Europa and the Bull — How Crete Began

Long before the palace of Knossos was built, long before the Labyrinth and the Minotaur, the story of Crete began with a Phoenician princess named Europa. She was the daughter of King Agenor of Tyre, renowned across the ancient world for her extraordinary beauty — a beauty that caught the attention of Zeus himself, king of the gods on distant Olympus. Zeus, who had taken mortal lovers before, became consumed with desire for Europa, but he knew that approaching her in his divine form would terrify her. So the lord of thunder and lightning chose a different disguise.