17:14, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Damn. Even I, as opposed as I am to the lovely peaceful flower loving hippy conception of the minoans, find that ridiculous. I'm surprised I didn't notice it. Although I have to say, part of that last sentence is not completely bad. It is true that the minoans were part of a larger bronze age world. And there does seem to be a whiff of the mythical lost utopia about Crete when people go on and on about a perfect, pacifist, matriarchial society in tune with nature's rythmns and blah blah blah. Still. It's from left field, as far as I am concerned. I would have expected to see it on the talk page, oh, a year and a half ago when there was someone strongly pushing the whole utopian thing really hard...but still. Novium 06:49, 7 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree with Novium, though my reading makes me think warfare was peripheral to Minoan palace culture. "Minoans and warfare" is a perfectly valid subheading. The current controversy needs to be encapsulated, with some references and a sense of what the arguments are based on, which is more enlightening than  declarations of conclusions. The section should be a report on current thinking. But not an oration. --Wetman 11:11, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
 * And just because there isn't evidence of a standing army or fortifications reminiscent of a war like society doesn't exclude them from warfare. They were a very sea and navy oriented society and likely relied more on their naval strength for defense as some have said. 96.31.177.52 (talk) 05:52, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

Completely unreadable for a layman
Hate to tell you guys this but however clear the information in this article may be to Minoan expert academics, it is completely unreadable for the majority of laymen who might actually read it on the internet. For instance; "On the Greek mainland, LHIIB began during LMIB," What in the hell does that mean? That is one of many utterly cryptic sentences to be found here. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.230.241.247 (talk) 13:43, 23 April 2007 (UTC).
 * I know this is a bit late, but if you read the chart on the side it lists what all of the abbreviations mean. JanderVK (talk) 15:22, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

Society and culture
This section is "doing my head in". Part of me wants to remove the whole thing and start again, part of me wants to fill it with requests for citations, part of me wants to break it up, perhaps have a separate article on the pax minoica / thalassocracy idea. Does anyone want to suggest a course of action. I have problems with a whole lot of this section but I can never get beyond the first three paragraphs which I find both annoying and difficult to correct without rewriting completely. Ayone want to offer advice or help?--5telios 19:45, 14 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The section should be broken up. Minoan religion should be spun off as a sub-article, and the human sacrifice stuff should be in there; right now, the length of that section is giving undue weight to a fairly minor issue in Minoan studies. The "pax minoica" stuff should also be a sub-article; all of this should be done according to summary style, leaving summaries of the sub-articles in this article. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:23, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Is there any connection between neolithic goddess worship on the island of Malta and the Minoan religion? Has this subject been discussed anywhere? Any info would be appreciated. golden bells, pomegranates, prunes &amp; prisms (talk) 17:31, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * If you're asking whether the two religions are related, the answer is no. Goddess worship is a characteristic of all pre-Indo-European cultures.--Yolgnu (talk) 12:19, 24 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for attempting an answer Yolgnu (are you following my every move on wikipedia?lol) but I'll hold out for a more authoritative answer. Specifically whether or not any studies exist detailing connections (or a lack thereof) between Mediterranean religious cults/practices of the period. golden bells, pomegranates, prunes &amp; prisms (talk) 17:33, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

The Minoan artifacts found at Tall el-Hamaam, Jordan bear mentoning.

There is no discussion whether Minoans were were Indo-Europeans? Semitic or something else? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.250.34.161 (talk • contribs) 06:39, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Citation needed tag added to the paragraph: "Concentration of wealth played a large role in the structure of society. Multiroom constructions were discovered in even the ‘poor’ areas of town, revealing a social equality and even distribution of wealth" I have been unable to find any reference that suggests "social equality" or "even distribution..." after several hours of searching. Stagworks (talk) 00:14, 7 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I also find confusing "Concentration of wealth played a large role in the structure of society" - it's contrary to the second sentence. The second sentence claims a lack of concentration of wealth; the first claims significant concentration of wealth. Allens (talk) 01:53, 7 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I'm new here, so I hesitate to say, that I think the paragraph is more political, in nature, than based in fact. I tagged it for cites, so the author of that paragraph could place them, instead of just removing it. Stagworks (talk) 00:20, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
 * After three weeks of searching, I have not been able to find any reference suggesting this statement. Therefore, unless a citation is given by the author, I will delete this paragraph, on Jan 8th, 2012.Stagworks (talk) 15:44, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Paragraph deleted, this date.Stagworks (talk) 00:02, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

The Perseus Project
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0165

The original by Plato, which is a primary source.

Thus the sentence: "The Greek term Minoites was coined after Evans use" shall be deleted, and the Platonic text shall be included, the same way the Biblical text is included in the article.

Anyone who disagrees, please provide your primary sources.

The sentence (Greek: Minoikos Politismos) shall be reinstalled, anyone who disagrees, provide your sources, and not your original research. --Mimon 14:20, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Mimon, you'd better read the no original research policy once more; Wikipedia relies upon secondary sources, not primary. In other words, we rely upon what modern scholars say about the Minoans, not Plato. If you want to include the notion that Plato and the ancient Greeks thought that the Minoans were a Greek people, you'll need to find support for this idea in modern scholarship, and I doubt you'll be able to do so. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:20, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

You better read what you are writing, because i have not written anywhere that the Minoans were Greek people, or please do show us, where i wrote such a thing.

