The Minos Ring (1500-1400 BC), this impressive gold ring, was discovered in 1928 in a field near the royal tomb-sanctuary of Knossos, on the Gypsades Hill.
It depicts a three-dimensional perspective map, capturing a sacred landscape (the sacred peak of Juktas, the artificial lake, and the two sanctuaries). The artistic representation on the ring was created by the artist with the sacred orientation of the Bronze Age (3000 BC to 1450 BC), East-West and North-South.
The Minos Ring constitutes the first written map-text for a better understanding of the First Great Culture of Crete. The sacred landscape of the ring is a copy of the archetypal sacred landscape of Phaistos, the Great Natural Temple of the goddess Europa.
It is now proven that Phaistos, during the Bronze Age, held absolute religious control over Crete, and only in the Mycenaean period did religious and political power shift to dominate Knossos.
