LABYRINTH, (Greek, Aarkptv0o0 among the ancients, a large and intricate edifice cut into various isles and meanders running into each other, so as to render it difficult to get out.
Four celebrated labyrinths were noted by the ancients, and by Pliny ranked amongst the wonders of the world : viz., the Cretan, the Egyptian, the Lenwino, and the Italian. That of Crete is the most finned ; it was built, as Diodorus Siculus conjectures, and Pliny positively asserts, by Daedalus, by command of king Minos, who kept the Minotaur shut up in it, on the model of that of Egypt, but on a less scale ; but both affirm, that in their time it no longer existed, having been either destroyed by time, or purposely demolished. It was from this labyrinth that Theseus is said to have made his escape by means of Ariadne's clue.
Diodorus Siculus and Pliny represent this labyrinth as having been a large edifice ; while others have considered it as merely a cavern hollowed in the rock, and full of winding passages. " If the labyrinth of Crete," says the Abbe Bar thelemi, "had been constructed by DaxIalus under the order of Minos, whence is it that we had no mention of it either by Homer, who more than once speaks of that prince, and of Crete, or by He•odotus, who describes that of Egypt, after having said that the monuments of the Egyptians are much superior to those of the Greeks ; or by the more ancient geographers ; or by any of the writers of the ages in which Greece flourished ? This work was attributed to aedalus, whose name," says our author, "is sufficient to discredit a tradition. His name, like that of Hercules, had become the resource of ignorance, whenever it turned its eyes on the early ages. All great labours, all works which required more strength than ingenuity, were attributed to Hercules ; and all those which had relation to the arts, and required a certain degree of intelligence in the execution, were ascribed to Thedalus." According to Diodorus and Pliny, no traces of the labyrinth of Crete existed in their time, and the date of its destruction had been forgotten. Yet it is said to have been visited by the disciples of Apollonins of Tyana, who was contemporary with those two authors. The Cretans,
therefore, believed that they possessed the labyrinth. "At Nauplia, near the ancient Argos," says Strabo, " are still to be seen vast caverns, in which are constructed labyrinths, that are believed to be the work of the Cyclops ;" the mean ing of which, as Barthelemi understands him, is, that the labours of men had opened in the rock passages which crossed and returned upon themselves, as in quarries. Such, he says, is the idea we ought to form of the labyrinth of Crete. He then suggests an inquiry, whether there were several laby rinths in that island ? Ancient authors speak only of one, which most of them place at Cnossus, and some few at Gor tyna. Belon and Tournefort describe a cavern situated at the foot of mount Ida, on the south side of the mountain, at a small distance from Gortyna : which, according to the former, was a quarry, and, according to the latter, the ancient labyrinth. Besides this, another is supposed to have been situated at Cnossus, and, in proof of the fact, it is alleged, that the coins of that city represent the plan of it. The place where the labyrinth of Crete was situated, according to Tournefort, was, as Barthelemi supposes, one league distant from Gortvna ; and, aeeo•ding to Strabo, it was distant from Cnossus six or seven leagues ; with respect to which our author concludes, that the territory of the latter city extended to the vicinity of the former. In reply to the inquiry, what was the use of the caverns, denominated labyrinths, Barthe lemi imagines, that they were first excavated in part by nature ; that in some places stones were extracted from them for building cities, and that, in more ancient times, they served for an habitation or asylum to the inhabitants of a district exposed to frequent incursions. According to Dio dorus Siculus, the most ancient Cretans dwelt in the caves of mount Ida. The people, when inquiries were made on the spot, said, that their labyrinth was originally a prison. It might indeed have been applied to this use ; but it is scarcely credible that, for preventing the escape. of a few unhappy wretches, such immense labours would have been under taken.