Chapter 14, The Cretan Bull Summary and Analysis

The Cretans are the people of the island of Crete. Many readers may have heard of the minotaur. There is more than one story about a bull. Over in India, which was a distant location but some had heard of it back then and there, the bull was a prominent symbol of a god. For the Greeks, including the Cretans, there were traditional rituals associated with leadership. One of these was that whoever was to become king had to ritualistically fight a bull. This may have been the case before or after the cessation of human and animal ritual sacrifices. These are practices which the majority in the present cultural context are deeply appreciated by many, while taken for granted. So, there are real bulls and real bull fights found in Grecian history. In 2009, the...