NYANI MARTIN

A "Minoan" Family Banquet in one of the great chambers of The Labyrinth, by Nyani Martin. "Ny" is an artist, scholar and writer (below) who really does her homework: every detail above is supported by new archaeology, from the tiny cups in people's hands to their three-legged cook-pot, the Libyan styles of the family-member at left, and the lyre-player at right. Crete's generations even today are this way about tradition: it's life!

     Kylia sighed with happiness, and because her feet hurt; she leaned a bit against Tinea, who tightened her arm around Kylia's waist, holding baby Dyktis to her breast with the other so he could suck idly and stay quiet.

     Kylia was standing, despite being in her eighth month, because the family was having its feast of the winter solstice, in the Great Hall of their House, and was honoring its new mothers as it did at the quarter-posts of every year. Tulanis was carrying the ritual meal to them, carefully, slowly, trying with all her adolescent might to be stately, and Kidunatsa, the eldest and their Priestess (and Tulanis' mother), was singing the private words to the Goddess before coming to Kylia and Tinea to say the public ones.

     Kylia loved this ritual. During her childhood in a Mainland fortress her mother and other Cycladic slaves had practiced a small smuggled version in secret. When she had come to the Family she lived with them as a daughter before she married them, and had learned the fuller version and celebrated it for several mothers of the family, including Mother Elucea and Tinea on her first pregnancy. The eldest woman of the House or its Priestess and an adolescent girl, a 'new' woman, offered a roasted liver and old-fashioned cereal paste cakes (made from toasted, crushed grain, rather than flour) to the household Goddess, on a stone plate, chopping the prescribed four herbs (for this time of year, fennel, thyme, sage, and hyssop) with a ground stone knife. The liver was sliced and sprinkled with the herbs, and then the ancient-style food was offered to the mothers near birth and right after, as the Priestess blessed them. It nourished their souls and promoted their fertility and milk.It was ancient, as could be seen from the food and the equipment, no copper or bronze used, only flaked obsidian and ground stone, and it was beautiful.

     Surrounding them were their family, the children watching and wandering, the adults clapping and singing a hymn of cheer; Tanaui  Sti was strumming his harp as he leaned against the Mother Pillar. Aristion came up to stand with Kylia and Tinea, one hand on each of their shoulders. This time, the liver was that of a fat duck, since that was what Elucea had chosen to roast, though they also had a joint of beef forequarter from the family down the mountain, who had slaughtered a bullock and traded sections to all their neighbors; far more meat than they usually ate of a meal, but then it *was* a feast. People had their first cups of wine or broth from the stewed beef, and pieces of warm flatbread to dip; soon, after this ritual, they would start in on the stewed beef with its vegetables and cooked dried milk-wheat, eating it with flatbread and raw lettuce from the garden, eating the duck with yeast bread from the starter that had been Tinea's dowry from her birth family, apples and grapes.

     Later they would have yogurt from cow's milk, with rosehips stewed in honey and put through a strainer, and fresh dark figs and pomegranite seeds, and resined wine with mead and small round balls of cannabis-honey-date sweetmeats to promote love and fertilty and the return of the sunshine. Kylia was very hungry, still making up for the three months of her pregnancy when she could barely eat, and looking forward to the meal, as delicious scents wafted into the Hall from the courtyard and the kitchen behind it.

     Tulanis reached them, flushed and blushing and beaming; Kidunatsa came up behind the girl to put a hand on her shoulder and sing the blessing to Kylia and Tinea, invoking the Goddess as Mother in them, praising their fruitfulness. Kylia and Tinea took a piece each of liver and of cereal
cake, kissed each other, and fed each other, as their family cheered, and  the child within Kylia kicked to add its own comment. She caught her breath, swallowwed, and felt as if even heavy with child as she was she could fly on her family's love.

     Kidunatsa took the remaining liver and cereal cakes to the Ancestors' pillar in the center of the room, its gray stone carved with a sixteen-pointed star and double axes. Tulanis scurried to her sister, who was stirring the simmering tripod pot, to fetch a cup of broth, and hurried to catch up with her mother; together they sang to the Ancestors, their voices haunting, strangely twining like snakes in the old ululating song, as Kylia listened with her head laid back onto Aristion's shoulder. Kidunatsa laid a small piece of each food at the base of the pillar, and poured the cup of broth into the offering-hole. Then she turned to the family and grinned, as Elucea came in, right on time, bearing the roast duck on a broad painted platter. "Let's eat!" the two women said together, looking at each other, and the Family cheered. Kylia cheered too, and sat down to eat.