It would seem from the latter observation that the expression "Troy-town" or "City of Troy" was in general use 500 years ago as a title for the Cretan Labyrinth, and seeing that the renaissance of classical learning was as yet in embryo the inference is that the name was a popular tradition of some antiquity.
We find the name of Troy definitely associated with the labyrinth long before this, however, in the crude engravings on the Etruscan wine-jar which we noticed in Chapter VIII., the oinochoë from Tragliatella.
Fig. 133.—Etruscan Wine-vase from Tragliatella. (Deecke.)
Fig. 134.—Etruscan Vase. "Troy Dance" Details. (Deecke.)
The meaning of these figures ([Figs. 133], [134] and [135]) has been much discussed, but it is now generally agreed that the labyrinth shown has a close relationship with the operations which are being performed by the group of armed men, and it is obvious that it is also connected in some way with the famous story of the wars of Troy, as we see by its label "Truia." What is this operation in which the warriors are engaged? We find a helpful clue in the story related by Virgil (B.C. 70–19) in his great epic of the Aeneid, in which the poet has embalmed for us the legends current in his time concerning the wanderings of Aeneas, the reputed son of Anchises and Venus, after the fall of the city of Troy, which he had fought bravely to defend.
Fig. 135.—Etruscan Vase. Details, showing Labyrinth and "retroscript" label—"TRUIA." (Deecke.)
Aeneas, who escaped from the city carrying his father on his shoulders, led forth also his little son Iulus. It is this boy whom, in the fifth book of the poem, Virgil pictures as taking part with his companions in a sport called the Ludus Trojae or Lusus Trojae (Game of Troy), sometimes simply Troja. According to the Roman tradition it was introduced into Italy by Aeneas, and his son Ascanius imparted it to the Alban kings and through them to the Romans. The game consisted of a sort of processional parade or dance, in which some of the participants appear to have been mounted on horseback. Virgil draws a comparison between the complicated movements of the game and the convolutions of the Cretan Labyrinth: