![]() On the Athenian stage, Minos is a cruel tyrant, the heartless exactor of the tribute of Athenian youths to feed to the Minotaur in revenge for the death of his son Androgeus during a riot (see Theseus). He was the author of the Cretan constitution and the founder of its naval supremacy. He lived at Knossos for nine years, where he received instruction from Zeus in the legislation he gave to the island. He reigned over Crete and the islands of the Aegean Sea three generations before the Trojan War. Thucydides tells us Minos was the most ancient man known to build a navy. Minos appears in Greek literature as the king of Knossos as early as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. Literary Minos ġ7th-century engraving of Scylla falling in love with Minos Minos's name would then signify a lunar deity in this context, thus connected to several words for a moon god in Indo-European languages. Īnother possibility is that Minos and his relatives would be dramatis personae in a local "astronomical myth." Telephassa (Minos's grandmother) means "far-shining" Pasiphaë (Minos's wife, a daughter of Sun god Helios) means "all-shining" or "wide-shining" Phaidra (Minos's daughter with Pasiphaë) means "bright, beaming" – all three containing a tangible Proto-Indo-European root *b heh 2- 'to glow, shine,' which, in Greek, derives φαής phaés 'light' and related words. Some 19th-century scholars proposed a connection between Minos and the names of other ancient founder-kings, such as Menes of Egypt, Mannus of Germany, and Manu of India, and even with Meon of Phrygia and Lydia (after him named Maeonia), Mizraim of Egypt in the Book of Genesis and the Canaanite deity Baal. There is a name in Minoan Linear A mi-nu-te that may be related to Minos. The royal title ro-ja is read on several documents, including on stone libation tables from the sanctuaries, where it follows the name of the main god, Asirai (which would be equivalent to Sanskrit Asura, and of Avestan Ahura). La Marle suggests that the name mwi-nu (Minos) is expected to mean ' ascetic' as Sanskrit muni, and fits this explanation to the legend about Minos sometimes living in caves on Crete. "Minos" is often interpreted as the Cretan word for "king" or, by a euhemerist interpretation, the name of a particular king that was subsequently used as a title.Īccording to La Marle's reading of Linear A, which has been heavily criticized as arbitrary, we should read mwi-nu ro-ja (Minos the king) on a Linear A tablet. Group of the damned, with Biagio da Cesena as Minos at right ![]()
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