The Find of a Lifetime: Sir Arthur Evans and the Discovery of Knossos [Paperback]

Sylvia L. Horwitz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 2001

The story of the dapper Victorian gentleman whose obsessions led to one of the most breathtaking discoveries in the history of archaeology: the Palace of Minos at Knossos. As the brilliant curator of the famed Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, Sir Arthur Evans was already a famed prehistorian and archaeologist before, at the age of fifty, he assumed his most celebrated role: as the discoverer of the ancient civilization of Crete - a civilization that, until then, had only been dimly recalled in the myth of Theseus. Less than a month after the first spadeful of earth had been turned on the site at Knossos, Evans discovered a labyrinthine palace that was clearly the seat of a fabulously wealthy and powerful culture. Sylvia Horwitz's biography brings us both the legend and the truth of this extraordinary man as well as the story of one of archaeology's most momentous and thrilling discoveries.

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About the Author

Sylvia L. Horowitz was educated at Case-Western Reserve University and has spent most of her life since 1946 abroad. She was the founder of the Overseas School of Rome and has worked on several digs in North Africa and the Middle East. She now lives in New York City.

Product Details

• Paperback: 278 pages
• Publisher: Sterling Publishing (December 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1842122215
• ISBN-13: 978-1842122211
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,821,529 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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3.0 out of 5 stars Sir Arthur Evans, the discoverer of Knossos, November 3, 2010

By 

D. B. Killings "Dagnabbit!" (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Find of a Lifetime: Sir Arthur Evans and the Discovery of Knossos (Paperback)

The Find of a Lifetime is a biography of the great archeologist Sir Arthur Evans, who in 1900 unearthed the great palace of Knossos and thereby brought to light an ancient and powerful civilization. The Minoans, as they came to be called (a name which they themselves probably did not use), were an important and powerful sea-faring people on the island of Crete who erected huge palaces and created works of art completely unique, but yet whose existence became only dimly remembered even in antiquity. By the time Evans began his work, the Minoans had faded to little more than legends of the Minotaur, the Labyrinth, and the stories of Daedalus and Icarus, and their very existence was doubted by most scholars as little more than a legendary fantasy. Evans discovery of Knossos changed all of that.

While title The Find of a Lifetime implies that Evans work at Knossos is the centerpiece of the work, that part of Evans life is really only handled in an abbreviated, cursory manner. Only the rough, highpoint aspects of it are covered, and far more detailed attention is paid to Evans early life as the son of an equally prominent antiquarian and scholar (Sir John Evans), as well as his years in the Balkans and various crusades for Balkan independence and freedom from the Ottoman Empire. His years as Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford are also covered, including his work to transform that institution into the world class museum it is today. But really, his work at Knossos remains his most important contribution, and I was rather disappointed to find that this book covers it in such a rudimentary way. Perhaps the author felt that much of that story was already well known and hence more attention should be paid to the less known aspects of Evans life. To be sure, the entire subject is not ignored, and some effort is made to track Evans various thoughts and scholarly debates. But compared to the non-archeological aspects of the work, I found the coverage of the archeological aspects of Evans life to be decidedly lacking, a definite defect for the biography of someone who is regarded as one of the great Archeologists of all time.

Horwitz's prose is not remarkable but is readable. Her writing rarely attempts to make sense or read into Evans' character, but instead simply reports his life matter-of-factly with little analysis. While she does do a very good job of outlining Evans life and why he is important to our understanding of ancient Aegean culture, I don't think she does much to make us understand Evans as a person. It is an okay book, but I do not feel it is a particularly insightful one. Those who are interested in learning about the life of Evans will probably find it of interest, but those who are more interested in the actual work he did at Knossos and the Minoans in general will probably want to look elsewhere.