Where did the Minoans Come From? Where did they Go?

Europe's First Bronze Age Civilization

The captivating mystique of the culture of Crete is growing stronger every day, as new evidence of the depth and reach of this first and greatest of Europe's Bronze Age cultures is brought to light. But who were the peoples we have come to call the Minoans? Perhaps more importantly, what happened to them?

Sumptuous palaces and artwork have been unearthed on Crete, including at Knossos, Phaistos and Mallia. Although we have their Linear A writings, they remain untranslated to this day. The civilization's heyday was between the 18th and 16th centuries B.C.E.  Sir Arthur Evans, who excavated Knossos in the late 19th century (and named them "Minoans" in honor of the later Greek legends of King Minos) theorized they came from North Africa. But in light of recent DNA evidence, the Minoans appear to have originated in a European people who migrated to Crete during Neolithic times, perhaps 10,000 years ago. See  May 14, 2013, Nature Communications, “A European population in Minoan Bronze Age Crete.” Neither is an eastern origin probable, although some relationship to the Phoenicians seems likely.

Evidence from Canaan

Both traditional Biblical testimony as well as modern archeology show a clear, and possibly quite early presence of Minoan culture in Canaan and the Levant. Minoan frescoes have been found in Israel at Tel Kabri, and the Bible specifically identifies the origin of the Philistines as "Caphtor," a close variant of the Egyptian word for Crete. The Philistines are later identified from Egyptian and other sources as one of the "Sea Peoples" responsible for the downfall of nearly every Mediterranean empire but Egypt around 1200 B.C.E. Indeed, evidence suggests that the Minoans may have been in Canaan at the beginning of the Bronze Age, or even earlier. Much of what we know of the Sea Peoples has likely been influenced by this traditional connection.

A Seafaring People

The Minoans were a seafaring society, possibly the most advanced of their era. It is still in dispute whether their trade network can be called a nautical "empire," as there is little direct evidence of their being a military power, rather than a peaceful mercantile bureaucracy. That their navy was capable of defense however, is evident in that fact that their Aegean cities required no walled fortifications for protection.

While we have no direct evidence that the Minoan culture "ruled" the seas, the development of port cities and harbors throughout the eastern Mediterranean as far back as the early Bronze Age exhibits strong similarities to Crete in both their design and technology, as well as their basic purpose of supporting what appeared to be a robust maritime trade relationship between the Aegean, Egypt and the Levant:

Where did they go?

The well known eruption of Thera (modern Santorini) no doubt contributed to the downfall of the Minoans on Crete and the nearby Aegean. But in addition to the ones we know of in the Mediterranean, could the culture already have had long established trade colonies beyond the Straits of Gibraltar by the time of the cataclysm?

Fascinating but speculative evidence from the new world suggests that Bronze Age Minoan traders may have been responsible for Meso-American "Copper Culture" artifacts, and the evidently extensive and unexplained copper mining in the North American and Canadian Midwest.

Great care must be used in evaluating any new world evidence as the "archeological" record has been subject to intense competing interests, not the least of which are Mormon beliefs in early advanced civilization in North and Meso-America, and fraught with numerous frauds, both pious and mercenary.

Perhaps the Minoan culture survived both the Theran eruption and the later Aegean Apocalypse outside the Mediterranean. Stretching our imagination even further, could the Sea Peoples have been the descendants of the pre-Theran Minoan culture, come back to claim their heritage?

We look forward to further findings.

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J.P. Jamin is the author of The Seas Come Still, a metaphysical novel based upon the fall of the Minoan culture.