Flourishing on Bronze Age Crete ca 3000–1100 BCE, the Minoans were a vibrant, colourful and innovative civilization that celebrated the beauty of life, nature's rhythms, and the boundless sea.

Their extraordinary artistic output reflects their love of the natural world all around them. Their sprawling palaces were adorned with breathtaking frescoes characterized by fluid lines and vivid colors. Instead of grim battle scenes, these murals depicted graceful leaping bulls, blue monkeys, and delicate saffron crocuses. Their creativity extended to their exquisite pottery, which featured dynamic motifs of octopus and coral wrapping around clay vessels, reflecting a sophisticated society deeply in tune with its environment.

This intimate connection with nature was inextricably linked to their mastery of the sea. Developing a formidable thalassocracy, the Minoans dominated the Aegean as unparalleled seafarers. Their advanced sailing vessels, elegantly depicted in frescoes at Akrotiri on Santorini/Thera, carried olive oil and fine ceramics across lucrative trade networks across the Mediterranean world, returning with exotic ivory and gold.

Two faïence figurines, dating to ca 1600 BCE, were excavated at Knossos.

Style B, with hands outstretched, is the larger of the two. Serpents, symbol of fertility, curl around her outstretched arms and body, their heads reaching her tall headdress. She wears a long robe and an apron and her breasts, are bare and characteristically protruding.

The smaller Style A, holds snakes in both hands. Her layered clothing represents the weaving of multiple colourful bands of cloth, which was a Minoan speciality which was displayed to spectacular effect in the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Athens. On her head she has a small seated cat.

Both are on display in the Heraklion Museum in Crete.