DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.807#0035
IO
THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.
Dorian
adoption
of Minos.
Epony-
mic
Myths.
Achaean
Legend.
supplied by the desire to secure a lower rung for the ladder of ascent
by means of which the new Dorian line of rulers might be brought into
immediate relation with the representative name of the older indigenous
dynasty. By the new-comers, Achaean as well as Dorian, the old hierarchical
tradition attaching to the name of Minos was invoked as a sanction for their
own claims. He was at the same time made more real by being brought
down to the age immediately preceding the Trojan War. The ' adoption of
Minos ' itself finds an almost exact parallel in the adoption of Agamemnon
not only by the Achaeans but by the later Spartan kings.1
According to Diodoros' account2 the Dorian eponymus Doros, after his
arrival in Crete, weds the daughter of ' Kres' and becomes the father of
Asterios. Asterios in turn takes to wife Europa, who had already, by Zeus,
given birth to Minos, Rhaclamanthys, and Sarpedon. Minos I marries Itone,
daughter of ' Lyktios ' (eponymus of Lyktos, later the great Dorian centre),
and begets the namegiver of the neighbouring Lykastos. ' Lykastos '
is father by ' Ida ' of Minos II, who in turn is made the establisher of the first
thalassocracy among the Hellenes. The whole genealogy is pure myth of
the eponymic kind, which may have a certain value in so far as it reflects the
blending of the indigenous elements of Crete with the Greek new-comers,
but which had the obvious aim of first, in a way, annexing the ' Minos I '
and thus leading up to a ' second ' who could be described as of Dorian birth.
In the more usual legend, which is in fact incorporated in that given by
Diodoros, we hear only of one Minos. In the Iliadz he belongs to the
second generation before the Trojan War. He is there the father of
Deukalion, who impersonates the Hellenic stock in the oldest sense of
the word, and through him the erandfather of the Achaean leader Idomeneus,
lord of Knossos, whose name itself seems to point to early settlement in the
land round Ida. The dominion of Idomeneus, according to the catalogue of
ships, included, besides Knossos, Gortyna, Lyktos, Miletos, Lykastos, Phaestos,
and Rhytion.4 and thus embraced the whole of Central Crete. That it
represents in part at least an ethnographic break is indicated by one significant
fact. The sister city of Carian Halikarnassos, the Cretan Karnessos,5 is
1 Such is the implied claim of the Spartan
envoy in his answer to Gelon of Syracuse when
he proposed to take command of the allied
Greeks : y K€ jxiy oi/xcofeiev 6 UeXo7Ti8'r]<; 'Aya-
/xe/xvcov Trv66[j<evo<; %TrapTirjTa<i rrjv 7]yepoviiqv
(iTrapaLprjcruaL vtto TeXwvo'; re kol ^vp'r/Koaiow
(Herod, vii. 159).
2 The account of Diodoros, iv. 60, is, as
Hoeck points out (Kreta, ii, pp. 27, 53), largely
derived through an Attic medium.
3 xiii. 449-51, and cf. Od. xix. 17S seqq.
4 //. ii. 645 seqq.
5 The older name of Lyktos was Kapvrjcrcru-
tto/Yis (Hesychios, s.v. : cf. Fick, Vorgriechische
Ortsnamen (1905), p. 29.
THE PALACE OF MINOS, ETC.
Dorian
adoption
of Minos.
Epony-
mic
Myths.
Achaean
Legend.
supplied by the desire to secure a lower rung for the ladder of ascent
by means of which the new Dorian line of rulers might be brought into
immediate relation with the representative name of the older indigenous
dynasty. By the new-comers, Achaean as well as Dorian, the old hierarchical
tradition attaching to the name of Minos was invoked as a sanction for their
own claims. He was at the same time made more real by being brought
down to the age immediately preceding the Trojan War. The ' adoption of
Minos ' itself finds an almost exact parallel in the adoption of Agamemnon
not only by the Achaeans but by the later Spartan kings.1
According to Diodoros' account2 the Dorian eponymus Doros, after his
arrival in Crete, weds the daughter of ' Kres' and becomes the father of
Asterios. Asterios in turn takes to wife Europa, who had already, by Zeus,
given birth to Minos, Rhaclamanthys, and Sarpedon. Minos I marries Itone,
daughter of ' Lyktios ' (eponymus of Lyktos, later the great Dorian centre),
and begets the namegiver of the neighbouring Lykastos. ' Lykastos '
is father by ' Ida ' of Minos II, who in turn is made the establisher of the first
thalassocracy among the Hellenes. The whole genealogy is pure myth of
the eponymic kind, which may have a certain value in so far as it reflects the
blending of the indigenous elements of Crete with the Greek new-comers,
but which had the obvious aim of first, in a way, annexing the ' Minos I '
and thus leading up to a ' second ' who could be described as of Dorian birth.
In the more usual legend, which is in fact incorporated in that given by
Diodoros, we hear only of one Minos. In the Iliadz he belongs to the
second generation before the Trojan War. He is there the father of
Deukalion, who impersonates the Hellenic stock in the oldest sense of
the word, and through him the erandfather of the Achaean leader Idomeneus,
lord of Knossos, whose name itself seems to point to early settlement in the
land round Ida. The dominion of Idomeneus, according to the catalogue of
ships, included, besides Knossos, Gortyna, Lyktos, Miletos, Lykastos, Phaestos,
and Rhytion.4 and thus embraced the whole of Central Crete. That it
represents in part at least an ethnographic break is indicated by one significant
fact. The sister city of Carian Halikarnassos, the Cretan Karnessos,5 is
1 Such is the implied claim of the Spartan
envoy in his answer to Gelon of Syracuse when
he proposed to take command of the allied
Greeks : y K€ jxiy oi/xcofeiev 6 UeXo7Ti8'r]<; 'Aya-
/xe/xvcov Trv66[j<evo<; %TrapTirjTa<i rrjv 7]yepoviiqv
(iTrapaLprjcruaL vtto TeXwvo'; re kol ^vp'r/Koaiow
(Herod, vii. 159).
2 The account of Diodoros, iv. 60, is, as
Hoeck points out (Kreta, ii, pp. 27, 53), largely
derived through an Attic medium.
3 xiii. 449-51, and cf. Od. xix. 17S seqq.
4 //. ii. 645 seqq.
5 The older name of Lyktos was Kapvrjcrcru-
tto/Yis (Hesychios, s.v. : cf. Fick, Vorgriechische
Ortsnamen (1905), p. 29.