High in the Amari valley of Rethymno, Margieles Cave holds traces of Crete's Protopalatial age, roughly 1900 to 1700 BCE, when the island's first palaces flourished. Excavations between 1978 and 2001, building on Marinatos's work of the 1930s, brought to light pottery and other remains from that era. Among the finds was a copper double axe incised with a bucranium, a bull's head, recovered during the earlier dig. Such objects tied cave sanctuaries to the ritual life of Minoan Crete, and this one rewards the curious traveler.
Coordinates and heritage data compiled in the Atika atlas.
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