J Archaeol Method Theory
DOI 10.1007/s10816-014-9206-y
Fire and the Holes: an Investigation of Low-Level
Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
Quentin Letesson
# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014
Abstract Drawing in equal measure on space syntax and a theoretical framework
recently advocated by Carl Knappett for the study of material culture, this paper offers
an innovative approach to the fixed, semi-fixed, and mobile elements constituting the
built environment. Through a case study from Bronze Age Crete, the paper deals with
specific fixtures (hearths and hollowed slabs called kernoi). It first investigates their
spatial contexts through configurational analysis and highlights the long history of their
existence in Minoan Crete. Finally, the paper addresses the ways in which these fixtures
might have acquired particular symbolic and functional meanings through recursive
interactions with people. By focusing on these associations and affordances of hearths
and kernoi, the paper intends to highlight the profound importance of low-level meanings of the built environment for the understanding of the complex interactions between
architecture, material assemblages, and people. Furthermore, it proposes a holistic
analytical method allowing the approach of interactional dynamics (people–space–
objects) that do not necessarily appear conspicuously in the archaeological record.
Keywords Built environment . Fixtures . Space syntax . Material agency . Praxeology .
Minoan Crete
Introduction
As advocated by Rapoport (1990, p. 13), architecture is constituted by the existence of
fixed (walls, floors, ceilings, doors, windows), semi-fixed (furniture in general), and
mobile elements (people in the building, their activities, and behaviors). Even if he
insisted on the fact that these three elements had to be taken into consideration to
understand the intricate relationship between built environment and behaviors
(Rapoport 1990), his approach somewhat reduces fixed and semi-fixed elements to
the backdrop of human practices, impoverishing their active role. Fixtures, such as
Q. Letesson (*)
Archaeology Centre—Aegean Material Culture Laboratory, University of Toronto, Anthropology
Building, 19 Russell St, Toronto, ON M5S 2S2, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Letesson
benches, altars, pedestals, etc., indeed provide very particular interpretive challenges. In
short, they are neither fully architectural nor really objects per se but, instead, combine
properties of these categories: they are implanted in specific spatial contexts and they
pertain to the proximate scale of human–object interactions. When considering them,
we therefore absolutely need to think quite explicitly in terms of movement and
occupation (the most basic forms of spatial behavior) but also of material agency as
well as bodily gestures and perception. This paper intends to tackle this issue by
advocating a theoretical framework that would allow, first, a holistic approach of archaeological features and assemblages in their architectural context, and second, a critical
evaluation of the dynamic interplays between these elements and people. Eventually, it
will also underline that what Rapoport termed low-level meanings of the built environment (i.e., ways in which the latter channels and interacts recursively with behavior and
movement) can certainly not be underestimated and might, in some instances, have played
a much more crucial role than the so-called middle- (i.e., deliberate indications about
identity and status communicated by the designers/builders of buildings) and high-levels
of meanings (i.e., cosmological and supernatural symbolism encoded in buildings)
(Rapoport 1988, 1990; see also Smith 2007, pp. 30–39)1. The interest of such an approach
will be illustrated through a case study from Minoan Bronze Age Crete, namely, fixed
hearths and slabs marked by carved depressions often called kernoi, and will also be
addressed in the light of a new approach to Minoan sociopolitical organization recently
developed by Driessen (2010, 2014).
Of course, thinking across people, material culture, and built space is not necessarily
a straightforward endeavor, even if there is long tradition of considering them in terms
of reciprocal influences. Here, however, a slightly different perspective will be adopted.
One that revolves around the idea that it is by considering built space, things, and
humans as a connected whole, as intimately entangled realities, that we can more
successfully grasp their complex interactions (Hodder 2012; Knappett 2005, 2011).
A Spatiotemporal Web of Interactions: Architecture, Objects, People
Where architecture is concerned, it has been amply demonstrated that the built form and
the social practices of which it is the theater are mutually constitutive of each other
(Blier 1987; Kent 1990; Parker Pearson and Richards 1994; Rapoport 1990; Vellinga
2007), and that, consequently, studying the configuration of the former can highlight
the occupation and movement patterns concomitant with the latter (Hanson 1998;
Hillier and Hanson 1984; Hillier 1996). Space is the active potential of architecture;
through its layout, it contributes to create the field of potential encounter and copresence within which people live and move, and whether or not it leads to social
interaction (Hillier 1989, p. 13). Space also plays a decisive role in tying together fixed
and semi-fixed elements of architecture in a coherent whole, which, once physically
constituted, can be encountered, used, and lived. In that sense, architecture is not the
simple backdrop of human actions or a straightforward crystallization of social norms,
but more an ongoing process of complex and dynamic interplays between space and
1
Of course, Rapoport (1988) himself recognized that these levels were not mutually exclusive and that, quite
on the contrary, they could actually depend on one another to gain in efficiency.
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
society. Furthermore, it has been also suggested that buildings themselves could be
considered living organisms (Blier 1987; Herva 2010; Waterson 1990; Hillier 1996, pp.
17–20) that undergo diverse biographical events such as initial construction, refurbishments, partial or total demolitions, alterations of layout, as well as final destruction.
Buildings have “life-histories, which consist in the unfolding of their relations with
both human and non-human components of their environments” (Ingold 2000, p. 187).
Thus, if space is paramount in making buildings live, so is time. In fact, in their life
cycle, buildings are often the object of practices that contribute to embed them in
specific temporalities (Herva 2005). While trying to understand such practices, one
quickly realizes that the built form, the people that inhabit it, and the objects they use are
not always clear-cut categories, and may sometimes work together in a complex whole.
As a matter of fact, scholars in material culture studies, advocating a less dichotomous
relationship between people and things, have also insisted on the fact that objects should
be granted a more active role (Gell 1998; Hicks and Beaudry 2010; Miller and Tilley
1996; Tilley et al. 2006). Therefore, there has been a growing concern for the ways in
which material artifacts take part in the constitution, negotiation, and transformation of
sociocultural identities and practices, as well as for the roles and implications of the
aspect of materiality for these processes (DeMarrais et al. 2004; Knappett 2005; Knappett
and Malafouris 2008; Miller 2005). A detailed review of this field of research is, of
course, beyond the scope of this paper (for a recent appraisal, see Swenson 2014).
Nevertheless, some specific notions that will be helpful in tackling the issue I’m
concerned with can be briefly underlined. For example, Gosden insisted on the fact that
objects could behave in ways that are not simply the result of human intention but can in
fact contribute to frame or trigger those intentions: “A building, a pot or a metal ornament
has certain characteristics of form which channel human action, provide a range of
sensory experiences (but exclude others) and place obligations on us in ways we relate
to objects and other people through these objects” (Gosden 2005, p. 196). He is also
especially concerned with life cycles of groups of objects and their “historical trajectories,” and underlined that, because material culture is relatively long-lasting, “people are
socialized in particular material worlds which exist prior to their birth” (Gosden 2005, p.
197). Therefore, in a particular type of enculturation process, specific stances or behaviors can be ingrained through contact with particular objects or sets of objects, together
with face-to-face human interactions and repeated movements, usually in particular
spatial settings (Knappett 2011, pp. 61–69). What is especially crucial to keep in mind
here is that, to get a clear picture of the intricate dynamics of material agency, objects have
to be treated in their full spatial and temporal situatedness (Knappett 2005, pp. 62–63). In
other words, the properties of individual and isolated objects are indeed important, and
under close scrutiny can reveal a great deal about the actions in which they are used and
mobilized, but, above all, such objects need to be considered in the larger and complex
spatial environment and temporal trajectory in which they are enmeshed, often if not
always, in close association with other non-human or human agents.
Of course, embracing such an approach also invites us to think about people in a very
specific way. In Thinking Through Material Culture, Carl Knappett (2005, pp. 3–10)
indeed makes claim for the necessity, in our attempt to understand people’s relationship
to the material world, to overcome the Cartesian dualism of mind and matter that still
pervades much of the social sciences, archaeology included. His alternative to this longlasting dichotomy is based on considering the human being simultaneously in terms of
Letesson
biological animacy, psychological agency, and social personhood (Knappett 2005, pp. 9,
11–34; see also Warnier 2001, p. 6). In this interdisciplinary stance, Knappett is one of
the advocates, in archaeology, of a broader tradition in social and cognitive sciences
which defends and develops a conception of people (in their physicality, thoughts,
actions, and perceptions) and their environment (in the broader sense, i.e., the material
world, but also the other living beings that populate it) as being in an intricate and
indissociable embrace of mutual interplays (Clark 1997, 2008; Ingold 2000). Much of
these ideas can of course be traced back to the seminal work of Gibson (1979) on
affordances (see also Costall 1995). Again, this is no place for a detailed hermeneutics of
this complex and stimulating strand of thoughts (see Ingold 2012), but some of its
concepts are worth noting for this particular case study. The obvious and main consequence of such a paradigm is that human and non-human elements need to be considered
conjointly in their dynamic and multifaceted relationships. Not doing so and give precedence to one or the other would simply mean ignoring a whole part of the issue. One of the
central themes of this paradigm is the idea of an embodied, situated, and distributed
cognition, i.e., the fact that numerous aspects of the relationships among human beings
and between the latter and their environment and material world are mediated through the
body, and contextually constituted in complex and indivisible interactions (Clark 1997,
2008; Hutchins 1995; Malafouris 2004, 2013)2. For Clark (1997, p. 36), “a better image of
cognition depicts perception, action, and thoughts as bound together in a variety of
complex and interpenetrating ways.” That does not mean that internal representations or
brain computations do not exist but simply that “the kinds of internal representation and
computation we employ are selected so as to complement the complex social and
ecological settings in which we must act” (Clark 1997, p. 221, his emphasis).
In this paper, interested, among other things, in patterns of movement and occupation within buildings, another notion related to this general paradigm and labeled
“praxeology” deserves to be developed a bit further (Warnier 2001, 2006; Knappett
2011, pp. 64–65). In Warnier’s words (2006, p. 187), praxeology is an approach to
human practices focusing on “sensori-affectivo-motor conducts geared to material
culture.” This implies different things. First, all human practices, or techniques of the
body (walking, running, carrying goods, using particular objects, and even resting
habits), involve motricity. Second, motor conducts are mediated through the seven
senses (the five usual ones, as well as proprioception and the vestibular sense of spatial
orientation). Furthermore, thirdly, the body also orients itself in space to achieve
specific goals which are motivated and modulated by desires and emotions. Finally,
these “sensori-affectivo-motor conducts” take place in a given materiality within which
the boundaries of the body are flexible and can be extended to include lots of objects
(Warnier 2001, p. 7). A classical example, being the blind person’s cane which,
perceptually speaking, is integral part of her/his body (Malafouris 2013, pp. 4–10).
The implications of praxeology for the study of material culture are considerable.
Indeed, rather than seeing various objects as supplements to the body, praxeology
consider them as integral to bodily conducts and as part of the bodily schema (Warnier
2
The terminology grounded cognition is sometimes preferred to embodied cognition in psychological
sciences because the former produces the mistaken assumption that all researchers believe that bodily states
are necessary for cognition, which may be related to distinct phenomena such as simulations or situated
actions (Barsalou 2008, pp. 618–619).
