Τρίτη 4 Σεπτεμβρίου 2012
Δευτέρα 3 Σεπτεμβρίου 2012
Medusa
In Greek Myth
Medusa,
one of the three Gorgons, daughter of Phorcys and Ceto. She was the only one of the
Gorgons who was subject to mortality. She is celebrated for her personal charms and the
beauty of her locks. Neptune became enamoured of her, and obtained her favours in the
temple of Minerva. This violation of the sanctity of the temple provoked Minerva, and she
changed the beautiful locks of Medusa, which had inspired Neptune’s love to serpents.
According to Apollodorus, Medusa and her sisters came into the world with snakes on their
heads, instead of hair, with yellow wings and brazen hands. Their bodies were also covered
with impenetrable scales, and their very looks had the power of killing or turning to
stones. Perseus rendered his name immortal by his conquest of Medusa. He cut off her head,
and the blood that dropped from the wound produced the innumerable serpents that infest
Africa. The conqueror placed Medusa's head on the shield of Minerva, which he had used in
his expedition. The head still retained the same petrifying power as before, as it was
fatally known in the court of Cepheus. . . . Some suppose that the Gorgons were a nation
of women, whom Perseus conquered. From Lempriιre’s Classical Dictionary of Proper names mentioned in Ancient Authors Writ Large. Ed. J. Lempriιre and F.A. Wright. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Camille Dumouliι
Medusa's head, an apparently simple motif linked to the myth of Perseus, was freed
through being severed and cut loose from its 'moorings' by the hero in the remote depths
of the world. There is something paradoxical about the story since the monster was all the
more indestructible because it had been killed. Indeed, the figure of Medusa is
characterized by paradox, both in terms of the actual mythical stare, which turned men to
stone, and in the interpretations that have been given to it. The fascination that she
exerts arises from a combination of beauty and horror. Her head was used, in Ancient
times, as an apotropaic mask -- a sort of talisman which both killed and redeemed.As well as being the very symbol of ambiguity, Medusa's head is also one of the most archaic mythical figures, perhaps an echo of the demon Humbaba who was decapitated by Gilgamesh. Everything implies that it is a 'representation' of the most meaningful aspect of the sacred. Insofar as it is the role of literature to assume responsibility for the sacred, each era, when confronted with the mystery of the 'origins', has re-examined Medusa's head with its mesmerizing stare as something which conceals the secret of the sacred.
THE OTHER AND THE MONSTER
If ambiguity is the hallmark of the sacred, the role of myths, as Renι Gerard purports
in his La Violence et le Sacrι (1972) is to generate differences and contrasts, to
distinguish between the two faces of the sacred. Therefore, from the viewpoint of the
oldest texts which are true to the spirit of the myth, Medusa is a representation of the
Other by virtue of her absolute and terrifying difference. At first sight, her monstrous
ugliness and her petrifying stare certainly bear this out.In La Mort dans les Yeux (1985), Vernant demonstrates that, for the Greeks, Medusa represented the face of the warrior possessed by battle frenzy. In The Shield of Heracles (232-3), Hesiod describes the wide-open mouth, the fearsome hair and the Gorgons' shrill cries which conjure up her terrifying aspect. Thus Medusa's mask frequently appears within the context of a
battle. It is present in the Iliad
on the shields of Athena (V, 738) and Agamemnon (XI, 36), and also during the
Renaissance, e.g. on Bellona's helmet described by Ronsard in the 'Ode α Michel de
l'Hospital' (Premier Livre des Odes, 1560). The Gorgon also represents what cannot
be represented, i.e. death, which it is impossible to see or to look at, like Hades
itself. In Hesiod's Theogony (275 et seq.) and in the Odyssey (XI, 633-5),
Medusa is the guardian of terrifying places, either the nocturnal borders of the world or
the Underworld. She reappears in this role in Dante's Divine Comedy (Inferno, IX,
55-7) and Milton's Paradise Lost (II, 611). Guarding the doorway to the world of
the dead, she prevents the living from entering.In Christian symbolism, Medusa represents the dreaded enemy and death, and thus becomes an embodiment of the Devil. She appears in this guise in a passage in the Book of Arthur which belongs to the cycle of the Holy Grail (Vulgate version of Arthurian romances, Vol. VII, Washington, 1913). In fact, this is a female monster, the 'Ugly Semblance', who lives at the bottom of a river. She does not exercise her powers by turning people to stone, but by causing the waters to swallow them up. Similarly, a play by Calderσn, which tells of the adventures of Andromeda and Perseus (Fortunas de Andromeda y Perseo), has the hero, a new incarnation of the Saviour, defeating Medusa who is the personification of Death and Sin.