Instead i added the quote from Plato, the same way that the mythic quote about the labyrinth is added and the quote from the Bible about Kaphtara, why did you delete Plato's quote?

Also i added the term Minos as presented in the Liddell & Scott Greek lexicon, and added the source as well, why did you delete that? Do you have another lexicon that presents the term in another language, maybe?

Why did you delete these 2 sources?

I shall revert back to the sources, unless you find the sources to be wrong or something. I did not add any comments in regards to the Greekness of the Minoans and i did not add any original research as you claim, i did not add anything to put it more simple. I only added sources as they are, nothing more nothing less. --Mimon 15:45, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * You've already made a string of comments about the Greekness of the Minoans above, when you were editing as User:62.103.252.148, and you wrote: "We certainly are unable to write the culture was replaced by another, for the culture is very very similar, so similar that one can say identical for a) In language(decipherement of Linear A using the Linear B), b) In The pottery c) On the accounts of the Greeks that even consider Mino as their godlike ancestor who gave them their laws." You are arguing that Plato (and the Cretans of his time) recognized Minos as a Greek lawgiver and thought the Minoans were Greek. Since you haven't provided any secondary sources (i.e. modern scholarship) that backs up these ideas I'm reverting your edits as original research. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:53, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

In the edit that you just edited: has anybody made in the article any such comments?

I do not see any.

Is there something else, that you would like to address? I ask you why did you delete the sources. I do not see any addition about the Greekness of the Minoans nor by myself not by anybody else, and i still await for the reason that you deleted the Liddel & Scott Lexicon, and Plato's quote? from the sources.

Will you answer the question? Or not? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mimon (talk • contribs).


 * If you didn't include those sources as a continuation of the argument you're making on this talk page, then they're simply irrelevant to the article. However, given that you've already claimed that the Minoans were Greek, it's easier to assume that you're including them to "prove" this fact. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:07, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Lol, given that i have wrote no such thing, you are only making assumptions.

These sources include quotes about Minos the term, since this article is about the Minoan Civilization, these sources, belong here. If you have any sources that cancel my sources, please provide them. And i hardly believe that you are in the position to decide what belongs and what does not belong in this article. The same way that the Biblical quote is there and the quote about the mythic labyrinth, the same way Plato's quote belongs in this article. Also the definition of the term Minos certainly belongs in the Minoan article for that is its definition, if you disagrre with the definition as provided by the sourced Liddell & Scott lexicon, then please provide another lexicon about the term Minos.--Mimon 16:16, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Are you saying you didn't contribute as User:62.103.252.148? I find that very unlikely. I also don't see any "Biblical quote"; perhaps you can explain what you're referring to. At any rate, since we have no evidence for what the Minoans called themselves, and no evidence that they were Greeks, this speculation about the meaning and history of "Minos" and related terms is not relevant to this article; it may belong in Minos. I'm taking it out again; since you will no doubt disagree with this, let me recommend that instead of reverting back to your edit, you either A) find some modern scholarship that supports your arguments or B) get some input from other editors. Please note that other people have participated in the discussion on this talk page, and so far no one's agreed with your position. Also, you might want to make yourself familiar with the three-revert rule, if you haven't already. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:44, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

What the above user said or did is completely irrelevant, also your continuing assumptions are completely irrelevant. I added quotes, that are sourced, and i added no comments and no original research of any sort.

These quotes belong in here whether you like it or not. I will add them on the Minos article and i will also add them in here for they are relative.

The same way this text belongs here:

"The term "Minoan" was coined by the British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans taking the name of the mythic "king" Minos. Minos was associated in myth with the labyrinth, which Evans identified as the site at Knossos. It is not known whether "Minos" was a personal name or a title. What the Minoans called themselves is unknown, although the Egyptian place name "Keftiu" (*kaftāw) and the Semitic "Kaftor" or "Caphtor" and "Kaptara" in the Mari archives apparently refers to the island of Crete. In the Odyssey which was composed after the destruction of the Minoan civilization, Homer calls the natives of Crete Eteocretans meaning, 'true Cretans'."

The same way the definition of the term Minoan and Plato's reference belong in here.

Your rejection shows that you have an ulterior motive of deleting anything that gives any relation to the Greeks. That is your problem, Wikipedia does not belong to you, dear Sir, nor can you decide what is relevant or not, especially without offering any reason.

The quotes belong here whether you like it or not. Or you can always state your reason for deleting them, if you keep on talking about the above user and his ulterior motives you simply prove your inability to address a very simple question.

Why do you delete sourced quotes that are relevant to the article? WHY?--Mimon 17:22, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Ok, so you're denying that you contributed as User:62.103.252.148, even though your account was created on June 16 and you're continuing the IP's arguments. Regardless of what you say, it's quite clear that you edited as that IP.