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
2006). Even if Knappett insists on the merits of praxeology in incorporating material
culture in the studies of human practices, he also notes that “Warnier does not provide
sufficient detail on the various kinds of interaction between the body and material
culture” (Knappett 2011, p. 65). Subsequently, he proposes that praxeology could be
reinforced by investigating how artefacts could act as pivots, scaffolds, or material
anchors (Knappett 2011, p. 65; 2005, pp. 54–63; see also Clark 1997, pp. 45–47); work
together in assemblages (Gosden 2005; Knappett 2010); and/or become accumulated or
enchained through practice (Chapman 2000; Chapman and Gaydarska 2006; Knappett
2006). I will come back on these notions in the following case study.
Case Study: Hearths and Kernoi in Bronze Age Crete
This case study will take us to the Aegean Bronze Age, in Minoan Crete and more
specifically during the beginning of the Late Bronze Age (LBA), the Neopalatial period
(1700/1675–1470/1460 BCE) 3. I will address the role that fixed hearths and kernoi
might have played in the built environment and show how, through time, both fixtures
acquired particular symbolic and functional meanings. Hearths and kernoi have indeed
existed since quite early in Minoan culture. They are documented from the Neolithic
onwards for the former, and since the Prepalatial period (3100/3000–1925/1900
B.C.E.) for the latter. So far, both features have been extensively studied and considerable insights offered on their role within Minoan society. However, most of these
researches remain unsatisfactory in some ways, precisely because, as noted above, such
fixtures occupy a gray zone between architecture and material culture. Generally,
scholars have either treated them too isolatedly without due regard for their spatiotemporal context, often rushing into blind functional description, or did not really propose a
clear methodological and/or theoretical framework to back up their hypotheses even if
they recognized and documented the importance of their architectural context. My main
goal here is certainly not to propose a new strict functional definition. Rather than
challenging traditional interpretations, this paper aims at considering hearths and kernoi
in terms of associations and affordances by respectively investigating their symbolic
significance and agency. It will also underline that, during the Neopalatial period,
certain hearths and kernoi appeared in key locations within buildings and may therefore
have played a pivotal role with regard to how Minoans navigated built space. Beyond
the fact that these fixtures may have worked together with the built environment to
channel, constrain, and even ingrain appropriate occupation and movement patterns in
particular spatial settings, it will also be demonstrated that, more fundamentally, they
embodied, together with the architectural configuration, dichotomous realities that
pervaded Neopalatial society as a whole and therefore need to be brought under close
scrutiny to understand the so-called Golden Age of Minoan Crete.
A Brief Note on Neopalatial Architecture
It is during the Neopalatial period that Minoan architecture reached its acme (McEnroe
2010, pp. 81–116). At the beginning of LBA, elaborate buildings could indeed be
3
Chronology is here based on Manning 2010, pp. 17 and 23, Tables 2.1 and 2.2.
Letesson
found throughout Crete, and especially in the central and eastern parts of the island, in
settlements but also standing alone in the countryside (McEnroe 1982; Hägg 1997).
Such buildings exhibited architectural features that are considered by most scholars as
having been developed in the context of polite architecture, (Driessen 1989–1990;
Shaw 2009, pp. 169–178). These particular features were manifold (Driessen 1989–
1990). They could not only be found in the use of lavish materials (gypsum dadoes and
veneering, colored stones for pavings and column bases, frescoes and relief decoration,
etc.) and innovative techniques (ashlar masonry; increased use of columns, piers and
pillars; pier-and-door partitions; etc.) but also in the introduction of specific rooms
(such as the so-called Minoan Halls, Lustral Basins, Pillar Crypts, but also light wells,
porticoes and verandas) and of new principles of design and layout (including more
complex circulatory patterns). If the question of the origin of such features is still a
matter of debate (Schoep 2002, 2004; Letesson 2014), their wide distribution throughout Crete at the beginning of the LBA is indisputable. Furthermore, this so-called
Palatial Style (Driessen 1989–1990) was so successful that its diffusion was not limited
to the island, but had ramifications throughout the Cyclades and even in the Greek
mainland (Shaw 2009, pp. 169–178; Palyvou 2005, pp. 179–188).
Among these features of the “Palatial Style,” some characteristics of Neopalatial
architecture that are of a particular interest for this study deserve a more thorough
examination. Preziosi (1983) and Palyvou (1987) were the first scholars that extensively considered Minoan architecture respectively in terms of recurrent organizational
properties (i.e., the ways in which rooms and internal spaces are similarly organized
and connected to one another in different buildings) and circulatory patterns (i.e., the
opportunities of movements that such an organization materialized). Preziosi (1983,
p. 200) suggested that Neopalatial buildings had a common structural logic underlying
their layout. Of course, the existence of a model does not exclude variations (Palyvou
2005, pp. 155–156), and Neopalatial architecture was indeed extremely diversified. For
example, even if they share common properties, no palaces are totally alike (Hägg and
Marinatos 1987; Driessen et al. 2002; McEnroe 2010, pp. 81–92), and non-palatial and/
or domestic buildings range from small and simple structures to large and complex
estates (McEnroe 1982, 2010, pp. 93–116). Furthermore, the adoption of the “Palatial
Style” is not homogeneous. In many buildings, together with constraining contextual
factors (such as topography, materials available, etc.), some local and ancestral architectural traditions prevailed, the new principles being merely adapted or, as it would
seem in some instances, simply ignored (McEnroe 1982, pp. 13–15; McEnroe 1990;
Driessen 1989–1990).
Neopalatial buildings then show a large number of innovative characteristics while
being deeply rooted in earlier—Pre- and Protopalatial (ca. 1925/1900–1750/1700
BCE)—architectural traditions (Shaw 2011; Letesson 2013, 2014). Furthermore, even
if they might have been laid out according to a recurrent model or set of principles, they
still look quite different from one another. I recently reconsidered this issue in analyzing
over 70 Neopalatial buildings, from modest domestic structures to monumental palaces
(Letesson 2009)4. Using space syntax (Hillier and Hanson 1984; Hillier 1996; Hanson
1998), this study was especially concerned with architectural configuration, that is to
4
For a pioneering work in the analysis of Aegean Bronze Age architecture through space syntax, see
Yiannouli 1992.
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
say the ways in which internal spaces and rooms were interconnected, open onto one
another or not, organized in sequences, kept apart from each other, closely associated
with the outside or remote from it. Consequently, issues of movement to and within a
building as well as the control exerted upon it, and the patterns of encounter/avoidance
between its users were underlined. Through this analysis, a genotype, a recurrent set of
principles that permeate Neopalatial architecture, was underlined and described
(Letesson and Driessen 2008; Letesson 2009, pp. 321–368; Letesson 2013). Among
the important characteristics of the genotype, one can note: (1) a growing use of
external transition spaces (such as vestibules, porches, porticoes, and corridors located
at the periphery of a building) that clearly differentiate the interior of a building from
the outside world; (2) a shift from an agglutinative mode (all the rooms directly opening
onto one another, and usually clustered around a central one) to an articulated mode
(rooms more clearly separated from each other and grouped in sectors by means of
internal spaces of transitions such as corridors) of organizing spaces; (3) the existence
of poles of convergence, rooms or open spaces that are closely connected to all other
rooms of the building. Such rooms formed a hub for most of the trajectories that crisscross the building, and therefore constituted a place where people would have easily
congregated. Hence, in Neopalatial architecture, there is a growing tendency towards a
stronger categorical differentiation (i.e., the fact that particular functions were assigned
without ambiguity to specific rooms—Hanson 1998, pp. 123–130) and architectural
segmentation (i.e., the fact that function-specific spaces, their associated activities, and
the persons who performed then were mostly kept apart from one another—Kent 1990)
5
. In the same study, I also illustrated that the architectural form (i.e., size, proportions,
and layout of rooms and open spaces) was probably mobilized to induce or constrain
movements (Letesson 2009, pp. 357–361; see also Letesson and Vansteenhuyse 2006).
This configurational analysis of the Neopalatial built environment shows that there
were strong recurrences in the way internal spaces were interconnected and organized,
therefore contributing to materialize different zones of activities by channeling and
constraining human movement and practices. This redundancy of the configuration
certainly contributed to enhance the legibility of the built environment with spatial and
social rules that were “unconsciously obeyed rather than formally taught” (Gosden
2005, p. 202). One of my goals here is to investigate how certain fixtures like hearths
and kernoi could have contributed to reinforce the effect of the configuration, how they
worked with architecture to ingrain and induce some prescribed spatial behaviors6.
Hearths and Kernoi in Minoan Crete: Function and Chronology
To better understand how hearths and kernoi might have acquired very specific
symbolic and functional meanings, it is crucial to acknowledge their formal and
chronological properties. Hearths are primarily considered as the “permanent allocation
of a certain amount of space for a fire” (Metaxa Muhly 1984, p. 107). Obviously, the
use of such installations could be manifold, ranging from the prime concern about the
5
Through ethnographic comparisons, Kent (1990) showed that a growing architectural segmentation is
usually concomitant with an increasing socio-political complexity.
6
Similar concerns also characterized the behavioral approach of Sanders (1990) who studied domestic
buildings of the Early Bronze Age village of Myrtos Fourno Koriphi with a specific interest for haptics,
smell zones, and the ways in which circulation could be altered through the placement of artifacts.
Letesson
distribution of heath and light to domestic practices and ceremonial performances as
well as industrial or artisanal activities (Metaxa Muhly 1984, p. 107; Kopaka et al. 1989,
p. 21; Shaw 1990, pp. 248–250; Rethemiotakis 1999, pp. 722 and 726). Identifying the
specific function(s) of a hearth usually requires a close examination of its context. To do
so, one has to take into account the area where it stands, its precise location within this
area, and the features and objects associated with it (Kopaka et al. 1989, pp. 23–24, n.9–
10). In some instance, hearths also adopted very peculiar shapes and formal properties, a
specialization probably related to their function (Metaxa Muhly 1984, p. 107; Kopaka
et al. 1989, pp. 23–24; Shaw 1990; Rethemiotakis 1999; Maeir and Hitchcock 2011).
Nevertheless, depending on the context, several functions might have been associated
with a single fixture (Rethemiotakis 1999, p. 726).
At first, very few fixed hearths were documented in Minoan Crete. This led Evans to
believe that fixed hearths went out of use after the Neolithic period when they were
replaced by braziers and movable tripod hearths (Evans 1928, p. 20). Even if the
scarcity of fixed hearths in the archaeological record has most certainly something to do
with the difficulties arising from recognizing pyrotechnic structures with certainty
(especially in Minoan Crete where fire destructions are quite common—Demargne
1932, p. 85; Kopaka et al. 1989, p. 21), Evans conclusions had a “pervasive influence
on later scholarship” (Metaxa Muhly 1984, p. 108)7. Nowadays, even if fixed hearths
remained less common during the Neopalatial period (Shaw 1990, p. 250), their
existence is nonetheless firmly attested (Table 1 and Fig. 1) as it is the case for earlier
(Evans 1928, pp. 18–21; Vagnetti 1972–1973; Todaro and Di Tonto 2008; McEnroe
2010, pp. 35–41; Demargne 1932, pp. 76–88; Metaxa Muhly 1984; Todaro 2012) and
later periods (Kopaka et al. 1989, p. 27, n.42; Shaw 1990, pp. 249–252; Moody 2009;
Maeir and Hitchcock 2011, pp. 54–55).
