Sculpted using bronze, Europa is a character in Ovid’s Metamorphosis. Europa is a character in Ovid’s Metamorphosis, the story is that while she was playing with her friends on a beach in Southern Greece, Zeus appeared to them as a placid little white bull. He seemed tame so they decorated him with flowers. Europa then climbed onto his back and he instantly took off and dived into the sea towards Crete where he raped her. The ancient parabole is that it was the rape of Europe by the East Persians. The Minoan piece is about the Bull Leapers of ancient Crete.