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The sense in which Spanish authors in the Baroque period employ the word ‘labyrinth’ presupposes an evolution, from ancient understanding of it, which the present article aims to outline. For Classical authors the word had the physical sense of a ‘complex construction’, although it could also be used metaphorically. But already in certain texts (Virgil, Ovid), the narration of the Cretan myth invited a moralizing interpretation which is given further prominence in late medieval and Renaissance texts. A further elaboration sees the labyrinth converted into a theological symbol representing deceit, offering an erroneous path which the Christian must avoid. Once these and other parallel lines of development have been traced, it becomes possible to see how complex is the use Calderón makes of the concept in El laberinto del mundo. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]