Knossos
North portico of the Minoan PalaceThis famous site was discovered in 1878 by the Cretan antiquarian Minos Kalokairinos, who led the first excavations and attributed the palace to the legendary King Minos. Interrupted by the Ottoman authorities, the excavations were resumed in 1900 by the British archaeologist Arthur Evans, who undertook restoration work that blended historical reality with imagination. Despite the controversy surrounding this work, Knossos remains Crete’s most famous and mysterious archaeological site.
