The ancient Greek world
was the birthplace and western civilization
and also extraordinary
ledgends
It was the lost city of Atlantis a utopian
world that
vanished into the sea
Does it lie beneath this island?
There was the terrifying minotaur
a half man half bull it lured it's victims into an underground labyrinth
and devoured them
could this palace reveal the secrets
behind the ledgend
how did the religious sanctuary Zues
give rise to the Olympic Games
we still celebrate today
At Delphi there was the mystic Oracle 
enabling the ancient Greeks to see into
the future
what was the secret behind their predictions
Greek imagination created the first the
theatre
and Greek ingenuity the first the acoustic arena how were they able to design
a sound stage
unsurpassed to this day
The Colossus at Rhodes was the tallest
bronze statue ever made
how were they able to make it stand an
incredible 100 feet high
 
and high above the city of Athens stands the supreme masterpiece
the magnificent Parthenon
How were the ancient Greeks able to
realize so many groundbreaking
innovations
at the dawn of European History
The land we know today as Greece lying
in the eastern Mediterranean
was once a very different world
in antiquity Greece was made up from a
collection of warring city-states
became an empire
as this strengthend much of the eastern
Mediterranean fell under the Geeks
control
some of these lands had their own rich
history and culture others lived on in
legend where fact and fantasy became one
nowhere was clouded by a more terrifying
story the island of Crete
at its centre lay the infamous palace of
Colossus
this was once the power base at the
Minoan civilization
and advanced maritime race who
controlled the wealth and trade
of the Mediterranean
more formidable still were the stories of the
island's infamous
King Minos
in Greek mythology he said to have built
a labyrinth
to cage a monster
half man half bull
the Minotaur was the shocking result
of a union between the sacred bull
and the King's unfaithful wife
 
This day on the island the remains of the
Palace of Colossus can still be seen
could this building once have housed the most terrible creations from the ancient
Greeks mythical past
or did the structure of the palace
inspire the story of the Minotaur
built some two thousand years before the
Greek world flourished
the palace contain hundreds of luxurious
rooms
but did horror lurk deep beneath the
splendor
in nineteen hundred an English
archaeologist decided to find out
Sir Arthur Evans began to excavate what
he believed
could be the legendary palace
as Evans dug a magnificent palace
began to emerge
covering an area of 20,000 square yards it
revealed astonishing technical feats of
the Bronze Age people
Evans called the Manoans
from little more than foundations Evans
was able to reconstruct the part of the
palace
to create a glimpse of a lost culture
one could say that the Minoans were truly
remarkable
in the building technologies they
inventive certain techniques and methods
that
were a breakthrough at that time
one innovation was a series of terraces
dug into the hillside
to create the palace's East Wing which
stood four stories
another was the grand staircase running
up inside the palace
it was supported by cedar wood pillars
it's a masterpiece in many ways because
it's no easy thing to build a staircase
going down two flights
on a wooden frame
the diameter of each column defines its
maximum load
three and a half thousand years ago the
Minoans calculated how to make the
strongest framework possible
by placing these columns directly
beneath one another
and they outstripped all other contemporary
civilizations
in their mastery of light
using light wells and windows on a
scale
never seen before
to control internal light and space the
ancient architects created a
groundbreaking system
of doors
the palace boasted an elaborate underfloor
 drainage system
this not only dealt with with Crete's rainfall
it also carried away waste
from one of the world's earliest toilets
this is the famous toilet of the Minoan
Palace outside these doors
you see this large slab and we have
here a hole
so somebody let's say a servant was outside
flushing
water as the toilet the toilet was being used
Leading to the Palace were the very first cobbled roads in Europe, built over a thousand years
before the Romans
there were even sidewalks for pedestrians
it became clear the Colossus lay at the
heart of a highly sophisticated
civilization
so why did so Arthur Evans link it with
the myth of the Minotaur
in its labyrinth
he found a number of clues including
strange engravings in the shape of a
double-headed axe
What was their secret meaning?  An ancient
word for this axe
is a Labrys
Evans believed this palace could be the
very origin the word Labyrinth
another clue linking the palace to the
myth is the layout itself
1500 interconnecting rooms many below
ground
a bewildering maze that would drive
outsiders to panic. Rather than being the
actual site at Minos mythical
labyrinth
built to imprison the Minotaur. Could the
maze-like palace in fact
have given rise to the story? A
possibility backed up by evidence that
the bull
an ancient symbol of power played a key role in Minoan life
Experts now think that the Minotaur myth evolved when the powerful Cretans
controlled the seas
demanding tributes from
lesser states
such as Athens
according to legend the Athenian hero
Theseus volunteered to confront
the monster
armed with just a sword and string to
mark his path through the labyrinth
Theseus the Athenian confronted the
Minotaur
slaying the beast
 
 
The Athenians promoted this story it made them look victorious
but in reality Athens at this time was 
only a minor city
when the powerful Palace the Colossus flourished
there is no doubt that this great palace
could inspire storytellers
or that its architecture would inspire
the Minoans successers
the ancient Greeks
Myths of monsters, heroes and gods were at the heart of Greek beliefs
the gods control human destiny and for the
greeks
the desire to know what the Gods held
in store for them became
an obsession
A remote hillside at Delphi
was discovered to have special powers
using the medium of a priestess
it was possible to channel the special
powers and talk to the gods
these predictions and forecasts at Delphi were known
as the Oracle
Greeks in their thousands would soon make the pilgrimage to this mysterious mountain
refuge
to discover their future
predicting the future became big
business the Oracle created a huge
source of revenue
and this remote hillside at Delphi became so
important
the Greek city states had embassies and
treasuries built here
you had the wealth the Swiss banks and the authority
