Knossos

by Laura Gill

On more than one level, the answer was no. Rusa thought about being a merchant-adventurer, a herdsman, even a jewel-smith like the nimble-fingered neighbor who had crafted Yikashata’s seal; Upala engraved such wonderful miniature scenes. He had even fantasized about becoming the adopted son and heir of the Minos. Becoming a priest-architect, however, had never fired his imagination. Rusa had no real desire to be like Daidalos. His ancestor seemed too remote, having lived almost four hundred years ago, and was more legend than a real man. Besides, the Labyrinth he had started had been finished by others. There were no marvels left to build.

  “I don’t know,” Rusa answered, trying not to offend his grandfather. “Nobody’s ever asked me.”

  “You see up there?” Zuhatta gestured with his walking stick to the scrub-clad hills. “That’s where the masons quarry the limestone and gypsum for all the buildings in Knossos, including your father’s house. We’ll have a closer look a bit later, but now we’re going someplace special.”

  Rusa was not really interested in rocks unless there were other boys to play with and adventures to be had. “Where is that?”

  They passed a roadside shrine crowned with sacral horns, and what must have been the house of the priest or priestess who tended it. “The tomb of Daidalos lies straight down this road,” Zuhatta said.

  Was that all, just a tomb? Rusa had visited the family tomb a few times to honor his paternal grandmother, who had died when he was three. The edifice was rather plain, nothing like the funerary complexes dedicated to the Minos’s family and to the high priests and priestesses that Zuhatta had once described for the boys. Those, he reported, had separate sanctuaries, and even workshops that produced funerary goods. Rusa had never seen anything like that, and, having heard from a spiteful Kumurru that Daidalos was buried in a hillside crevice, was not expecting to encounter it now.

  Therefore, he was astonished to discover that the legendary architect, his maternal ancestor, had the biggest, nicest tomb he had ever seen. Yellow columns with black bases supported a two-story porch overlooking the road. Zuhatta escorted Rusa through a doorway, then up a flight of stairs into a vestibule equipped with an altar. Beyond stood a wooden door caulked all around the edges, sealed with clay lozenges bearing elaborate images that were to keep thieves from entering. Yikashata did the same on those occasions, such as the summer Bull Dance, when the entire household left; he shut all the doors, stretched twine across them, and affixed his seal, which could not be removed without breaking it and alerting the residents that an intruder had been there.

  Zuhatta gingerly touched one of the pendant seals whose spiral maze and bull Rusa recognized as belonging to his grandfather. “Now this seal with the bull and sun belonged to Minos Atarsha, father of Minos Hammuras, and these others are from the high priest and priestess of Knossos that ruled sixteen years ago when my father died,” he explained. “And when I die, and my bones are washed and ready to be reinterred, these seals will be broken so that I, too, can be buried here.” Zuhatta smiled, in spite of the macabre subject. “Every descendant of Daidalos who serves as a priest-architect has the right to be buried here in this tomb. You, too, Rusa, if you choose that profession.”

  Rusa did not want to think about dying and becoming a heap of bones, and could not fathom why the thought gave his grandfather such pleasure. “What about the rest of my family?”

  “You will have to choose—oh, but you’re young and that’s a long way off.” Zuhatta stepped away from the sealed door to return to the altar. “Come here now, and let’s pay our respects.”

  He had brought wine to splash onto the altar. “Great Daidalos, distinguish ancestor, Zuhatta your descendant offers your ghost this gift of Dionysos. And here is my grandson, Dadarusa. Look upon him with favor as his elders decide his future.” Zuhatta might have stopped there, but he kept going, tipping more wine onto an altar stone stained purple from decades of such leavings. “Here, too, is a libation for Ikaros, for Iapyx, for...” With each offering he recited his genealogy.

  Rusa knew to respect the shades by keeping his eyes lowered, yet he had to fight to suppress his disinterest. Zuhatta’s ancestors were his ancestors, too, but all the same he felt disconnected from all the names, from the seals on the door, and even from the physical remainders beyond. Any curiosity he had about Daidalos could be summed up in a single question, which he dared not ask in a consecrated place like a tomb. Only when he and his grandfather had taken their leave, and started up a dusty switchback trail leading to the quarry, did he summon enough courage to ask.

