In Greek mythology, who was abducted by Zeus disguised as a bull?
"The White Bull The White Bull (original title in French: ""Le Taureau Blanc"") is a fable and a work of """"contes philosophiques"""", a philosophical novel, written by the Age of Enlightenment-era philosopher Voltaire. The story is based on the Greek tale of Europa and the bull, where the white bull is in fact the Greek god Zeus. The date the story was written is unknown but it was published between the years 1773 and 1774. Voltaire's work seems to be prophetic in nature because the story was published only fifteen years before the French Revolution, when beheadings became common. ""How"
"its location, and familiarized himself with van Mander's theories and interpretations of Ovid's myths. Van Mander commented on Europa's abduction, with a European spin to it. Ovid's account of the abduction of Europa is found in Book II 833-75 of ""Metamorphoses"". Europa is a princess of Tyre, who is playing with her court on the coast when a beautiful bull appears. Europa mounts the bull, which quickly whisks her away into the ocean. When Europa and her friends notice the bull retreating further into the sea without coming back, the bull transforms into Zeus and carries her to Mount Olympus"
"Crete. Dionysus was another god of resurrection who was strongly linked to the bull. In a worship hymn from Olympia, at a festival for Hera, Dionysus is also invited to come as a bull, ""with bull-foot raging."" ""Quite frequently he is portrayed with bull horns, and in Kyzikos he has a tauromorphic image,"" Walter Burkert relates, and refers also to an archaic myth in which Dionysus is slaughtered as a bull calf and impiously eaten by the Titans. For the Greeks, the bull was strongly linked to the Cretan Bull: Theseus of Athens had to capture the ancient sacred bull"
"Theseus immediately as Aegeus' son and worried that Theseus would be chosen as heir to Aegeus' kingdom instead of her son Medus. She tried to arrange to have Theseus killed by asking him to capture the Marathonian Bull, an emblem of Cretan power. On the way to Marathon, Theseus took shelter from a storm in the hut of an ancient woman named Hecale. She swore to make a sacrifice to Zeus if Theseus were successful in capturing the bull. Theseus did capture the bull, but when he returned to Hecale's hut, she was dead. In her honour Theseus gave her"
"hymn from Olympia, at a festival for Hera, Dionysus is invited to come as a bull; ""with bull-foot raging"". Walter Burkert relates, ""Quite frequently [Dionysus] is portrayed with bull horns, and in Kyzikos he has a tauromorphic image"", and refers also to an archaic myth in which Dionysus is slaughtered as a bull calf and impiously eaten by the Titans. In the Classical period of Greece, the bull and other animals identified with deities were separated from them as their ""agalma"", a kind of heraldic show-piece that concretely signified their numinous presence. The snake and phallus were symbols of Dionysus"
"the Hebrew plural form ""ʻAštārōṯ"" in this sense, see Astaroth). Some ancient sources assert that in the territory of Sidon the temple of Astarte was sacred to Europa. According to an old Cretan story, Europa was a Phoenician princess whom Zeus, having transformed himself into a white bull, abducted, and carried to Crete. Some scholars claim that the cult of the Minoan snake goddess who is identified with Ariadne (the ""utterly pure"") was similar to the cult of Astarte. Her cult as Aphrodite was transmitted to Cythera and then to Greece. Herodotus wrote that the religious community of Aphrodite originated"
"Cretan Bull In Greek mythology, the Cretan Bull () was the bull Pasiphaë fell in love with, giving birth to the Minotaur. Minos was king in Crete. In order to confirm his right to rule, rather than any of his brothers, he prayed Poseidon send him a snow-white bull as a sign. Poseidon sent Minos the bull, with the understanding that it would be sacrificed to the god. Deciding that Poseidon's bull was too fine a specimen to kill, Minos sent it to his herds and substituted another, inferior bull for sacrifice. Enraged, Poseidon had Aphrodite cause Pasiphaë, wife of"
"want the labor to be discounted as before). The Bull had been wreaking havoc on Crete by uprooting crops and leveling orchard walls. Hercules snuck up behind the Bull and then used his hands to throttle it (stopping before it was killed), and then shipped it back to Tiryns. Eurystheus, who hid in his ""pithos"" at first sight of the creature, wanted to sacrifice the Bull to Hera, who hated Hercules. She refused the sacrifice because it reflected glory on Hercules. The Bull was released and wandered into Marathon, becoming known as the Marathonian Bull. Theseus would later sacrifice the"
