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Taurocathapsy
Bull-leaping (, ) is a term for various types of non-violent bull fighting. Some are based on an ancient ritual from the Minoan civilization involving an acrobat leaping over the back of a charging bull (or cow). As a sport it survives in Spain, with bulls, as ; in modern France, usually with cows rather than bulls, as ; and in Tamil Nadu, India with bulls as Jallikattu. Ritual leaping over bulls is a motif in Middle Bronze Age figurative art, especially in Minoan art, and what are probably Minoan objects found in Mycenaean Greece, but it is also sometimes found in Hittite Anatolia, the Levant, Bactria and the Indus Valley. It is often interpreted as a depiction of a rite performed in connection with bull worship. Iconography Younger (1995) classifies bull-leaping depictions in Bronze Age Aegean art as follows: * Type I: the acrobat approaches the bull from the front, grabs the horns, and somersaults backwards * Type II: the acrobat approaches the bull from the front, dive ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Knossos Bull Leaping Fresco
Knossos (; , ; Linear B: ''Ko-no-so'') is a Bronze Age archaeological site in Crete. The site was a major centre of the Minoan civilization and is known for its association with the Greek myth of Theseus and the minotaur. It is located on the outskirts of Heraklion, and remains a popular tourist destination. Knossos is considered by many to be the oldest city in Europe. Knossos is dominated by the monumental Palace of Minos. Like other Minoan palaces, this complex of buildings served as a combination religious and administrative centre rather than a royal residence. The earliest parts of the palace were built around 1900 BC in an area that had been used for ritual feasting since the Neolithic. The palace was continually renovated and expanded over the next five centuries until its final destruction around 1350 BC. The site was first excavated by Minos Kalokairinos in 1877. In 1900, Arthur Evans, Sir Arthur Evans undertook more extensive excavations which unearthed most of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ritual
A ritual is a repeated, structured sequence of actions or behaviors that alters the internal or external state of an individual, group, or environment, regardless of conscious understanding, emotional context, or symbolic meaning. Traditionally associated with gestures, words, or revered objects, rituals also occur in non-human species, such as elephant mourning or corvid object-leaving. They may be prescribed by tradition, including religious practices, and are often characterized by formalism, traditionalism, rule-governance, and performance. Rituals are a feature of all known human societies. They include not only the worship rites and sacraments of organized religions and cults, but also rites of passage, atonement and ritual purification, purification rites, oaths of allegiance, dedication ceremonies, coronations and presidential inaugurations, marriages, funerals and more. Even common actions like handshake, hand-shaking and saying "hello" may be termed as ''rituals''. Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Minoan Frescoes From Tell El-Daba
The Minoan wall paintings at Tell el-Dab'a are of particular interest to Egyptologists and archaeologists. They are of Minoan style, content, and technology, but there is uncertainty over the ethnic identity of the artists. The paintings depict images of bull-leaping, bull-grappling, griffins, and hunts. They were discovered by a team of archaeologists led by Manfred Bietak, in the palace district of the Thutmosid period at Tell el-Dab'a. The frescoes date to the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt, most likely during the reigns of either the pharaohs Hatshepsut (reigned c. 1479 – 1458 BCE) or Thutmose III (reigned 1479 – 1425 BCE), after being previously considered to belong to the late Second Intermediate Period. The paintings indicate an involvement of Egypt in international relations and cultural exchanges with the Eastern Mediterranean either through marriage or exchange of gifts. Palace District of the Thutmosid Period The palace district of the Thutmosid period covers a pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Late Minoan
Minoan chronology is a framework of dates used to divide the history of the Minoan civilization. Two systems of relative chronology are used for the Minoans. One is based on sequences of pottery styles, while the other is based on the architectural phases of the Minoan palaces. These systems are often used alongside one another. Establishing an absolute chronology has proved difficult, since different methodologies provide different results. For instance, while carbon dating places the eruption of Thera around 1600 BC, synchronism with Egyptian records would place it roughly a century later. Relative chronology Ceramic periodization The standard relative chronology divides Minoan history into three eras: ''Early Minoan (EM)'', ''Middle Minoan (MM)'' and ''Late Minoan (LM)''. These eras are divided into sub-eras using Roman numerals (e.g. EM I, EM II, EM III) and sub-sub-eras using capital letters (e.g. LM IIIA, LMIIIB, LM IIIC). This system is based on the sequenc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Acrobatics
Acrobatics () is the performance of human feats of balance (ability), balance, agility, and motor coordination. Acrobatic skills are used in performing arts, sports, sporting events, and martial arts. Extensive use of acrobatic skills are most often performed in acro dance, circus, gymnastics, and freerunning and to a lesser extent in other athletic activities including ballet, slacklining and Diving (sport), diving. Although acrobatics is most commonly associated with human body performance, the term is used to describe other types of performance, such as aerobatics. History Acrobatic traditions are found in many cultures, and there is evidence that the earliest such traditions occurred thousands of years ago. For example, Minoan civilization, Minoan art from contains depictions of bull-leaping, acrobatic feats on the backs of bulls. Ancient Greeks practiced acrobatics, and the noble court displays of the European Middle Ages would often include acrobatic performances that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aegean Art
