Myth
Zeus saw Agenor's daughter Europa gathering flowers and immediately fell in love with her. Zeus transformed himself into a white bull and carried Europa away to the island of Crete. He then revealed his true identity and Europa became the first queen of Crete. Agenor, meanwhile, sent Europa's brothers, Cadmus and Cilix in search of her, telling them not to return without her. In some versions of the tale, Agenor sends her other brothers as well: Phineus or Thasus (and of course Phoenix in the versions where the Cadmus's father is Agenor).
As Europa could not be found, none of the brothers returned. Cadmus consulted the oracle of Delphi and was advised to travel until encountering a cow. He was to follow this cow and to found a city where the cow would lie down; this city became Thebes. Cilix searched for her and settled down in Asia Minor. The land was called Cilicia after him.
Read more about this topic: Agenor
Famous quotes containing the word myth:
“By blood we live, the hot, the cold,
To ravage and redeem the world:
There is no bloodless myth will hold.”
—Geoffrey Hill (b. 1932)
“One of the oddest features of western Christianized culture is its ready acceptance of the myth of the stable family and the happy marriage. We have been taught to accept the myth not as an heroic ideal, something good, brave, and nearly impossible to fulfil, but as the very fibre of normal life. Given most families and most marriages, the belief seems admirable but foolhardy.”
—Jonathan Raban (b. 1942)
“The generation of women before us who rushed to fill the corporate ranks altered our expectations of what working motherhood could be, tempered our ambition, and exploded the supermom myth many of us held dear.”
—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)