"Minos, to fall in love with the bull. She subsequently gave birth to the half-man, half-bull, Minotaur. Poseidon passed on his rage to the bull, causing it lay waste the land. After consulting the oracle at Delphi, Minos had Daedalus construct the Labyrinth to hold the Minotaur. Heracles was sent to capture the bull by Eurystheus as his seventh task. He sailed to Crete, whereupon Minos gave Heracles permission to take the bull away as it had been wreaking havoc on Crete by uprooting crops and leveling orchard walls. Heracles captured the bull, and then shipped it to Eurystheus in"
"from Zeus' thigh. Dionysus Zagreus was important in Orphic theology. In Protrepticus ii. 14 ff. by Clement of Alexandria, this child had the form of a bull. Zeus intended to make him the ruler of the universe but the jealous Titans lured the child away, tore him to pieces, cooked him and ate him. Athena preserved his heart, however, which Zeus swallowed. According to Boslooper, Clement omitted one part of the myth that forms a connection between his account and the Theban legend of Dionysus. Because Zeus swallowed the heart of Dionysus Zagreus, when Semele bore Dionysus the new god"
"portrayed as having been raised by a she-wolf which suckled the infants, as depicted in the iconic image of the Capitoline Wolf. The Greek god Zeus was said to have been brought up by Amalthea, portrayed variously as a goat who suckled the god or as a nymph who brought him up on the milk of her goat. Similarly, Telephus, the son of the demigod Heracles, was suckled by a deer. Several famous ancient historical figures were claimed to have been suckled by animals; Cyrus I of Persia was said to have been suckled by a dog, while mares supposedly"
"Flegetonte (""river of blood""), to continue through the seventh Circle. Minotaur In Greek mythology, the Minotaur (, ; , , Etruscan: ""Θevrumineś"") is a mythical creature portrayed in Classical times with the head and tail of a bull and the body of a man or, as described by Roman poet Ovid, a being ""part man and part bull"". It dwelt at the center of the Labyrinth, which was an elaborate maze-like construction designed by the architect Daedalus and his son Icarus, on the command of King Minos of Crete. The Minotaur was eventually killed by the Athenian hero Theseus. The"
"vary widely, with one consistent detail: in Greek imagery outside Crete, Talos is always being vanquished: he seems to have been an enigmatic figure to the Greeks themselves. Talos is described by Greeks in two versions. In one version, Talos is a gift from Hephaestus to Minos, forged with the aid of the Cyclopes in the form of a bull. In the other version, Talos is a gift from Zeus to Europa. Or he may have been the son of ""Kres"", the personification of Crete; in ""Argonautica"" Talos threw rocks at any approaching ship to protect his island. In the"
"a Greek hero, or demon or god. Demeter-Europa was his nurse. Europa (in Greek: broad-eyes) was a Phoenician princess whom Zeus, having transformed himself into a white bull, abducted and carried to Creta, and is equated with Astarte as a moon goddess by ancient sources. Some scholars connect Astarte with the Minoan snake goddess, whose cult as Aphrodite spread from Creta to Greece. Near the Menestheus's port or Menesthei Portus (), modern El Puerto de Santa María, Spain, was the Oracle of Menestheus (), to whom, also, the inhabitants of Gades offered sacrifices. The term ""oracle"" is also applied in"
"the Minotaur. After a curse from Poseidon, Pasiphae experienced lust for and mated with a white bull sent by Poseidon. ""The Bull was the old pre-Olympian Poseidon,"" Ruck and Staples remark. In the Greek literalistic understanding of a Minoan myth, in order to actually copulate with the bull, she had the Athenian artificer Daedalus construct a portable wooden cow with a cowhide covering, within which she was able to satisfy her strong desire. The effect of the Greek interpretation was to reduce a more-than-human female, daughter of the Sun itself, to a stereotyped emblem of grotesque bestiality and the shocking"
"for the throne and prayed to Poseidon for a gift to prove to Cretans that he was worthy of the throne because the gods favored him. Poseidon sent him a white bull from the sea on a condition that it be sacrificed for him. Minos kept the bull for himself because of its strength and beauty and sacrificed another one of his bulls. Poseidon was outraged and cursed that Queen Pasiphae fall in love with the bull and lust it. She used the help of Daedalus to build a wooden cow into which she fit herself to trick the bull"
"bull to Athena and/or Apollo. The eighth labour was to bring back the Mares of Diomedes, which had been trained to eat human flesh by their owner, King Diomedes of Thrace. In one version of the story, Hercules brought a number of youths to help him. They took the mares, called Podargos (""swift-footed""), Lampon (""the shining""), Xanthos (""the blond""), and Deinos (""the terrible""), and were chased by Diomedes and his men. Hercules was not aware that the horses were kept tethered to a bronze manger because they were wild; their madness being attributed to an unnatural diet of human flesh."