 * As I've already explained, the material you want to include is irrelevant to the article. Bear in mind that the overwhelming scholarly consensus is that the Minoans were not Greeks, we don't know what language they spoke, and we don't know what they called themselves. Nevertheless, you insist that the article start "The Minoan Civilization (Greek:: Μίνως)", as if "Μίνως" was the native language term for the Minoan civilization. You further insist on including a reference to Plato's Laws, in which the origin of the 5th century BC legal system on Crete is traced back to Minos. Apparently, you feel this reference is relevant because this shows that Cretan (i.e. Greek) laws can be traced back to Minoan society. Therefore (you apparently think), Minoans are Greeks. As I've already said many times, this is your interpretation of Plato (a primary source), and unless you can demonstrate that your opinion is shared by reputable scholarship, this is obvious original research, and cannot be included in the article. So please stop complaining that I haven't explained myself, I have, several times. --Akhilleus (talk) 20:48, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Akilleus is correct here: Plato (who flourished in the 5th century BC) is not a reliable source for the racial make-up and/or language of a people that lived over a thousand years before his time.  semper fictilis 21:11, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

The reliability of Plato is another subject which is completely irrelevant. What is relevant is why should not his reference be added in the article? Why not? Is it relevant or is it not? Yes it is.

Also why does Akhilleus delete the term Minos which is sourced from the Liddell Scott lexicon?

Where exactly is Akhilleus correct?

Also Akhilleus, do not continue to make assumptions, because they are exactly that assumptions, and nothing else.

Will you offer a valid reason as to why you delete the references? Or will you keep assuming? --Mimon 21:25, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * What you are trying to insert is incorrect. Modern archaeologists, historians, and linguists are agreed that Minoans were not Greek.  They don't know quite what they were.  But no one believes they are Greek.  semper fictilis 21:37, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

What am trying to insert is straight up lifted from the perseus project, a very valid, and scholarly source. I have not written anywhere that the Minoans were Greeks, nowhere, so i do not see why you keep on accusing of me doing so. What i am trying to insert is valid sources, scholarly material. The Greekness of the Minoans is another subject. The subject here is why should referenced scholarly sources should not be added? Why? --Mimon 21:44, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Since, none of the individuals that refute my sources have offered any valid reason as to why they are doing so, thus the material i simply cited will be added as they were before. If you find a reason that they should not, please provide it. Regards.--Mimon 22:18, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Mimon, the reason has been explained to you; you are simply unwilling to accept the explanation. If you revert back to your version you'll be going against a consensus of editors and you'll be violating the three revert-rule, as well as Wikipedia's prohibition on original research. If for some reason you haven't read the no original research policy, please do so now. If you revert again, you may be blocked from editing. --Akhilleus (talk) 22:23, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

What is the reason, tell us. You have not said anything. Why do you delete sources? WHY? This is not original research, and if it is, quote the passage that makes it be. I have not added any points as you claim and accuse me of, i have only cited sources, and you delete them without offering any reason as to why you do so. Say the reason.--Mimon 22:31, 16 June 2007 (UTC)


 * This is like hitting my head against a brick wall. Do you understand the difference between a primary and secondary source? Do you understand that when you cite Plato, you're citing a primary source?
 * At any rate, please note that you've been reported for your 3RR violation: Administrators%27_noticeboard/3RR. If you self-revert (i.e., go back to this revision, you will not be in violation of the 3RR, so consider reverting your last edit. --Akhilleus (talk) 22:40, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

The en occurred during LMIA (and LHI)
The en links to a disambiguation page. Which of the pages is actually meant?Gakrivas 18:57, 6 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Good question. And what is LHI? the terms LMI, etc. is explained, but LH? Brando130 16:10, 21 September 2007 (UTC)


 * It's Late Helladic I--Helladic is the dating system used for the Bronze Age on the Greek mainland. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:13, 21 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I think it must be an old vandalism that no one has caught. Most likely, the "en" was probably the Thera eruption, I would imagine...but I'm not changing it in case I am wrong. :) 70.20.228.140 (talk) 06:28, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Bull Leaping
Does anyone else think the bull-leaping section is a little excessive? It seems to me to have fallen prey to the usual flights of fancy that seems to effect people wherever the Minoans are concerned. I mean, the pictures are kind of vague, and while there has been a lot of interpretation of them, a lot of it seems to be mostly unsubstantiated (due to the lack of evidence, etc). For example, I remember a discussion in a seminar on bull leaping that bulls do not toss their heads up like the article assumes they do (the placing of hands on the sacred horns to be vaulted up etc etc etc). Any thoughts? Novium (talk) 01:29, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Image:AncientPhonecian.jpg
hey guys, this image clearly represents a Minoan woman, it was shot at Akrotiri, why then is it linked to Phoenicia? need expert opinion if anyone can help. ;) Eli  +  20:46, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Because the people who researched and published the book "Phoenicians: Lebanon's Epic Heritage" disagree with your controversial opinion to the extend that they feature it on the front cover of their book. That is why it is linked to Phoenicia. ;} - Gennarous (talk) 22:05, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh. Because a New Age writer of self-published books (the only books published by his publisher are his) says so we should believe him? See the amazon.com review that says "On the cover of this book is a detail from one of the frescoes found on the Greek, Aegean island of Thera (Santorini). This site was destroyed by a volcanic eruption in 1623 BC. It is not "Phoenician", or Lebanese!
 * On Thera, scenes/decorations depicted on wall frescoes are replicated on the daggers which have been found in the shaft graves of the Greek mainland city of Mycenae. Indeed, the same type of dagger has been found on Thera. Ships depicted on one of the frescoes on Thera are identical to ships depicted on signet rings, as per examples from graves on the Greek mainland site of Tyrins. Boar's tusk helmets depicted on another fresco at Thera are attested to on the entire Greek mainland as well as on Krete and are described in great detail as being worn by the Greeks besieging Troy in Homer's Iliad. A lady depicted on an adjacent fresco to the one pictured on the cover wears ear rings identical to those which are found in another of the shaft graves at Mycenae. The writing of Mycenaeans, known as "Linear B", was translated in 1954 by the Englishman Michael Ventris: it is Greek & dates to the 15th century BC. How do Mycenaean/Greek motifs come to be used as illustrating the world of Lebanese/Phoenicians? This book is propaganda. You don't have to go beyond the front cover to realise this.
 * The book itself is not a scholarly publication. --Doug Weller (talk) 08:50, 2 May 2008 (UTC)