  “Grandfather,” he began, “I know this sounds stupid, but if Daidalos made wings for Ikaros, why not for Iapyx, too?”

  “What’s that, wings?” Zuhatta grunted. Rusa held his breath, hoping his grandfather would not be too angry. They had just climbed to a ridge affording an excellent view of the tomb, road, and ravine below, and Rusa, who had never been so high up before, was just realizing that he did not like heights very much. Instinctively, he scuttled around to his grandfather’s right to avoid the edge.

  Once Zuhatta understood the question, however, he expressed his bemusement with a snorting laugh. “You must mean the wax and feather wings Daidalos made to escape the Minos’s clutches, yes? What a clever boy you are! I never really thought anything about the wings. I suppose Iapyx didn’t have any because he was born later, after Ikaros died. No one really knows. Records from that time are very scarce.”

  Ten minutes later, they reached the first of several limestone quarries which, Zuhatta explained, served the entire region from Archanes to Katsamba. He introduced Rusa to the master mason, a red-faced, friendly-looking man named Ripanna, who asked Rusa whether he wanted to watch how his men broke the stone from the hillside.

  Rusa had always assumed that the masons used chisels to chip the blocks free, and discovered that he was right, up to a certain point.

  “Look here, young man,” Ripanna said, tracing with a thick finger the chisel marks on a half-cut block. “Now my masons can waste several more days pounding it free, or they can harness the gods’ gifts of fire and water to hasten the process. Look over there.” Placing a guiding hand on Rusa’s shoulder, he leaned down and pointed with the other hand to a block wreathed in white smoke. “That fire’s been burning long enough to get the rock very hot. Ashur’s crew is going to douse the flames with water. What do you think will happen then, young Dadarusa?”

  “I’m not sure.” Rusa refrained from shrugging because his elders had told him it was impolite. “It will cool down very fast?”

  Ripanna sounded pleased enough that Rusa guessed he had given the correct answer. “And when rock that’s been heated cools very fast, what happens then?” Before Rusa could venture a reply, the mason indicated the crewmen scurrying forward with buckets of water to splash onto the smoking block. “Listen closely.”

  Rusa heard the squelch and hiss of water hitting the hot surface. Again and again the masons doused the stones, creating steam where there had been smoke, until—there was no mistaking the sound—there was an audible pop, then another, and another. Ripanna triumphantly clapped Rusa’s shoulder. “That’s the sound of rock cracking free from Lady Potnia’s bosom. When it cools and the steam clears, we’ll have a closer look.”

  Because the air was so thick with limestone dust, Zuhatta tossed Rusa a faded cloth to cover his nose and mouth with, and admonished him to keep his throat moistened with regular swigs from his waterskin. “Men who do this sort of work long enough get a hacking dust cough,” he said.

  “Is that why Kumurru coughs?” Rusa asked through the cloth. It smelled like his grandfather’s sweat.

  “No, young man.” Zuhatta did not mask his face with a cloth; he must have been accustomed to the dust. “That’s from his years in a dusty counting house, and his weak constitution.”

  A moment later, Ripanna took them to inspect the block, where he used his finger to further describe the cracking process. “See where it’s fractured along its natural grain?”
He indicated the vertical split; the stone had, indeed, broken where it should. “That’s deliberate, young man. A good mason always takes the natural properties of the stone into consideration when he works it. Now, we’ll chip away what remains on the bottom to free the block, then we’ll drag it down to our workshops, shape it, smooth it, and prepare it according to the specifications we’ve been given.” Ripanna gestured. The stone was still radiating heat, and could not be touched. “This particular block will be a cornerstone for the foundation of a house.”

  “How do you know?”

  Then Ripanna laughed. “Because we don’t cut the block unless we know first. That would be a waste of Potnia’s gifts. You see, an architect has to send an order with the measurements, and pay us for the materials and work. Otherwise...” He snapped his fingers. “Nothing. Isn’t that right, friend?” The chuckle he exchanged with Zuhatta hinted at some private joke.

