Key Info

- Half-man half-bull trapped inside the Labyrinth 

- Slain by Theseus

Brief Bio

The Minotaur, also known as Asterion, is a mythical creature portrayed during classical antiquity 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". 

After ascending the throne of the island of Crete, Minos competed with his brothers as ruler. Minos prayed to the sea god Poseidon to send him a snow-white bull as a sign of the god's favor. Minos was to sacrifice the bull to honor Poseidon, but owing to the bull's beauty he decided instead to keep him. Minos believed that the god would accept a substitute sacrifice. To punish Minos, Poseidon arranged with Aphrodite for Minos's wife, Pasiphaë, to fall in love with the bull which lead to the birth of Asterius, the Minotaur, making him a grandchild of Helios. 

Pasiphaë nursed the Minotaur but he grew in size and became ferocious and began devouring humans for sustenance.Minos, following advice from the oracle at Delphi, had Daedalus and his son Icarus construct a gigantic Labyrinth to hold the Minotaur. Its location was near Minos's palace in Knossos.

According to tradition, every nine years the people of Athens were compelled by King Minos to choose fourteen young noble citizens (seven men and seven women) to be offered as sacrificial victims to the Minotaur in retribution for the death of Minos's son Androgeos. The Minotaur was eventually slain by the Athenian hero Theseus, who managed to navigate the labyrinth with the help of a thread offered to him by the King's daughter, Ariadne.