Minoan Red
How do you tell old from older? If you can find references about it in ancient Greek mythology, there is no contest there. Welcome to the palace of the Minotaur, the strange labyrinth made of thirteen hundred rooms whose functions remain a mystery, a place that must have been very animated and colorful in its day, back in 1700BC, baked as it was by the tropical sun and surrounded by a blue sea.
The sun shines as brightly today as it did then, bouncing off the smooth white surfaces, making the details sharper and revealing strange mason marks carved in the giant blocks of stone. I found one myself, a trident.
The ancient ruins should look old and dusty, like a land that time forgot, but they don’t. Between the Minoan red (this place got to name its own color) and the sunshine, the complex feels alive and well, even in its current state, that of an archaeological dig. There is something about the spirit of the place that keeps you alert, makes you pay attention, draws you near.
Maybe the memory of Daedalus and Icarus still lingers around the white stones to remind everybody of the earliest human aspiration to fly.
Maybe it’s the eerie feeling you get when you walk through a place that is already familiar to you from the stories of your childhood, but you never thought was real. Maybe it’s just me.
