NEW VISIONS

Featuring Artists of Today

with Aegean Inspirations

NYANI MARTIN

RITUAL CRETE

GEORGOS ANGELINIS

     REVIEW

     by Diane Darling, Editor

     GREEN MAN MAGAZINE

     #11, Winter 1996

     "I savored this book for months. I kept it by my bed and rarely would I turn out the light without first entering into the lost world of great Crete.

      "The story is told entirely in the first person, by Deucalion, brother/consort of the last true Queen of Crete. His story spans the beginning of the end of his world, through the agony of the ending, and on to the beginnings of cultural domination of Greek ideas, under which we yet labor, thousands of years later.

      "John Dempsey has written this well-researched (and in its academic niche, well-respected) fictionalization of the beginningless time when men and women were partners in the world, when the gods were alive in every spring and mountain and the Queen's heart. Striking is the balance of gender values: men are ornamented, poets, defenders, traders and clergy; so are women, who are also legislators, mercenaries, craftswomen, priestesses. The betweenish---eunuchs and fey folk---are powerful due to their union of opposites, and valued for their courage. In time the reader loses track of who is what, and finds the distinction mostly irrelevant.

      "By contrast, the "hero" Theseus, who is effectively Ariadne's hostage, displays the usual signs of a hard life made brutal through testosterone poisoning. The Queen's plans for him are inscrutable to a man who is heir to and deeply indentified with the rising militant city-state of Athens. The subtle refinements and gender equity of Crete he views as weaknesses, and, alas, he is correct. When the end is upon them, the Cretans, abandoned by their gods, have only their honor to sustain them, where as the Greeks' honor restrains them not at all.

      "This is a book for a serious reader and a lover of ancient history. Complex, disturbing, subtle, with the ring of truth."

LINKS

http://world.std.com/~nyani/minoans.html Nyani Martin's rich collection of "Minoan" and other ancient-world art and materials: includes very useful articles, book reviews and other hard to find info

http://home.earthlink.net/~macrakis/new_works.html Highly innovative and lively multi-site by professional photographer Michele Macrakis---You'll have fun, learn and smile with the warmth of this treatment of Crete then and now

http://home.teleport.com/~bmor Barbara Mor's "Rad Victorian Radio" website ---including The Amazon Theory Cafe and Mor's "Chronicles" full of her multi-level, many-passioned prose on the world we inhabit (for better or worse). If you think perception and poetry are things of the past, pay a visit! Historian Mor is also one of our time's truly inventive and outstanding poets whose explorations of today will both chill and exhilarate you. Incandescent

http://sheisstillburning.com "She Is Still Burning," a site edited by Canadian historian, poet and artist Harriet Ellenberger. The artists of word and image she brings together will teach you how to begin to listen to what The Earth has to say. Do yourself a favor

http://www.inetsupermall.com/amazon_online_books.htm Read customer-reviews of historian and poet Barbara Mor's The Great Cosmic Mother: Rediscovering the Religion of the Earth for an idea of the transformative powers of its scholarship. These include some "It's all feminist speculation" responses---standard in their failure to offer specific sensible counter-interpretations

http://www.dilos.com/region/crete/min_cul.html Comprehensive chronology of early-Cretan history, plus travel information

http://www.uk.digiserve.com/mentor/minoan/index.htm Packed with clear information and rare photos of lesser-known but important ÒMinoanÓ sites---presented with breadth, precision and passion by Ian Swindale

http://www.fhw.gr/chronos/02/crete/en/index2.html Strong organization and visual layout---a broad and well-organized introduction to the "Minoan" world from ecology to cultural achievements

http://phoenicia.org/index.shtml Phoenicia.org---A comprehensive, voluminous and multisided exploration of thje post-"Minoan" Mediterranean world. Excellent visuals and organization: inclusive of many points of view, well-documented, energetic reading. By Salim George Khalaf

http://eve.enviroweb.org/home.html Eve Online: Eccofeminist Visions Emerging, by Cathleen and Colleen McGuire and other scholars and historians, activists, artists and energized people! A journey in itself plus links to community forums and resources

http://www.dragonridge.com/meanderings.htm Excellent photos, diagrams, and further links to studies of ÒMinoanÓ towns, the Heraklion Archaeological Museum and the Crete of today---by Peter Lok

http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/MINOA/MINOANS.HTM Bureaucrats & Barbarians: The Minoans. Detailed introductory articles, many special-focus topics on Crete as well as Mycenean culture, and good bibliography---by Richard Hooker

http://www.historywiz.com/minoans-mm.htm History Wiz: If you have Flash software, enjoy the Cretan art-presentation

http://residentassociates.org/com/minoans.asp The Smithsonian Resident Associate Program's recent conference-program---just for an idea of topics of interest to modern scholarship

http://www.phaistos.demon.co.uk/minoans.html The Salt Line Home Page---Interesting if arguable speculations on ancient CreteÕs calendar, astrological system, connections to the Megalithic period, The Phaestos Disc ("the Bronze Age computer Disc") and more conundrums---by Alan Butler

http://www.serve.com/archaeology/books/minoans.html AON Books---Very good new scholarly books, fiction, travel writing and other resources on the Aegean, Crete, Atlantis and Mycenean studies, The Bronze Age

http://www.minoans.com/ Follow the world tour adventures of today's young troupes of "Minoan Dancers" from Greece!

http://emuseum.mnsu.edu/prehistory/aegean/pre-greece/minoan/minoan.html Good photos of sites and museum pieces; plus links to the Greek Dark Ages

http://www-adm.pdx.edu/user/sinq/greekciv2/others/atlantis/eason.htm Mostly focus on the Thera Volcano disaster and Atlantis studies

http://www.culture.gr/2/21/215/21505/215051/e21505120.html Flavours of Their Time presents a scholarly conference on new discoveries about Bronze Age diet, food-economics and more

http://www.wargamesfoundry.com/library/trojan.htm Research on the tactics and technologies of war from ancient Crete to Troy

209.211.251.196/html/Guidebooks/Minoans.pdf If you have Adobe Acrobat Reader, download this worthwhile "World Almanac" for basic information and good bibliography

http://w ww.ritualgoddess.com/ More recent fiction and scholarly works on everything from "Minoans" to ancient Turkey's Catal Huyuk and Women's Spirituality movements