 * thank you Doug Eli  +  17:29, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Cannibalism
Evidence of cannibalism in the Minoan civilization should be mentioned. Badagnani (talk) 08:07, 15 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Why? What sources are there? --Akhilleus (talk) 18:26, 15 May 2008 (UTC)


 * There's a show on PBS called Secrets of the Dead which talked about the demise of the Minoans. They mention that Human remains were ritually chopped up and scraped in a manner that is in accordance with cannibalism.

http://projectsx.dartmouth.edu/history/bronze_age/lessons/les/15.html

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/?p=61

http://books.google.com/books?id=rg4rTjo0OCQC&pg=PA93&lpg=PA93&dq=cannibalism+knossos&source=web&ots=XBurQG0rZ_&sig=6TpC7LfLmhbZ7UWPpf5q8Jx6AFg&hl=en#PPA93,M1

(The book source says the Minoans were destroyed by the Mycenaeans, dispite plenty of evidence that the Minoans were already decimated by a tsunami. It's a glorified travel guide, so have your grain of salt handy.)72.78.23.7 (talk) 03:36, 16 May 2008 (UTC)


 * There should already be a bit in there about human sacrifice and cannibalism, mostly based off site reports. Well, that and the national geographic article about a site (which the excavators never bothered to write up and publish). grrr. Novium (talk) 07:19, 17 May 2008 (UTC)


 * "Grr" indeed. Any and all of the reports of human sacrifice seem highly dubious and have nothing to substantiate them. That doesn't mean that it isn't a valid discussion topic, but I'd hardly call the very limited interpretation that exists presently as evidence for human sacrifice, let-alone cannibalism. As far as I'm aware, cannibalism is not under any serious academic discussion Dune Sherban (talk) 23:35, 22 August 2008 (UTC).

there is a history of perfectly serious academic discussion regarding human sacrifice in Minoan civilization. The source given above is certainly quotable. It is correct, as stated in the book, that this topic was hotly debated in the 1980s to 1990s (with inconclusive results, I might add). We can try to unearth the primary publications, but just quoting the secondary source is sufficient to establish the existence of this debate. --dab (𒁳) 08:07, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

dab is correct. it should also be mentioned that the various evidence for human sacrifice (eg cut-marks on bones) are frequently interpreted as simple burial or re-burial rituals. 85.72.94.239 (talk) 04:49, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
 * The topic has been discussed by several serious and respected scholars for pre-classical and classical Greece too (Walter Burkert, for instance)  and of course that's even more controversial because those are the most canonic and foundatory ages of Western civilization. There are no ancient texts that clearly mention human sacrifice in Greece, but some that suggest that it may have occurred in closed cults or as a survival in extreme circumstances. Strausszek (talk) 21:42, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Anemospilia gives a great summary of the extremely compelling evidence for Minoan human sacrifice at the site. I believe most academics now accept this interpretation. RE: cannibalism? I haven't read anything that seemed irrefutable. I'm interested in primary sources, if someone has found compelling evidence. k. da-ma-te (talk) 02:11, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Minoan History Link Suggestion
Lost History-The Search for Minoan CannibalismTokarski21 (talk) 15:38, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Restoration
Surely there should be at least some reference to the 'restoration' of Minoan fresco's and architecture by Evans? It makes me wince to see the images presented on the page as truly representative of Minoan art without even a qualifying Restored Fresco. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.234.144.69 (talk) 10:12, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Seems reasonable to me. Novium (talk) 23:11, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Figures
The first paragraph under "sculptures and figures" suggests that most clay figurines were votive deposits, including those intended for "kings". Seeing as there is no textual evidence in Crete, at least before Mycenaean dominion, to suggest a monarchy (of whatever form), the use of kings should be seen as highly controversial? Dune Sherban (talk) 11:54, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

The Minoan language
Through the available corpus written in Linear A, which is much larger than Proto-Canaanite and Proto-Sinaitic for instance, it has been possible to check the frequencies of signs and to complete their previous definition through the GORILA (Recueil des Inscriptions en Linéaire A). For the reading of the signs, see La Marle's work about Linear A Linear_A.

