The Bull-Symbol in the Royal Line of Crete
Patrick Mooney
Humanities 204
23 April 2006
The figure of the bull occurs quite frequently in the genealogical line descending from Zeus and Europa. In fact, the frequency with which it recurs is striking enough to suggest that there is a symbolic lesson being reinforced in this mythic cycle.
The bull-symbol recurs over and over throughout this mythological cycle: Zeus takes the form of a white bull in order to charm and abduct Europa. Their son, Minos, who became king of Crete by defeating his brothers Rhadamanthus and Sarpedon, prays that Poseidon might deliver him beautiful white bull to sacrifice as a sign that his kingship is divinely favored. When Minos elects to sacrifice another bull and keep Poseidon’s gift for himself, Poseidon, enraged, causes Minos’s wife Pasiphaë to be inspired with an unnatural passion for the white bull. After appealing to the inventor Daedalus to help her consummate her passion for the bull, she gives birth to the Minotaur, a half-bull, half-man monster. The Minotaur is imprisoned in a maze, the labyrinth, which is constructed by Daedalus. It is fed every nine years with a group of seven youths and seven maidens sent from Athens. These youths are exacted as tribute by Minos as punishment for the death of his son Androgeus while visiting Athens -- who, according to some versions of the story (e.g. that reported by Hamilton), was killed by a bull. (Leeming 196-7; Graves 303-6, 312, 336-9; Hamilton 150-2; Howe and Harrer 85, 169-70, 274)
The bull-symbol can thus be seen in at least four places in the three generations covered in this mythic cycle: As the form taken by Zeus on his abduction of Europa; as the gift of Poseidon and lover of Pasiphaë; as a component of the Minotaur, the offspring of Pasiphaë and the bull; and as the murderer of Androgeus. It is also clear that the bull is not merely seen as significant as a component of the genetic heritage of Zeus-the-bull, as it also becomes significant as the murder of Androgeus. In this context, there is no indication that the bull-murderer is a descendant of Zeus. (Nor, for that matter, is the Minotaur.) Rather, it seems more appropriate to say that the line of Zeus and Europa is plagued (or, perhaps, cursed) with a heritage that expresses itself symbolically in the form of bulls.
Robert Graves points out that, in this cycle, Pasiphaë is symbolic of the moon and that white bulls were particularly sacred to the moon. (306; 297) Zeus, in assuming the form of a white bull, then, assumes the attributes of a fertility-goddess. Along with Poseidon’s rage that Minos had not sacrificed the bull he had sent, this may indicate in narrative terms the rising of the Olympian pantheon over older cults of Earth and fertility and the absorption of their figures into the official, patriarchal Olympian sky-religion, a process Leeming suggests several times in his commentary on the Greek myths (on, e.g, 103-4). This process is also suggested by Minos’s refusal to "sacrifice" (from Latin sacrum facere, "to make sacred") the white bull to Poseidon -- which can be seen as a passive resistance to the rising Olympian religion. (Partridge 579)
Though this establishes motivation for many of the players involved in the myths, particularly in the second generation, it fails to explain fully the symbolic value of the bull. It is worthwhile, then, to examine more closely the function of the bull in each part of the mythic cycle, to show how it advances the plot of the story: Zeus assumes the form of a bull in order to abduct Europa. His son, Minos, is cuckolded by Poseidon’s bull after he fails to sacrifice it. Minos’s son Androgeus is killed by a bull that he had been sent to hunt. And the Minotaur is the devourer of youths. In all of these appearances, the bull-symbol is characterized by uncontrolled drives -- especially violence. Indeed, Chevalier and Gheerbrant claim that "bulls arouse visions of irresistible strength and vitality" and "evoke male impulsiveness ... In Greek mythology, bulls symbolize the unleashing of uncontrolled violence. They were ... sacred to Poseidon ... and to Dionysos." (131)
This provides enough information to sketch a brief symbolic interpretation of the mythic cycle. Zeus’s assumption of the form of a bull in order to abduct Europa indicates, simply, the violence of his intention. Minos’s failure to sacrifice (i.e. sacralize) the white bull involves at least two symbolic layers. If sacrificing an animal involves, in a symbolic manner, the offering-up of that symbolic aspect of the celebrant -- the elevation of that part of the personality to a sublime status -- than Minos, who gained the kingship of Crete by defeating his brothers in battle, is symbolically refusing to move past the stage in his life where uncontrolled violence is a spiritually healthy mode of life. [1] Chevalier and Gheerbrant explain, "in the Jungian analysis of symbolism the sacrifice of the bull ‘can be seen as a symbol of the triumph of man’s spiritual nature over his animality.’" (135) In short, Minos refuses to integrate (or sublimate) this mode of action into a higher form of existence. Additionally, when the white bull, sacred to the moon, is not sacrificed, Minos also symbolically refuses to integrate female and fertile modes of living, thinking, and experience into his personality. His wife’s unnatural passion for the bull and their unnatural offspring are a symbolic punishment for this lack of spiritual health and psychic integration.
