Editing Minotaur (section)

==Appearance==
The Minotaur is commonly represented in Classical art with the body of a man and the head and tail of a bull. According to [[Sophocles]]'s {{lang|grc-Latn|[[Women of Trachis|Trachiniai]]}}, when the river spirit [[Achelous]] seduced [[Deianira]], one of the guises he assumed was a man with the head of a bull. From [[classical antiquity]] through the [[Renaissance]], the Minotaur appears at the center of many depictions of the Labyrinth.{{refn|Several examples are shown in Kern (2000).<ref name=Kern-2000/>}} [[Ovid]]'s Latin account of the Minotaur, which did not describe which half was bull and which half man, was the most widely available during the Middle Ages, and several later versions show a man's head and torso on a bull's body - the reverse of the Classical configuration, reminiscent of a [[centaur]].{{refn|Examples include illustrations&nbsp;204, 237, 238, and 371 in Kern.<ref name=Kern-2000/>}} This alternative tradition survived into the Renaissance, and is reflected in Dryden's elaborated translation of [[Virgil]]'s description of the Minotaur in Book VI of the ''[[Aeneid]]'': "The lower part a beast, a man above/The monument of their polluted love."<ref>The Aeneid of Virgil, as translated by John Dryden, found at http://classics.mit.edu/Virgil/aeneid.6.vi.html . Virgil's text calls the Minotaur "biformis"; like Ovid, he does not describe which part is bull, which part man.</ref> It still figures in some modern depictions, such as [[Steele Savage]]'s illustrations for [[Edith Hamilton]]'s ''[[Mythology (book)|Mythology]]'' (1942).