From life to death and back to life, the Labyrinth archetype and the Knossos Palace in Crete

Abstract

This contribution aims at reflecting on the relationship between the constructed work and its original form, referring to the case of the Palace of Knossos in Crete as an archaic and original architecture, an ancestral place where the cultural practices related to death and rebirth found their stable and evocative form. The archetype of the Labyrinth, as well as the space of the cave, constitute the thematic poles around which the discourse on the Palace of Knossos is articulated, a constructed work to host the rites of passage between life and death, reified in the impeded wandering and in the meanders, in their intimate relationship with a nucleus that guards the mysterium tremendum and that opens to the idea of the infinite continuation of life through death.

Keywords

• palazzo di cnosso
• labirinto
• caverna