The language which is read then is clearly an Indo-Iranian one. The grammatical structure is very close to ancien Indo-Iranian types, particularly Vedic Sanskrit and Old Persian. The structure of the phonemes (more than 5 vowels) can't be a Semitic one. The frequencies of the most useful syllables are very different between Linear A and Linear B and can't suggest a possibility for a Greek language. Nominal cases are distinct from Anatolian ones. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.23.178.54 (talk) 11:11, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

"Minoo" is another old persian word for "Paradise" (which is an old persian word too)62.178.18.53 (talk) 20:58, 4 June 2009 (UTC)


 * it's mostly just administrative records though, not much of interest, maybe we find something of interest in them when they're finally decipherable, but for now it just looks like tallies of different goods. Hpelgrift (talk) 00:46, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Some material has been copied directly from a website without source
Hi, this is my very first post in wikipedia, so I apologize in advance if I'm doing anything wrong!

I noticed that the editors put a "need citation here" on the first paragraph about Minoan art. I googled that exact phrase, and got this link:

http://dic.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/45269

I found out that that website says EXACTLY the same thing. Now we have no proof of which came first, but I'm guessing this website wrote it first. I'm sorry I don't know how to cite sources on wikipedia, maybe someone could do that for me?

LeoHolt (talk) 19:09, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

The Secret of the Snake Woman
About a year ago, I watched a documentary on the Minoan people called "The Secret of the Snake Woman," and from it I learned that at least one of the goddess figurines has a codpiece, which is an item only found on male statues - this statue was discovered to be a fake. In fact, the reconstructed statue shown at the end of the program was of a male deity with an Egyptian facial cast, suggesting strongly to me that either the Minoans were having their idol statues made in Egypt, or that ancient Egyptians were actually living in Minoa itself. I believe the documentary appeared on either the Canadian History or the Discovery Channel, but I cant quite remember which, because many of their programs are on the same topics. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.246.162.137 (talk) 02:56, 23 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Amazing how years of dedicated study by a professional historian can be reduced to a 50 minute video by the History Channel. Always the latest "astounding" finds. Good entertainment is not equivalent to good scholarship. In fact, the opposite. Piano non troppo (talk) 18:48, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

A question on information, and links that people can use to edit the Minoans article
This article isn't as well written as it can be. I have in fact found many websites that you could call secondary sources that we can both use as I'm trying to write a report on the Minoans myself. I have in fact used information from Wikipedia. That information is as follows:
 * 1) Minoans were traders, and their cultural contacts reached far beyond the island of Crete — to Old Kingdom Egypt, to copper-bearing Cyprus and the Syrian coasts beyond, and to Anatolia. Minoan techniques and styles in ceramics provided models, of fluctuating influence, for Helladic Greece. In addition to the familiar example of Thera, Minoan "colonies" can be found first of all at Kastri on Cythera, an island close to the Greek mainland that came under Minoan influence in the mid-third millennium BC and remained Minoan in culture for a thousand years, until Mycenaean occupation in the thirteenth century.
 * 2) Objects of Minoan manufacture suggest there was a network of trade with mainland Greece (notably Mycenae), Cyprus, Syria, Anatolia, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and westward as far as the coast of Spain.
 * 3) The Minoans greatly influenced the Mycenaean Greeks; the early Greek writing system Linear B, for example, was an adapted version of Minoan Linear A.
 * 4) The Minoan religion focused on female deities, with females officiating. The statues of priestesses in Minoan culture and frescoes showing men and women participating in the same sports such as bull-leaping, lead some archaeologists to believe that men and women held equal social status. Inheritance is thought to have been matrilineal. The frescoes include many depictions of people, with the genders distinguished by colour: the men's skin is reddish-brown, the women's white.
 * 5) Concentration of wealth played a large role in the structure of society. Multiroom constructions were discovered in even the ‘poor’ areas of town, revealing a social equality and even distribution of wealth. Minoan artwork reveals that equality existed among genders as well. Evidence includes frescos that depict women participating with men in recreational sporting events. The absence of a powerful warrior class meant that women and men were placed on an even playing field.

Is there any problem with using this information?

OK, going back to what I said before, if you want online secondary sources, try these: http://www.dilos.com/location/13406 http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A765146 http://wsu.edu/~dee/MINOA/HISTORY.htm (quite academic) http://minoan.com http://www.historyforfids.org/learn/greeks/history/minoans.htm http://www.ahistoryofgreece.com/bronzeage.htm http://www.mlahanas.de/Greeks/History/Minoans.html http://www.localhistories.org/minoan.html http://greece.mrdonn.org/minoans.html http://www.ancient-greece.org/history/minoan.html http://www.ancient-greece.org/culture/minoan-cult.html http://www.ancient-greece.org/architecture/minoan-archi.html And finally: http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/i-m/minoans01.html