At first glance, therefore, Medusa's head is very much a representation of the terrifying Other, of absolute negativity. She continues to fulfil this function in the twentieth-century trilogy by the Greek writer Pandelis Prevelakis, The Ways of Creation, which comprises The Sun of Death (Athens, 1959; Paris, 1965), The Head of the Medusa (Athens, 1963) and The Bread of the Angels (Athens, 1966). In the trilogy, the Gorgon represents both 'Nietzschian nihilism' and the foreign ideologies which threaten Hellenism. The hero sets out to free Greece once again from the monster, but he fails and realizes that there is no longer a single piece of untaited land in his country. Everything points to the fact that the malady specific to modern Greece, and the country's inability to accommodate, change, have provoked this monstrous 'representation' of the Other. Medusa's head does indeed seem to be a mask which serves to justify her absolute and evil strangeness.
The fact that Medusa is a mask and that this mask hides a more human face, is borne out by the way in which her portrayal is developed from the pre-Classical era to the Hellenistic period. There is a dual transformation i.e. the disappearance of both facial quality and ugliness (see Images de la Gorgone, Bibliothιque Nationale, 1985). Beneath the mask lies what could be called Medusa's 'tragic beauty'.
THE MIRROR AND THE MASK
Many elements of the myth suggest, through its basic ambiguity, the tragic nature of
Medusa. One of the most revealing of these is the gift from Athena to Asclepius of two
drops of the Gorgon's blood, one of which has the power to cure and even resurrect, while
the other is a deadly poison. Medusa's blood is therefore the epitome of the 'pharmakon',
while she herself -- as is shown by the apotropaic function of her mask -- is a
'pharmakos'. As has been demonstrated by Renι Girard, the 'pharmakos' is the scapegoat
whose sacrifice establishes the dual nature of the sacred and reinforces the separation of
the monster and the god. However, it is for literature and the arts to reveal the close
relationship between opposites and the 'innocence' of the victim. In this respect, the
myth of Medusa is revealing. In his study The Mirror of Medusa (1983), Tobin
Siebers has identified the importance of two elements, i.e. the rivalry between Athena and
the Gorgon, and the mirror motif.According to Ovid (Metamorphoses, IV. 779ff), the reason for the dispute lay in Poseidon's rape of Medusa inside the temple of the virgin goddess. The goddess is supposed to have punished Medusa by transforming her face, which therefore made Medusa an innocent victim for the second time. However, another tradition, used by Mallarmι in Les Dieux antiques (1880), stressed a more personal rivalry: Medusa had boasted that she was more beautiful than Athena. Everything points to the face that the goddess found it necessary to set herself apart from her negative double in order to assert her 'own' identity. Common features are numerous. For example, snakes are the attribute of Athena, as illustrated by the famous statue of Phidias and indicated by certain Orphic poems which refer to her as 'la Serpentine'. Moreover, the hypnotic stare is one of the features of the goddess 'with blue-green eyes', whose bird is the owl, depicted with an unblinking gaze. Finally, because she has affixed Medusa's head to her shield, in battle or in anger she assumes the terrifying appearance of the monster. Thus, in the Aeneid (11, 171), she expresses her wrath by making flames shoot forth from her eyes. These observations are intended to show that Athena and Medusa are the two indissociable aspects of the same sacred power.
A similar claim could be made in respect of Perseus, who retains traces of his association with his monstrous double, Medusa. Using her decapitated head to turn his enemies to stone, he spreads death around him. And when he flies over Africa with his trophy in a bag, through some sort of negligence, drops of blood fall to earth and are changed into poisonous snakes which reduce Medusa's lethal power (Ovid, op. cit., IV. 618). Two famous paintings illustrate this close connection between the hero and the monster. Cellini's Perseus resembles the head he is holding in his hand (as demonstrated by Siebers) and Paul Klee's L’esprit a combattu le mal (1904) portrays a complete reversal of roles -- Perseus is painted full face with a terrible countenance, while Medusa turns aside.
In this interplay of doubles, the theme of reflection is fundamental. It explains the process of victimization to which Medusa was subjected, and which falls within the province of the superstition of the 'evil eye'. The way to respond to the 'evil eye' is either to use a third eye -- the one that Perseus threw at the Graiae - or to deflect the evil spell by using a mirror. Ovid, in particular, stressed the significance of the shield in which Perseus was able to see the Gorgon without being turned to stone, and which was given to him by Athena. Everything indicates that the mirror was the real weapon. It was interpreted thus by Calderσn and Prevelakis, and also by Roger Caillois in Mιduse et Cie (1960).
Ovid was responsible for establishing the link with Narcissus, a myth that he made famous. It seems that the same process of victimization is at work here. The individual is considered to have been the victim of his own reflection, which absolves the victimizer (Perseus, the group) from all blame. This association of the two myths (and also the intention of apportioning blame) appears in a passage in Desportes' Amours d’Hyppolite (1573) where the poet tells his lady that she is in danger of seeing herself changed 'into some hard rock' by her 'Medusa's eye'. Even more revealing is Gautier's story Jettatura (1857) in which the hero, accused of having the 'evil eye', eventually believes it to be true and watches the monstrous transformation of his face in the mirror: 'Imagine Medusa looking at her horrible, hypnotic face in the lurid reflection of the bronze shield.'
