ρέθυμνο (10. 249)

We had intended to pay a visit to Rethymno (corresponding to the ancient cities of Rhithymnia and Arsinoe, chiefly known as a mint in antiquity with coins bearing a double dolphin insignia that’s the modern city’s symbol) along with Knossos but it was already too much to see and so made a return trip with a couple extra stops along the way. First we came to the resort village of Georgioupoli (Γεωργιούπολη)—originally a fishing community and identified with Amphimalla on ancient atlases with an islet connected to the mainland hosting the church of St Nicholas. 

Next we came to Rethymno, an ancient seat of the Minoan culture and dominated by a Venetian fortezza as a fortified commercial station between Chania and Heraklion—the main feature of the citadel dating from the Ottoman era with central Sultan Ibrahim mosque (formerly the Agia Nicholas). 

Afterwards, we explored a gorge (Mili / Μυλοι) just parallel to the city that was absolutely tropical amid mills, waterfalls and citrus orchards as well as groves if banana plants ornamenting a taverna hidden in the valley.

𐀒𐀜𐀰 (10. 248)

With evidence of human occupation for the past one hundred and fifty thousand years and settled some five millennia past in the early neolithic period, we visited the archaeological site and partial, creative reconstruction of King Minos’ palace compound at Knossos, considered the oldest city in Europe and with the Minoan culture the origin of the first intelligible writing system with Linear B. 

We drove through Souda Bay along the Northern Cretan highway to the central coastal city of Heraklion. Abandoned for unknown reasons during the late Bronze Age, the site was unearthed in the early 1890s by one Sir John Arthur Evens, whose father excavated Hallstadt, and whose career included prior turns as war correspondent for the Manchester Guardian, a spy in the Balkans and the caretaker of the Ashmolean Museum, who secured digging  rights from the Ottomans around the same time the up-until-then legendary Troy was rediscovered by Heinrich Schliemann (the pair somewhat in correspondence and competition with another) in another part of the Empire.

The term palace turned out to be possibly misleading, rather than interpreting the over thousand connected chambers of workshops of this administrative centre the maze that held the dread Minotaur. Moreover labyrs (𐀛)—whence ultimately labyrinth was Cretan for a double-biting axe head, a glyph inscribed at corners, sort of like an evil eye, to protect what’s inside the walls, and could be interpreted as guide marks to find one’s way back out. 

We found parking in an olive grove near a traditional tavern near the entrance to the site. The host said we were welcome to park in the shade at his establishment, and just might consider dining there afterwards—not a bad business model.

ausflug kreta (10. 247)

Despite extensive study and having seen plenty of pictures ahead of time, reaching our accommodations late at night, we weren’t quite certain what to expect for the view and surrounding terrain but our spot on Angali bay looking out on the Sea of Crete, located on the westerly third of the island did not disappoint. 

We took a trip early in the day to the ancient provincial capital Chania (Χανία, pronounced Hanya), a settlement dating back to the Minoan civilisation in the Neolithic age some five-thousand years ago and influenced by the Greeks, the Venetians, who built the port, lighthouse (Φαρός) and shipyard as a naval outpost to protect their thalassocracy against piracy, the Byzantines and the Ottomans before rejoining Greece again. 

After exploring the city, we visited the monastery Agia Triada Tsangarolon (Μονή Αγίας Τριάδος, the Holy Trinity) in Byzantine style and dated from the seventh century. Like many of the active communities in the region, the estate produces its own wine and olive oil. 

Later in the evening we went into the nearby village of Stavros and had dinner at a restaurant in a converted windmill on the beach, the same location where the 1964 film Zorba the Greek was shot, at least the “Teach me to dance” scene.

άγιος άνδρέας ο κρητικός (10. 231)

Fêted on this day on the occasion of his martyrdom in the Forum Bovis (the Ox Market where public executions were held) of Constantinople by order of Constantine V in 766 or 767, the fervent iconodule Andrew of Crete (AOC, not to be confused with more prominent theologian and hymnographer from a few decades earlier with the same name) was a champion of religious imagery when such practises were suppressed as idolatrous by imperial authorities in the Eastern Empire during the Byzantine Iconoclasm. A monastery as was dedicated in his memory (originally named for the apostle and later after the ultimate triumph of Orthodoxy adding the appellation ή Κρίσις—by-the-Judgement, Krisis—for this popular opposition figure sentenced to death for his iconophilia) and currently houses the Koca Mustafa Pasha mosque.