Without denying the typological and chronological complexity of this issue, my
main concern here is more closely related to the social dimensions of the fire, to the
communality of the hearth considered “a focal location, the very heart of the house,
where residents congregate” (Shaw 1990, p. 235). Vitruvius already considered fire the
basic mediator in the sense that, as Glacken (1976, p. 108) explains, “the sounds made
by individuals around the fire led to speech and language, later to the deliberate
assembly and to social intercourse.” In Crete, the collective nature of practices associated with hearths is widely attested from the Neolithic until the end of the LBA. In
earlier periods, these practices are usually related to commensality, either in funerary or
settlement contexts, and the hearths quite often in the open air (Hamilakis 1998; Todaro
and Di Tonto 2008; Todaro 2012; Tomkins 2012). Nevertheless, as mentioned above,
internal domestic hearths also existed at these periods. They were most probably used
on a daily basis on the household scale. Later, this type of hearth, more closely
connected to the restricted domestic sphere, usually within buildings, seems to have
been the norm. For example, in Neopalatial architecture, the existence of a fire fixture
around which people gathered is documented in the so-called room with central hearth
and column (Fig. 2; Deshayes and Dessenne 1959, pp. 12–13; Pelon 1966, pp. 566–567;
7
For example, although traditional interpretations of Minoans having only portable hearths or braziers in an
island characterized by a warmer climate than mainland Greece (Jones 1972, p. 348) are now largely at odds
with archaeological evidence, Moody (2009) nonetheless recently argued that hearths did not become
prevalent in Crete until the Postpalatial period.
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
Table 1 Central hearths and their locations within Neopalatial buildings
a
Site
Building
Room/space
1
Chania
House 1
11
2
Malia
Zeta-Beta
17
3
Malia
Maison de la Façade à Redans
16
4
Malia
Epsilon
24
5
Galatas
Palace
17
6
Kommos
North House
17
7
Kommos
House with the Press
2
8
Sklavokambos
/
15
1 Shaw 1990, p. 235, n.7; 2 Deshayes and Dessenne 1959, pp. 7–26; van Effenterre 1980, p. 167, Fig. 234; 3
van Effenterre 1969, pp. 96–98, Fig. 7–8, pl.LV; 4 Deshayes and Dessenne 1959, p. 106; 5 Rethemiotakis
1999, pp. 723–724; 6 Shaw and Shaw 1996, pp. 37, 40–41 and 366–367, pl.2.4 and 2.48; 7 Shaw and Shaw
1996, pp. 106, 122 and 366–367, pl.2.165, 2.178 and 5.7; 8 Kopaka et al. 1989, p. 25, n.26
a
Fixed hearths: 1, 2, 5, 6, 7; non-fixed hearth: 3; imprints: 4, 8
van Effenterre 1980, p. 418; Hallager and Tzedakis 1984, pp. 5–6; Michailidou 1987;
Shaw 1990, p. 235; Shaw and Shaw 1996, pp. 366–367; Soles 2003, p. 128). This type
of room goes back to the Protopalatial period (van Effenterre 1980, pp. 162–165 and
171–172; Waterhouse 1983, p. 311; Palyvou 2002, p. 168) and could even be traced
earlier, if one accepts that it may have derived from the open-air central court of earlier
rural houses as suggested by Michaelidou (1987, p. 522; see also Waterhouse 1983, p.
312; Weinberg 1961, p. 318). Furthermore, even if the column is not always present, the
existence of rooms with a centrally placed fixed hearth is securely attested in domestic
structures of the beginning of the Middle Minoan (MM) period, notably in Malia
(Demargne 1932, p. 88; Metaxa Muhly 1984, p. 120; Kopaka et al. 1989, p. 24;
Rethemiotakis 1999, p. 723; McEnroe 2010, pp. 35–41)8.
The term kernos is potentially misleading. Originally, it was used to describe a clay
vessel primarily used in the worship of the Eleusinian deities (Chapouthier 1928, pp.
305–307; Metaxa Muhly 1981, p. 242). It took the form of a pedestaled bowl with
flaring rims often, although not invariably, provided with small attached receptacles or
kotyliskoi (Metaxa Muhly 1981, p. 242). Xanthoudides was the first to use the word
kernos to define the function of several multiple vessels of clay and stone dating from
periods from Early Minoan (EM) II through Late Minoan (LM) III (Xanthoudides
1905–1906). He connected them with stone libation tables and other objects which
were all considered receptacles for offerings to the gods or the dead (Xanthoudides
1905–1906, pp. 14–15; Xanthoudides 1924, pp. 17–18, 45, 79, and 99). Many of the
objects identified by Xanthoudides as kernoi have since been recognized as domestic
utensils, lamps, lamp stands, and braziers (Metaxa Muhly 1981, pp. 242–243).
Nevertheless, the term kernos remained in use for a specific type of stone container
also called block vase (Warren 1969, pp. 11–14; Metaxa Muhly 1981, pp. 243–252).
8
As previously mentioned, even if the existence of fixed hearths is attested in Neolithic houses, their position
within the room does not seem to be as systematically central (Evans 1928, pp. 18–21, Fig. 8A; McEnroe
2010, pp. 12–16). LMIII central fixed hearths have also been found (see for example Shaw 1990, p. 235, n.8;
Driessen and Farnoux 1994, p. 60; Driessen et al. 2009a, b; and many examples in Langohr 2009).
Letesson
16
15
(3)
(2)
(4)
(1)
(5)
(6)
0
(7)
10m
(9)
0
10m
(8)
Fig. 1 Location of central hearths in Neopalatial buildings (room/space in light gray; 1, Sklavokampos; 2,
Malia—Zeta-Beta; 3, Malia—Maison de la Façade à Redans; 4, Chania—House I; 5, Kommos—House with
the Press; 6, Kommos—North House; 7, Malia—Quartier Epsilon; 8, Malia—Palace; 9, Galatas—Palace)
By analogy to the later clay vases, Chapouthier (1928, p. 307) firstly used the term
kernos to describe the circular stone fixture with regular sets of little carved depressions
embedded in a terrace close to the southwest corner of the Central Court of the palace
of Malia. From this analogy of form, Chapouthier (1928, pp. 307–312) extrapolated an
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
Fig. 2 Central hearth and column
base in the House with the Press
(Kommos) (Shaw and Shaw
1996, p. 709, plate 5.7)
analogy of function, interpreting it as an offering table (see also Chapouthier and Joly
1936, pp. 17–18). Soon after, on the basis of the same evidence, Evans (1930, pp. 390–
396) disregarded this interpretation and treated this type of cupped slab as a kind of
game board (for Evans’ argument, see also Hitchcock 2000, pp. 68–69), a proposition
originally made by Harriet Boyd for a similar stone slab of later date found in Kavousi
(Boyd 1901, pp. 141–143). Since then, they have been assigned either a ritual (usually
as offering table—Demargne 1932, pp. 60–76; Nilsson 1950, pp. 106–107, 129–130;
Pelon 1980, p. 134, n.2; Pelon 1988, pp. 42–43; Soles 1991, p. 71, n.111; Soles 1992,
pp. 222–223) or a more secular function (usually as game board—van Effenterre 1955;
van Effenterre 1980, pp. 62–63; Metaxa Muhly 1981, pp. 253–259; Hood 1984; Swiny
1986, pp. 44–60). Nevertheless, some scholars also noted that these two interpretation
were not necessarily mutually exclusive (Evans 1930, p. 393; van Effenterre 1955, p.
546; Hitchcock 2000, pp. 148–149) whereas others did not really give total credit to
one or the other (Warren 1972, pp. 230–231). The most comprehensive study on the
subject was conducted by Hillbom (Hillbom 2003, 2005; see also Whittaker 2002). His
detailed and exhaustive analysis led him to believe that, with the exception of some
monumental and prominently located examples, most of Minoan cup-holes—a more
neutral term that he prefers to kernoi—were indeed game boards (Hillbom 2003, p. 36
and 52; a proposition originally made by Swiny 1986, pp. 44–60) 9. Nevertheless, he
also willingly admits that such activities could have had strong ritual connections and
implications (Hillbom 2003, pp. 53–54; Hillbom 2005, p. 122). More recently, Cucuzza
(2010) proposed a reassessment of the kernoi’s functionality in which he insisted on the
fact that the settings of many of these stones with depressions plead in favor of a
function related to the redistribution of goods, maybe in the form of a ritualized game
(see also Hitchcock 2000, pp. 148–149).
In this paper, the term kernos refers to the aforementioned stone slabs, usually
embedded in a plane surface and therefore considered a fixed element. Their most
distinctive feature is the existence, on their upper surface, usually polished or worn
smooth, of small shallow depressions carved along the slab’s edge (Fig. 3). In the most
prestigious example, these depressions are finely worked, forming different circles in a
concentric fashion (Demargne 1932, pp. 295–300), but most of the time, they are rather
crudely made on slabs which are not necessarily circular (van Effenterre 1955, p. 542;
Metaxa Muhly 1981, pp. 253–254; Soles 1992, p. 222; for a detailed classification
9
See also the contrast between Hood 1984 and his later ideas cited in Hitchcock 2000, p. 149.
Letesson
based on appearance, shape, and placement within sites, see Hillbom 2003). The
number and size of depressions is also quite variable and the presence of a larger
central hollow is not systematic (van Effenterre 1955, p. 542; Warren 1972, pp. 230–231;
Soles 1992, pp. 221–222; Hillbom 2003, p. 12). The type of stone varies but limestone
(sidheropetra) appeared to have been preferably used in Malia, Mochlos, and Gournia
(Soles 1992, p. 221). Stone kernos are attested since the Prepalatial period but most of
them date to the Protopalatial (Cucuzza 2010, p. 136) and Neopalatial periods (Hillbom
2003, pp. 24–27 and 52). They were found in funerary contexts (Demargne 1932, pp. 60–
76; Demargne 1945, pp. 33–34; Soles 1992, pp. 20, 221–223; Cucuzza 2010, p. 137), at
the peak sanctuary on top of Mount Iuktas (Hood 1984, p. 41, n.13; Karetsou 2012; Soles
1992, p. 221), but also in settlements, often in close relation to courts or the so-called
theatral areas (Pernier 1935, p. 135; Soles 1979, p. 154, n.30; Warren 1972, pp. 230–231;
Hitchcock 2000, pp. 68–72; Ferrari and Cucuzza 2004; Cucuzza 2010, p. 138). More
precisely, Hillbom underlined that around 70 % of the kernoi selected in his catalog were
actually carved on pavement slabs located in stairs, theatral areas, courts, or streets
(Hillbom 2003, p. 17, Fig. 5 and 51). He considered these areas open, easily accessible,
public, and multifunctional and insisted that it strongly pled in favor of a more private,
profane, and mundane function (such as gaming) for the cup-holes located in such places
(Hillbom 2003, pp. 33–34). Within buildings, they were found in so-called shrines or cult
rooms, storage spaces, and at the proximity of entrances (Hitchcock 2000, p. 72; Cucuzza
2010, p. 139; see also Soles 1979, pp. 152–154, Figs. 1 and 2 for the account of an unusual
concentration of kernoi in a domestic shrine within the MM house Aa at Gournia—see
also Hillbom 2003, p. 35, n.129 for a critical evaluation of this interpretation).
Neopalatial Hearths and Kernoi in Their Spatial Settings
The hearths and kernoi selected in this paper are not the only examples of the
Neopalatial period. As a matter of fact, to be efficiently conducted and give significant
results in archaeological research, space syntax analysis requires buildings which meet
specific requirements concerning their preservation and layout (Cutting 2003).
Therefore, some Neopalatial architectural remains, too scanty or confused in terms of
internal organization (Letesson 2009, pp. 13–15 and 49–51), could not be integrated in
the data base. Consequently, some hearths and kernoi that are documented for the
Neopalatial period are not considered here. Furthermore, the examples of fixtures that
will be discussed are not selected merely because they are hearths and kernoi, but
because of their specific location within buildings. As aforementioned, hearths and
kernoi undoubtedly existed in various contexts, and that might have considerably
affected the way in which they were symbolically loaded.
