Crete

Crete is the largest island in Greece and has been the backdrop for a number of stories of ancient Greek mythology: the birth of Zeus, the arrival of Europa, the bronze guardian Talos, and the palace of King Minos with its labyrinth.

Zeus’ Birth

Zeus, the king of gods and men, was born on Crete. Hesiod says that Rhea was sent to Lyctus in Crete to bear him, and that Earth hid the child in a cave on Mount Aegeum (Theogony 477–484); Apollodorus places the birth in a cave of Dicte, where the Curetes guarded him and the nymphs Adrasteia and Ida fed him on the milk of the goat Amalthea (Library 1.1.6–7). It was to Crete, too, that Zeus in the form of a tame bull carried Europa across the sea from Phoenicia; she bore him Minos, Sarpedon and Rhadamanthys there, and the Cretan prince Asterius married her and brought up her sons (Apollodorus 3.1.1–2). Off the north coast lies the island of Dia, where, according to Homer, Artemis killed Ariadne on the witness of Dionysus as Theseus was carrying her from Crete to Athens (Odyssey 11.321–325). The Sirens, Pausanias relates, were persuaded by Hera to compete with the Muses in singing; the Muses won and plucked out the Sirens’ feathers to make crowns for themselves (Pausanias 9.34.3). The bronze man Talos was the guardian of Crete, running round the island three times a day and pelting ships with stones; he had a single vein closed by a bronze nail, and when the Argo came Medea brought about his death, either by driving him mad with drugs or by promising him immortality and drawing out the nail, so that the ichor, the divine blood, ran out (Apollodorus 1.9.26).

King Minos Palace

Finally, it was the place where the palace of King Minos was located, at Knossos, where Daedalus had built the labyrinth in order to house the Minotaur, a monster formed from the union of Minos' wife, Pasiphae, and the bull sent by Poseidon (Apollodorus 3.1.3–4, 3.15.8). Daedalus and his son Icarus were shut up in the labyrinth, but managed to escape by creating wings made of feathers and wax; however, Icarus flew too close to the sun, the wax melted and he fell to his doom in the sea that was named Icarian after him (Apollodorus, Epitome 1.12–13). It was here that Theseus was brought with the Athenian tribute in order to kill the Minotaur (Epitome 1.7–9).

See Also: Zeus, Amalthea, Europa, Sirens, The Muses, Talos, Medea, Minos, Daedalus, Minotaur, Pasiphae, Icarus, Theseus, Ariadne