Sanctuary Rhyton

I came across this interesting artefact the other day. It's the so called "Sanctuary Rhyton" from Zakros. It is dated to the Late Bronze Age, 1550-1500 BC.

The rhyton was discovered in the palace of Zakros, the most isolated of all the Minoan Palaces.

It is located on the east coast of Crete, south of Palaikastro. Its position, in a green valley surrounded by violet mountains, shelters it from the dangerously strong north winds that pass Cape Sidero on the northeast tip of Crete. It was the last of the major palaces to be discovered and is smaller than the other three at Knossos, Malia and Phaistos. Like the other three palaces, Zakros palace was also destroyed at the end of the third phase of the Neo-palatial period by "a sudden catastrophe" followed by fire...

The "Sanctuary Rhyton" is an amazing artefact. It is made of chlorite. The neck and rim retain traces of gilding, and very likely the entire vessel was gilded to give an impression of solid gold. It now exists, however, in contrasting sections of dark green and light brown, possibly the result of the broken pieces being burnt at different temperatures or of chemical reactions to the combustion fumes of whatever was burning nearby.

A rhyton decorated with what has traditionally been seen as a representation of a so called "Peak Sanctuary". Peak sanctuaries are widespread throughout the island of Crete and are, as their name suggests, located on mountain peaks. Like there is one on top of the this peak at Modi in eastern Crete.

Most scholars agree that peak sanctuaries were used for religious rites. In all of them, human and animal clay figurines have been found, and evidence of sacrifice is often present. There is some evidence that peak sanctuaries were visited seasonally. Peak Sanctuaries were a phenomenon dating from the Middle Minoan I period.

Now, here is the whole picture of the Peak Sanctuary from the Sanctuary Rhyton rolled out flat:

Most researchers assume that the rhyton depicts actual Minoan mountain peak sanctuary.

Van Leuven sees a resemblance to the Juktas sanctuary as seen from the east...

Lembessi and Muhly and Preziosi and Hitchcock have seen a resemblance to the Kato Syme sanctuary.

That's the one where all the votive plaques depicting Ibex hunting were found. I talk about this in my post "Goat riding thunder god". In the same article I tried to explain the root of the Ibex cult in Minoan, Mycenaean and Classical Greek civilisations...

Now that I know how important Ibex was for the Minoans, seeing an artefact like the Sanctuary Rhyton I immediately knew what I was looking at...But I wondered if anyone else knew...

So I started looking at published articles about this rhyton. And prevailing feeling of disappointment set in...

Apart from the general (not 100% though) agreement that the image depicts a Peak Sanctuary:

"We basically have no idea what to make of the image depicted on the Sanctuary Rhyton..."

An example of how little "we understand" artefact is the article entitled "The Sanctuary Rhyton" by Karla Huebner from Wright State University.

Here are some excerpts from the article:

We know little of the philosophy underlying Minoan religion...

We know merely that their beliefs were sufficiently complex as to involve shrines, votive offerings, multiple ritual acts and objects, mythological beings, and symbolism that mostly defies modern interpretation...

But the highly sophisticated nature of Minoan society and its complex ritual paraphernalia tell us that we are not dealing with a primitive fertility cult, important though fertility probably was in Minoan religion....

The Sanctuary Rhyton is generally considered a ritual vessel. Platon stresses the "exclusively cultic purpose of many rhyta with religious representations"....But we don't know how it could have been used...Everything we know about the Minoan world indicates that its religion was deeply bound to the natural world...So the natural scene depicted on the Sanctuary Rhyton has to have had a religious significance...

Altogether, six goats and two birds populate the landscape on the Sanctuary Rhyton. In
general their presence has been regarded as part of the scenery: that in essence a peak sanctuary can be expected to attract wildlife between human visits and that goats and birds signify the remote nature of the locale...

However, it seems important to note that the landscape on the Sanctuary Rhyton is constructed in a suspiciously hierarchical manner and, despite its absence of humans, closely resembles some of the cult scenes shown on seals where the so-called Mistress of the Animals is flanked by animals or birds of some sort or another...Considering that seals and other artefacts show a goddess figure accompanied by animals (particularly goats and birds), this so-called Mistress of the Animals is therefore implied by unpeopled scenes of goats and birds...Or The Goddess could be represented by the "baetyl", the rough stone poking between the two middle Ibex goats facing each other. These kind of stones were in the past believed to be of a divine origin and were worshipped as sacred. If baetyls have been correctly interpreted as an iconic representations of deities, then the goddess is already in the picture, flanked by her goats. The birds can be interpreted as representing "divine epiphany" and thus are yet another indicator of the possible complex sacred significance of the rhyton scene...