"Minotaur In Greek mythology, the Minotaur (, ; , , Etruscan: ""Θevrumineś"") is a mythical creature portrayed in Classical times with the head and tail of a bull and the body of a man or, as described by Roman poet Ovid, a being ""part man and part bull"". It dwelt at the center of the Labyrinth, which was an elaborate maze-like construction designed by the architect Daedalus and his son Icarus, on the command of King Minos of Crete. The Minotaur was eventually killed by the Athenian hero Theseus. The term Minotaur derives from the Ancient Greek , a compound"
"the Minotaur. Theseus set to try to capture the bull. On the way to Marathon, Theseus sought shelter from a storm in the shack owned by an old lady named Hecale. She swore to make a sacrifice to Zeus if Theseus was successful in capturing the bull. Theseus did capture the bull, but when he returned to Hecale's hut, she was dead. Theseus built a deme in her honour. He then dragged the bull to Athens where he sacrificed it to Athena and/or Apollo. Theseus then went to Crete where he killed the Minotaur with the help of Minos' daughter"
"bull is familiar in Judeo-Christian cultures from the Biblical episode wherein an idol of the golden calf (() is made by Aaron and worshipped by the Hebrews in the wilderness of the Sinai Peninsula (Book of Exodus). The text of the Hebrew Bible can be understood to refer to the idol as representing a separate god, or as representing Yahweh himself, perhaps through an association or religious syncretism with Egyptian or Levantine bull gods, rather than a new deity in itself. Among the Twelve Olympians, Hera's epithet ""Bo-opis"" is usually translated ""ox-eyed"" Hera, but the term could just as well"
"Hecale In Greek mythology, Hecale ( ""Hekálē""), was an old woman who offered succor to Theseus on his way to capture the Marathonian Bull. On the way to Marathon to capture the Bull, Theseus sought shelter from a storm in a shack owned by an ancient lady named Hecale. She swore to make a sacrifice to Zeus if Theseus was successful in capturing the bull. Theseus did capture the bull but when he returned to Hecale's hut, she was dead. Theseus built a deme in her honor (Hecale was a deme of the tribe Leontis). The legend is described in"
"friends were gathering flowers in a meadow. The god transformed into a bull with breath smelling of saffron, in the guise of which he abducted Europa, carrying her upon his back to Crete. There she bore Minos, Rhadamanthys and Sarpedon to Zeus, and he gave her a necklace made by Hephaestus that would figure in Theban saga as the Necklace of Harmonia. Sarpedon ruled Lycia, and was apparently granted a lifespan equal to three generations of men by Zeus. His death at Troy and the rain of blood it inspired Zeus to send is briefly described. Minos ruled Crete, succeeding"
"of the name (Minos) and the noun ""bull"", translated as ""(the) Bull of Minos"". In Crete, the Minotaur was known by the name Asterion, a name shared with Minos' foster-father. ""Minotaur"" was originally a proper noun in reference to this mythical figure. The use of ""minotaur"" as a common noun to refer to members of a generic species of bull-headed creatures developed much later, in 20th-century fantasy genre fiction. After he ascended the throne of the island of Crete, Minos competed with his brothers to rule. Minos prayed to Poseidon, the sea god, to send him a snow-white bull, as"
"Zeus, in the form of a white bull, that swam her to Crete; or to the very myth of the Minotaur, which was the product of Pasiphaë's, a Cretan Queen's, intercourse with a white bull, initially allotted to King Minos, Pasiphaë's husband, as a sacrifice for Poseidon. Quinotaur The Quinotaur (Lat. Quinotaurus) is a mythical sea creature mentioned in the 7th century Frankish Chronicle of Fredegar. Referred to as """"bestea Neptuni Quinotauri similis"""", (""the beast of Neptune which resembles a Quinotaur"") it was held to have fathered Meroveus by attacking the wife of the Frankish king Chlodio and thus to"
"the Tyre. Karel van Mander looked for an applicable meaning to the work that constructed a moral concept to the classical literature. He quoted an unnamed ancient source that stated that the abducted princess was representative of ""the human soul, borne by the body through the troubled sea of this world"". Van Mander theorized that the bull, which is Zeus in the classical tale, is really the name of a ship that bore Europa from her eastern home of Tyre to the western continent that adopts her name. The literary comments of van Mander are essential to deconstructing the allegorical"
