Ariadne (poem) and watch for a signal. That night the signal is seen by Ariadne; she parts tearfully from Phaedra, and arrives on the beach in time to see the survivors of the Labyrinth staggering down from the hills. The ship slips away. On board, while the exhausted survivors sleep, Theseus tells Ariadne of the night's events: how the Athenian maidens were bathed and perfumed by African eunuchs and dressed as brides; how the captives were led into the cave, down mazy passages and dim chambers, each with statues of the Cretan snake-goddess; how the last chamber contained the horror: the Minotaur
Minotaur the main political and cultural potency in the Aegean Sea. As the fledgling Athens (and probably other continental Greek cities) was under tribute to Crete, it can be assumed that such tribute included young men and women for sacrifice. This ceremony was performed by a priest disguised with a bull head or mask, thus explaining the imagery of the Minotaur. Once continental Greece was free from Crete's dominance, the myth of the Minotaur worked to distance the forming religious consciousness of the Hellene "poleis" from Minoan beliefs. The Minotaur ("infamia di Creti", Italian for "infamy of Crete"), appears briefly in