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Minos

📍 Knossos, Greece Legendary Figure ~1400 BC
Minos

King Minos of Crete rose to power after proving his divine favor when Poseidon sent him a magnificent white bull. Breaking his vow to sacrifice the bull, Minos kept it – prompting Poseidon to curse his wife Pasiphae with an unnatural desire for the creature. Through the craftsman Daedalus's help, she mated with the bull, producing the Minotaur – a Legendary Creature with a bull's head and human body.

To hide this shameful creature, Minos had Daedalus build the legendary Labyrinth. After Minos's son was killed in Athens, he forced the city to send seven youths and seven maidens each year as sacrifice to the Minotaur. When the hero Theseus arrived among the victims, Minos's daughter Ariadne helped him slay the Legendary Creature and escape. Furious, Minos imprisoned Daedalus, who escaped using crafted wings, though his son Icarus perished in the attempt.

Minos tracked Daedalus to Sicily through a clever test involving threading a seashell. However, his pursuit proved fatal – Daedalus engineered the palace's bath pipes to scald the king to death with boiling water.