Medusa's head is both a mirror and a mask. It is the mirror of collective violence which leaves the Devil's mark on the individual, as well as being the image of death for those who look at it. Both these themes -- violence rendered sacred and death by petrifaction -- are found in Das Corgonenhaupt (Berlin, 1972), a work by Walter Krόger about the nuclear threat.
However, when considered in terms of archetypal structures, Medusa's mask still retains its secret. What is the reason for the viperine hair, the wide-open mouth with the lolling tongue, and, in particular, why is Medusa female? What relationship is there between violence, holy terror and woman?
THE DISCONCERTING STRANGENESS OF THE FEMININE
Robert Graves (Greek Myths, 1958) believes that the myth of Perseus preserves
the memory of the conflicts which occurred between men and women in the transition from a
matriarchal to a patriarchal society. In fact the function of the Gorgon's mask was to
keep men at a safe distance from the sacred ceremonies and mysteries reserved for women,
i.e. those which celebrated the Triple Goddess, the Moon. Graves reminds us that the
Orphic poems referred to the full moon as the 'Gorgon's head'. The mask was also worn by
young maidens to ward off male lust. The episode of Perseus' victory over Medusa
represents the end of female ascendancy and the taking over of the temples by men, who had
become the masters of the divine which Medusa's head had concealed from them.Although it may have become less intense, the battle of the sexes was not resolved. The feminine continued to remain a source of fear for men, and the association of women with Medusa, evoked an aspect of the sex which was both fascinating and dangerous. Medusa often appeared in Renaissance poetry, e.g. Ronsard's Second Livre des Amours (S. 79, 1555), but the stare which turned men to stone was often only a conventional metaphor for the lover's 'coup de foudre'. The comparison took on a deeper meaning during the nineteenth century. Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal (1857) and 'decadent' literature such as Lorrain's M. de Phocas (1901), provide illustrations of the dangerous fascination exerted by woman, with her deadly stare and mysterious hair. But it was Goethe's Faust Part I (1808) which supplied the real significance of this connection. During the 'Walpurgis night,’ Faust thinks he sees Margarita but Mephistopheles warns him that it is Medusa and explains that 'magic deludes every man into believing that he has found his beloved in her'.
This terrible woman, the paragon of all women, whom every man simultaneously fears and seeks and for whom Medusa is the mask, is in fact the mother, i.e. the great Goddess Mother whose rites were concealed by the Gorgon's face. Countless texts illustrate Medusa's affinity with the depths of the sea and the terrible power of nature, e.g. Hugo's Les Travailleurs de la Mer (1864), Lautrιmont's Chants de Maldoror (1869) and Pierre Lou�s' Aphrodite (1896), but the most explicit example is probably the text written by Freud in 1922: Das Medusenhaupt -- 'Medusa's Head'. He presents her as the supreme talisman who provides the image of castration -- associated in the child's mind with the discovery of maternal sexuality -- and its denial. The snakes are multiple phalluses and petrifaction represents the comforting erection.
From this point onwards, the myth of Perseus takes on a new psychological meaning. It tells of the exploit of the hero who, because he has conquered ‘castrating' woman and armed himself with the talisman of Medusa's head (seen here in its comforting, phallic role), is able to conquer Andromeda, the terrifying virgin, and kill the sea monster which represents the evil aspect of woman. This motif is also found in the Christian legend of St George (Jacques de Voragine, La Lιgende dorιe, (1264) as well as in the anthropological legends concerning the fear of the 'dentate vagina'. A 'sacred' man must perform the first sexual act with a woman.
Two texts illustrate this aspect of the myth. One is, the Book of Arthur (op. cit). in the passage devoted to the 'Ugly Semblance'. The monster occupies the lands of a maiden who not only asks the king for the assistance of a knight but also for a husband whom she describes as though he had always been intended for her. The task that he performs seems to have been the necessary requirement for his union with the Virgin. The story stresses the association of the monster with the element of water and, in particular, with the sea into which it has to be driven back. The second text is a short story by Dφblin, Der Ritter Blaubart -- the 'Knight with the Blue Beard' (1911). Because the hero has had mysterious and intimate relations with a primitive monster -- a giant medusa -- he is forced to either kill all the women he loves or allow them to be killed. However, one of them, because of her purity, confronts the monster in the secret chamber where it lurks. In this last example, the character seems to have been unable to free himself from the maternal influence and fear of the feminine.
