I am in Greece, where so much originates, especially our words. It is because of this shared language that Greece is home to so many parts of our common cultural imagination. At Knossos, you can visit the palace where supposedly Ariadne gave Theseus a string to help guide him out of the deadly labyrinth he ventured into to kill the Minotaur. In a tower above, Icarus and his father, Daedalus, the architect of the palace, were locked up. You know what happened next in the superstructure of myths that live in this place. Theseus slew the Minotaur and returned home, but he flew the wrong sail. His father, Aegeus, leaped into the sea, which took his name. Icarus, to evade checks on departing boats, flew away on waxen wings, but flew too close to the sun.

King Minos may have been a real, individual historical figure, but his name was certainly a term that referred to the Cretan king at Knossos, much like “Caesar” became a general term for a Roman ruler and later turned into “czar.” The Minotaur myth, they think, emerged from the ceremonial use of bull torso costumes the king would wear — combining the name with the Greek “tauros.” I was crestfallen to find no archaeological site of the labyrinth itself, as I prefer to think of the Greek myths as literally true. (Everyone needs something to believe in. They must not have excavated the right spot yet.) The word “labyrinth” also comes from this place. A labrys is a ceremonial double-sided ax that, in the story, the Minotaur wields, and, in history, was used for ritual slaughter. They have one in the museum down the hill (the ax, not a minotaur, sadly).