The mythical bronze giant, Talos, guarded which island?
In Greek mythology, Talos, also spelled Talus or Talon was a giant automaton made of bronze to protect Europa in Crete from pirates and invaders. Europa was a Phoenician princess and the mother of King Minos of Crete. Talos circled the island's shores three times daily.
Talos's bronze nature suggested to the author of "Bibliothēkē" that he may have been a survivor from the Age of Bronze, a descendant of the brazen race that sprang from meliae "ash-tree nymphs" according to the Greek epic poem by Apollonius Rhodius, "Argonautica". Despite being made of metal, Talos did have a weakness: his ankle, where the single vein containing all of his life-fluid (ichor, the blood of the gods) was sealed with a thin membrane of skin or a bronze nail. The enchantress, Medea, exploited this weakness and killed Talos by bewitching him to graze his ankle on a sharp rock.
Talos is said to have been made by the Greek god Hephaestus at the request of Zeus, to protect Europa from people who would want to kidnap her. Incidentally, Europa had been kidnapped from the Levant (an area in the Eastern Mediterranean) by Zeus and taken to Crete, and the continent of Europe is named after her.
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