Finally, this association of Medusa with castrating woman is very evident in a passage in Chκne et Chien (1952) by Queneau: 'Severed head, evil woman/ Medusa with her lolling tongue/So it was you who would have castrated me?' However, the myth reveals -- and this seems to be obscured by the Freudian interpretation -- that woman's 'castration' is a result of the violence imposed on her by the original hero. Woman only appears in the story divided by separative decapitation, casting off the feminine in the remote depths of the world. Cast down, the feminine remains unrecognized within its innermost recess and it is this 'abject' void which maintains the theatre of the world and the logic of the talisman. In this theatre, woman occupies the two opposite extremes of evil (castration, sorcery) and their cure (the phallus, the Virgin), i.e. of the abyss and the Ideal. That is why, despite her terrifying power, she is fascinating. 'Fascinum' means 'charm' and 'evil spell', but also 'virile member'. Between the 'emptiness' and the Idol represented by the division of woman, yawns the gulf of male Desire. This persistent ambiguity can be found in the classification of the creature called the medusa. It owes its name to its resemblance to Medusa's head (Apollinaire, Bestiaire, 1920), but is included in the Acephelan category. Medusa keeps her secret behind the ambiguous mask. Although she is 'representable', she is never 'presentable' and even Perseus only sees her reflected in his shield. She is the hidden presence, absent from the world, which enables the scene to be played out. In his 'heroic comedy' Le Naufrage de Mιduse (1986), Ristat shows Perseus searching for the Gorgons and meeting Hermes, the 'Guardian of Resemblances', who proves to the terrified hero that 'Medusa herself is only a shadow'.
However, the hero remains trapped in the interplay of images and the logic of the talisman, just as he remains fascinated by the Gorgon mask. Thus Medusa's head becomes, for the man who takes possession of it after severing it from the terrifying woman, and in accordance with the principle of the 'pharmakon', the complete opposite, i.e. the 'skeptron' -- the sun.
‘O MEDUSA, O SUN'
In the same way that there is a hidden similarity between Athena, Goddess of Wisdom,
and Medusa, a similarity also exists between the sun, symbol of the Ideal and the Gorgon's
mask. Although they are both objects of desire, Athena and the sun are unapproachable and
terrifying for those who come too close. This danger is illustrated by the Platonic myth
of Phaedrus (247-8e) in which the downfall of souls is brought about by an overpowering
desire to see the sun. Certain structural elements from the myth of Medusa also reappear
in the myth of the Cave (The Republic, 514-7a), i.e. fascination, averted eyes,
violence inflicted on the philosopher, etc.In his poem (op. cit.), Queneau maintains that the sun, like the Gorgon, is fearsome and castrating: 'The sun: O monster, O Gorgon, O Medusa/O sun'. In this way, Medusa herself can become an incarnation of the Ideal, i.e. of Virtue (Du Bellay, Epithalame, 1559), of Beauty (Baudelaire, op. cit., 'La Beautι') and of Truth (Kosmas Politis, Eroica, Athens, 1938). Surely the sun itself is the severed head that, like the head of St John the Baptist, only soars in the zenith: 'In triumphant flights/from that scythe' (Mallarmι, Hιrodiade, 'Cantique de saint Jean', 1913). Whoever seeks Athena, finds Medusa's head. Whoever approaches too close to the sun discovers its castrating and castrated monstrousness (Bataille, L’Anus Solaire, 1931).
Although Nietzsche had embarked upon the destruction of all idols, he too, in this way, recognized the desire for death inherent in the desire for truth at any cost. The philosopher who wants to examine all things 'in depth', discovers the petrifying abyss. The destiny of the man whom Nietzsche refers to as 'the Don Juan of knowledge' will be paralyzed as if by Medusa, and will himself be 'changed into a guest of stone' (Morgenrφte i.e. the Dawn of Day, 327, 1881). This is also the destiny of the 'lover of truth' who, in the Dionysos Dithyramben (1888) appears to be 'changed into a statue/into a sacred column'. Nietzsche, who was aware of the necessity 'for the philosopher' to live within the 'closed circuit of representation' (Derrida), to seek the truth even if he no longer believes in it, without ever being able to attain it, devised his own version of the 'truth', his Medusa's head, the Eternal Return: 'Great thought is like Medusa's head: all the world's features harden, a deadly, ice-cold battle' (Posthumous Fragments, Winter 1884-5).
All thinkers who reflect upon the nature of representation, as well as on thought which pursues the 'eidos' are in danger of confronting Medusa's head. Thus, Aristotle, in The Politics (VIII) differentiates between instructive and cathartic music which is associated with Bacchic trances, whose instrument is the flute and which should be avoided. To prove his point, he refers to the myth of Athena. When she played the flute, her face became so distorted that she abandoned the instrument. It was in fact she who had invented the flute to imitate an unknown sound, virtually unrepresentable, i.e. the hissing of the snakes on Medusa's head as she was decapitated (Pindar, The Pythian Odes, XII, 2-3). As she played, she noticed in a spring that her features were becoming distorted and assuming the appearance of the Gorgon's mask. This once more introduces the Narcissistic theme and the blurring of the difference between Athena and her rival, which here arises from tragic art. Therefore, in terms of philosophy, art should remain in the service of the 'eidos' by continuing to represent the image that arouses desire for the Object.
