Dating Knossos and the arrival of the earliest Neolithic in the southern Aegean

Knossos, on Crete, has long been famous both for its Minoan period remains and for the presence, at the base of the stratigraphy, of an early Neolithic settlement. The chronology and development of the Neolithic settlement, however, have hitherto been unclear New light is now thrown on this formative period by combining new and older radiocarbon dates with contextual information in a Bayesian modelling framework. The results from Crete and western Anatolia suggest that an earlier, small-scale Aceramic colonisation preceded the later Neolithic reoccupation of Knossos. Keywords: Aegean, Knossos, Neolithic, early farmers, sea-faring, radiocarbon dating
Introduction Despite being one of the most celebrated archaeological sites in Europe, the origins of Knossos, on the island of Crete, Greece (Figure 1), remain enigmatic. The site was brought [...]