Miceneo ma-ka (Knossos) e l’epiteto cretese Welkhanos: qualche riflessione di linguistica, poetica e onomastica indoeuropea

Starting from a recent book about a collection of religious and philologic studies on Crete, from the Minoan to the Greek classical period, this paper deals with the importance of the island of Crete for investigating the ancient civilizations in the Mediterranean. Thus, it focuses on a pair of Cretan linguistic issues, namely Linear B ma-ka and the epithet of Zeus Welkhanos, which are discussed in the frame of comparative Indo-European linguistics and poetics.