However, if the goats are considered to belong to the goddess, perhaps in this instance they represent her worshippers...

But why are the goats arranged the way they are? What of the two goats on the ground? Why are they left out of the hierarchy?

Here goes speculation about two paths to enlightenment, the religious one, depicted by the goat galloping through the gate, and mystic one, depicted by the goat leaping directly on to the highest platform. And that some think that the leaping goat is favoured over galloping goat...

Why should the leaping goat be favored over the galloping goat? To answer this question requires a greater knowledge of Minoan symbolism and iconography than we currently possess...

Finally the conclusion of the whole article:

Ultimately, the Sanctuary Rhyton presents us not only with a unique work of ancient Aegean art, but with an opportunity to ask a wide variety of questions about Minoan society, art, and religion...

Basically we have more questions than answers...

Ok, let me try to fill in the blanks...

1. I agree, this is definitely a ritual vessel.

2. It depicts a mountain peak sanctuary, during winter season. Saffron crocuses are depicted flowering on surrounding rocks and they flower from November onward. And the branches placed on the altar on the left hand side are olive branches, and olives are ready to be picked from November onward...

3. These sanctuaries were most likely built in such a way that Ibexes can enter them during their winter mating season, and the arrival of Ibexes was seen as a good omen.

In my post "Goat" I explained why the zodiac sign Capricorn is where it is on the zodiac circle.

In it I talked about the Ibex behaviour. For most of the year, males and females occupy different habitat. Females rely on steep terrain more so than males. Males use lowland meadows during the spring, which is when snow melts and green grass appears. They then climb to alpine meadows during the summer. When winter arrives, both sexes move to steep rocky slopes that amass little snow and spend the winter there. Once they are all together on high rocky mountain slopes, the are finally in position to start mating.

Ibex mating season is:

For Alpine Ibexes, December to January (Which is why in Europe, Ibex is associated with winter solstice)

For Bezoar Ibexes, November to January (Which is why in Middle East, Ibex is associated with the arrival of the rain season which starts in November)

For Cretan Ibexes, (descendant of Bezoar Ibex) October to November (Which is why in Crete, Ibex is associated with the arrival of the rain season which starts in October/November)

As I explained in my post "Goat riding thunder god, Cretan ibexes climbing the mountain peaks in October and starting their mating season, announce the arrival of the rain season, which in Crete starts in October and ends in April...And the arrival of the Thunder (Storm, Rain) God...

Which opens a very interesting question: Who were the mountain sanctuaries dedicated to? Well, The Goddess, Mother Earth, as the rain season is the time when Earth (Cold, Dark, Wet, Yin) rules over climatic Earth-Sun system...But I believe that in Crete, these sanctuaries were also dedicated to the Thunder (Storm, Rain) God. Have you ever wondered why mountain peaks are associated with thunder gods? The usual explanation is because they attract lots of lightning...I bought that too...Until now...Are mountain peaks associated with thunder gods because He arrives when Ibexes climb the mountain peaks? And if so, is this another religious relic that entered Europe from the south east, as it only makes sense in Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East?

4. The six goats don't represent the worshipers. They represent 6 rain season months: October/November to March/April.

As you can see the highest precipitation is between October and March...It is during Winter and Spring rivers, streams and wells fill with water from Winter rainfall and the Spring melting of the snow from the mountains. Most rivers and streams are dry by the end of May!!! Springs start drying out towards the end of the summer...After which the only water available to the people is the water collected during Winter and Spring in cisterns...Cisterns are still used all over Eastern Mediterranean even today....I believe that what Ibexes are sitting on is the depiction water (spirals, waves) filling in a cistern...

Which brings be back to this statement from the article:

"The Sanctuary Rhyton is generally considered a ritual vessel. Platon stresses the "exclusively cultic purpose of many rhyta with religious representations"....But we don't know how it could have been used..."

Now this rhyton is super weird. It is very tall and narrow...Its height is 310 mm...Now the total average yearly precipitation on Crete is 476 mm...But this rhyton was made during Minoan Warm Period...When the average yearly temperature was much higher than today. Which means that possibly the average yearly precipitation on Crete was lower...

Now, today the total precipitation during the 6 goat months is 420 mm. How much was it during Minoan Warm Period? Somewhere between 420 mm and 310 mm? Or maybe the winter precipitation was actually higher....

To measure precipitation, you would use a tube of equal with opened towards the sky. The height of water in the tube is the measure of precipitation.

