Mediterranean #15 - Heraklion Museum Crete
After a morning visit to Knossos, and a box lunch on the bus, we paid a brief visit to the annex of the Archaeological Museum of Heraklion. The main museum was undergoing renovations at the time, but a number of the most beautiful and important pieces from its collections were on display in an annex. In a way, that was a benefit to groups such as ours who had only a brief time to spend at the museum. We were able to see the highlights of the collection without having to run from room to room. It did, however, mean that items were squeezed together in small wall-mounted displays, so you couldn't walk around them and see all sides of them. When I look back at these images, though, I think only of my feelings of total awe at the artistry and beauty of so many of the pieces, and not the struggle to squeeze to the front of each display in order to see its contents.
Whenever I photographed particular displays, I tried to photograph the sign legends that went with them, but I wasn't always able to do that because of the crowds and our limited time. When I was able to do that, I have transcribed that information into the appropriate figure captions. Also, there were a number of more recent, non-Minoan items on display, mostly sculptures from the eras of Dorian Greek through Roman occupation, which I opted not to photograph in view of our very limited time at the museum.
I have map tagged a representative selection of items for the areas where they were unearthed. Clicking the "Map This" button on the upper right will show you the general distribution of archaeological sites, but not their relative importance in terms of number and quality of artifacts recovered from each place.
A note about the post-processing. All of the images required significant modification of the color balance. I tried, not always successfully, to achieve a certain uniformity of result across the set of pictures.
Read MoreWhenever I photographed particular displays, I tried to photograph the sign legends that went with them, but I wasn't always able to do that because of the crowds and our limited time. When I was able to do that, I have transcribed that information into the appropriate figure captions. Also, there were a number of more recent, non-Minoan items on display, mostly sculptures from the eras of Dorian Greek through Roman occupation, which I opted not to photograph in view of our very limited time at the museum.
I have map tagged a representative selection of items for the areas where they were unearthed. Clicking the "Map This" button on the upper right will show you the general distribution of archaeological sites, but not their relative importance in terms of number and quality of artifacts recovered from each place.
A note about the post-processing. All of the images required significant modification of the color balance. I tried, not always successfully, to achieve a certain uniformity of result across the set of pictures.
