Monday 06 August 2018, some of an archaeo-history group from Chania amongst others will travel into the White Mountains of west Crete for a memorial tree dedication to Oliver Rackham. Rackham’s tree before site cleaning and interpretive plaque – Zelkova abelicea (Ambelitsiá) pollard on Psyllaki Family property – J. This book was released in the same year that the Kommos conceptual planning was forwarded to the local Ministry of Culture office in Heraklion. Two distinct and distinguished academic, science-based specialists, Dr.’s Oliver Rackham and Jennifer Moody collaborated and published a seminal book, The Making of the Cretan Landscape, that discussed Crete’s chronology, environment, inhabitants, landscape, unusual places and conservation and future. The plan also recommended using the existing and adjusted conditions and features to interpret the botany, zoology and geo-morphology, to name but a few possibilities. What was found there and what function occurred there, are critical for public interpretation of the site. The plan also addressed the need to include various subjects that could be experienced on site beyond the archaeological artifacts and the ruinous structures, exposed through the archaeological excavation. It promoted public use as a basic tenet for the important cultural resource to be conserved.
The Kommos Conservancy’s original conceptual plan 1 for the Kommos archaeological site, in south central Crete was to plan for Kommos to be opened as a public park. Stratis and Jill Marrington The Oliver Rackham memorial tree after preparation for public access and interpretation – Jennifer Moody photo A tribute to Professor Oliver Rackham’s multi-disciplinary contributions to understanding Crete