Face mythical monster in Labyrinth at Ashmolean Museum's Knossos show

The Minotaur, as it was known, was big, angry and hungry; specifically for human flesh, feasting on young men and women which were delivered to him in his maze at the palace of his father King Minos of Crete in Knossos.

And so the beast – the result of an unnatural coupling between the King’s straying wife and a particularly dashing bull – would have lived out his days had it not been for a plucky Athenian prince called Theseus.

Keen to stop the cycle of human sacrifice, the young warrior rolled up at Knossos and, armed with a ball of thread, navigated the labyrinth and put paid to his taurine foe once and for all.

The story is myth, of course. The bull-beast, maze and the slaying of the young.

Or is it?

READ MORE: Oxford TV historian Janina Ramirez is captivated by the treasures of the Labyrinth at the Ashmolean

Are elements of it, in fact, true? Was there really a labyrinth at Knossos and were youthful victims ritually offered as sacrifice?

Labyrinth: All pictures by Ed Nix

The fact behind mythical Knossos is the tantalising subject of a groundbreaking new show at the Ashmolean Museum, which opens this week.

Labyrinth: Knossos, Myth & Reality is a unique exhibition that features more than 200 objects – half of them on loan from Athens and Crete.

They are shown, for the first time in more than a century, alongside the Ashmolean’s own Cretan collection; the most important outside Greece.

And, beyond the Aegean, there is no better place to mount such an event, for it was a former keeper of the Ashmolean who was instrumental in revealing the secrets of Knossos, being granted permission, in 1900, to excavate the abandoned site – now the most archaeological site in Greece, after the Acropolis in Athens.

Sir Arthur Evans’s dig followed centuries of searching by travellers for the mythical Labyrinth.

But he did not discover the site of the Palace of Knossos; that was down to a Cretan scholar called Minos Kalokairinos.

The enthusiast had been forbidden from digging at the site, though, over fears any finds made could be taken off the island and shipped to Constantinople by its then Ottoman overlords.

Evans’s archaeological finds, however, fuelled the imagination – with frescos, clay tablets and a stone throne suggesting that was indeed the site of the Labyrinth.

Some of those treasures feature in the Oxford show – ranging from jaw-dropping statuary and ceramics to the most delicate pieces of jewellery and fine art.

Fresco fragments depict life in ancient Knossos and decorated amphora and beautifully crafted tools give an insight into ancient Minoan society.

They are joined by dazzling crafts, temple repositories, and ceremonial weapons – including a blade which may have been used for human sacrifice, a hint at the possible origins of the Minotaur myth.

A recurring theme is the bull itself.

Andrew Shapland, the Ashmolean’s Sir Arthur Evans curator of Bronze Age and Classical Greece, suggested the use of bulls in religious ritual – as illustrated in the show with images of young men and women running among the animals – may also be at the heart of the enduring Minotaur story.

An imposing marble Roman statue of a Minotaur guards entrance of the maze-like exhibition.

“This represents a reunification to tell the story of the myth,” says Xa Sturgis, the museum’s charismatic director, who celebrated the collaboration between the museum and counterparts in Athens and Crete.

“This is an exhibition which only the Ashmolean could mount. Since 1903, the museum has held the largest and most significant collection of Minoan archaeology outside Crete, thanks to one of my predecessors as Ashmolean director, Sir Arthur Evans.

“Long thought of as an archaeological pioneer, Evans and his interventions at Knossos are now being reconsidered in their historical context.

“The exhibition offers both an exploration of Minoan culture and Greek myth – and a deeper look at British archaeological history.”

He adds: “Although some of Evans’s finds have long been on display at the Ashmolean, these are the ‘duplicate’ objects that he was allowed to export from Crete. For the first time, this exhibition brings some of his finds to Oxford that had never left the island.”

Oxford University cultural historian Dr Janina Ramirez has praised the exhibition, singling out its celebration of the prominent role of women in ancient Knossos.

Dr Ramirez, who is a successful writer and a familiar face on television having presented popular programmes exploring the history of art, said: “The discovery of Knossos is the stuff of archaeological fantasy. It is real life Indiana Jones stuff, with beautiful art going back five millennia.”

• Labyrinth: Knossos, Myth & Reality is at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, until July 30. Tickets from ashmolean.org