It is located in the valley of Messara in the south of the Psiloritis mountain, in the current position of the settlements of Metropolis and Agioi Deka, and near the Libyan Sea.

Gortyn was the most powerful and prosperous city of Crete and took hegemony of the island, dominating the entire valley from Messara to Levina.

As it had allied with the Romans, it avoided the disaster that happened to many other Cretan cities, when invaded by Quintus Caecilius Metellus Creticus in 68 BC.

[6] Built with large isodomic stones, this cathedral keeps its intended height only in the areas of the Holy Bema and in pastophoria.

Daedalic plastic and many other clay figurines, black and red figure paintings and plenty of pottery, especially the type called kernos, were found in the temple.

These inscriptions are the laws of the city of Gortyn, which are inscribed in the Dorian dialect on large stone slabs and are still plainly visible.

Although portions of the inscriptions have been placed in museums such as the Louvre in Paris, a modern structure at the site of the mostly ruined Odeon now houses many of the stones bearing the famous law code.

The identification of Europa in this myth gives weight to the claim that the civilization of the European continent was born on the island of Crete.

A colossal statue of Europa sitting on the back of a bull was discovered at the amphitheatre in Gortyn in the nineteenth century and is now in the collections of the British Museum.

According to Book III of Homer's The Odyssey, Menelaus and his fleet of ships, returning home from the Trojan War, were blown off course to the Gortyn coastline.

Homer describes stormy seas that pushed the ships against a sharp reef, ultimately destroying many of the vessels but sparing the crew.