But it is also condemned if it presents the object in such an obvious manner that the remoteness of desire degenerates into dangerous enjoyment. This partly explains Tournier’s condemnation of image and photography in La Goutte d'Or (1985). He explicitly links their power to Medusa's petrifying fascination and contrasts them with the art of writing which is the art of education and the route to wisdom 'par excellence'.
It would seem that the fear experienced at the sight of Medusa's head is the terror of discovering the secret behind the representation of the image.
From Companion to Literary Myths, Heroes, and Archetypes. Ed. Pierre Brunel. Routledge, 1996. Copyright © 1996 by Routledge.
Visual Representations of Medusa
 Medusa head frieze of 2nd century A.D. from the architrave of Didyma, Hellenistic Temple of Apollo. Photograph by Don Keller Online Source: http://perseus.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/ |
 Head of Medusa. Flemish Artist, 16th Century. Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy. Online Source: http://www.arca.net/uffizi/img/1479.jpg |
 Medusa by Caravaggio (1573-1610). The Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy. Online Source: http://sunsite.dk/cgfa/caravagg/p-caravag2.htm |
 Perseus and Medusa. Benenuto Cellini. Bronze, 18 feet high. 1545-54. Loggia dei Lanzi, Florence, Italy. Online Source: http://www.bluffton.edu/sullivanm/lanzi/whole.jpg Detail  |
 Perseus beheading Medusa. Online Source: http://homepage.mac.com/cparada/GML/Perseus1.html |
Τετάρτη 1 Αυγούστου 2012
THE PANES were rustic daimones (spirits) of wild mountains and highland pasture, as well as the sheep flocks and goat herds which grazed these lands.
The Panes were depicted as goat-footed men, with the tails, bushy beards, snub noses, pointed ears and horns of a goat. Sometimes they were shown with full goat heads, like the image right. As lascivious fertility spirits they were often depicted with erect members.
The Panes were a multiplication of the Arkadian god Pan. They were closely associated with the Satyroi, which were depicted with assine tails and ears, as opposed to goatish features of the Pan.
"Kabeiroi (Cabeiri) and Korybantes (Corybantes) and Panes and Satyroi (Satyrs) and Tityroi."
Pausanias, Description of Greece 8. 37. 1 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue C2nd A.D.) :
"The sacred enclosure of Despoine [near Akakesion in Arkadia]. As you go to the temple there is a portico on the right, with reliefs of white marble on the wall . . . On the third relief are Nymphai and Panes."
Ovid, Metamorphoses 1. 192 ff (trans. Melville) (Roman epic C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"I [Zeus] have my Demigods (semidei), my Fauni [Panes] and Satyri, my Nymphae and Rustic Sprites (numina rustica) of wold and wood, not worthy yet to win the sky, but sure the earth, their portion, we must prove secure."
Ovid, Metamorphoses 6. 392 ff :
"The countryfolk, the Numina Silvarum [Sylvan Deities], the Fauni [Panes] and brother Satyri and the Nymphae, were all in tears [following the death of the Satyrus Marsyas], Olympus too."
Ovid, Metamorphoses 14. 634 ff :
"For fear of rustic force she [the Latin Hamadryas Pomona] walled her orchard in to keep away the sex she shunned. What tricks did they not try, the quick young light-foot Satyri, and the Panes who wreathe their horns with pine . . . what did they all not try to win her love?"
Ovid, Heroides 4. 47 ff (trans. Showerman) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"I am borne on, like daughters of the Bacchic cry driven by the frenzy of their god [Dionysos], and those who shake the timbrel at the foot of Ida's ridge [i.e. the Korybantes], or those whom Dryades half-divine and Fauni two-horned (bicornes) [Panes] have touched with their own spirit and driven distraught."
Ovid, Heroides 4. 169 ff :
"May the agile goddess [Artemis] wait on you [the hunter Hippolytos] in the solitary glade to keep you safe, and the deep forest yield you wild beasts to slay; so may the Satyri be your friends, and the mountain deities (numina montanum), the Panes, and may the boar fall pierced in full front by your spear; so may the Nymphae . . . give you the flowing water to relieve your parching thirst!"
Cicero, De Natura Deorum 3. 17 (trans. Rackham) (Roman rhetorician C1st B.C.) :
"If gods exist, are Nymphae also goddesses? If the Nymphae are, the Panes and Satyri also are gods; but they are not gods; therefore the Nymphae also are not."
Statius, Silvae 2. 2. 102 ff (trans. Mozley) (Roman poetry C1st A.D.) :
"Often in autumn-time when the grapes are ripening, a Nereis climbs the rocks, and under cover of the shades of night brushes the sea-water from her eyes with a leafy vine-spray, and snatches sweet clusters from the hills. Often is the vintage sprinkled by the neighbouring foam; Satyri plunge into the waters, and Panes from the mountain are fain to grasp the Sea-Nympha as she flies naked through the waves."
