Mythology
The labyrinth was designed to be inescapable
Daedalus built the Cretan labyrinth so cunningly that he barely escaped it himself. Theseus survived only because Ariadne gave him a thread to unwind as he walked into the dark.
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Medusa was cursed, not born a monster
In Ovid's telling, Medusa was a beautiful priestess of Athena. After Poseidon assaulted her in the goddess's temple, Athena punished Medusa instead of him, turning her hair into serpents and her gaze to stone.
Icarus fell because he ignored both warnings
Daedalus told his son not to fly too high, where the sun would melt the wax of his wings, nor too low, where sea spray would soak the feathers. Icarus soared toward the sun and the wings came apart over the Aegean.
Thor's hammer had a famously short handle
In Norse myth, Mjolnir was forged by dwarves while Loki, in the shape of a fly, stung the smith. The distraction left the handle too short, but the hammer still never missed and always returned to Thor's hand.
Norse cosmology hangs from a single tree
Yggdrasil, the world ash, connects nine realms through its roots and branches. An eagle sits at its crown, a dragon gnaws at its roots, and a squirrel named Ratatoskr carries insults between them.
Egyptians believed the heart was weighed against a feather
In the Hall of Two Truths, Anubis balanced the dead person's heart against the feather of Ma'at. A heart heavier with wrongdoing was devoured by Ammit, ending any hope of the afterlife.
The sun god sailed through the underworld every night
Egyptians pictured Ra crossing the sky in a solar barque by day, then travelling the underworld river at night, fighting the serpent Apophis before being reborn at dawn.