Minotaur, << MIHN uh tawr, >> in Greek mythology, was a monster that was half man and half bull. It is usually shown with the head of a bull and body of a man. The Minotaur was the offspring of a bull and a woman named Pasiphae. Pasiphae was the wife of King Minos of Crete. Minos kept the Minotaur in the Labyrinth. The Labyrinth was a mazelike building from which no one could escape. Minos sacrificed seven Athenian youths and seven Athenian maidens to the Minotaur each year. Theseus of Athens finally killed the Minotaur. He escaped from the Labyrinth by following a thread given to him by Minos’s daughter, Ariadne. See Theseus.
A palace excavated during the 1900’s at Knossos in Crete has so many passageways that it resembles the legendary Labyrinth. Paintings found there show bulls and bull-baiting games.
