Tylissos

I drove west today, passed the city of Heraklion (three locals have told me Heraklion is the ugliest city in Crete), and on to the Minoan Houses at Tylissos. Three houses have been excavated but the site extends under the current village & could be much, much larger.

The houses were built in the 16th Century BC and have many features seen at the Palace of Phaistos, just on a smaller scale. 

After the disappointment of failing to find the aqueduct yesterday, today I found two. This is the water cistern at Tylissos, the end of the aqueduct is on the left of the steps. It pre-dates the Roman aqueduct at Gortys (around 5th century BC), by 10 centuries - clever folk the Minoans.

After Tylissos I headed off to Kato Archanes in search of an archaeological museum which was nowhere to be found. To my great delight I did discover a Venetian aqueduct just south of Knossos - which made up for yesterday!

Finally I visited Knossos, which is an odd place - partially reconstructed, which helped me make sense of the sites at Phaistos and Tylissos. Not sure I'm a fan of this style of archaeology - it's difficult to know what's modern and what's ancient!