GREEK GOD
A GREAT ARTIST

Athens is still a small town,

living within his walls was a man named Daedalus who was a worker

most skilled in wood and stone and metal ever known. He is the one who

teaching people how to build a better home and how to

hang their doors on hinges and how to support the roof with poles

and pole. He was the first person to tie things

glue; he found plumbing and auger; and he showed

sailors how to install poles on their ships and how to install sails with

straps. He built a stone palace for AEgeus, the young king of Athens, and

the Temple of Athena stands on a large rocky hill in the middle

town.

Daedalus had a nephew named

The Perdix he took as a child to teach the artisan trade

edifice. But Perdix is a very precise learner, and soon

surpassing his teacher in the knowledge of many things. His eyes are always open

to see what happened to him, and he learned knowledge

about the fields and forests. One day walking by the sea, he took

the backbone of a large fish, and from which he found

saws. See how a bird carves a hole in a tree trunk,

he learned to make and use chisels. Then he found the wheel

used a potter to print clay; and he made

the first pair of compasses from the stick branch off to draw a circle; and

he learned many other strange and useful things.

Daedalus was not happy when he saw that

the child is very precise and wise, very ready to learn, and very

wanna do.

"If he continues like this,"

he murmured, "he will be a greater man than me; his name will be

remember, and my name will be forgotten."

Day after day, at work, Daedalus

pondering over this matter, and soon his heart was filled with hatred towards

Young perdix. One morning when the two put on an ornament on the outside wall

athenian Temple, Daedalus sent his nephew to a narrow scaffold

it hangs high on the edge of the rocky cliff where the temple is

stand up. Then, when the child complies, it is quite easy, with a punch

hammer, to drop scaffolding from its fasteners.

Poor Perdix fell

he was face down in the air, and he would be smashed to pieces on the rocks

at the foot of the cliff if Athena doesn't see it and

pitied him. When he was still circling in the air, he changed it

he became a partridge, and he flew up the hill to live forever in the forest and

the farm he loved so much. And to this day, when the winds of the season

the heat blew and wildflowers bloomed in the meadows and swamps, the sound

Perdix is sometimes still heard, calling his partner from among the grasses

and the reeds or among the groves of trees.

As for Daedalus, when the Athenians

hearing his cowardly actions, they were filled with grief and

anger-suffering for the young Perdix, who all have learned to

loving; anger towards the evil uncle, who only loves him

by oneself. At first they were to punish Daedalus with death

it was well deserved, but when they remembered what he had

do it to make their home more enjoyable and their life more

easily, they let him live; yet they drove him out of Athens

and asked him to never come back.

There's a ship in the harbor that just

ready to embark on a journey across the sea, and within it Daedalus

set out with all his precious equipment and his still son

small, Icarus. Day after day the little ship sailed slowly to the

south, keep the mainland coast always on the right. It's passing through

Troezen and the rocky coast of Argos, and then boldly across the sea.

it was there that Daedalus landed and made himself known; and the King of Crete,

who had heard of his amazing skills, welcomed him to

his kingdom, and gave him a house in his palace, and promised that he

will be rewarded with great wealth and honor if he will stay and

practice it. Crafts there as he did in Athens.

The name of the King of Crete is

Minos. His grandfather, whose name is also Minos, is the son of Europa, a

the young princess who was supposedly carried by the white bull on her back across the sea

from far away Asia. This Elder Minos was considered the most

wise—so wise, so Jupiter chose him to be wrong

a Judge in the Underworld. Younger minos are almost as wise

with his grandfather; and he was brave and far-sighted and skilled

as a human ruler. He has made all the islands submit to

his kingdom, and his ships sailed to every part of the world and brought

return to Crete the wealth of a foreign land. So it's not hard for him to

he persuaded Daedalus to stay with him and become his chief craftsman.

And Daedalus built for King Minos a

the most beautiful palace with marble floors and granite pillars; and

in the palace he erected golden statues that had tongues and could

speaking; and for the splendor and beauty there is no other building in the

this whole vast earth that can be compared to it.

At that time live among the hills

Crete is a monstrous monster called the Minotaur, which as it is yet

it has been seen since then until now. This creature, supposedly,

human in stature, but the face and head of a bull are wild and fierce in character

like a mountain lion. The Cretans would not have killed him if they had

it could; for they thought that Mighty People were living together

Jupiter at the top of the mountain has sent him between them, and that

these creatures will be angry if anyone takes their life. Him

it is the pest and terror of the whole country. Where he is at least

hopefully, there he must have been; and almost every day some

men, women, or children were captured and eaten by him.

"You've done so many things

amazingly," said the king to Daedalus, "can't you

doing something to clean up this Minotaur land?"

"Should I kill him?" ask

Daedalus.

"Ah no!" word

raja. "It will only bring greater misfortune to

we're."

"Then I'll wake up the house

for him," said Daedalus, "and you can hold him there as

captives."

"But he would probably go and die if

he was locked up in prison" said the king.

"He will have plenty of room to

hang around" said Daedalus; "and if you only occasionally

feed one of your enemies to him, I promise you that

he'll live and grow."

So the outside craftsman

they gathered their workers together, and they built a house

it is amazing with so many rooms in it and so many streets

weaved so that no one who went deep into it could find

the way out again; and Daedalus called it the Labyrinth, and with cunning

persuading the Minotaur to enter. The monster soon got lost in

between the winding passageways, but the sound of his terrible cry

it could be heard day and night as he walked back and forth in vain

trying to find a place to escape.