There's also Encarta, Britannica and any other general history sites like that last one. That's 13 websites, some of them are easier to understand than others, but ALL of them are secondary sources and ALL of them are worth reading. Perhaps these will help you make the Minoans article better. At least you won't have as many excuses.114.73.164.23 (talk) 11:47, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Sinclair Hood
Hood is used for a vital part of the article. Given that he wrote that 40 years ago, I think we need to see what the current literature says. Dougweller (talk) 10:59, 27 January 2010 (UTC) ''

History unsatisfying
I am not satisfied with the section on history. It is confusing, because it overuses the abbreviations (e.g. "A short time after the LMIB/LMII catastrophe"), and it does not tell much about how the Minoan culture developed. A good book written by experts explains this in a much better fashion. Perhaps Wikipedia is here being too prudent: it does not want to state interpretations which may not be correct. But then why are good books and experts able to state them? Tropical wind (talk) 07:26, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Two Thera eruptions
There were possibly two Thera eruptions, one around 1650 (with unclear consequences; we do not if this was the natural catastrophe which destroyed the palaces) and another around 1450 (which may have been the catastrophe which led to the Minoans' downfall). Previously, this article spoke only about 1 eruption; in light of this, I have rewritten it to mention both. Tropical wind (talk) 08:11, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Matriarchal religion =/= petticoat government
Lorynote, I have reverted your latest edit. If you wish to assert that Minoan Crete was a matriarchal society, you need to find sources that talk about structures in decision making, inheritance and ownership of property, status of women in marriage etc etc. Your argument that having goddesses means that the society was dominated by women is OR without sources that directly support it. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:22, 28 November 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. It is a fact that the Minoans have been used as a quarry by the 1970s Goddess movement, but that doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the Minoans themselves any more than the Cimmerians have got to do with Conan the Cimmerian. --dab (𒁳) 11:04, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Quite. Gimbutas rides again. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 11:36, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Gimbutas is very unhappily associated with 1970s crackpot feminism. It's her own fault, but nevertheless the work she did in her early career, pre-1974, is very good. She then became the figurehead of feminism and got carried away, but in spite of her obvious ideological agenda, her work is still valid scholarship, in stark contrast to the stream-of-consciousness, facts-are-for-suckers nonsense put out by her followers. --dab (𒁳) 12:14, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

Copyright violation
The sections on painting, sculpture and technology have been blanked as a copyright problem, since they were evidently pasted in this 2008 edit from and. It is highly unlikely that infringement was reversed. The content was entered on 18 August 2008. The next change which remains,, was entered four days later and altered the article away from the source.

Clean material has been added since the copyvio, but it will need to be evaluated before being restored to insure that nothing derivative of the original remains. Any information used from that source needs to be completely and thoroughly rewritten.

I have blanked the section to permit interested contributors an opportunity to address the issue before an administrator closes the listing. The article is in no danger of being deleted, but the blanked content may be if no usable rewrite is proposed. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:35, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Religion - matriarchy?
"Third, it is difficult to make sense of characteristic modes of rule and domination that depend on the martial or even the prominently economic. That only leaves, for the interpreter, the vague areas of "religion" and "ritual*' to pigeonhole Minoan Crete to conventional accounts of hierarchical and stratificatory social systems.27 If therefore a theistic nomenclature for the isle continues to be insisted upon, perhaps the least problematic would be: an adorant theacentric henotheism tilting toward feminine polytheism." But given the unsettled status of whether the Minoans even made use of anthropomorphic allusions to deities, a less controversial point of departure seems warranted. "Nature'*—in fact the more relevant term would be the Hellenic phusis rather than the Latin natura—seems ubiquitous in all the available representations." Page 6, Unis Vers Cythere: Aesthetic-Political Investigations in Polis Thought and the Artful Firm  by Josef Chytry Peter Lang Pub Inc; 15 Nov 2009 ISBN-13: 978-1433107320 Dougweller (talk) 11:54, 1 December 2010 (UTC)


 * We need a Minoan religion article. Such an article will certainly have a "Matriarchy theory" section, but the gist of such a section will invariably be that this stuff is mostly projection.


 * The main part of the "Minoan religion" article, by contrast, will need to be based on serious academic literature, written by specialists on the Aegean Bronze Age.


 * You do not do any prehistoric culture a favour in casting it in terms of your own ideology. This happens to the Celts and the Minoans all the time, just because they are almost entirely prehistoric and therefore "shrouded in mystery". --dab (𒁳) 12:18, 1 December 2010 (UTC)


 * You are referring to Lorynote I hope? Dougweller (talk) 12:20, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * this was intended as the impersonal you. Nobody does any prehistoric culture a favour by taking it out of its own context. --dab (𒁳) 19:10, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Sadly it's all too frequently done. Dougweller (talk) 19:29, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

Reception
As may be seen from the above there is much popular speculation of what the Minoans might have been. A section to this article on the reception of the little we know about the Minoans into popular culture might help Wikipedia users distinguish between what is supported by the current state of knowledge and what ventures into the realms of fiction. Everybody got to be somewhere! (talk) 16:37, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Layout and other
I notice the initial layout has gotten out of hand. This happens often by the accumulation of those boxes. They have gotten more attractive than they used to be. I remember a few years ago some of the administrators decried the use of the boxes as crowding out other possible layouts. For a while an effort was made to stop them, but they became so attractive and comprehensive that the administrators gave up their campaign. But, there are a few points to remember. For many boxes a footer or bottom banner alternative exists. I did one myself for the Bronze Age. In our article here we have a Greek box and a Greek footer, which is redundant. I propose to add the Bronze Age footer and take out those two thin side boxes. It is too crowded at the top. What I would like to do is put the chronological table under the map of Crete. Thus the reader can view right at the top a simple summary of the main sites and the main chronology.

