Preserving memory in Minoan Crete: filled-in bench and platform deposits from the First Palace of Phaistos

Recent studies in Aegean prehistory have focused on the phenomenon of accumulated artefacts in structured depositions as mnemonic records, i.e. as reflecting people’s desire to preserve the memory of some specific events. Beside foundation deposits, which are particularly well attested in Minoan Crete, many other kinds of structured deposits need to be better investigated within their own context in order to reach a better understanding of their function and social meaning. The Minoan site of Phaistos, southern Crete, in the period of the First Palaces (i.e. Proto¬palatial period, 19-17th centuries BC) represents an ideal case, as it is rich in what are here called ‘filled-in bench and platform deposits’, i.e. benches and platforms effectively made-up mainly with complete and fragmentary vases (and some other finds such as animal bones), which are placed in a ‘structured’ manner and sealed up inside visible and functional architectural features. This paper wants to explore this practice with the aim to explain its function and social meaning in connection to the local history of the town of Phaistos. Since most of these filled-in structures are intimately connected to architectural alterations of the Phaistian Protopalatial buildings, I first argue that they reflect social practices strictly connected to the resident community and/or visitors to the First Palace at Phaistos and reveal a need to mark major changes in its biography; second, I suggest that the hoarding of selected objects resulting from specific social events within specifically constructed benches or platforms should be interpreted as a materialised mnemonic record of these events.