The hearths I am concerned with are particular in the sense that they are part of a
type of room which, as noted above, has a long history in Minoan architecture and is
recurrent in the Neopalatial period: the room with central hearth and column (Table 1).
In domestic architecture, where it is more often encountered, this room is often
considered the heart of buildings. Indeed, this specific space—usually the largest in
the ground floor—is often centrally located within buildings. Moreover, it must have
played a pivotal role in internal circulations as many other rooms were frequently
organized around it (McEnroe 1982, p. 10). Such a room would therefore have been at
the very center of domestic life, hosting household daily practices such as food
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
Fig. 3 Kernos from the palace at Malia (adapted from Chapoutier 1928, p. 297, Fig. 4)
processing and consumption, family gatherings, guest receptions, as well as small craft
activities. The rooms listed in Table 1 were indeed poles of convergence; they were the
functional core and central focus of the household or social group in charge of the
building. In these rooms, the central hearth was first and foremost a communal hearth
(Rethemiotakis 1999; see also Maeir and Hitchcock 2011, p. 53). As Rethemiotakis
(1999, p. 726) pointed out, in domestic contexts, several functions could be—and more
than probably were—associated to one hearth whereas in more monumental (and
public) buildings, like the palace at Galatas, the different functions demanded different
hearths (see also Metaxa Muhly 1984, p. 120). This combination of a central—and
primarily but not exclusively social—hearth and a more functional hearth (whether for
cooking, ritual practices, or industrial and artisanal activities, or simply a combination
of these functions) is not unparalleled in Neopalatial architecture. It can also be found
in domestic architecture like, for example, in the Maison de la façade à redans (Fig. 1)
at Malia where room 15 was interpreted as a kitchen with a cooking hearth in its
Letesson
southwest corner (van Effenterre 1969, p. 94), and room 16 which produced, at its
center, a large terracotta platter covered with ashes and flecks of charcoal that probably
worked as a portable hearth (van Effenterre 1969, p. 97, pl.LV). Such a duplication also
existed later in Postpalatial Crete, like at Sissi, where the LM IIIB building CD shows
both central “social” and more functional hearths (Driessen et al. 2009b, pp. 113–138;
Driessen et al. 2011, pp. 83–141; Driessen et al. 2012, pp. 63–115) or at LM IIIC
Kavousi-Vronda where the co-occurrence of hearths and ovens is attested (Maeir and
Hitchcock 2011, p. 55).
Most of the selected kernoi were found in palatial centers (Malia, Phaistos, Gournia),
usually within the monumental building’s fabric (Table 2). When they were encountered in smaller settlements, they were often—but not always—embedded in an open
area (Mochlos, Pseira). These kernoi are worth mentioning briefly10. In the palace of
Malia (Fig. 4), three kernoi where found. The first and most famous one is located on a
paved platform (XVI 1) in the southwest corner of the Central Court. This platform is
connected to both the Central Court and the south entrance corridor. It is also situated
just to the south of a terraced area whose precise function is not known. The second
kernos is located in the small room VII 13 which clearly constitutes an interface
between the corridor of the magazines (C 2) and passageways VII 10–12 leading to
the Central Court. The third kernos was found embedded in the first landing of staircase
IX a-b, one of the main transition space between the Central Court and the first floor of
the palace. At Gournia (Fig. 5), building G, also called “palace” by its excavator (Soles
2002), three kernoi were found. Room 18, in a sector apparently dedicated to ritual
activities of the ground floor (Soles 1991, p. 54), produced the first one. In a situation
quite similar to that of Malia’s southwest platform (Soles 1991, p. 71, n.111), this room
was actually a buffer zone, a transition space, between the north porch (and the Public
Court), the interior of the building through room I and the ritual rooms and potential
treasuries for votives to the southwest. The second kernos was found outside the
building, on the basement level, to the east of room 13, where the so-called Terrace
and Paved Corridor merge into a small open-air space (Soles 1991, p. 36). There stood
a baetyl closely associated with the kernos and a double-axe mason’s mark (carved on
the west wall of room 13) (Soles 1991, p. 37, n.29, Figs. 25 and 26). This area was
clearly a specific area in the passage leading from the West Court and the northern
street to the Public Court. The third kernos in the palace of Gournia was carved in the
second step of staircase 26 leading to the first floor. Soles (1991, p. 64, n.84) rightfully
compared this kernos with the one found in staircase IX a-b at Malia. In the palace of
Phaistos (Fig. 5), some of the steps of the monumental staircase 66 show cupules that
could have formed several kernoi (Hitchcock 2000, pp. 70–71) not unlike those found
on the theatral area of the first palace (Pernier 1935, p. 185). At Mochlos, Building B.2
and its surroundings produced two kernoi (Fig. 4). Within the building, a triangular
purple schist slab showing several small carved depressions was interpreted as a
potential kernos (Soles and Davaras 1996, p. 188, pl.50e and 51b). It was located in
the northern part of room 3 and closely associated with a basin preceded by two
columns. Even if room 3 is far too large and important to be considered a mere
transition space, it still constitutes the major node in the circulation system within
10
The plans of all subsequent buildings mentioned in the text, can also be found in more detailed versions in
Letesson 2009 or on http://letesson.minoan-aegis.be.
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
Table 2 Kernoi and their location within Neopalatial buildings
Site
Building
Room/space
1
Malia
Palace
XVI
2
Malia
Palace
VII13
3
Malia
Palace
IXa-b
4
Gournia
Palace
18
5
Gournia
Palace
Baetyl court (West of room 13)
6
Gournia
Palace
26
7
Phaistos
Palace
66
8
Mochlos
C.3
9
9
Mochlos
B.2
3
10
Mochlos
B.2
Terrace south of B.2
11
Pseira
BS/BV
Plateia
1 Chapouthier and Joly 1936, pp. 17–18; Pelon 1980, pp. 134–135; van Effenterre 1980, pp. 62–63; 2 Pelon
1980, p. 166, pl.3.2; 3 Pelon 1980, p191, n.1, pl.147.4; 4 Soles 1991, pp. 48–50 and 71, n.111, Fig. 47; 5 Soles
1991, pp. 34–37 and 72, Figs 24–26; 6 Soles 1991, p. 64, n.84, Fig. 66; 7 Hitchcock 2000, pp. 70–71; 8 Soles
and Davaras 1996, p. 196; 9 Soles and Davaras 1996, p. 188, pl.50e and 51.b; 10 Soles and Davaras 1996, p.
190; 11 McEnroe 2001, p. 85
Building B.2. Indeed, after entering the building through vestibule 1-2, it was necessary
to go through room 3 to reach any other part of B.2. The other kernos was found on a
paved terrace to the south of Building B.2 (Soles and Davaras 1996, p. 190). This area
was closely connected to an ascending platform along the south facade of B.2. Both
produced a large number of conical cups probably used as lamps and deposited there
during a ceremony certainly connected to the pillar crypts (below rooms 5 and 6) and
the altar to which the platform led (Soles 1999, p. 57; Soles 2004, p. 159). In house C.3
(Fig. 4), the initial location of the kernoi, found close to the staircase descending
towards the lowest level of the building, is a bit more controversial and it is possible
that it actually fell from the upper floor (Soles and Davaras 1996, p. 196). In Pseira
(Fig. 4), to the east of the small town square (plateia) facing building BS-BV, a large flat
slab with several cupules irregularly carved on its surface was probably used as a
kernos (Soles and Davaras 1988, p. 211, pl.58b; Floyd 1998, p. 4, Fig. 1). Davaras
insisted on the fact that the kernos was aligned with and probably linked to the portico
entrance of building BS-BV which formed a liminal zone between outside and inside
(McEnroe 2001, p. 85).
When considering these examples, one thing clearly stands out: most of the kernoi
were embedded in or close to transition spaces or passages. Chapouthier was the first to
insist on this specificity and noted that “les rites autour du kernos sont essentiellement
des rites de passage” (Chapouthier 1928, p. 317). He sees the kernoi in the palace at
Malia, together with another stones marked with small depressions, as related to
libations and contributing to sanctify the approach to specific locations within the
building (Chapouthier 1928, pp. 317–321, Figs. 14–15 and 18). This notion of passage
or transition associated with kernoi was also evoked by other scholars (see Pelon 1980,
p. 191, n.1; Soles 1992, pp. 219 and 222–223; Hitchcock 2000, p. 72) but remained
curiously absent from more recent studies (such as Cucuzza 2010) or seemed to have
Letesson
IXa-b
C2
Central Court
VII 13
VII 10-11
XVI 1
0
10m
(1)
2
1
3
5
6
9
Plateia
(2)
(3)
(4)
0
10m
Fig. 4 Location of kernoi in Neopalatial buildings I (room/space in light gray; 1, Malia—Palace; 2,
Mochlos—House C.3; Mochlos—Building B.2; Pseira—Building BS/BS)
been considered of less significance than the usual functions (Hillbom 2003, p. 33,
n.119). Of course, other kernoi were also found embedded in rooms or spaces that were
not passages (Pelon 1980, p. 191, n1 and 159; Cucuzza 2010, p. 139). Nevertheless,
one has also to keep in mind that these notions of passage or transition could have been
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
66
Central Court
26
West Court
I
18
Public Court
13
Baetyl Court
(1)
(2)
0
10m
Fig. 5 Location of kernoi in Neopalatial buildings II (room/space in light gray; 1, Phaistos—Palace; 2,
Gournia—Palace)
effective in a more subtle way than the mere physical movement from one place to
another. Such issues will be further discussed below.
Hearths and Kernoi in Action: Associations and Affordances
If, as noted above, some Neopalatial hearths and kernoi had a specific role because of
their spatial position within buildings, their existence in Minoan society over a long
period of time also contributed to give them an enduring significance. Of course, the
symbolic and functional meanings of these fixtures should be dealt with in close
correlation, as two facets of the same issue (Knappett 2005, p. 63, n.25). As stated
by Sinha (2005, p. 1543): “Artefacts represent the practices that they support, constrain
and potentiate, and the cognitive capacities which are implicated in these practices.”
However, I will first address the associations (symbolic meaning) of central hearths and
kernoi as such but also in their relations with architecture. In so doing, issues of agency
and affordances (functional meaning) will already be outlined, but they will receive a
fuller development in a second time.
As mentioned above, the social or communal nature of the hearth is firmly attested
from the Neolithic onwards, and thus, unsurprisingly, in Minoan Crete, as in many
Letesson
other places, hearths have a long history of association with the idea of gathering;
however, since quite early, this was reinforced by the fact that the physical centrality of
the fireplace seems to have been a recurring concern of the Minoans. At first, these
remarks might seem somewhat trivial but let us take them one step further and see how
they gain weight when considered in close relation to a recent reinterpretation of
Minoan socio-political organization (Driessen 2010). In this paper, Driessen discusses
the Levi-Straussian concept of House society (société à maisons—Levi-Strauss 1975;
see also Gonzales-Ruibal 2006), its successive reassessment and redefinition (Carsten
and Hugh-Jones 1995; Joyce and Gillespie 2000), as well as its potential applicability
in the case of Minoan Crete. As in other societies, in Bronze Age Crete, Houses would
have formed corporate groups constituting the primary unit of production and consumption and would have defined themselves essentially through their locus-boundness
and intergenerationality (Driessen 2010). In other words, Houses can be more generally
considered social groups of variable size practically and symbolically centered on an
estate (building or other). This spatial anchorage and the actions involved with its
preservation participate in perpetuating the group identity and serve “to configure [its]
status vis-à-vis other houses within the larger society” (Gillespie 2000, p. 2). The
concept of House is particularly powerful in the sense that it does not simply equate
affiliation to the group with kin or lineage but considers membership as resulting from
multiple strategies and practices related to kinship, economics, religion, and politics
(Gillespie 2000, p. 15). Although this enduring social group is materially represented
by a physical structure, associated objects (such as furnishings, curated heirlooms, and
graves) within the same designated locus in the landscape also take an active part in its
intergenerational existence and the promulgation of its status (Driessen 2010, p. 41).