8x8 (10. 162)

herbst: vintage Eastern Bloc matchboxes welcoming Fall  

αρνάκι: comedian Shari Lewis delivers One Minute Mythologies—via r/Obscure Media  

wie ist dein name, mann: adapting Hamilton in German for the Hamburg stage—possibly a bit rough for those who committed the original lyrics to heart but Lin-Manuel Miranda is deeply involved 

tl;dr: an AI powered tool that provides a summary of long videos—via Web Curios  

wolf hall: RIP historical fiction author Hilary Mantel  

not in my backyard: good luck getting anything built in Sim Nimby (see also)—again from Web Curios

voting integrity: Russian soldiers in occupied regions of Ukraine undertake door-to-door balloting in the referenda to ensure citizens choose wisely  

kirie: celebrating the onset of autumn with more of the Japanese art of leave carving

fiftyshapes ltd (10. 130)

Incorporated on this day in 1967, the Beatles’ Apple Electronics venture was headed by a television repair technician named Yannis Alexis Madras, whom had been discovered by John Lennon two years prior after seeing a selection of his Nothing Boxes (plastic housing with blinking lights) at a London Gallery. Given the moniker “Magic Alex,” he reputedly pitched a series of increasingly fantastical (but ones we’d like to see) inventions including a seventy-two track tape machine, an air-buffer to prevent car accidents, replacing Ringo’s drums with a sonic force field, a wallpaper sound-system, invisibility paint and an artificial sun—none of which unfortunately materialised. 

Later that same year, Madras tried to help broker a deal for the band to purchase a Greek island but that deal fell through as well. Though the majority of Madras’ inventions were dismissed as impossible (perhaps rather inexplicably, he was nonetheless entrusted him with the design of their new recording studio once they left Abbey Road), one of his proposals for a scrambling device that would prevent fans from recording their songs from the radio was better received. Parting ways in 1969—ostensibly jealous over the influence that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi had over Lennon after they were all in India together, Madras took up a career in security and anti-terrorism, offering custom bullet-proof vehicles, bug-detectors, etc—his clients primarily exiled heads-of-state living in London, Crown Prince Juan Carlos, the Shah of Iran and fellow countryman Constantine II.

6x6 (10. 122)

derivative art: online communities are rejecting AI-generated images 

compostable mushroom shroud: when Luke Perry passed away in 2019, he requested that his mortal remains leave no trace—only it didn’t work—via the morning news  

forms of address: the title culture of German—and the UK—via Marginal Revolution 

remember-tini: a Virginia country club is facing backlash for a planned 9/11-themed seafood Sunday brunch—via Super Punch    

temenos: every four years a screening of experimental filmmaker Gregory Markopoulos’ eighty-hour Eniaios is held in the Peloponnese that his magnum opus could spiritually cleanse our over-polluted media diets  

multi-level marketing: the online community bent on undermining crypto-scams and bitcoin pyramid schemes

time in a bottle (10. 087)

A favourite topic here at PfRC being the subject of time and time-keeping and having previously covered topics of Roman hours, the French Revolutionary Decimal Calendar, Time Zones, Knocker-Uppers and Daylight Savings Time, we quite enjoyed this latest instalment of You’re Dead to Me—the comedy podcast that takes history seriously, that explores both the want to escape the tyranny of clock and how in its measurement of time, our horizons are broadened beyond the immediate to the eminent. Following one tradition that informs the generally agreed upon standard, it was the Roman conquest of Greek Sicily and bringing back the sundial of Syracuse as a war trophy and putting it on public display (despite being calibrated for Sicily-time) was the beginning of regimented time-keeping with the fabulist Titus Maccius Plautus lamented of this new installation in the forum during the Punic Wars, duplicated all over the empire, “May the gods damn the man who first discovered the hours—when I was a boy, my stomach was the only sundial, but now what there is isn’t eaten lest the sun say so.” Much more to explore at the links above.

i am the hellenistic ideal (10. 031)

First aired on this day in 1992, the 1959 sword-and-sandal pastiche Ercole e la regina di Lidia by Ennio De Concini and Pietro Francisci—featuring Steve Reeves reprising the title role—was given the MST3K treatment and is regarded among the cast’s favourites. Whilst journeying across Attica with a young Odysseus and his new bride Iole, Hercules is asked to settle a rival between two counter-claimants to the throne of Thebes after the abdication of Oedipus and taking a sip from Lethe—the river of forgetfulness—and becomes captive of the Queen of Lydia, Omphale, who keeps men until she grows weary of their company and transforms them into statues. The trio eventually escape and Hercules regains his memory and help ensure that Thebes gets a just ruler.