Minos, in burying the Minotaur underground in the labyrinth, is symbolically ignoring the effects of his failure to integrate the psychic elements of the feminine and the fertile and of his failure to transcend the uncontrolled violence symbolized by the bull. The maze can be seen as symbolic of the subconscious elements of the personality, in which Minos has buried the expression of his failure. As Chevalier and Gheerbrant explain,
the maze also takes one to the center of one’s self, "to some hidden, inner shrine, occupied by the most mysterious portion" of the human personality. This conjures up the ... depths of the unconscious ... [which can] only be reached by the consciousness after making many detours or by intense concentration. (644)
It is ultimately Theseus who penetrates the labyrinth and kills the monster. It is worth noting that Theseus, in some versions of the myth, is the son of Poseidon [2] and can thus be seen as righting the psychic wrong caused by the sin against his father. It is also worth noting that the Minotaur is not depicted as a white bull (and this symbol of femininity is thus missing from this part of the mythic cycle). However, Theseus achieves his goal only with the help of Ariadne, daughter of Minos, and there is thus a symbol of the cooperation of the masculine and feminine in the overcoming of the perversion of the natural. It is also worth noting that Ariadne is the son of Minos and thus the descendant of Zeus, the sky-god, and Theseus is the son of Poseidon, the sea-god. There is thus a pleasing symbol of the reunion of earth and sky, old symbols of masculine and feminine. Finally, it may be noteworthy to point out that Ariadne, after being abandoned by Theseus, became the wife of Dionysos, to whom bulls were also sacred.
Ultimately, the mythological cycle can be seen as representing the working-out of inherited guilt through a family, much as the curse on the house of Atreus is finally resolved in the trial of Orestes. Perhaps more interesting, however, is the reading in which various members of the family work out, progressively, various conflicts in their collective unconscious. In this reading, the violence committed by Zeus is unsuccessfully dealt with by his son, Minos. This failure to overcome the sins of the father leads to the punishment of Minos by the death of his son, Androgeus, by one bull, and by the infidelity of his wife with another bull. The offspring of Pasiphaë and the white bull is hidden, indicative of another failure of Minos to integrate the uncontrolled and violent aspects of his psyche. It is finally the daughter of Minos, Ariadne, and the cousin of Minos, Theseus, who slay the Minotaur, symbolizing the overcoming of the overwhelmingly violent.
End Notes
1 A Freudian might suggest that, symbolically, Minos has failed to develop a superego strong enough to check the passions of his ego, i.e. has failed to become a mature adult.
2 And thus is Minos’s cousin, the son of his father’s brother, righting the wrongs committed by his relative.
References
Chevalier, Jean, and Alain Gheerbrant. The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols. Tr. John Buchanan-Brown. London: Penguin, 1996.
Graves, Robert. The Greek Myths, Volume One. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1955.
Hamilton, Edith. Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes. New York: Mentor, 1969.
Howe, George, and G. A. Harrer. A Handbook of Classical Mythology. Royston, England: 1996.
Leeming, David Adams. The World of Myth: An Anthology. New York: Oxford UP, 1990.
Partridge, Eric. Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English. New York: Greenwich House, 1983.
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