Aegean art (2800–1100 BC) is art that was created in the lands surrounding, and the islands within, the Aegean Sea during the Bronze Age, that is, until the 11th century BC, before Ancient Greek art. Because it is mostly found in the territory of modern Greece, it is sometimes called Greek Bronze Age art, though it includes not just the art of the Mycenaean Greeks, but also that of the Cycladic and Minoan cultures, which converged over time. Cycladic art is known for its simple figurines carved in white marble; Minoan art for its palace complexes with frescos, imagery of bulls and bull-leaping, and sophisticated pottery and jewellery; and Mycenaean art for its lavish metalwork in gold, imagery of combat and massively-constructed citadels and tombs. These are very different arts, reflecting very different cultures. For this reason, many art historians consider the term "Aegean art" inappropriate, as it reflects mere geographic proximity and not cultural or artistic unity ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bull Worship
Cattle are prominent in some religions and mythologies. As such, numerous peoples throughout the world have at one point in time honored bulls as sacred. In the Sumerian religion, Marduk is the "bull of Utu". In Hinduism, Shiva's steed is Nandi, the Bull. The sacred bull survives in the constellation Taurus. The bull, whether lunar as in Mesopotamia or solar as in India, is the subject of various other cultural and religious incarnations as well as modern mentions in New Age cultures. In prehistoric art Aurochs are depicted in many Paleolithic European cave paintings such as those found at Lascaux and Livernon in France. Their life force may have been thought to have magical qualities, for early carvings of the aurochs have also been found. The impressive and dangerous aurochs survived into the Iron Age in Anatolia and the Near East and were worshipped throughout that area as sacred animals; the earliest remnants of bull worship can be found at neolithic Çatalhöyük. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indus Valley Civilisation
The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation, was a Bronze Age civilisation in the Northwestern South Asia, northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 Common Era, BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form from 2600 BCE to 1900 BCE. Together with ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, it was one of three early civilisations of the Near East and South Asia, and of the three, the most widespread, its sites spanning an area including much of Pakistan, Northwest India, northwestern India and northeast Afghanistan. The civilisation flourished both in the alluvial plain of the Indus River, which flows through the length of Pakistan, and along a system of perennial monsoon-fed rivers that once coursed in the vicinity of the Ghaggar-Hakra River, Ghaggar-Hakra, a seasonal river in northwest India and eastern Pakistan. The term ''Harappan'' is sometimes applied to the Indus Civilisation after its type site Harappa, the first to be exc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex
The Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC) is the modern archaeological designation for a particular Middle Bronze Age civilisation of southern Central Asia, also known as the Oxus Civilization. The civilisation's urban phase or Integration Era was dated in 2010 by Sandro Salvatori to –1950 BC, but a different view is held by Nadezhda A. Dubova and Bertille Lyonnet, –1700 BC.Lyonnet, Bertille, and Nadezhda A. Dubova, (2020b)"Questioning the Oxus Civilization or Bactria- Margiana Archaeological Culture (BMAC): an overview" in Bertille Lyonnet and Nadezhda A. Dubova (eds.), ''The World of the Oxus Civilization'', Routledge, London and New York, p. 32.: "...Salvatori has often dated its beginning very early (ca. 2400 BC), to make it match with Shahdad where a large amount of material similar to that of the BMAC has been discovered. With the start of international cooperation and the multiplication of analyses, the dates now admitted by all place the Oxus Civilizati ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Levant
The Levant ( ) is the subregion that borders the Eastern Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean sea to the west, and forms the core of West Asia and the political term, Middle East, ''Middle East''. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is equivalent to Cyprus and a stretch of land bordering the Mediterranean Sea in Western AsiaGasiorowski, Mark (2016). ''The Government and Politics of the Middle East and North Africa''. p. 5: "... today the term ''Levantine'' can describe shared cultural products, such as Levantine cuisine or Levantine archaeology". .Steiner & Killebrew, p9: "The general limits ..., as defined here, begin at the Plain of 'Amuq in the north and extend south until the Wâdī al-Arish, along the northern coast of Sinai. ... The western coastline and the eastern deserts set the boundaries for the Levant ... The Euphrates and the area around Jebel el-Bishrī mark the eastern boundary of the northern Levant, as d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hittite Empire
The Hittites () were an Anatolian peoples, Anatolian Proto-Indo-Europeans, Indo-European people who formed one of the first major civilizations of the Bronze Age in West Asia. Possibly originating from beyond the Black Sea, they settled in modern-day Turkey in the early 2nd millennium BC. The Hittites formed a series of Polity, polities in north-central Anatolia, including the kingdom of Kussara (before 1750 BC), the Kültepe, Kanesh or Nesha Kingdom (–1650 BC), and an empire centered on their capital, Hattusa (around 1650 BC). Known in modern times as the Hittite Empire, it reached its peak during the mid-14th century BC under Šuppiluliuma I, when it encompassed most of Anatolia and parts of the northern Levant and Upper Mesopotamia, bordering the rival empires of the Hurri-Mitanni and Assyrians. Between the 15th and 13th centuries BC, the Hittites were one of the dominant powers of the Near East, coming into conflict with the New Kingdom of Egypt, the Middle Assyrian Empi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