"the bull to Poseidon, but then decided to substitute a different bull. In rage, Poseidon cursed Pasiphaë, Minos' wife, with a mad passion for the bull. Daedalus built her a wooden cow, which she hid inside. The bull mated with the wooden cow and Pasiphaë was impregnated by the bull, giving birth to a horrible monster, again named Asterius, the Minotaur, half man half bull. Daedalus then built a complicated ""chamber that with its tangled windings perplexed the outward way"" called the Labyrinth, and Minos put the Minotaur in it. To make sure no one would ever know the secret"
"Enalus Enalus or Enalos was a man from Lesbos in ancient Greek mythology. The Penthelides, the first settlers in Lesbos, had received an oracle from Amphitrite commanding them to sacrifice a bull to Poseidon and a virgin to Amphitrite and the Nereides, as soon as they should, on their journey to Lesbos, come to the rock Mesogeion. The leaders of the colonists accordingly caused their daughters to draw lots, the result of which was, that the daughter of Smintheus or Phineus was to be sacrificed. When she was on the point of being thrown into the sea, her lover, Enalus,"
"(III.1.4) asserts:Pasiphaë gave birth to Asterius, who was called the Minotaur. He had the face of a bull, but the rest of him was human; and Minos, in compliance with certain oracles, shut him up and guarded him in the Labyrinth.""Minotaur"" is simply a name of Hellene coining to describe his Cretan iconic bull-man image: see Minotaur. Coins minted at Cnossus from the fifth century showed the kneeling bull or the head of a goddess crowned with a wreath of grain and on the reverse—the ""underside""—a scheme of four meander patterns joined at the centre windmill fashion, sometimes with sickle"
"the union of the god and the goddess. Otherwise Earth would be symbolised in the tree and Heaven in the double axe of the god. Later Velchanos was depicted as a bull as testified in the myths of Pasiphae and Europa. The Greeks misunderstood the meaning of the bull as for them the symbol of Zeus was a bird: the cock, the cuckoo or the eagle. Theseus brought to Delos the dance named ""géranos"" (literally the dance of the crane) which Capdeville connects with ""Garanos"", a variant of the ""Recaranus"" of Italic myths. B. Sergent remarks that such an inquiry"
"Hera by Zeus. Her archaic association was primarily with cattle, as a Cow Goddess, who was especially venerated in ""cattle-rich"" Euboea. On Cyprus, very early archaeological sites contain bull skulls that have been adapted for use as masks (see Bull (mythology)). Her familiar Homeric epithet ""Boôpis"", is always translated ""cow-eyed"". In this respect, Hera bears some resemblance to the Ancient Egyptian deity Hathor, a maternal goddess associated with cattle. Hera bore several epithets in the mythological tradition, including: Hera is known for her jealousy; even Zeus, who is known to fear nothing, feared her tantrums. Zeus fell in love with"
"her hospitality, by order of Theseus, as Philochorus relates."" One of today's Athens northern suburbs, Ekáli, an affluent and very exclusive residential community on the western foot of Mount Penteli, is called by that name. Hecale In Greek mythology, Hecale ( ""Hekálē""), was an old woman who offered succor to Theseus on his way to capture the Marathonian Bull. On the way to Marathon to capture the Bull, Theseus sought shelter from a storm in a shack owned by an ancient lady named Hecale. She swore to make a sacrifice to Zeus if Theseus was successful in capturing the bull."
"Zeus transformed into a bull. Some bronze figurines of the 6th century BC are also displayed in the same room, of which notable is a figurine of Apollo, made by a Laconian workshop. On one of the cases fastened against the wall is displayed a bronze tile depicting a scene from the Odyssey: a man, possibly Ulysses, tied under the belly of a ram is possibly escaping from the cave of Polyphemus; another tile depicts Hercules carrying the Erymanthian boar to king Eurystheus, who hides in a jar, terrified. Finally, simae from two archaic treasuries are also displayed; they are"
"associated with that of the Eagle (Aquila). A moon of Jupiter, the planet named after Zeus's Roman counterpart, was named Ganymede by the German astronomer Simon Marius. Plato accounts for the pederastic aspect of the myth by attributing its origin to Crete, where the social custom of ""paiderastía"" was supposed to have originated (see ""Cretan pederasty""). Athenaeus ecorded a version of the myth were Ganymede was abducted by the legendary King Minos to serve as his cupbearer instead of Zeus. Some authors have equated this version of the myth to Cretan pederasty practices, as recorded by Strabo and Ephoros, that"