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 Theseus in Crete |
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- What's wrong father, why are you so sad? he asked. - Oh, my son, the collectors from Crete have arrive, and soon they will sail with seven boys and seven girls as a tribute that Athens is required to send every nine years to king Minos of Crete. Theseus understood what was going on, since he had heart about
this story before: Androgeus had won in one of the events but the next day he was found dead (murdered). Minos accused the Athenians for the death of the prince because he had been in the safekeeping and a guest of king Aegeus. Minos avenged the death of his son with war, and in addition to the damage done to the Athenians by Minos' army, the gods also punished the land with drought, famine, and plague. The oracle at Delphi told the Athenians that their troubles would not end until they appeased Minos, so the Athenians immediately asked for terms of peace. Minos required that every nine years, seven young men and maidens would be sent to Crete to be sacrificed to the Minotaur. The Minotaur was a monster, half-man, half-bull, that lived in the center of a maze called the Labyrinth. It had been born to Minos's wife Pasiphae as a punishment from the gods. Minos had been challenged to prove that he was of divine parentage, so he called on the sea god Poseidon to send him a sign. The god obliged, and a beautiful white bull emerged from the sea. Minos liked it so much that he neglected to sacrifice it to the gods, as he should have done. As a punishment, Poseidon caused the king's wife to fall in love with the bull. She had the master craftsman Daedalus build her a hollow cow in which to approach the beast. As a result, the Minotaur was born. Daedalus together with his son Ikarus made a complex maze (labyrinth) that became the Minotaur's home. Anyone who entered this maze would never find their way out! This labyrinth now became the Minotaurs hunting grounds. The monster is generally depicted as having the head of a bull and the body of a man. But in the Middle Ages, artists portrayed a man's head and torso on a bull's body." This was the third time that the Cretans had come for the tribute, and the Athenians were all very unhappy. Every man with a teen-aged son or daughter had to participate in a lottery to determine who would have to go. The Athenians grumbled that Aegeus, who was the cause of their trouble, would not participate in the lottery, and that true Athenians sacrificed their children so a foreign bastard might inherit the kingdom. Theseus was aware of this discontent, so he offered himself as one of the victims, not just as a participant in the lottery. Everyone admired the nobility and loved the goodness of this act, and all of Aegeu's tears could not turn Theseus away from his noble resolution. |
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- Do not worry father, said the hero, I will kill this monster and set Athens free from this tribute. - Be very careful my son, if anything happens to you I will die, said Aegeus. Promise me one thing, on your return use white sails on the ship so that I will know that you are victorious. - I promise my father, said the young prince. Black sails were on the ship taking the victims to Crete. This time, however, Aegeus put white sails aboard and ordered the crew to use white sails instead of the black ones on the return voyage if Theseus managed to do what he had confidently promised - kill the Minotaur.
The sea upon which they sailed was the domain of Poseidon, who together with
his brothers Zeus and Hades were the three most powerful gods of the Greek
pantheon. Between them they divided creation, Zeus taking Mount Olympus and
the sky, Hades the Underworld and Poseidon the sea. But there were other
deities of the watery depths, notably the "old man of the sea", the god
Nereus, with his fifty daughters, the Nereids. When Theseus was en route to
Crete, he encountered one of these divinities.
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