Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 1): Zeus god of the bright sky (Cambridge, 1914)

492

The Minotaur

the middle of the Labyrinth, the place which on other coins is occupied by the
Minotaur.'

From the concluding sentences of this paragraph I should dissent.
The fact that the earliest known form of the Labyrinth is a
derivative of the swastika leads us to believe that the dance
represented the revolving sun rather than the ecliptic. But that
the Minotaur, like the Chilcotin Indians walking in a circle and
leaning on their staves, was engaged in a piece of mimetic ritual
seems to me highly probable. I would interpret in this sense an
unpublished stater of Knossos in the McClean collection at Cam-
bridge (fig. 354). This interesting coin has for its reverse design
a Labyrinth clearly based on the swastika-pattern, and for its
obverse a Minotaur of unique type. He has a bull's head and tail;
but from under his mask—for such it must be—hang two un-
mistakeable tresses of human hair, and as he hastens along he
leans upon a staff. A figure better adapted to express the solar
dance it would be hard to imagine.

Such a dance doubtless served to promote the year's vegetation;
and it has been argued with much probability by E. Neustadt1 that
the crown of Theseus or Ariadne was originally a flowery crown
comparable -with the May-garland. Bakchylides speaks of the

Fig- 354-

former as 'dark with roses2'; Timachidas, of the latter as made
from the ' Theseus-flower8.' The wreath in question, whether his
or hers, was transformed into a constellation at a later date when
magic had yielded to science. Yet even then tradition did not
forget that a shining crown of some sort was connected with the
Labyrinth. According to Epimenides, Theseus after slaying the
Minotaur escaped from the Labyrinth by virtue of a glittering
crown, which Dionysos had given to Ariadne. This crown, formed
by Hephaistos of fiery gold and Indian gems, made light for the
hero in the dark maze: it was afterwards placed by Dionysos
among the stars4.

1 E. Neustadt De Jove Cretico Berolini 1906 p. 29 ff.

2 Bakchyl. 16. 116. 3 Timachidas ap. Athen. 684 F.

4 Epimenides ap. pseudo-Eratosth. catast. 5 and Hyg.poet. astr. 2. 5, cp. Paus. 5. 19. 1.
See further Gruppe Gr. Myth. Rel. p. 603 n. 3 and n. 6.