The rhyton is not of equal with, so 10mm of rain during early months would create thicker layer of water in the rhyton than 10mm of rain during later months...I wonder...If we got a tube of water of the same radius as the rhyton neck and the height of 420 mm and poured it into the rhyton would it fill the rhyton or not? The thing I am hinting to is: is it possible that this rhyton was used as the precipitation measuring device??? If the rhyton was full of water at the end of the rain season season, then cisterns were also full of water and people will not suffer from thirst during late summer early autumn drought time...

Also, remember that in the past rain was seen as "holy water" with magic properties. Rain was also seen as "Sky father's semen" which fertilises Mother Earth and creates life...So a rhyton full of holy water could have been used in fertility related ceremonies, probably performed during the other, Hot, Dry, Yang, part of the year...

5. The speculation about two paths to enlightenment, the religious one, depicted by the goat galloping through the gate, and mystic one, depicted by the goat leaping directly on to the highest platform, is complete...

The article states that:

"Everything we know about the Minoan world indicates that its religion was deeply bound to the natural world...So the natural scene depicted on the Sanctuary Rhyton has to have had a religious significance..."

Which is spot on. The problem, as always is in this statement from the article:

"But the highly sophisticated nature of Minoan society and its complex ritual paraphernalia tell us that we are not dealing with a primitive fertility cult, important though fertility probably was in Minoan religion...."

For our ancestors, the life creating interplay between Father Sky (Sun) and Mother Earth, was the most important thing in the world. Their lives depended on these two getting dirty together and producing crops...As far as I can see, no religious symbol is randomly chosen. They all have their root in nature and describe natural phenomena which was important to our peasant ancestors...It's the town folk, like aristocrats, philosophers, priests...who got separated from the land and eventually forgot the original meaning of these symbols. Or, like our modern archaeologists, didn't think they were cool enough or deep enough (you know the statement "that can't be all...") who went on turning natural religion into supernatural one, obscuring in process what was behind it all...

So why are the goats arranged the way they are arranged?

The leaping goat represents the Ibex goat which climbs the mountain peaks during October to start the mating season...

This is also the beginning of the rain season. Precipitation rises.

The four sitting goats represent the months of the highest precipitation: November, December, January, February...

The sixth goat running down from the mountain represents the end of rain season which ends at the end of March. Precipitation quickly dwindles...

Between the two middle goats is Winter Solstice...

6. The rock between the two middle Ibexes does represent The Goddess. In the Balkans shepherds used to pray to Baba (Mother Earth) stones (rocky crags, exposed bedrock) for good weather. Rocks were seen as body of Baba (Mother, Grandmother, Mother Earth, Yin) who was also seen as the source of cold, wet (bad) weather. The pointy rocks were also used in weather making, rain controlling magic...I talked about this in my post "Grýla". The pointy rock in the centre of the picture was most likely seen by the Minoans as significant, as the depiction of the Mother Earth, Baba (Mother, Grandmother, Mother Earth, Yin)...The rock worship, very similar to the Slavic (and Baltic) rock worship, is depicted on Minoan artefacts...I will talk about this in more details soon...

Another ancient mythological and ritual trait preserved by Balkan Slavs???

7. The birds definitely don't represent "divine epiphany" and are not "yet another indicator of the possible complex sacred significance of the rhyton scene"...

Crete is on a major bird migratory route between Europe and Africa. A lot of migrating birds just fly over, with some stopping for a rest. Some European birds though actually winter in Crete.

This bird watching article says that: "Autumn passage begins in late August and lasts until October. Winter visitors arrive by the beginning of November leave by the end of March. Spring passage begins in late March and lasts until May."

The birds depicted on the rhyton are of the same species. Any ornithologists here to identify it? Considering that the bird on the left is sitting and not flying, it is probably one of the wintering birds...

In my post "Leto" I talked about the fact that in Slavic folklore the migrating birds are the heralds of the beginning and the end of the hot (fertile) part of the year in the temperate Eurasia. Their arrival in spring is ritually celebrated. In Crete, because the climate is different, the migrating birds are heralds of the beginning and the end of the cold (fertile) part of the year...Their arrival in autumn was most likely also ritually celebrated by Minoans...

Another ancient mythological and ritual trait preserved by Balkan Slavs???

So why is this rhyton so misunderstood???

Because archaeologists don't study natural sciences, which are not deemed important for understanding our ancestors who lived in nature, from nature...Beggars belief I know...Also because everyone keeps looking for "deeper" meaning...Things can't be this simple, right?

PS: I will talk about "The horns of consecration" which are littering the scene in another post...