Apuleius, The Golden Ass 6. 24 ff (trans. Walsh) (Roman novel C2nd A.D.) :
"[At the wedding of Cupid (Eros) and Psyche:] She [Aphrodite] had organized the performance so that the Musae sang in chorus, a Satyrus played the flute, and a Paniscus [a Pan] sang to the shepherd's pipes."
"They [the poets] also invented some of the names by which to designate the ministers, choral dancers, and attendants upon the sacred rites [of Rhea and Dionysos], I mean Kabeiroi and Korybantes and Panes and Satyroi (Satyrs) and Tityroi."
Philostratus the Elder, Imagines 1. 19 (trans. Fairbanks) (Greek rhetorician C3rd A.D.) :
"[From a description of an ancient Greek painting depicting Dionysos and the pirates:] A mission ship and a pirate's ship. Dionysos steers the former, on board the latter are Tyrrhenians, pirates who ravage their own sea . . He [Dionysos] is accompanied only by Lydian women and Satyroi and fluteplayers, and an aged narthex-bearer, and Maronian wine, and by Maron himself. Hearing that Panes sail with him in the form of goats, they [the pirates] planned to carry off the Bakkhai (Bacchae) for themselves and to turn over to the Panes she-goats, such as are raised in the land of the Tyrrhenians."
Ovid, Fasti 1. 391 ff (trans.Boyle) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"You were holding, Greece, the feast of grape-crowned Bacchus [Dionysos], celebrated by custom each third winter. The gods who serve Lyaeus [Dionysos] also attended and whoever is not hostile to play, namely Panes and young Satyri and goddesses who haunt streams and lonely wilds [and Seilenos and Priapos] . . . They discovered a grove suitable for party pleasures and sprawled on grass-lined couches. Liber [Dionysos] supplied wine, they had brought their own garlands, a brook gave water for frugal mixing."
Propertius, Elegies 3. 17 (trans. Goold) (Roman elegy C1st B.C.) :
"Dircean Thebes will beat the wanton tambourine [in the worship of Dionysos], and goat-foot Panes will play on pipes of reed."
Seneca, Phaedra 783 ff (trans. Miller) (Roman tragedy C1st A.D.) :
"For thy slumbers the frolicsome goddesses of the groves will lay their snares, the Dryads, who pursue Panes wandering on the mountains."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 9. 200 ff (trans. Rouse) (Greek epic C5th A.D.) :
"Thus he [Dionysos] grew up beside cliffloving Rheia [in the mountains of Phrygia], yet a boy in healthy youth, mountainbred. Circles of Panes among the rocks came about the dancebeating son of Thyone, skipping around the crags on shaggy-knee legs and crying ‘Euoi!’ to Bakkhos; and the goatfoot hooves rattled in their capers, as they went round and round in the dance."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 11. 113 ff :
"The Panes have their cithern and their melodious tootling pipes [as gifts from Dionysos]; the Satyroi (Satyrs) have the roundrattling tomtom from your patron Dionysos; even the mountainranging Bassarids ride on the backs of lions."
Suidas s.v. Backhai (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek lexicon C10th A.D.) :
"Bakkhai (Bacchae): [Bacchantes] and Satyroi (Satyrs) and Panes and Silenoi, attendants of Dionysos."
"Now [in India] the hill the summit of which is inhabited by the sages is, according to the account of our travellers, of about the same height as the Akropolis of Athens; and it rises: straight up from the plain, though its natural position equally secures it from attack for the rock surrounds it on all sides. On many parts of this rock you see traces of cloven feet and outlines of beards and of faces, and here and there impressions of backs as of persons who had slipt--and rolled down. For they say that Dionysos, when he was trying to storm the place together with Herakles, ordered the Panes to attack it, thinking that they would be strong enough to take it by assault; but they were thunderstruck by the sages and fell one, one way, and another, another; and the rocks as it were took the print of the various postures in which they fell and failed."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 14. 67 ff (trans. Rouse) (Greek epic C5th A.D.) :
"[Rheia summons the rustic spirits to the army Dionysos for a campaign against the Indians:] The rockdwellers came also from their self-vaulted caves, bearing all the name of Pan their father the ranger of the wilderness, all armed to join the host; they have human form, and a shaggy goat's head upon it with horns. Twelve horned Panes there were, with this changeling shape and hornbearing head, who were begotten of the one ancestral Pan their mountainranging father. One they named Kelaineus (Blackie) as his looks bore witness, and one Argennos (Whitey) after his colour; Aigikoros (Goatgluts) was well dubbed, because he glutted himself with goat's-milk which he pressed from nannies udders in the flock. Another masterly Pan was called Eugeneios (Longbeard), from a throat and chin which was a thick meadow of hair. Daphoineus (the Bloody) came along with Omester (Eat-em-raw); Phobos (the Fright-away) with shaggy-legged Philamnos (the Lamb's Friend). Glaukos with Xanthos, Glaukos glaring like the bright sea, with a complexion to match. Xanthos had a mane of hair like a bayard, which gave that name to the horned frequenter of the rocks. Then there was bold Argos with a shock of hair as white as snow . . . Along with these came Phorbas (Fear) to join their march, savage and insatiate."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 17. 136 ff :
"[During Dionysos' war against the Indians:] The Panes madly made battle skipping with light foot over the peaks. One of them gript and enemy's neck tight with encircling hands, and ript him with his goat's-hooves, tearing through the flank and strong corselet together. Another caught a fugitive Indian and ran him through this middle where he stood, then lifting him on the curved points of his two longbranching antlers, sent him flying high through the airy ways, rolling over himself like a tumbler. Another waved in his hand the strawcutting sickle of sheafbearing Deo, and reaped the enemy crops with clawcurved blade, like cornears of conflict, like gavels of the battlefield. There was a revel for Ares [i.e. War], there was harvest-home for Dionysos, when the enemy's heads were cut! He offered the curved blade to watching Bakkhos, dabbled with human dew, and so poured a blood-libation to Dionysos, and made the Moirai (Fates) drunken with the battlecup he filled for them. Another man was standing, when one goatfoot Pan twined both hands interlacing about his neck, and struck his wellcorseted emeny with his horn, tearing his flank with the double point. Another met a fellow rushing on him with a blow from his cudgel, and smashed his forehead right between the ends of his eyebrows."