Therefore, Driessen investigates notions of continuity of place, life cycle of buildings,
concentration and display of value, as well as the presence of specific building
materials (stone) and heirlooms with regard to several Minoan buildings throughout
the Bronze Age (Driessen 2010, pp. 43–55).
Even if his analysis is soundly argued, it is intriguing that there is no mention of the
centrality of the hearth in Minoan architecture. In many Southeast Asian societies, it has
been amply demonstrated that the communal preparation and consumption of rice
meals determine who belongs to these Houses (Carsten 1997), the hearth assuming a
vital position in this process and being considered as “what makes a house possible”
(Janowski 1995, p. 92) and constitutes its “very heart” (Carsten 1995, p. 114). Vellinga
even stressed that in several accounts of Southeast Asian House societies, the hearth is
considered the locus where kinship is created through cooking and eating practices
while the house in itself, the material building, is merely the backdrop of the action,
“reflecting or representing through its spatial layout and design the level and nature of
‘togetherness’ within and between Houses but playing no apparent part in its constitution and perpetuation” (Vellinga 2007, p. 759). Quite on the contrary, while stressing
the “intimate personal relation between buildings and people,” and presenting Minoan
architectural structures as “living bodies with an intergenerational quality which made
them socially relevant to a succession of people organized in a community” (Driessen
2010, p. 40), Driessen rightly recognizes a more active role to the actual buildings.
Nevertheless, it does not seem too far-fetched to consider that certain types of Minoan
hearths may have also greatly contributed to the negotiation and perpetuation of House
membership through practices of commensality that are incidentally well documented
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
in Bronze Age Crete. Therefore, in Minoan Houses, central hearths would have been
one of the main focal points of social reproduction; they would have constituted critical
material scaffolds for the perpetuation of the ideological basis that defines the Cretan
Bronze Age society.
Furthermore, although House societies imply communal living, they are far from
egalitarian: social hierarchies and inequalities, especially through ancestry and inherited
titles11, are parts of their essential features (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995; Coupland
and Banning 1996; Joyce and Gillespie 2000) and yet, around the central hearth,
everybody gathers, regardless of ranks. It means that together with their key role in
social reproduction, central hearths might have played also a decisive function in terms
of spatial solidarity. In space syntax, spatial solidarity is linked to the generation, in the
built environment, of people’s contiguity and encounter (Hillier and Hanson 1984,
p. 145). In Neopalatial architecture, the poles of convergence are the configurational
materialization of spatial solidarity in many different types of buildings, they formed
areas to which people had equal access and in which they shared equal rights, places
where local interactions depending on spatial proximity, such as communal meals, took
place (Letesson and Driessen 2008, pp. 209–210; Letesson 2009, pp. 348–349). As
aforementioned, these poles of convergence are well integrated in the buildings, they
formed hubs in the circulation patterns, rooms, and spaces where Minoans could and
would have almost naturally congregated. Naturally in the sense that their recurrent
spatial properties—especially in terms of localization and connections to other rooms—
were certainly strong behavioral cues, ingrained through habit in every users of
Neopalatial buildings. In some of these rooms, the presence of a central hearth might
well have contributed to enhance the spatial solidarity rooted in the architectural
configuration. That might well be one of the main reasons of the long-lasting
Minoan architectural tradition of rooms with central hearth and column, and, by
extension, of centrally placed hearths in other poles of convergence. Central hearths
would then have been, at once, a locus for the constitution of and integration within the
House and a symbol for the place of spatial solidarity.
Let us now consider the symbolic associations that can be linked to kernoi. Even if
the latter were found in various environments (Soles 1992, pp. 221–222; Hillbom 2003,
p. 17, Fig. 5; Cucuzza 2010), it seems that they were often imbued with notions of
transition and/or transformation. This broadly encompasses diverse and yet somewhat
interrelated phenomena such as the transition from life to death (kernoi found in
relation with the entrance of tombs), from profane to sacred (kernoi found in or on
the way to ritual spaces), from outside to inside (kernoi found in liminal zones or close
to thresholds/boundaries of some sort), but also the transformation of raw natural
products into processed goods (kernoi found in or on the way to storage spaces, but
also kernoi as evoking earlier grinding stones that might have been their prototypes—
Soles 1992, p. 223), or, as discussed by Cucuzza (2010), the transition from the
community to the individual through redistribution. In this last case, it is interesting
to note that the type of kernoi that have a large central hollow encircled with smaller
cupules might well have been icons of this redistribution principle (with the central
hollow representing the community and symbolically containing the goods to share,
11
In the same vein, Driessen (2010, p. 53) proposed that specific seal stone types may have been expressing
differences in status within and between Houses.
Letesson
and the cupules standing for the individuals, symbolically containing a portion of the
shared goods), but also practical devices to made such a distribution easier (a bit like
some sort of a Minoan abacus used to calculate how to divide the goods to share).
These phenomena are quite diverse facets of the potential significance and use of
kernoi, but they nonetheless all point to the same broad notion of transition/
transformation. In that sense, maybe it does not matter that much to know if they were
actually used as gaming boards or libation surfaces, but it seems more promising to
consider that, within or close to Neopalatial buildings, they may have acted as liminal
attention focusing devices, signposting a spatial shift.
In the same manner that all Neopalatial hearths were not playing a major role in
social reproduction and spatial solidarity, all Neopalatial kernoi were not vested with
the role of signpost. Nevertheless, in the examples detailed above, their broad association with notions of transition/transformation seemed to have been called upon in
close correlation with transition spaces that are the basis of architectural segmentation
in the Neopalatial built environment. These transition spaces (corridors, passageways,
stairways, porches, porticoes, etc.) are often characterized by formal and spatial
recurrences (in terms of localization within the buildings, connections to other rooms,
etc.) that certainly contributed to enhance the legibility of the built environment for its
different users. Kernoi would then have helped to reinforce and manifest the transpatial
solidarity operating in such spaces. In space syntax, transpatial solidarity happens
when the discreteness of connected spaces is emphasized by strong control of their
boundary or liminal area to avoid undesired/uncontrolled incursions: “The essence of a
transpatial solidarity lies in the local reproduction of a structure recognizably identical
to that of other members of the group. The stronger and more complex the structure,
therefore, and the more exactly it is adhered to, the stronger will be the solidarity”
(Hillier and Hanson 1984, p. 145). Whereas spatial solidarity is about contiguity and
encounter, transpatial solidarity is about analogy and isolation, it is materialized in
“analogous structures realized in controlled isolation by discrete individuals” (Hillier
and Hanson 1984, p. 145). It is hence argued here that the effects, in terms of
transpatial solidarity, of the recurrence and reproduction of identical patterns of spaces
are maximized by specific fixtures, namely, the kernoi. This spatial segregation and
restriction in terms of access is probably the result of asymmetrical relations within the
social group. If one takes again the concept of House society into consideration, it is
well known and documented that inequalities existed within the House itself and
between different Houses (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995; Joyce and Gillespie 2000;
Driessen 2010, p. 42). If the central hearths represented the heterarchy in congregation,
the kernoi in the transition spaces, on the contrary, expressed the hierarchies in
segregation. Rights of access to specific spaces and rooms may have been function
of gender, age, or class/rank within the social group. A detailed investigation of these
criterions is way beyond the scope of this paper, and, for the present argument, it
suffices to underline that kernoi would then have been, at once, a material signpost of
segregation within Neopalatial society and a symbol for the places of transpatial
solidarity.
As underlined above, hearths and kernoi acquired a specific significance because
they were perceived but also physically encountered in similar conditions over a long
period of time and in particular spatial contexts. By illustrating their temporal and
spatial situatedness (Knappett 2005, pp. 62–63), one can easily apprehend how they
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
took part in an enduring enculturation process. Now that some light has been shed on
the trajectories through which central hearths and kernoi acquired, through various
associations, their potential to act, it seems crucial to engage in a more detailed
dissection of the mechanisms that may have actuated it. In other words, to consider
the ways in which hearths and kernoi worked as mediators (Knappett 2005, pp. 54–58;
Latour 2006, pp. 83–89), shaping human intentions and supporting/framing human
actions. Generally speaking, and building on this notion of enculturation, it would seem
plausible that, at the vicinity of a central hearth or a kernos, Minoans would have
somewhat instinctively adopted specific stances or behaviors triggered by almost
unconscious reminiscences—rooted in perception, emotion, and proprioception
(Warnier 2001)—of previous encounters with and occurrences of such fixtures12. As
noted by Clark, repeated interactions with external resources are crucial to the human
mind, “to the flow of thoughts and the adaptive success of reason” (Clark 1997, p. 68).
Such interactions can hence “transform inputs, simplify search, aid recognition, prompt
associative recall, offload memory, and so on,” truly qualifying humans as “distributed
cognitive engines” (Clark 1997, p. 68). Furthermore, as aforementioned, these interactions gratify artefacts with an active role. As long as they modify a given situation by
introducing a difference in the sequence of events that characterize an action, they
become actors of their own (Latour 2006, p. 103). That, of course, does not mean that
these non-human actors totally determine the action: central hearths do not attract
people around them, and kernoi do not sort people out, granting access to a particular
place. As Latour (2006, pp. 103–104) stressed it, we must consider more subtle
gradations in non-human agency between plain and full causality and mere inexistence:
“Outre le fait de ‘déterminer’ et de servir d’‘arrière-fond de l’action humaine’, les
choses peuvent autoriser, rendre possible, encourager, mettre à portée, permettre,
suggérer, influencer, faire obstacle, interdire, et ainsi de suite.” It is exactly for that
reason that Knappett (2011, pp. 64–69) pleaded for an upgraded praxeology to study
and decipher human interactions with artefacts. First, he suggested a more systematic
approach of the “processes by which objects/things might be implicated or included in
bodily gestures” (Knappett 2011, p. 69); second, he also urged researchers to focus on
“artefacts assemblages, groups of artefacts that can in some senses work in concert to
provide contexts for action and perception” (Knappett 2011, p. 69; see also Gosden
2005) rather than on individual artefacts. Thirdly, he insisted on the necessity to
develop a more socialized approach, one that goes beyond the individual interactions
at the proximate level (i.e., individual–object at the micro scale) and is concerned with a
larger social group, and the processes through which the latter is created and defined by
practices involving artefacts (i.e., community of practice at the meso-scale—Knappett
2011, pp. 98–105; see also Knappett 2005, p. 60).
As described above, in Neopalatial architecture, central hearths and kernoi appeared in
very specific spatial contexts and, it was therefore argued that they acted simultaneously
as material reminders and symbols of dichotomous realities that nonetheless conjointly
characterized the Neopalatial built environment13 and are summarized in Table 3.
12
It has been suggested, for example, that the perception of relevant objects could trigger affordances for
actions stored in memory (Glenberg 1997).
