Pasiphaë

Daughter of Helios the Sun and the Oceanid Perseis, sister to the sorcerers Aeëtes and Circe — and like them a witch in her own right. Queen of Crete by her marriage to Minos, she was the mother of Ariadne, Phaedra, Androgeos, and Deucalion. When Minos refused to sacrifice to Poseidon the splendid white bull the god had sent from the sea, Poseidon cursed Pasiphaë with a consuming desire for the animal; Daedalus built her a hollow wooden cow, and from the union she bore Asterion — the Minotaur. The Euripidean *Cretans* turns her defence into a tragic speech: the fault, she says, was her husband's impiety, and the punishment fell on her body.

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