Nonnus, Dionsyiaca 18. 48 ff :
"The Panes [in Dionysos' army], high on their familiar rocks, danced in the dust with nimble feet, passing over the headlands of those untrodden precipices."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 21. 178 ff :
"[When the god Dionysos was driven into the sea by Lykourgos (Lycurgus):] The Satyros so full of energy showed a face unsmiling, and languished in sorrow strange to him. The Panes wandered wild through the woods with hillranging hoof, Panes in search of Dionysos, and heard no word of him . . . So they [the companions of Dionysos] were all restless and sad."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 22. 39 ff :
"The Panes then, roaming about the craggy ravines sped on nimble hooves through the trackless hills; in terrible places, where even that light traveller the bird would not dare to fly, or traverse with his pair of beating wings in his lofty course."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 23. 155 ff :
"[The Indian river Hydaspes tries to drown the troops of Dionysos as they cross his stream:] He curved his own stream, and leapt upon Bakkhos with a volley of foaming surf . . . The syrinx of Pan was floating on the surface and rolling of itself on the waves, tossed about beside the double pipes."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 24. 35 ff :
"Spare my reeds [set on fire], which . . . spare the harmonious tune of the pan-pipes which guides your [Dionysos's] own mystic song!"
Nonnus, Dionsyiaca 24. 100 ff :
"The Satyroi (Satyrs) attended his [Dionysos's] passage, and with them Bakkhante women and Panes passed through the water."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 24. 123 ff :
"They [the Panes, Satyroi and Bakkhantes] leapt about dancing on the Indian drags, along the rocky paths; then they built shelters undisturbed in the dark forest, and spent the night among the trees. Some went deerhunting with dogs after the long-antlered stags."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 27. 25 ff :
"[Deriades addresses his Indian troops:] ‘Kill me those Panes also with devastating steel. Or if they are gods, and it is not permitted to pierce the body of unwounded Pan with cutting steel, then I make prey of the mountainranging Panes, and they shall tend herds of elephants in the wilderness. Thee are plenty of wild beasts here also, with which I will join the wildbeast Kentauroi (Centaurs) and Panes of hillranging Dionysos; or I will make them a swarm of attendants for my daughter, and waiters upon the festal table of Morrheus.’"
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 29. 313 ff :
"[During the Indian War of Dionysos:] A friendly Pan fought with his goatsfeet: with a sharp stroke of his pointed hoof he tore all down the hollow flank of [the Indian] archer Melaneus and laid open his belly."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 34. 128 ff :
"[Dionysos is driven mad by Hera was absent from the war, demoralising the army of the god:] the Panes had drunk no hot blood fresh from the veins of a lioness of the wilds, and rushed not swift as the wind frenzied into the conflict, but they were mild with fear: hesitating they pawed the ground with gentle noiseless hooves, and ceased the terrible leaps of their highland dance."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 37. 10 ff :
"[During the Indian War of Dionysos:] When Dionysos saw friendly calm instead of war, early in the morning he sent out mules and their attendant men to bring dry wood from the mountains, that he might burn with fire the dead body of Opheltes. Their leader into the forest of pines was Phaunos [Faunus] who was well practised in the secrets of the lonely thickets which he knew so well, for he had learnt about the highland haunts of Kirke (Circe) his mother. The woodman's ace cut down the trees in long rows. Many an elm was felled by the long edge of the axe, many an oak with leaves waving high struck down with a crash, many a pine lay all along, many a fir stooped its dry needles; as the trees were felled far and wide, little by little the rocks were bared. So many a Hamadryas Nymphe sought another home, and swiftly joined the unfamiliar maids of the brooks.