  “Indeed.” Zuhatta collected himself, then explained further. “See, Dadarusa, every architect is supposed to learn the principles of masonry by spending one part of their apprenticeship working in a quarry. I had to learn about the properties of stones, and how to break and shape blocks before I was allowed to start ordering them. I also had to learn the carpenter’s trade, to know about wood, how to make and lay bricks, and how to work with plaster. The measure of a competent architect is how well he can perform the tasks he assigns his men.”

  “That’s not all there is.” Ripanna winked at Rusa. “Now, any man, even a child, can stack bricks, wooden beams, and stones atop each other, but it takes an architect to keep them from falling down.”

  Rusa understood that the conversation was being staged for his benefit, and that the two men wanted him to break rocks just as Zuhatta had done in his youth. At the very least, the prospect sounded boring. Nor did he like the sound of ending up with a perpetual cough. “I didn’t know priest-architects did all that just to build a house.”

  “Oh, a priest-architect, is it?” Ripanna’s surprise appeared genuine. “Is this the one, then?” he asked Zuhatta.

  “Perhaps.” Then Zuhatta bent down to address Rusa. “Priest-architects don’t build houses. No, they serve the Labyrinth as priests of Daidalos, and take responsibility for the temple’s upkeep.”

  Priests of Daidalos. Rusa had frequently wondered why people used that phrase. “Is Daidalos a god?”

  “Hmm, that’s rather complicated. I’ll explain it to you on the way down,” Zuhatta answered.

  Thanking Ripanna for his time, Zuhatta led the way down a second trail which led past another site used for the quarrying of gypsum. If he was going to address the subject of Daidalos’s godhood, then it seemed to Rusa that he was taking his time about it. Nonetheless, Rusa knew not to be rude by prompting him. One did not interrupt elders or tell them to hurry up.

  Zuhatta finally spoke. “Hmm, is Daidalos a god?” Rusa recognized that as a rhetorical question. “Well, no, not exactly. He’s one of those favored mortals who has been taken to dwell among the gods. He can intercede with them on behalf of his descendants or other architects.”

  “And that’s why he has a shrine?” Rusa knew there was a room in the Labyrinth where Daidalos’s relics were kept, but had never been there, and, to be honest, cherished very little curiosity about the place where the legendary architect had spent his last days; it sounded to him like nothing more than a musty cubicle where someone had died long ago, and not at all as exciting as swimming with sponge divers or escaping the wrath of a fire demon inhabiting a burning mountain.

  “Yes, that’s right, but the shrine is only for consecrated priest-architects and their apprentices,” Zuhatta said. “I could not take you there unless you received a special dispensation.”

  Rusa did not necessarily mind, and hoped that his grandfather did not assume that he wanted to become an apprentice.

  By the time he and his grandfather reached the bottom of the hill, it was noon. They paused under a stand of dusty olive trees to eat and doze a while before setting out again. “Would you like to see something interesting?” Zuhatta adjusted his hat and retrieved his walking stick.

  Rusa considered his response. If the “something interesting” turned out to be another quarry, then the answer was no. “Is it very far?” His calves burned from the climb and his feet hurt.

  “It’s on the way.”

  They did not take the river route, but headed west, crossing the Vlychia along a stone viaduct serving the Labyrinth. Rusa gawked in amazement at what seemed to him the work of giants. The stream flowed through a series of corbel arches seated upon four massive stone piers. Above, a broad causeway allowed for easy foot and animal traffic. Everything was so monumental, as if giants dwelled in the temple. Maybe in the sanctuaries there were giant chairs, tables, and beds for the gods to use when they descended to earth. He said so to his grandfather.

  “I’ve never been inside the sanctuaries,” Zuhatta admitted, “so I don’t know what the immortals look like, but this causeway and the porch and everything else you see there is for mortals to use.” He prodded Rusa along with a gentle nudge. “This was the last project undertaken by your ancestor, Priest-Architect Eshmal. He began it after the temple built by Daidalos, the original Labyrinth, was destroyed by the Great Bull’s anger generations ago. Hundreds of limestone blocks make up the causeway. That alone took twelve years to build. Another priest-architect erected the portico, but it was Eshmal’s son-in-law, your four times great-grandfather Aranaru, who built the porch. Impressive, yes?”

