Myth & LegendGreek → English
Minotaur
/ˈmaɪnətɔːr/noun
The bull-headed monster of Cretan myth, kept in the Labyrinth and fed on Athenian youths.
The Greek roots
Μίνως
Mínōs
Minos, king of Crete
ταῦρος
taûros
bull
Literally: “Minos's bull”
The story of the word
The name identifies the creature by its owner rather than its nature: Minos kept it, though it was his wife Pasiphaë who bore it. Athens paid a tribute of seven boys and seven girls until Theseus went in with Ariadne's thread. Chaucer has the word in English by the late 1300s. Ταῦρος is the constellation Taurus and the animal in every Mediterranean bull cult from Knossos onwards.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → Old French → English
- First recorded
- late 14th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
labyrinthTaurustoreador
In a sentence
The maze at the centre of the museum was laid out as a Minotaur's labyrinth for children.