I notice that for an article so short there is a superabundance of references. Now I see that much material was in fact removed as being plagiarism. We don't need that. I think maybe I will make a back-burner effort on this one to tidy it up a bit and make sure it is complete and the refs are right. Slow work, nothing to get excited about. I don't plan to collide with anyone. Thanks for your police work on this article; it is after all more in the public eye.Dave (talk) 08:16, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Oxford bibliographies ref
This is not a ref to the material annotated. It appears to be inserted advertising. However, it is of a scholarly nature so I am moving it to external links. I think it is a propos here to point out the difference between hard sell and soft sell. In soft sell the product sells itself. I suppose most everyone has had their shot at selling door-to-door, which is the hard sell, and few either last long or like it. I doubt if there is anything more offensive on this side of the law. There is a large degree of inadvetertent soft sell in WP and this attracts donation money I am sure. Sometimes the soft sellers gang up on editors who oppose the soft sell. I really find that most unethical. However in the case of hard sellers there is no question; it offends everyone. Please don't do it. Whenever I see it here I am just taking it out and I doubt if there will be any legitimate resistance. Why don't you learn how to sell soft?Dave (talk) 11:04, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Copyrights and plagiarism
This is a major issue, and this section continues the discussion given above.

The problem is, how to evaluate identical material found on the Internet. Most Internet sites are quite shameless about copying from Wikipedia word-for-word. In fact it is disgusting. There ought to be a law, but there isn't. Now, when you see something that obviously is identical, how are you to evaluate it? I'm not providing an answer here, only telling you what I am doing and plan to do unless otherwise informed. Because, as a matter of fact, just about the entire article duplicates material found on the Internet or vice versa, and we have to determine which. The copryright mark does not help a bit. I have seen whole book chapters stolen from someone else and copyrighted under the thief's copyright. Anyone can copyright anything at any time. Whether that would stand up in court is another question but most people are not going to see the inside of a court about it any time soon. We know justice is blind, but she is also accessible only through a slot machine. You put your coins in, kerchink, kerchnik, kerchink. When the weight becomes heavy enough the little light goes on and you may ask the queen of justice your question for the length of time you have purchased. Quantus furor sit futurus, quando iudex est venturus, but for the moment that is neither here nor there.

You can compare versions if you wish. If the other fellow has an earlier date then we're the copiers. From where I sit you'd be spending your whole WP time doing only that. I just make an ad hoc judgement. Unless the site looks legitimate, such as a university site, or a scientific site, I suppose they are copying from WP and leave it alone. If the writing is too good for WP I run an Internet check with Google Books Google in general on .pdf files. Lately another problem has cropped up. Google has taken to binding up WP articles and selling them as their own. So far this is mainly mobilereference. You then pay Google for the WP articles. What can WP say? None of their stuff is copyrighted. At first this plagiarism was mitigated by the identification of WP as a source by Google. Now I see they are stopping that identification. This entire article appears in Google mobilereference. Why should Google not just take WP material as its own and say not a word about it? It isn't against the law. So now, WP is in printed books. Just how are you to tell the difference? I don't know. At the moment I am assuming that any similarity to WP articles and Google mobilereference results from appropriation by Google. I cannot call it theft, as it is not against the law.I would say, if you see something that is the same, you have to determine who is likely to have copied from whom. Unless there is a published author on the Google book, I think they have to be discounted as anyone you cpuld copy from, as they are the main copiers. But, unless there is some indication (I won't say evidence), that the WP editor copied, I don;t think we can just go around deleting WP articles. That's an interesting scenario. First WP writes an article. Then Google publishes it. Then Google turns around and forces WP to remove it. They in fact steal and copyright someone else's work as their own. Well, good luck on this difficult issue. I certainly am very unsure that any of the material removed was in fact plagiarized. Well, we do the best we can.Dave (talk) 13:15, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

It looks like people had this discussion about plagiarism six years ago. Six years later, there are still paragraphs in this article plagiarized and—what is remarkable—the plagiarized paragraphs attempt to hide the plagiarism by citing sources that are irrelevant or uncheckable.