  Rusa could have done without the history lesson—or he would have preferred to have it later—so he could simply gape at and appreciate the construction for what it was, a thing of incomparable splendor.

  Clearing the causeway, Zuhatta hustled Rusa around the southwest perimeter of the temple mount. Tall cypresses shaded a walkway leading to the broad apron of the west court. Rusa knew where they were now. Every autumn, townspeople and many from the surrounding countryside flocked there to witness the Epiphany of the Goddess upon the porch that Rusa’s parents called the Window of Appearances. On those occasions, Rusa and Dida took turns sitting on Yikashata’s shoulders so they might have a better view, even though they were usually so far back that they hardly saw anything.

  Now Rusa stood in that very courtyard with his grandfather, on one of the raised ceremonial walkways the Minos used when he visited the temple. Zuhatta urged him down, however, before the sentry posted to their right could challenge them. “Never approach a pathway to the gods unless they summon you, Dadarusa,” he cautioned, “or unless you have legitimate business with them.” He saluted the sentry with his walking stick. “Well met, Myolaros! This is my grandson, Dadarusa.”

  Myolaros wore a tight-fitting leather cap sewn with bronze rondels, a yellow kilt, and dagger. He grasped a spear half a head taller than he was, and he was a tall man. Rusa wondered if he ever got bored, standing there all day. He nodded gravely. “Well met, Dadarusa.”

  “I brought the boy to show him the entrance to the Corridor of the Minos.” Zuhatta gestured to a portal oddly bisected by a yellow pillar, but did not wait for the sentry to give permission before nudging Rusa forward.

  “Now, young man, Priest-Architect Aranaru built all this you see here.” Rusa braced himself for another dull lecture. “After the Great Bull destroyed the first Labyrinth, Aranaru was charged with widening and rebuilding the court, and making it more impressive.” Zuhatta droned on and on, using technical terms like orthostates and kreipdoma while forgetting in his enthusiasm to define them. Rusa’s head swam from trying to remember everything. Without doubt, his grandfather would decide to test him later.

  “Now this...” Zuhatta guided him back to the portal of the Corridor of the Minos. “Perhaps you’re wondering about the pillar? Well, my grandfather in his youth had as a neighbor a very old man who remembered Priest-Architect Aranaru from his youth. He’d worked on the west court with his father, who was a stonemason, you see. He told my g
reat-grandfather how one day he’d eavesdropped on Aranaru telling his wife that if she couldn’t squeeze past this pillar he would have to divorce her.” Zuhatta waited a moment to finish the tale. “She had gotten quite stout in her middle age, see? It was a joke between them.” He chuckled, and so did Rusa, picturing a fat old lady stuck between the pillar and wall, arms flailing.

  Next, Zuhatta pointed out the Window of Appearances, lavishly decorated with scarlet pillars, checkered dadoes, and a yellow lintel, where the high priestess as Rhaya greeted the harvest at summer’s end, and the high priest of Poteidan announced the Opening of the Sea Lanes after the propitiatory bull sacrifices at the end of winter. Yikashata could not take his family to see the latter because he had to attend the Minos, and Kumurru did not consider it worthwhile to brave the cold weather just to see a knocked-kneed priest brandish a bloody labrys.

  “Too bad there’s bad blood between your other grandfather and High Priest Selukkos,” Zuhatta commented, in a tone suggesting that he was not at all sorry. “Selukkos denied him employment in the Labyrinth some years ago, or so I hear.” Rusa had not known that about Kumurru, but it seemed a mean and petty thing for Zuhatta to mention, and he felt guilty by association.

  Zuhatta slapped his thigh as if brushing off dirt. “Well, Dadarusa, if you remind me toward the end of next winter, I’ll come around and take you and your brothers to see the sacrifices. It’s quite the spectacle, with the tritons and banners and the priests in their regalia. Your mother can come, too. There’s no reason why she ought to stay home like a put-upon nursemaid.”

  Rusa could no longer hold back his frustration. “Grandfather, why don’t you and Grandfather Kumurru like each other? You always say mean things about each other, and, well, it’s not nice.”

  From the second the words left his mouth to the moment Zuhatta’s face fell, and he scrunched his jowls, Rusa regretted having said anything. Children were not supposed to complain about what their elders did.