13
It is clear that some of these dichotomies are essential features of built environment in general, but, in the
case of Neopalatial architecture, it is their recurrent distribution within space and across various type of
buildings that is worth noting (Letesson 2009, pp. 355–357).
Letesson
Table 3 Dichotomous properties
of the Neopalatial built environment
Central hearths
Kernoi
Occupation
Movement
Congregation/integration
Selection/segregation
Spatial solidarity
Transpatial solidarity
Agglutinative layout
Articulated layout
The list could be expanded with, respectively, heterarchical use of space vs hierarchical use of space, sociopetal vs sociofugal (Hall 1971), but these broad notions do not
really tell us yet how—by which processes—these fixtures were co-implicated in the
bio-psycho-social Minoan subject, the “ways in which mind, agency and object come
to be intertwined and codependent” (Knappett 2006, p. 239). A challenging starting
point is to consider central hearths and kernoi as pivots for micro-scale human action.
As defined by Knappett (2011, p. 66), “a pivot acts as a focus for shared gaze or joint
attention, thereby bringing artefacts into the domain of social interactions.” Joint
attention is a fundamental notion in developmental psychology (Eilan et al. 2005); in
its stricter sense, it is the process of sharing one’s experience of observing an object or
event, by following gaze, pointing gestures, or other verbal or non-verbal indications.
As such, it is fundamental for many aspects of language and socio-emotional development, and usually implies two individuals (often a human infant and an adult, but
also great apes) and their shared attention on a third element or target (Eilan et al.
2005). Knappett’s use of the term is somewhat looser: the pivotal artefacts are considered some sort of material hubs of attention through which several people
(not necessarily two) share a range of sensory experiences that ultimately can contribute
to channel human action or place obligations on the behaviors that people adopt
between themselves or in the relation to objects or particular spatial settings. Such
pivotal artefacts can play a crucial role in scaffolded learning (Stout 2002; Knappett
2005, pp. 58–60). Usually referring to apprenticeship and the acquisition of a particular
skill, or set of skills (adze knapping in Indonesia in the work of Stout)14, this concept
can also be extended to the adoption of appropriate behaviors. In both cases, the
process of scaffolding is made possible by particular and deliberate manipulation of
social and physical/material circumstances to which people adapt their perception and
action. As noted by Knappett (2011, p. 67): “These scaffolds are locked to specific
gestures and sequence of actions, and their spatial configuration is significant.”
Basically, no task, no behavior, or practice exist apart from the physical and social
matrix that give them structure and meaning. These contextual information need to be
taken into consideration in as many details as possible if one hopes to understand the
specificities of such tasks, behaviors, or practices. As pointed out by Stout (2002,
14
This concept also originates in developmental psychology and refers to problem solving with scaffolding
essentially consisting of “an adult ‘controlling’ those elements of the task that are initially beyond the learner's
capacity, thus permitting him to concentrate upon and complete only those elements that are within his range
of competence. The task thus proceeds to a successful conclusion.” It can however be assumed that “the
process can potentially achieve much more for the learner than an assisted completion of the task. It may
result, eventually, in development of task competence by the learner at a pace that would far outstrip his
unassisted efforts.” (Wood et al. 1976, p. 90).
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
p. 695), extracting such detailed information about the social and material circumstances of given practices from the fragmentary archaeological record is a daring
challenge. Nevertheless, an acute investigation of the spatial settings, the material
conditions, and—if possible—some considerations about the social framework of
particular actions (in this case movement and occupation within the Neopalatial
environment) can provide valuable information on their specificities. Before applying
these notions to central hearths and kernoi, the concept of material anchors is worth
noting. The term refers to material structures that are mobilized to ground concepts, to
stabilize conceptual blends, that is to say to facilitate some actions by reducing the
importance of the cognitive task necessary to perform them (Hutchins 2005). An
example, quoted by Knappett (2011, p. 67), is that of the queue: a series of individuals
lining up according to their order of arrival to get access to a service or a resource at a
specific location. In that case, the material structure of people distributed in space
anchors the conceptual sequence, “obviating the need for the tricky cognitive task of
each individual trying to remember the order in which different individuals appeared”
(Knappett 2011, p. 67).
I argue that, in some instance, central hearths and kernoi were indeed pivots,
scaffolds, and material anchors. In and together with the Neopalatial built space as
described here, they had the potential to induce, prop, channel, and constrain circulatory behaviors and practices. But how so? If one takes the kernoi to start with, one
could imagine that, as gaming boards, they have been used as pivots for scaffolded
learning. In his discussion on the type of games that Minoan cup-holes could have been
used for, Hillbom specifically insisted on the race or alignment games (Hillbom 2003,
p. 50). This type of game is usually won by reaching a position before your opponent.
They usually necessitate a basic understanding of movement and placement rules but,
in more complex versions, notions of spatial distribution, encounters, and path finding
are also relevant. Of course, Minoan kernoi are usually relatively simple in terms of
layout (Hillbom 2003, p. 49) and, therefore, the games they might have served were
probably relatively straightforward. Nevertheless, even if the ultimate goal was to cross
the finish line with game pieces, more detailed rules regarding how to capture, block,
jump a piece, or which holes to avoid or seek (Hillbom 2003, p. 47) could have existed
and implied an in-depth learning. Even if leisure and entertainment could have been
primarily sought, playing and learning how to play might well have farther reaching
outcomes. Let us imagine that an expert player (an adult) taught how to play to an
inexperienced one (a child). Together with the cupules, forming circuits or displayed in
rough lines covering a rectangular or squarish area, they most certainly had markers,
like pebbles, seeds, beans, shells, beads, or smalls sticks of wood (Hillbom 2003, p.
49), maybe of different sizes, shapes, and colors15. One could then wonder if, with these
elements at hand, the adult did not have pivotal artifacts for scaffolding the learning of
specific spatial rules. Let us elaborate on this idea a bit further: with the board and its
particular distribution of cup-holes, one could ground a whole range of concepts related
to spatial properties (contiguity, connectivity, proximity/distance, limit/boundary,
openness/enclosure, etc.), but also, in conjunction with the markers, specific spatial
actions in a wide spectrum ranging from simple occupation to complex movement
15
One of these kernoi was recently found associated with many pebbles during the 2013 excavation campaign
at Palaikastro (East Crete).
Letesson
(such as staying, crossing, being included/excluded, following specific steps in a
progression, avoiding areas to reach a point, etc.). If one entertains the possibility that
markers had different shapes and colors, the set of available grounding opportunities for
conceptual blends is even larger. Indeed, the formal properties of the markers could
have materialized a differentiation in terms of actors with different rights and opportunities in terms of spatial actions in specific spatial settings. The following example is
totally imaginary but underlines the type of logic that might have been involved in
such a scaffolded learning: black pebbles—women—can access to this space but
must avoid this area of the board; white pebble—men—have to cross two specific
points before reaching an area on the board where they can be gathered; terracotta
beads—children/youth—can only access this point if it already contains an adult,
that is to say, a black or white pebble, etc. By playing the game, pivotal artefacts
(the board and the markers) could then have been useful scaffolds to ground
complex requirements and ingrain appropriate behaviors to prepare the learner to a
real experience in the built space.
If any surface with cup-holes, whatever its location, could have been used for
scaffolded learning of specific rules applying to movement and occupation of different
categories of users in the built environment, the kernoi located within the later could
also have been mobilized in a slightly different fashion. For example, one could
imagine that each person who wished to cross the area where a kernos was located
had to put a marker corresponding to its status within the social group (the markers
representing the status being the same than the one used in gaming) in one of the
cupules. In doing so, the kernoi and markers could well have worked as material
anchors providing easily and in a straightforward manner a whole range of information,
available to anyone approaching the kernos and previously trained to use the markers in
specific ways while playing the game. If one follows the imaginary but indicative
account given earlier to illustrate our point, the kernoi could then have been used by a
children or a youth to identify the presence or absence of an adult (white or black
pebble) in the room to which he/she wanted to get access to and therefore behave
appropriately, the presence of an adult being mandatory in the previous example. In the
same logic, passing a kernos, maybe with other markers placed in specific fashions,
would have triggered particular memories in an adult wishing to reach a specific area of
the building and help him/her to take suitable actions during the completion of his/her
navigation through the built environment. Furthermore, one could wonder if, in
particular instances, the number of cup-holes in the different kernoi were not simply
referring to the number of people that could get access to a specific area at the same
time, or if the layouts of the cupules did not work as icons of the types of circulatory
behaviors implied in the access (e.g., queuing, bypassing, pausing, etc.). In these
examples, it is clear that if the markers used during the scaffolded learning were the
same than the ones involved in the aforementioned practices at the proximity of a
kernos, the material anchoring of the appropriate behavior would have been even
stronger and more efficient.
If, as advocated above, kernoi were indeed strongly symbolically associated with
notions of transition/transformation and, at times, practically used as devices to perform
practices materializing this transition, whether by leaving a marker in one of the cupholes, or in using the surface to perform libations as advocated by many scholars, they
definitely would have had the potential to play a pivotal role in Neopalatial architecture.
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
What is important here is to underline that whatever the mechanisms at play in relation
to kernoi, it seems plausible to admit that they all tended to reinforce and actually
ground physically as much as cognitively—the efficiency of the latter being intrinsically related to the former—the kernoi’s signpost agency discussed earlier.
As argued above, central hearths were first and foremost communal hearths, the
fixture where affiliation to the social group was negotiated, the place where spatial
solidarity was paramount. They were also pivotal artefacts in various ways. Whereas
Wright convincingly underlined the importance, in the Mycenaean society, of the
hearth-wanax ideology (Wright 1994, pp. 57–59), with the hearth symbolizing the
center of the state and being part of a cult institution, rituals through which the ruler
maintained its legitimacy, in Minoan Crete it seems more promising to consider the
central hearth as symbolizing the locus-boundness and perpetuity of the social group.
They acquired this potential by their temporal recurrence in spatial settings often
associated with gatherings, but also because they were instrumental in preparing the
food of which the sharing was an essential component of social reproduction (Todaro
2012; Tomkins 2012). This enduring commensality and associated practices turned the
central hearths into material anchors: when encountered, they probably constituted powerful cues triggering appropriate bodily stance, psycho-emotional state, and social relations.
Whereas the poles of convergence configurationally tended to bring people together in
space (spatial solidarity by contiguity and encounter), the central hearths they contained
were props inducing a specific spatial distribution of these people (social solidarity by
interpersonal equality). In other words, Minoans would have gathered around a central
hearth adopting bodily stances (e.g., seated position in circle around the fire), psychoemotional states (e.g., full awareness of the other participants and acute sense of togetherness), and social practices (e.g., shared preparation and consumption of food and drinks)
that were intrinsically interdependent and echoed an enduring range of behaviors associated
with the communal fire in Minoan society. It is in that sense that, as proposed above, central
hearths may have been instrumental in the reproduction of the Minoan House.
