No one now dreams of hesitating to accept the statements of Herodotus and Thucydides as to the great sea-empire of Crete. Whoever the Minos to whom they allude may have been--whether he was actually a single great historical monarch who brought the glory of the kingdom to its culmination, or whether the name was the title of a race of Kings, is a matter of small moment. In either case the sea-power of Minoan Crete was a reality which endured, not for one reign, but for many reigns; and it is practically certain that, during a long period of history, the whole sea-borne trade of Europe, Asia, and Africa, was in the hands of these, the earliest lords of the ocean. [Illustration XXXII: GOLDSMITHS' WORK FROM BEEHIVE TOMBS, PHAESTOS (_p_. 216) _G. Maraghiannis_] The recollections of the fallen power that survived in the Greek mind were chiefly those connected with the oppressive aspect of the dominion which the Lord of Knossos exercised over the AEgean area; but in Egypt there lingered for centuries a tradition which did more justice to the glories of Minoan Crete. In the Timaeus, Plato tells a story of how Solon went to Egypt, and was told by a priest at Sais that long ago there had been a great island in the western sea, where a wonderful central power held sway, not only over the whole of its own land, but also over other islands and parts of the continent. In an attempt at universal conquest, this island State made war upon Greece and Egypt, but was defeated by the Athenians, and overwhelmed by the sea as a punishment for its sins, leaving only a range of mud-banks, dangerous to navigation, to mark the place where it had been. In the Timaeus and Critias, Plato describes with considerable detail the features of the island State, and the details are such that he might almost have been describing what the Egyptian priest who originally told the story was no doubt endeavouring to describe--the actual port and Palace of Knossos, with the life that went on there. 'The great harbour, for example, with its shipping and its merchants coming from all parts, the elaborate bathrooms, the stadium, and the solemn sacrifice of a bull, are all thoroughly, though not exclusively, Minoan; but when we read how the bull is hunted "in the temple of Poseidon without weapons but with staves and nooses," we have an unmistakable description of the bull-ring at Knossos, the very thing which struck foreigners most, and which gave rise to the legend of the Minotaur.'[*] [Footnote *: 'The Lost Continent,' _Times_, February 19, 1909. The anonymous writer was the first to identify Crete with the 'Lost Atlantis.']