8x8

did someone say beveragino: the rise of the hun culture and naff couture 

to california and back again: more on the prolific, pioneering photographer Lora Webb Nichols (previously)—via Messy Nessy Chic  

satanic panic: the enigmatic Guidestones monument (previously) in the US state of Georgia was demolished following blast  

rats, sinking ship, you know the drill: a tranche of key minister and secretaries leave the Johnson government, demand his resignation  

μελιτζάνα: entrepreneurs from the island of Crete produce a promotional video to boost candied eggplant sales 

shift happens: modifier keys and more on the history and development of keyboards, via Waxy 

baade’s window: a selection of superlative photographs of the Milky Way for the Star Festival 

poolboy: more roséwave playlists from NPR

apicius

We quite enjoyed revisiting the topic of a mysterious, most-favoured herb of Antiquity called silphium (previously)—considered a gift from Apollo and used as condiment, perfume, aphrodisiac, and seasoning and with medicinal uses ranging from anti-haemorrhoidal to contraceptive, imported into the Greek and Roman world from a narrow, microclimate in Syria that was resistant to transplantation. Over-harvesting and over-grazing coupled with climate change curried its abrupt disappearance from cupboards and medicine cabinets two millennia hence and serves as a warning best heeded about our own culinary staples and how familiar and enriching flavours and seasoning might meet the same fate. Much more at the links above.

never look a gift horse in the mouth

Though this kind of exact date for something semi-legendary, laden with cultural baggage and millennia hence is notoriously hard to pin down, the attestation by among others Eratosthenes, polymath and librarian of Alexandria who calculated the circumference and axial tilt of Earth to a remarkable degree of accuracy (thanks in part to his access to extensive geological data at the library), traditionally places the Fall of Troy, the end of the decade-long siege of the impenetrable city by the Achaean armies when they were let into the gates, hiding inside a wooden horse, a ruse thought up by Odysseus—a creature sacred to the Trojans, on this day in 1183 BCE. Left on the beach as an offering for their return home, the Greeks had apparently decamped. Many were suspicious, including Cassandra and Laocoön—with of course no one listening to the former and the latter being devoured by a sea serpent along with his sons sent by Athena to keep the priest’s mouth shut but they ultimately decided to keep the horse and celebrated the end of their long blockade with an evening of drunken revelry. Most of the population was massacred in their sleep as the Greeks sacked the city—save for Aeneas who went on to found Rome in some traditions, with most of the Greeks also denied a safe homecoming by the gods for their atrocious behaviour as victors and for their desecration of temples and holy sites and were doomed to wrack and ruin.

7x7

stacy’s dad has got me down bad: a Fountains of Wayne cover from a different perspective  

imperial trans-antarctic expedition: the shipwreck of Ernest Shackleton’s 1914 exploratory mission discovered  

beachcomber: eighteenth-century seaweed pressings speak to fecklessness and romance 

ithaca: an new AI model is helping scholars decipher and date ancient inscriptions  

x-wing: Star Wars space craft size comparison  

snowmen: David Lynch’s haunting images—evocative of Eraserhead from Boise, Idaho in the early ‘90s  

there’s a doll, inside of doll, inside a doll, inside a dolly: Robbie Williams’ 2016 Party Like a Russian was inspired by an encounter with the inner-circle of oligarchs when asked to perform at a New Year’s Eve party

idomeneo

Considered one of the greatest operatic works of all time, the Italian language dramma per musica based on a 1705 stage play by French tragedian Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon about the eponymous King of Crete by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart had its premiere as the opener for court carnival season in München on this day in 1781. The piece in three acts with ballet interludes tells the story of the homecoming of the commander-in-chief who led the Cretan navy into the Trojan War, comrade of Ajax and rebuffed suitor of Helen, Idomeneus (Ἰδομενεύς—like The Odyssey)—grateful for peaceable relations again after decades of fighting, exercises clemency over prisoners of war brought from Troy, including Priam’s daughter Princess Ilia, though Argonaut Princess Electra is not happy about the potential competition to marry into the dynasty. In contravention to an earlier pledge that would have the king sacrifice his son to the sea on condition of a safe return, Neptune relents and spares the life of the king’s son Prince Idamante, on the promise that he relinquishes his throne to the younger generation, with the new king taking the Trojan princess as his queen. All are happy except Electra—her later parricidical frenzy attributed to this early rejection.