Of course, the symbolic impact of commensality and its egalitarian character around
the central hearth could have been reinforced by other objects completing this assemblage
of space–fixture and reinforcing its material structure for more efficient conceptual
blending. It is clear that commensality does not simply equate equality (Macdonald and
Knappett 2007; Halstead and Barrett 2004) but, in this case, one can wonder if particular
ceramic containers could have worked together with this specific context of the rooms
with central hearth and column to trigger, enhance, and shore up this social solidarity
through interpersonal equality. The case of the conical cups—a very recurrent type of
vessel throughout most of the Minoan Bronze Age (see Wiener 2011 for a recent
reevaluation)—comes to mind immediately. They have been identified as tokens of
hospitality (Rupp and Tsipopoulou 1999; Knappett 2011, p. 120) but could also have
been tokens of equality through their standardized form and plain features. It has been
noted that House societies are always characterized by social hierarchies through titles and
ancestry and their associated practices. This was also true of Minoan society and it has
been amply demonstrated that asymmetries in the social matrix were probably created by
groups promulgating their higher status through elite consumption, involving commensal
activities (Schoep 2002, 2004) but, in the specific context of a pole of convergence
associated with a central hearth, one can wonder if egalitarian practices in terms of
commensality were not predominant. In that case, it seems sensible to admit that the
Letesson
conical cups could have been part of an artefact assemblage (i.e., space–fixture–cups) that
would have provided a particularly suitable context for framing heterarchical relations in
the communal consumption of food and drinks. Markers (such as pebbles) and conical
cups were briefly mentioned, respectively with kernoi and central hearths, but it is clear
that the artefact assemblages at play in Neopalatial Crete were probably far more complex
and distributed in a wider range of objects (Knappett 2011, pp. 98–123).
I do not imply that kernoi and central hearths were nothing more than behavioral
cues, they most certainly had other functions. As noted by Hutchins (2005, p. 1555),
there are different degrees of materially anchored blends depending on the presence of
material structure in the visual field, the complexity of the material structure, and
whether the material structure was designed to support the blend or is used opportunistically, as it was probably the case for kernoi and central hearths in the Neopalatial
built environment. As it will be discussed below, this opportunistic use of various
material structures and of their long-lasting symbolic significance in a recurring and
standardized fashion is a fundamental characteristic of the Neopalatial period.
Furthermore, artefacts are frequently complex and multi-layered; like words, they
may be polysemous (Sinha 2005, p. 1544) and this paper aims at offering lines of
enquiry for exploring the complex meanings that could have been entangled in fixtures
that seem rather simple at first sight. These interpretations of ways in which central
hearths and kernoi may have constituted material structures for conceptual blends in
terms of navigation and occupation in the Neopalatial built environment are of course
hypothetical, and some would probably say a bit far-fetched. Nevertheless, considered
in conjunction with the configurational properties of LM I architectural space (Letesson
2009), they open stimulating perspectives of research and can contribute to shed light
on some issues concerning the Neopalatial period as a whole.
As a matter of fact, central hearths and kernoi are worth considering together
because they epitomize two clearly distinct but complementary characteristics of
Neopalatial architecture and associated circulatory behaviors (Table 3). In this table,
these fixtures have mostly been considered at the micro-scale level of proximate
human–human/human–artefact interactions in a restricted and well-defined spatial
context. To close the loop and expand Table 3, some broader processes can be brought
to the fore. They might help to consider the higher scale of groups interactions in larger
spatial or temporal contexts, that is to say to understand how “a virtual community of
objects that can transcend time and space, and which can be drawn upon across
communities” (Knappett 2011, p. 122), might have been created. In other words, they
could help us to understand how the properties listed in Table 3 and the mechanisms
discussed above may have been so pervasive that they affected Neopalatial society as a
whole, so that, for example, any Minoan knew how to navigate properly any type of
buildings he/she might have encountered. This of course strongly recalls the idea of a
strong architectural genotype recurrent in any buildings whatever their phenotypical
expressions (Letesson 2009). The processes in question, namely layering and networking, have recently been discussed by Knappett (2006). Even if he draws a parallel
between these concepts and the basic social practices of accumulation and enchainment
defined by Chapman (2000; Chapman and Gaydarska 2007) and further developed by
Gamble (2007; see also Knappett 2006, pp. 239–240 and 247–248), Knappett mostly
illustrates the notions of layering and networking in relation to the works of two artists,
Duchamp and Gormley (Knappett 2006, pp. 244–247), and does not really provide
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
leads for their application in archaeology 16. It follows that there is no clear-cut
definition of layering and networking. Nevertheless, several remarks are worth
mentioning before applying them to this case study. First of all, these processes
are complementary rather than mutually exclusive (Knappett 2006, pp. 247–248).
Even if they are both “kinds of interface between subject and object” (Knappett
2006, p. 239), they do not draw on the same logic. Broadly speaking, layering
involves working upon surfaces, creating sediments, strata that pile up over time
but also, in connection with accumulation, it refers to practices whereby human
and artefacts are concentrated in sets at particular locales (Knappett 2006, pp. 240
and 248). Whereas layering is about concentration and contiguity, networking
relies on distributing human and artefacts at different nodes (i.e., places in space
and/or moments in time) while linking them together in nets of interrelations
whether physical or conceptual (Knappett 2006, p. 248). With that in mind,
Table 3 could be completed as shown in Table 4.
The relationships of layering and networking to the other elements of Table 4 are
relatively self-explanatory but deserve some comments nonetheless. If one considers the fixtures alone to start with, on the one hand, it has been documented that
Minoan hearths are relatively frequently refurbished by applying a new layer of clay
or plaster on top of the previous ones (Metaxa Muhly 1984; Rethemiotakis 1999,
p. 723; Maeir and Hitchcock 2011, p. 55) 17. On the other hand, kernoi, in their
materiality or affordances, are not directly pointing towards networking 18; therefore, it is at the level of the space–fixture assemblage that one can look for it.
Indeed, placed in transition spaces and materially anchoring transpatial solidarity,
kernoi are clearly related to networking. As signpost, they reinforce the dual
properties of transition spaces which keep different spaces separated from each
other while being at the same time the link that bind them together (Hanson 1998,
p. 285) and create specific circulatory patterns. This is exactly what networking is:
the distribution of nodes, differentiated by means of physical or conceptual distance, kept together by links forming a structure that materialize or guide the flow of
people, artefacts, information, etc. On the contrary, the poles of convergence are
pure expressions of layering. Functionally, as seen above, they are the most adapted
places for the gathering, or accumulation, of people in space and, in that context,
central hearths are the material anchors of spatial solidarity. But, more fundamentally, certain types of poles of convergence are also physical expressions of the
layering processes involving different temporal scales. The so-called room with the
16
He nonetheless later noted that these concepts add an extra dimension and that “they provide an explicit
means for shifting scale from micro to macro, from part to whole” (Knappett 2011, p. 35).
17
It has been noted that in some cases, the substructure of hearths was made of sherds (Metaxa Muhly 1984,
p. 108; Maeir and Hitchcock 2011, p. 54). In that case, it could be argued that such sherds were part of a
structured deposition and manifested enchainment practices tying specific vessels (as the conical cups
mentioned above) and their associated practices with the hearths.
18
It could be argued that, as gaming boards, kernoi could have something to do with the distribution at
different locales through the placement and movement of the markers in the cup-holes while tying these
markers together in a fixed layout carved on the stone. Nevertheless, it could also be noted that, if considered
as practical devices for the redistribution of goods, they could be related to a part-to-whole relationship,
usually associated with accumulation (Knappett 2006, p. 248).
Letesson
Table 4 Updated dichotomous
properties of Neopalatial built
environment
Central hearths
Kernoi
Occupation
Movement
Congregation/integration
Selection/segregation
Spatial solidarity
Transpatial solidarity
Agglutinative layout
Articulated layout
Layering
Networking
central column and hearth is probably one of the most traditional rooms found in
Minoan architecture, it can be found since the Pre- and Protopalatial periods and endured till
the Postpalatial era, similarly included in buildings of very contrasting layouts and functions.
In that sense, using such a traditional room in Neopalatial architecture recalls the layering
process by the reoccurrence of an identical spatial form in buildings of different periods19.
Nevertheless, the better example of a pole of convergence as reflection of the layering process
can be found in the central courts of the palaces. As demonstrated by Tomkins (2012) and
Todaro (2012), during the Neolithic, the area that would later be occupied by the Central Court
was already open and the theater of commensal practices associated with hearths. It seems
likely that these areas remained open, continued to work as communal arenas, and that, layer
by layer, they became the monumental Central Courts of the Neopalatial period. In such
contexts, the spatiotemporal anchoring of the practices associated with these spaces—room
with central column and hearth and Central Court alike—is of course a kind of layering and
strongly recalls the notions of locus-boundness as material testimony of the perpetuity of the
House as underlined by Driessen (2010).
As advocated above, the dichotomous realities listed in Table 4 conjointly characterized
Neopalatial architecture. The assemblages of pole of convergence—central hearth and transition space—kernos and the processes of layering and networking that underlie them are
complementary in framing the patterns of occupation and circulation within the built environment. But, more fundamentally, layering and networking indeed work together because
containing and separating can be two sides of the same coin and necessary conditions for
social cohesion and reproduction (Empson 2007). Neopalatial architecture hence relies on
separation, segregation, and difference in the global layout of the built form in order for
sameness, or contiguity and co-presence, to continue at specific locales. Neopalatial architecture is strongly articulated, and as noted above, it features a high segmentation and categorical
differentiation. In other words, it is characterized by the existence of definite sectors dedicated
to specific activities and therefore only accessible for people that perform or are implicated in
the sequence of events required by those activities. Those sectors are individualized and kept
separated from one another by transition spaces that articulate the layout. Although, simultaneously, within this articulated and segmented spatial context, an area—here labeled pole of
convergence—always stands out as a place where encounters between and co-presence of
different categories of users are made possible and, probably, even fostered. When navigating
Neopalatial buildings, categories of Minoan users—probably according to their status, age, or
gender—could access certain areas more or less directly but were strictly kept away from
19
In certain cases, this reoccurrence is even a re-appropriation (and therefore closer to layering), as it is the
case in the Maison Zeta-Beta at Malia where a room with a central column dating from the Protopalatial period
was perfectly integrated in the layout of the Neopalatial building (Letesson 2009, p. 136).
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
others. Nevertheless, within each building, there was a place anybody, regardless of ranks,
could get access to; a place where any Minoan could benefit from the same rights, a place
where social cohesion was advertized and constantly re-negotiated. And, this is because
people, the activities they performed and the rooms where they took place were strictly
differentiated and distributed in space that the theater of spatial solidarity was of such
importance and clearly distinguished itself from the surrounding areas. In that sense, in
Neopalatial architecture, a strict networking was a prerequisite for an efficient layering20.
Portable Hearths and Kernoi?
