Minos, king of Crete, was one of the sons of Zeus. Despite having an illustrious career in the afterlife as judge of the fate of condemned souls, he was controversial among the gods. He rejected the gods after they gave him a sign of his right to become King of Crete, and most notably ignored Poseidon’s wishes when he decided against sacrificing an impressive white bull that emerged from the sea. This angered Poseidon so much that he caused his wife, Pasiphaë, to fall in love with the bull, and her subsequent copulation with the bull led to the birth of the Minotaur.
Characteristics
The son of Zeus was filled with hatred and vengeance and did everything his own way. The crested king ignored the wishes of the gods and was also thirsty for power and right. He was cunning and immensely powerful, but also jealous, naive, and gullible, which ultimately led to his death.
Literature
In Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Minos was the King of Knossos (the House of the Labyrinth). Thucydides, an Athenian historian and general, believed that he was the first man to have a navy. In Virgil’s Aeneid, he was the decider of the fates of those who were sentenced to death on the basis of a false accusation.
One of the three judges of death, he stands atop a huge urn and chooses the fate of the soul—together with a soundproof jury—to Elysium or Tartarus. In Dante’s epic poem Inferno, part of his Divine Comedy, Minos sits in the Second Circle of Hell, where souls are tested by admitting their sins. Minos is depicted with a gigantic tail sprouting behind him, reminiscent of a snake, and—to decide the correct level of punishment for these souls—he wraps himself in his tail.
The number of times Minos’ tail wraps around him shows in which Circle the fallen soul will spend eternity. Once his tail finishes wrapping around his body, he tells the soul which Circle it is confined to.
In The Battle of the Labyrinth, the fourth book in Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson series, Minos is shown helping the demigod Nico di Angelo in his attempt to bring his sister back to life. However, in this book, Minos only wanted to help Nico di Angelo because he wanted to trick him into killing Daedalus, the man who built the labyrinth. He wanted to do this because Daedalus was the only person who knew how to escape from his clutches, and the only person who knew how to kill the Minotaur.
In the postmodern and experimental novel House of Leaves, Minos and the Minotaur are written several times in the fictional manuscript that contains a significant portion of the novel by the deceased character Zampanó. In Zampanó’s discussion, he draws comparisons between the mythological labyrinth of Ancient Greece and the labyrinth of the house in his novel. Zampanó depicts the Greek mythological labyrinth in a bewildering mixture of precise and inaccurate forms. In Mary Renault’s The King Must Die, Minos is infected with leprosy and wears a symbolic bull mask. This story explores his illegitimate stepson, nicknamed The Minotaur.
Visual Arts
In the Sistine Chapel—and in reference to Dante’s Inferno—Michelangelo’s renowned painting The Last Judgment depicts Minos as the judge of the underworld, surrounded by various demons. His tail is wrapped around himself, and donkey ears sprout from one side of his head (nonsense). Minos is shown deciding the fate of souls who are brought before him to be judged in hell.
Coins and Vases
On Cretan coins, Minos is depicted as bearded, wearing a kind of crown known as a diadem, a headband that connotes royalty. Minos has curly hair and appears arrogant and honorable. He is portrayed in a similar way to Zeus due to their blood relations.
Explanation of the myth
Asterion, the King of Crete before Minos, originally adopted three sons of Zeus and Europa: Minos, Sarpedon, and Rhadamanthus. Asterion supposedly received all laws directly from Zeus. Minos’ son, Androgeus, after winning the Panathenaic Games, was sent by King Aegeus to Marathon to fight a bull. However, Androgeus lost the bullfight and was subsequently killed. This enraged Minos, who traveled to Athens to avenge his son.
On his travels there, he camped in the territory where Nisus, the King of Megara, lived. Minos discovered that Nisus’ strength came from his crimson hair, which was buried among the white, and subsequently got his daughter Scylla to fall in love with him. After winning Scylla’s love, Minos convinced her to cut her father’s hair so that he could conquer Megara.
Once Minos conquered the city, he punished Scylla for her disloyalty by tying her to a ship that dragged her until she finally drowned. Once Nisus arrived in Attica, he asked Zeus to punish the city. Zeus obliged, and ravaged the city with plague and famine. Concerned, an oracle instructed the Athenians to comply with Minos’ wishes in order to escape a miserable fate.
Minos demanded that every nine years, King Aegeus, the founder of Athens in Greek mythology, choose seven girls and seven boys to go to the labyrinth created by Daedalus in Crete, to be consumed by the Minotaur.
Eventually, Minos rose to become king. He said he had prayed to Poseidon for a sign, and Poseidon provided one by sending a colossal white bull from the sea. Minos was to sacrifice the bull to thank Poseidon. However, Minos decided to sacrifice a different bull. This angered Poseidon, who cursed Minos’ wife, Pasiphaë, causing her to fall in love with the bull. Daedalus built a wooden cow for Pasiphaë, so she could hide inside it.
The bull mated with the wooden cow and impregnated Pasiphaë, causing her to give birth to the abomination called Asterion. This was the Minotaur, part man, part bull. With his pride wounded, Minos did not want anyone to know who the Minotaur was, and he did not want anyone to know how to escape the labyrinth. The only person who knew who he was and how to escape was the builder of the labyrinth, Daedalus, along with his son Icarus. Although Daedalus was able to escape with Icarus, as he had made wings for him, Icarus flew too close to the sun and his wings melted, causing him to fall and drown in the sea.
Death of Minos
While Daedalus was escaping from the labyrinth, Minos went looking for him. He traveled everywhere to find him. Minos went to every city to ask for a riddle. He arrived in Camicus in Sicily, where he asked King Copal for a riddle. The riddle Minos asked was about a spiral seashell that needed to be unraveled to the end.
Daedalus tied the piece of string to an ant traveling through the shell. However, the king offered him a bath first. After Minos accepted the offer, he was trapped in the bath and—along with the king’s daughters—Daedalus poured boiling water on him until he died.
After his death, he became judge of the dead for Hades. He worked alongside Aeacus and Rhadmanthus. The former judged Europeans and the latter judged Asians. He held the cards, while casting the decisive vote on the fate of the dead.
