Daedalus

In Greek "Daedalus" means cunning worker. (The word is not of Hellenic origin and was borrowed by the Greeks from another culture.) In Latin it means skillful. "Daedalean" or "Daedalic" has come to mean something that is ingenious, complicated or convoluted.

Referring to the story of King Minos and the labyrinth that Daedalus built for him, Ovid calls Daedalus "an artist/ Famous in building, who could set in stone/ Confusion and conflict, and deceive the eye/ With devious aisles and passages." (In another myth it is Daedalus who builds the wooden bull in which Pasiphae, the wife of Minos, can hide in order to fulfill her passion for the bull that Minos refused to sacrifice to Poseidon. The result of that god's punishment is the Minotaur which Minos needs to hide and thus the labyrinth. Perhaps a myth for another day.) As mentioned in another post, Ovid describes Daedalus' invention of the wings as "changing the laws of nature" and later relates the murder of Talos Perdix as "the story [that] reflects no credit on Daedalus." (A bit of an understatement.) Ovid, it seems to me, describes an amoral man.  If we look beyond the creations of Daedalus, we have a schemer whose pride goes beyond arrogance. Perhaps as with those who view his flight, Daedalus believes that he must be a god.

Omitting Daedalus from Landscape with the Fall of Icarus could be interpreted as Brueghel's statement that Daedalus is a failure as both inventor and father. Since he includes the partridge in the painting, Brueghel seems to be emphasizing a contrast: The goddess put feathers on Talos Perdix and he lived; Daedalus put feathers on himself and his son and Icarus died. Perhaps the painting shows more than universal indifference to human suffering.