Mazes and Labyrinths: A General Account of Their History and Development

In the _Annales Archéologiques_ for 1857 it was stated that M. Bonnin, of Evreux, had collected no less than 200 designs of mazes or labyrinths, representative of all sorts of n...

The consideration of labyrinths worked in Roman mosaic pavements leads us on to a very interesting development of the subject which deserves a chapter to itself, namely, the Lab...

There is no limit to the number of patterns which, without any metaphorical extension of terms, we may legitimately describe as coming within the scope of the words "maze" and "...

A mile or two outside Winchester and rising up above the village of Chilcombe is the rounded shoulder of St. Catherine's Hill, on the summit of which lies a curious squarish "Mi...

of as a building. Robert Fabyan, for instance, a historian of the late sixteenth century, speaks of it as a "house named Labyrinthus or Daedalus worke, or howse wroughte like un...

There has been considerable speculation as to how the typical labyrinth form first came into existence. It became stereotyped long before the Christian era and retained its char...

The Romans made much use of the services of the _topiarius_, or hedge-trimmer--he is referred to by Cicero and other writers--and it is quite possible that they had shrubs or bu...

Towards the end of the eighteenth century the taste for mazes in private gardens had to some extent declined, but as an adjunct to places of public amusement the topiary labyrin...

The romantic and mysterious flavour of the words "maze" and "labyrinth" has induced many a writer of fiction to adopt one or the other as the theme of a story, or as the setting...

The Hampton Court maze (Fig. 110) was constructed in 1690 and in all probability displaced an older maze, a relic of Wolsey's time. The maze is situated close to the Bushy Park...

We have just remarked that the custom of placing labyrinth designs in churches does not appear to have become general on this side of the English Channel. We have in England, ho...

In 1858--the year in which Archdeacon Trollope published the results of his researches--Capt. W. H. Mounsey drew attention to the description in a Welsh history book ("Drych y P...

The mention of the word "maze" most frequently calls to mind a block of tall shrubs penetrated by a puzzling branching path, which terminates in an arbour or goal of some sort....

We find this association, for instance, in the case of the "Troy-towns" of Somerton and Hillbury, the "Walls of Troy" of the Cumberland Marshes and Appleby (Lincs), and the "Cae...

In Chapter XII we noticed some of the principal suggestions which had been made up to a few years ago as to the origin of our turf mazes, and saw that the question was one which...

A few miles to the north-east of Gortyna, and not far south of the north coast town of Candia, lay, at the base of the hill of Kephala, a few ruined walls indicating the site of...

According to the Romano-Greek writer Apollodorus,[1] whose "Bibliotheke" consisted of a history of the world from the fall of Troy onwards, Daedalus built the Labyrinth at Knoss...

The story of "Fair Rosamond" and her mazy Bower, though it cannot lay claim to that standard of authenticity which is generally required of historical data, has for so long occu...

Charles Kingsley in "The Heroes" and Nathaniel Hawthorne in "Tanglewood Tales" have familiarised most English-speaking people with the story of the exploits of Theseus, and doub...

The earliest structure of any kind to which we find the word _labyrinth_ applied was a huge building situated in the North of Egypt, a land always noted for its stupendous monum...

The hedge-maze, which is the only type with which most of us have a first-hand acquaintance, is generally felt to be a survival of a romantic age, even though we esteem its func...

Pliny (died A.D. 79) mentions one built by Smilis of Aegina, after the Egyptian model, on the island of Lemnos, and says that it was renowned for the beauty of its 150 columns a...

A structure which evoked so much wonder and admiration in ancient times can hardly fail to have aroused the curiosity of later generations, but no serious attempts to locate it...

A Maze Collector--The Labyrinth in Queer Places--The Maze on Paper and on the Sands--Mirror Mazes--A Temporary Hedge Maze--Maze Toys--A Verbal Labyrinth--The Maze in Place-names...

The reader may be inclined to question the necessity for a whole chapter to be devoted to such a matter as this. "Surely anybody who has the curiosity to do so can look the word...

The Winchester Mizmaze--The Vanished Mazes of Dorset: Leigh, Pimperne, Dorchester and Bere Regis--Aubrey's Notes on Wiltshire and Cotswold Mazes--The Saffron Walden Maze-- The C...

Local Names--The Alkborough "Julian's Bower"--Juxtaposition to Ancient Ecclesiastical Site--A Fragment of Folk-lore-- De la Pryme's Diary--The Breamore Mizmaze--Romantic Situati...

An old Welsh Custom--"Troy" or "Turnings"?--Dr. Trollope on the Ecclesiastical Origin of Turf Mazes--The Welsh Figure-- Criticism of the Ecclesiastical View--"Treading the Maze"...

Topiary work of the Romans--Pliny's "Hippodromus"--Dubious Mediaeval References--Rosamond's Bower--Early French "Daedales"--Mazes painted by Holbein and Tintoretto-- Du Cerceau'...

Other Labyrinths mentioned by Pliny--Varro's Description of the Etruscan Labyrinth; the tomb of Lars Porsena--Speculations regarding it--Travels of Dennis--Labyrinthine Caverns...

The Stone Labyrinths of Finland--Their Local Traditions and Nomenclature--Their Antiquity--Aubrey's Acute Observation-- Some Maze-like Rock Engravings in England, Ireland, and B...

"Troy" in Labyrinth Names--An old French Reference--The Vase of Tragliatella--Virgil's Account of the Troy Game--The Delian Crane Dance--Knossos and Troy--Ariadne's Dance-- Spri...

Plutarch's Life of Theseus; the Cretan Exploit--The Athenian Tribute--The Labyrinth of Daedalus--The Clue of Ariadne-- The Fight with the Minotaur--The Crane Dance--Tragedies of...

Algeria, Orléansville--Italy: Lucca, Pavia, Piacenza, Cremona, Rome and Ravenna--France: Chartres, St. Quentin, Amiens, Rheims, Bayeux, Sens, Auxerre, Arras, St. Omer, Poitiers,...

Explorations of Sir Arthur Evans--Momentous Discoveries-- Unearthing of the Palaces--Their Antiquity--Description of the Great Palace--The Maze on the Wall--The Hall of the Doub...

The Need of a Definition--Practical Limitations--Classification of Mazes and Labyrinths--Unicursal and Multicursal, Compact and Diffuse Types--Modes of Branching--Straight-line...

"Fair Rosamond," Henry, and Eleanor--The Dagger or the Bowl-- History of the Legend--Accounts of Brompton and Higden-- Delone's Ballad--Rosamond in Verse and Prose--Her Epitaph-...

The Question of Definition again--Bowers and Julian-Bowers-- What was a Bower and who was Julian?--The Labyrinth and the Double Axe--Chaucer and the Maze--Metaphorical Labyrinth...

The Meander and other Rudimentary Forms--Seal-impressions-- Coins of Knossos--"Unicursal" Nature of the Knossian Design--Graffito of Pompeii--The _Casa del Labirinto_-- Roman Mo...

Decline of the Hedge-Maze Vogue--Mazes in "Pleasure Gardens": North London, South London--Modern Mazes in Essex, Suffolk, Cheshire, Lincolnshire, and Gloucestershire--Some Moder...