Guided Walking Tour with Skip-the-Line Entry. You can order and we can purchase the entrance fees in advance to avoid the lines and you should pay us in cash the day of the tour.
WeGuide will take you through the palace of Knossos with an official guide. Knossos, a bewildering complex of more than 1500 interlocking rooms, a true labyrinth, was more than a cage of the gruesome Minotaur.
Discover the advanced and sophisticated 4000 year old Civilization of Crete. Meet the Minoans, see the Palace of Knossos with its Labyrinth and splendid wall paintings.
Full Itinerary
Visit Knossos with WeGuide.
We meet you at Knossos where you do not have to stand in line for hours to get your ticket as it can be Skip-the-Line Entry. You can order and we can purchase the entrance fees in advance to avoid the lines and you should pay us in cash the day of the tour. See below price list – free of fees !!
WeGuide will take you through the palace of Knossos with an official guide. Knossos, a bewildering complex of more than 1500 interlocking rooms, a true labyrinth, was more than a cage of the gruesome Minotaur..It was an astonishing palace, built for a mighty king of the Bronze Age. As we wander through the labyrinthine ruins you will have the chance to see the original throne of ‘’Minos”, still in place after 3,500 years; the mystifying sanctuaries, the luxurious Domestic quarters of the Royal family, the once upon a time bursting with Crete’s treasures pantries and the astonishing water-management systems, just to name a few of the Minoan wonders!
Knossos, the capital of Minoan Crete is located about twenty minutes south of the modern port and town of Heraklion and is considered Europe’s oldest city. In the seventh millennium BC a small community of hunters and farmers set the foundation of the islands long history, which lasted for thousands of years. The peak of the Minoan culture lasted about six hundred years, from 2000-1400 BC. The first palace of Knossos, close to the Kairatos river, was erected soon after 2000BC, when the Pyramids of Egypt and the Stonehenge were just a few hundred years old. The wealthy palace, seat of the ruler and the civil/religious authority was the perfect arena of power display in the elaborate palatial feasts with exotic materials shipped from the Aegean, Levant and Egypt. The happy life of its residents came to an abrupt end in 1700 BC when a catastrophic earthquake destroyed the Palace but did not reverse the cultural dynamics of Minoan Crete.
A new palace is immediately built in Knossos, the most significant and monumental of all and for more than 300 years it represented the pre-eminent center of power in Bronze Age Crete. The New Palace was an imposing complex with important architectural innovations, splendid frescoes adorning the walls, hundreds of rooms distributed in four storeys, impressive storage areas, specialized workshops and spacious courts hosting ceremonies and feasts. The ruler and the palatial court displayed an elaborate and refined way of life. At the peak of Knossos political power, economic growth and artistic creation, destruction hit in 1450BC bearing the mark of a human agent, after a series of earthquakes that had already destabilized the region. The Mycenaeans took advantage of the upheaval, invaded Crete and settled in the Palace of Knossos until the last decades of the 14nth century BC, when the final destruction of the Palace put an end to the celebrated palatial life.
The palace in ruins became a ghost of its glorious past, the material from which legends and myths are made of… According to Greek mythology King Minos lived in the palace at Knossos, where he had the architect Daedalus build an elaborate labyrinth in which to contain the Queen’s son, the half-man half-bull monster called the Minotaur. The brave Athenian prince Theseus, with the help of the love-struck Minoan princess Ariadne, defeated the monster and found his way out of the Labyrinth which then became the prison of his ingenious architect, Deadalus and his ill-fated son Icarus. For the first time in human history, the thought of humans flying became a reality when Deadalus fashioned wings of wax and feathers for himself and for Icarus and escaped. Icarus, however, flew too near the Sun, his wings melted, and he fell into the sea and drowned. The island on which his body was washed ashore was later named Icaria.
Sir. Arthur Evans, is the British (Welsh) archaeologist who devoted his life and fortune to excavate and study the Palace of Knossos for more than 30 years (1900-1931). He restored large parts of the palace in a way that it is possible today to appreciate the grandeur and complexity of a structure that evolved over several millennia, grew to occupy about 22,000 square meters and today offers us a unique chance to get a glimpse of the most important palace of the Minoans, Europe’s first advanced and highly sophisticated culture.
The tour is executed with the assistance of your private professional guide. The customer uses its own vehicle. Meeting point; Entrance to the site of Knossos.
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https://www.weguide.gr/01-knossos-palace-greek-mythology.php
Authorised by G.N.T.O. R.T.E.No.: 1039 Ε 6000 0286 301