In many buildings, central hearth and kernoi can be found associated in close
vicinity to one another. It is the case since quite early, as in the MM I building
of Chrysolakkos at Malia (Demargne 1932), but, as shown by the examples
listed in Tables 1 and 2, during the Neopalatial period, they also appeared on
their own. Furthermore, a quick glance at the same tables reveals that kernoi
are more common within the fabric of a building in palatial contexts (Malia,
Gournia, Phaistos) or on an open area adjoining a large building in smaller
settlements (Pseira, Mochlos), whereas central hearths are more often encountered in domestic contexts or more mundane buildings. This raises several
issues that need to be briefly tackled before concluding. Firstly, it means that
the interpretations given above have to be considered more as general guidelines than a strict framework. In the case of Pseira and Mochlos (Fig. 4), where
the kernoi were found embedded on an open space (plateia) closely related to a
major building of the settlement (respectively, Building BS-BV and Building
B.2), one can wonder if the main place of spatial solidarity was not the plateia
in itself, with the kernoi signposting transpatial solidarity in relation to the
entrance of these major buildings. The latter might then have been inaccessible
for certain categories of Minoans, a hypothesis reinforced by the presence of a
second kernos embedded close to the main entrance of Building B.2 (in room
3, see Soles and Davaras 1996, p. 188) and the pronounced axiality, noted by
Davaras, between the kernos on Pseira’s plateia and the only entrance of
Building BS-BV (McEnroe 2001, p. 85). In Gournia (Fig. 5), the kernos found
in the Baetyl court (Soles 1991, pp. 34–37 and 72) would not be so different
than any other palatial kernoi if one considers Soles’s hypothesis of seeing the
so-called Public Court of the site as a real Central Court, bordered by wings to
the east and west (Soles 2002). Secondly, we might entertain the possibility that
the active role proposed here for central hearths and kernoi could well have
been preferably attributed to portable implements mimicking their general
features 21 in certain contexts. With that idea in mind, it can be argued that
the poles of convergence listed in Table 5 and that do not present central
20
It is clear that this logic is function of the strength of the expression of the genotype in the built form. In
other words, the stronger the program, the stronger this logic (Letesson and Driessen 2008, pp. 211–212;
Hillier 1996, pp. 250–255). The latter would indeed be more strongly expressed in palaces that were a clear
crystallization of the genotype than in looser materializations of it. This is indeed related to the fact that palaces
were probably hosting a larger number of categories of users than other and more modest buildings. I do
nonetheless believe that the same logic would have applied to Neopalatial architecture as a whole but with a
variable intensity (Letesson 2009, pp. 355–357).
21
See Knappett (2002, pp. 108–113) about skeuomorphism.
Letesson
Table 5 Rooms with similar spatial properties than the room with central hearth and column in Neopalatial
architecture. Some lack the central hearth (1–6) or both the hearth and the central column (7–15). Some also
have peculiar architectural features (usually multiple columns or pillars at their center) but also show the
configurational properties of the pole of convergence (16–18)
Site
Building
Room/space
3
1
Agia Varvara
/
2
Vasiliki
M
3
3
Mochlos
Artisans’ Quarter A
4
4
Mochlos
Artisans’ Quarter B
2
5
Mochlos
Artisans’ Quarter B
10
6
Mochlos
Chalinomouri
6
7
Prasa
B
1
8
Stou Kouse
/
1
9
Kommos
House with the Snake Tube
5
10
Pitsidia
/
10
11
Rousses
/
1
12
Palaikastro
N
5
13
Palaikastro
5
5
14
Palaikastro
Χ
3
15
Choiromandres
/
1
16
Knossos
Unexplored Mansion
H
17
Palaikastro
Beta
6
18
Malia
Epsilon
13/14
1 Pelon 1966, pp. 560–561; 2 Driessen and MacDonald 1997, pp. 216–217, Fig.7.66; 3 Soles 2003, pp. 12–
17; 4 Soles 2003, pp. 64–67; 5 Soles 2003, pp. 55–59; 6 Soles 2003, pp. 107–111; 7 Metaxa Muhly 1984, p.
119, n.118; 8 Driessen and MacDonald 1997, p. 207; 9 Shaw and Shaw 1996, p. 206; 10 Driessen and
MacDonald 1997, p. 210; 11 Driessen and MacDonald 1997, pp. 219–220; 12 Sackett and Popham 1965, p.
264 and 268; 13 MacGillivray et al. 2000, p. 42, n.12; 14 Bosanquet 1904–1905, p. 283; 15 Tzedakis et al.
1989, pp. 69–72; Tzedakis et al. 1990, p. 51; 16 Popham 1984, pp. 109–111; Hatzaki 2005, p. 199; 17
Bosanquet 1901–1902, pp. 311–312; Driessen 1989–1990, p. 14, n.85; 18 Deshayes and Dessenne 1959, p.
105; van Effenterre 1980, pp. 257, 403 and 418)
hearths might instead have been equipped with portable braziers. It could also
be suggested that fire-boxes (Kopaka et al. 1989, p. 22, n.2) might have been
the designated receptacle to carry and keep the communal fire of the House
when the hearth was refurbished or when the original social group spread in
different communities throughout the island (Driessen 2010, pp. 55–56). Where
kernoi are concerned, Soles noted that they might have been replaced by
portable tripod altars (Soles 1992, p. 219). The same might also apply to some
terracotta ring vases or even circle of conical cups (Soles 1992, p. 223, see also
Chapouthier 1928, pp. 305–306). For example, could that be the case of the “clay kernos
of curious form,” described as a “three-legged caldron of which the feet were attached to
three small, interlinked wheels in a triangular vertical arrangement” (Platon 1971, p. 201)
and found closely associated with the northeast court and main entrance to the palace of
Zakros? And if kernoi were also, in some ways, related to practices involving liquids, what
about the libation pits found next to the doors leading towards the room 17 with its central
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
hearth in the palace of Galatas (Rethemiotakis 1999, p. 724)? All these questions underline
that the interpretations that were given in this paper have to be taken with caution but also,
that they could, at the same time, encourage us to consider many other issues in
challenging and innovative ways.
Conclusion
As noted by Stout (2002, p. 694): “Humans live in a constructed environment,
physically, socially, and cognitively. Information is not simply confined within
the heads of individuals but distributed throughout this constructed environment.” Therefore, in this paper, it was not so much central hearths and kernoi
as such that I dealt with. However, the focus was clearly on their association
with architecture, the ways whereby agency was distributed across these
fixtures and the spatial configuration, and how they worked together and were
mobilized conjointly to maximize the legibility of the Neopalatial built environment, to scaffold particular set of practices in terms of movement and/or
occupation at specific locations within buildings.
In this paper, I have attempted to demonstrate that this process depended on
an array of factors. First, I illustrated the long history of hearths and kernoi in
Minoan society and the recurring properties of their spatial context, both
contributing to give them an enduring significance. Second, I highlighted that
their specific location within Neopalatial architecture was certainly not incidental. As underlined in earlier researches, the latter was characterized by an
inner structural logic that permeated all its manifestations from modest farmhouses to monumental palaces (Letesson 2009). Neopalatial architecture is
peculiar in the sense that it constitutes the climax of an evolution of the built
space in Minoan Crete, with tightly controlled permeability, architectural
articulation and segmentation, as well as categorical differentiation reaching
an unprecedented degree of standardization (Letesson 2014). Furthermore,
Neopalatial society was also marked by a strong normalization of preexisting
practices that became partly devoid of their original fluidity and diversity
(Adam 2006; Devolder 2009; Knappett 2011, pp. 73–97; Letesson 2013).
Third, I showed how Driessen’s (2010) concept of House society for
Minoan Crete could provide a particularly relevant framework to start
questioning the social meaning of hearths and kernoi. Fourth, by building on
the preceding elements, I discussed the associations (symbolic meanings) of
these fixtures and illustrated their affordances (functional meanings) in particular situations. To summarize it, both hearths and kernoi were indeed imbued
with specific meanings through their spatiotemporal trajectories and properties,
and certainly took part in an enduring enculturation process. Furthermore, they
probably also took an active part in the standardization of the Neopalatial
spatial configuration and the scaffolding of the circulatory practices associated
with it. It does not mean that all hearths and kernoi were material anchors for
the navigation and occupation of space, especially because this potential was
respectively dependent on their close association with a pole of convergence
and a transition space, but it underlines that strong indications for appropriate
Letesson
behaviors within the built environment were a major concern for the Minoans
during the Neopalatial period. Of course, it seems almost certain that other
cues were also used to ingrain and reinforce certain categorical identities and
create strongly controlled interfaces between them 22. Fifth, through the processes of layering and networking, I discussed how central hearths and kernoi
were indeed agents that, together with many other artefacts networked in
complex assemblages, contributed to promulgate and reproduce a new social
order in the Neopalatial period. The growing concern for control that this
institutionalization exhibits has been related, in turn, to an ever-increasing
socio-political complexity (Letesson and Driessen 2008), to the rise of a
new religious ideology notably expressed in the instrumentalization of ritual
practices (Devolder 2009), to an attempt to break up with the past (Adam
2007), or to the emergence of a political culture promulgated by Knossos
which manifested itself in strategies of objectification (Knappett 2011, pp.
121–122). Of course, none of these dynamic processes are incompatible and it seems
clearly more promising to consider that they were complementary if not co-dependent. To
paraphrase Knappett: “It is as if a series of connections were needed between different
materialities to guide and structure practices across and between communities; and that
these were established iconically through the repetition of recognizable forms” (Knappett
2011, p. 121). As for the Neopalatial architectural genotype, this standardization of
material culture and associated practices was omnipresent but not necessarily uniform
in all its manifestations. For example, whereas in many examples the areas dedicated to
gatherings tended to be incorporated within the articulated and segmented fabric of the
buildings, in others, they stayed in the open, as in the case of the rather informal plateia of
Mochlos and Pseira. That might account for a variable intensity of influence of the origin
of this institutionalization wave (presumably Knossos) but also accounts for the survival
of regional or local cultural idiosyncrasies whose material expression regained in strength
during the progressive collapse of the palatial power in Bronze Age Crete.
One of the central concerns of this paper was also to offer a theoretical and
methodological holistic approach for the study of the complex interactions between
the fixed, semi-fixed, and mobile elements of the built environment (Rapoport 1990). I
argued here that, by combining a configurational analysis of architecture with notions
of material agency and affordances as well as concepts from the field of embodied
cognition and praxeology, we can progress towards a better understanding of the
complex assemblages of artefacts, features, and built space so typical of the archaeological record. I also showed that such an approach could greatly contribute to highlight
ways in which “people read environmental cues, make judgments about the occupants
of settings, and then act accordingly” (Rapoport 1990, p. 139) but, more importantly
perhaps, I underlined that these low-level meanings of the built environment were
crucial in many ways and certainly had a deep and enduring impact on the Cretan
Bronze Age society. In Minoan archaeology, to a few noticeable exceptions (Sanders
1990; Athanasiou 2014), scholars have mostly considered the middle- and high-level of
meanings conveyed by the built environment. Research on the monumentality as the
22
For example, painted bands on the walls, frescoes, structural details, etc. (Palyvou 1987, p. 195; Preziosi
1983, pp. 138, 158 and 210) could have contributed to foster appropriate contacts between different categories
of users while preventing unwanted interferences and encounters.
Low-Level Meanings in the Minoan Built Environment
expression of power and architectural patterning as framing/promoting group identity
or on the cosmological counterparts of built spaces is indeed common and certainly
produced valuable contributions to the understanding of Minoan society as a whole.
Nevertheless, as it is probably the case for other sub-fields of our discipline, there often
seems to be an unfortunate lack of interest for the low-level meanings which probably
has a lot to do with the fact that they do not appear as conspicuously in the archaeological record. In this paper, I hope to have demonstrated that an acute attention to the
spatiotemporal processes and dynamics in which low-level meanings of the built
environment were enmeshed can actually shed light on fundamental issues in ancient
societies and certainly is a prerequisite for the assessment of the complex interactions
between architecture, objects, and people.
Acknowledgments This paper was originally written as part of a postdoctoral project entitled Minoan Architecture: A Syntactical Genealogy founded by the Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique (F.R.S.-FNRS). In a later
stage, additional research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union Seventh
Framework Programme ([FP7/2007-2013] [FP7/2007-2011]) under grant agreement no. PIOF-GA-2012-326640.
I am grateful for the comments and critical reading of the two anonymous reviewers. I also warmly thank Carl
Knappett for his insightful suggestions on earlier drafts of this paper, Joe Shaw for his authorization to reproduce the
photograph used in Fig. 2, and Charlotte Langohr and Simon Jusseret for their support and inspiring conversations.
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