The common, impressive method of drawing of celebrated prehistoric frescoes excavated in Thera, Crete and Thebes

In the Late Bronze Age, in Second Millennium B. C., very important civilizations had flourished in the Aegean Islands and shores, such as the one of Akrotiri, Thera, of the Minoan Crete and of the Mycenean Boeotia. One of the main characteristics of these civilizations was the widespread Art of Wall Painting. In the present work, the method of drawing of a number of celebrated wall-paintings belonging to the three (3) aforementioned civilizations is studied. The authors have demonstrated that the entire set of the borderlines of all figures appearing in the studied frescoes, have been drawn by six (6) geometric stencils-guides, namely four (4) hyperbolae and two (2) Archimedes (linear) spirals, the conception and construction of which was impressively and extraordinarily advanced for the specific era. The conception and construction of these mathematical curves was, so far, believed that it took place at least one thou-sand four hundred (1400) years later by giants of thought, Geometry and Mathematics in the Classical Era.(c) 2022 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This study analyzes the drawing method of famous wall paintings from the civilizations of Akrotiri, Minoan Crete, and Mycenean Boeotia. The authors discovered that the borderlines of all figures in these frescoes were drawn using six geometric stencils-guides, including hyperbolae and Archimedes spirals. This advanced technique challenges previous beliefs about the development of mathematical curves in ancient civilizations.