Photos of the Beautiful Ancient Minoan Goddess Figurine

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Photos of the Very Best Beautiful Ancient Minoan Goddess Figurine Pottery Statues including Snake Goddess & Poppy Goddess statues. Photos by photographer Paul E Williams. (TIP – use the icons below the slideshow for thumbnail photos and info)

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Photos of Ancient Minoan Goddess Figurine Pottery

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Photos of the very best Minoan snake goddess figurines and terracotta goddess figures.

Minoan Snake Goddess Figurines

Two Minoan snake goddess figurines were excavated in 1903 in the Minoan palace at Knossos in the Greek island of Crete by British archaeologist Arthur Evans. The Knossos figurines, both significantly incomplete, date to near the end of the neo-palatial period of Minoan civilization, around 1600 BCE.

It was Evans who called the larger of his pair of figurines a “Snake Goddess”, the smaller a “Snake Priestess”. Since then, it has been debated whether Evans was right, or whether both figurines depict priestesses, or both depict the same deity or distinct deities.

The two Knossos snake goddess figurines were found by Evans excavators in one of a group of stone-lined and lidded cists Evans called the “Temple Repositories”.

The Minoan figurines are made of faience, a crushed quartz-paste material which after firing gives a true vitreous finish with bright colours and a lustrous sheen. It was used in the funeral cult and in the sanctuaries.

The larger of these figures has snakes crawling over her arms and up to her “cylindrical crown”, at the top of which a snake’s head rears up. The figure lacked the body below the waist, one arm, and part of the crown. She has prominent bare breasts, with what seems to be one or more snakes winding round them.

Her dress includes a thick belt with a “sacred knot”. The smaller figure, as restored, holds two snakes in her raised hands, and the figure on her head-dress is a cat or panther. However, as excavated, she lacked a head and the proper left arm was missing below the elbow. The head was recreated by Evans and one of his restorers.

Other excavations have revealed Minoan terracotta votive offerings, probably representing the goddess rather than humans, in at least one case “snake-wrangling” and with snakes rising from the diadem or headress.

Minoan Poppy Goddess Figurines

This type of figure often has attributes rising from the headress, typified by the Poppy goddess. The name poppy goddess is often used for a famous example of a distinctive type of large female terracotta figurine in Minoan art, presumably representing a goddess, but not thought to be cult images, rather votive offerings.

It was discovered in a sanctuary of the Post-palace period (LM III, 1400–1100 BC) at Gazi, Crete, and is now is in the Heraklion Archaeological Museum.

The name comes from the shape of the terminals of opium poppy seedheads rising from the diadem on the head. The figurines found at Gazi, which are larger than any previously produced on Minoan Crete, are rendered in an extremely stylized manner. The bodies are rigid, the skirts simple cylinders, and the poses stereotyped.

All photos can be downloaded as editorial royalty free images. Property Rights belong to the relevant museums.