The olive is a favourite subject in Minoan art. Olive trees, olive branches and olive blooms are depicted in many wall paintings and relief works, found at the palace of Knossos (1600-1400 BC) and displayed in the Heraclion Museum today.

Wall-painting with olive foliage	Storage-jar (pithos) from Psira island

Of the most well known, is the wall painting depicting an olive tree between wild goats, the relief with the bull and the olive tree at the balcony of the northern entrance of Knossos palace, the wall-painting with "The dance in the Sacred Grove" and other scenes with olive foliage, blooming branch, branches and relief olives.

 

Olive branches and leaves are often depicted on the vases of the Minoan period. Characteristic examples are to be found in the storage-jar discovered at the small island Psira off the coastline of north-eastern Crete which is decorated with bull's heads and olive shoots on either side (1600-1500 B.C) as in the cup with the olive branch in bloom from Knossos (1600-1500 B.C), both now displayed in the Heraklion Museum.

Rushing bull and olive-tree

 

	The olive was a favourite subject even in the craft of gold-plating in the Minoan period. Characteristic of this is the superb piece of jewellery made up of a bunch of golden olive leaves found in the pre-palatial cemetery on the small island just outside today's settlement of Mochlos to the north of the village of Lastros in Sitia.
Olive - trees on the fresco  "Dance at the Sacred grove"Knossos

 

	At the Olympic games that started in 776 B.C, ancient Greeks were crowning the winners with a wreath ("kotinos") made of branches cutted always off the same wild olive-tree, known as "kallistefanos" (which means "for beautiful wreaths").
Wild goats and olive-tree

 

Also at the Panathenea games (600 B.C), the winner's prize was a decorated amphora, full of olive-oil which was produced of the "Mories" (Sacred) olive-trees belonging to Godess Athena.

Wall-painting with olive-tree branch			Olive branch in bloom