Consider the paragraph beginning "During LMIIIA (1400–1350 BC), Amenhotep III noted k-f-t-w (Kaftor)": that is lifted nearly word for word from R. Moritt, The Stones that Speak (Newcastle upon Tyne, 2010), 3. Someone has added citations to Kozloff 2012, which doesn't even discuss the matter at hand in the sentence, and to a book entitled Minos, without even bothering to check who the author is—obviously the person adding the citation didn't have the book at hand, and it's not available for browsing through Google books. The book is not even entitled Minos: that's the title of the journal to which the book, whose real title is  A-na-qo-ta: Studies Presented to J. T. Killen, was a supplement. It's an edited book, so the citation needs to include the chapter author and title — but the citation is absolutely bogus as it stands, and the whole paragraph is obviously lifted from Moritt 2010. 2601:602:900:1021:8A8:E0FB:B9A2:8887 (talk) 20:03, 10 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Kozloff does discuss the matter - sentence beginning "In fact, the names ...". But the funny thing is that the WP para can be seen as far back as 2007, but, as you say Moritt (which is certainly uncomfortably similar) was only published in 2010.... Hmmm! Johnbod (talk) 01:35, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

The New York Times Free article
Even as I was writing the above the NY Times removed one of the free articles used as a ref. That is the problem with giving url's here. So, I'm taking the url out. The other article is still for free. The only thing being referenced was the date people sailed to Crete. So, since the article is not longer being offered as a free read, I'm removing that ref. You called it, NY Times. Now you don't get the free advertising. Give nothing, get nothing. Ciao.Dave (talk) 13:30, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Coining of Minoan
The story of the coining of Minoan is a very pleasant little fairy tale. It also matches one of the Google plagiarisms word for word. It's a good thing I don't have to decide about it. I can just relieve my mind, because the whole thing is made up. The source given is the Oxford Classical Dictionary. Unfortunately it is not previewable. Woops! A trip to the library for me? Nope. Whatever it says, it isn't what we say it says. I used to wonder why editors put in stuff that was made up, and why I had to fight so hard to change it. Now I know, these lies are profitable when sold on the Internet. I should have known. Truth and justice, you never fight for that. Money - well, you would kill and die for that, and for small amounts, too. Deja vue. I'm reminded of the film where some fighting companions for the US army in WWII go off on their own to knock over a bank behind the lines, making common cause with the German tank commander. Not really that far-fetched, hey? It seems as though I can just shut up and play along, joining in the great Internet fantasy - people love to hear a good story, and will pay a lot of money for it - or I can try to fix this piece of junk. I remember, there was such infighting over this thing! Well, I wouldn't really want to work on the fantasy. I can try to write fiction for that. Most people can't tell the difference anyway. Is there a difference? How do we know what we know if we know it? Do we know? What I think I will do is, try to improve this very slowly. That's all I got time for. If you need this information for research, better continue to look it up independently.Dave (talk) 17:39, 22 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Nice rant. Totally inappropriate for Wiki Talk Pages.  Did you have some sort of Reliable Source to discuss that disputes what all other historical sources say? 18:22, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

No article about Stylianos Alexiou in English Wikipedia
but in German Wiki, we see : http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stylianos_Alexiou Böri (talk) 13:21, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
 * That has been remedied with article Stylianos Alexiou. --Jpbrenna (talk) 15:59, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

DNA indicates Minoans indigenous
. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.116.44.150 (talk) 04:29, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Linguistic and genetic affiliation
I removed the following two paragraphs in the Overview section:
 * Some scholars have argued that the Minoan people were not Indo-European. Hermann Bengtson suggested in 2002 that they were related to the pre-Greek dwellers of the Greek mainland and Western Anatolia, the so-called Pelasgians.[7] However, DNA testing of Minoan skeletons has shown that the Minoans were, in fact, European.[8]


 * A recent genetic study of mtDNA compared Minoans with ancient and modern European populations, and showed the greatest similarity with modern Greeks and modern inhabitants of Crete.[9]

This is misleading and a bit confused. Indo-European is a language family, not a genetic or racial grouping. People describing the language of Linear A or the Eteocretan inscriptions as unrelated to other known languages are not claiming that the Minoans weren't European. There are other European languages (eg. Basque, Finnish, Hungarian) that aren't part of the Indo-European language group. That DNA samples obtained from human remains at a Minoan archeological site are similar to those of modern Cretans has little bearing on the issue of whether the language of Linear A is an isolate, connected to a proposed Tyrrhenian language family including other ancient languages spoken in southern Europe, or related to ancient Indo-European languages spoken in Anatolia.

The article already has a section on "Population genetics studies" which references the same Nature article, but avoids confusing the issues of linguistic and genetic relationships. A discussion of possible linguistic affiliations of Linear A (and Eteocretan) can go in the "Language and writing" section. This doesn't need to be in the "Overview" section. Naŋar (talk) 16:08, 12 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Excellent job,  well  written, and  much clearer.71.99.234.66 (talk) 18:23, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

Mysterious Minoans Were European, DNA Finds
Mysterious Minoans Were European, DNA Finds. Komitsuki (talk) 10:05, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Professor George Stamatoyannopoulos of Washington University, who authored and published the research actually stated quite clearly in his writing that the Minoans are not exactly like the Europeans or even the DNA sequence is only about one-third alike, thus more of a combination of Europeans and Iranians is more of a closer resemblence to who they truly were and how they actually looked like. Edhhan87 (talk) 17:27, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

Bronze saws
The first paragraph under architecture states that the Minoans cut the stone for their roads with bronze swords. Is that even possible? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.56.59.170 (talk) 23:11, 7 November 2013 (UTC)