Parties coming up would often meet, men on the hills traversing different mountain-paths. One saw them up aloft, out in front, coming down, crossing over, with feet wandering in all directions. The sticks were packed in bundles with ropes well twisted and fastened tight and trim, and laid on the mules' backs; the animals set out in lines, and the hooves rang on the mountain-paths as they hurried along, the surface of the sandy dust was burdened by heavy logs dragged behind. Satyroi (Satyrs) and Panes were busy; some cut wood with axes, some pulled it from tree after tree with their hands, or lifted trunks with untiring arms and rattled over the rocks with dancing feet."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 38. 1 ff :
"The people retired into the recesses of the forest, and entered their huts. The rustic Panes housed themselves under shelter in the ravines, for they occupied at evening time the natural caverns of a lioness in the wilds. The Satyroi (Satyrs) dived into a bear's cave, and hollowed their little bed in the rock with sharp finger-nails in place of cutting steel; until the light-brining morning shone, and the brightness of Eos (the Dawn) newly risen showed itself peacefully to both Indians and Satyroi."
The Panes were depicted as goat-footed men, with the tails, bushy beards, snub noses, pointed ears and horns of a goat. Sometimes they were shown with full goat heads, like the image right. As lascivious fertility spirits they were often depicted with erect members.
The Panes were a multiplication of the Arkadian god Pan. They were closely associated with the Satyroi, which were depicted with assine tails and ears, as opposed to goatish features of the Pan.
| PARENTS |
| Some were sons of HERMES, of ZEUS, & of the prime PAN |
| LIST OF PANES |
| AIGIPAN A Pan who helped Zeus in his battles with the monster Typhoeus. He was placed amongst the stars as the Constellation Capricorn. |
| AGREUS A Pan god of hunting and rustic prophecy. |
| NOMIOS A Pan god of shepherds and pastures. |
| PAN The first Pan, a god of shepherds, hunting, rustic music and prophecy. |
| PANEIDES The twelve sons of the primal Pan. |
| PAN SYBARIOS An Italian Pan born when a shepherd coupled with one of his goats. |
| PHAUNOS (or Faunus) A goat-footed Italian god of the flocks. |
PANES THE RUSTIC GODS
Strabo, Geography 10. 3. 15 (trans. Jones) (Greek geographer C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :"Kabeiroi (Cabeiri) and Korybantes (Corybantes) and Panes and Satyroi (Satyrs) and Tityroi."
Pausanias, Description of Greece 8. 37. 1 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue C2nd A.D.) :
"The sacred enclosure of Despoine [near Akakesion in Arkadia]. As you go to the temple there is a portico on the right, with reliefs of white marble on the wall . . . On the third relief are Nymphai and Panes."
Ovid, Metamorphoses 1. 192 ff (trans. Melville) (Roman epic C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"I [Zeus] have my Demigods (semidei), my Fauni [Panes] and Satyri, my Nymphae and Rustic Sprites (numina rustica) of wold and wood, not worthy yet to win the sky, but sure the earth, their portion, we must prove secure."
Ovid, Metamorphoses 6. 392 ff :
"The countryfolk, the Numina Silvarum [Sylvan Deities], the Fauni [Panes] and brother Satyri and the Nymphae, were all in tears [following the death of the Satyrus Marsyas], Olympus too."
Ovid, Metamorphoses 14. 634 ff :
"For fear of rustic force she [the Latin Hamadryas Pomona] walled her orchard in to keep away the sex she shunned. What tricks did they not try, the quick young light-foot Satyri, and the Panes who wreathe their horns with pine . . . what did they all not try to win her love?"
Ovid, Heroides 4. 47 ff (trans. Showerman) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"I am borne on, like daughters of the Bacchic cry driven by the frenzy of their god [Dionysos], and those who shake the timbrel at the foot of Ida's ridge [i.e. the Korybantes], or those whom Dryades half-divine and Fauni two-horned (bicornes) [Panes] have touched with their own spirit and driven distraught."
Ovid, Heroides 4. 169 ff :
"May the agile goddess [Artemis] wait on you [the hunter Hippolytos] in the solitary glade to keep you safe, and the deep forest yield you wild beasts to slay; so may the Satyri be your friends, and the mountain deities (numina montanum), the Panes, and may the boar fall pierced in full front by your spear; so may the Nymphae . . . give you the flowing water to relieve your parching thirst!"
Cicero, De Natura Deorum 3. 17 (trans. Rackham) (Roman rhetorician C1st B.C.) :
"If gods exist, are Nymphae also goddesses? If the Nymphae are, the Panes and Satyri also are gods; but they are not gods; therefore the Nymphae also are not."
Statius, Silvae 2. 2. 102 ff (trans. Mozley) (Roman poetry C1st A.D.) :
"Often in autumn-time when the grapes are ripening, a Nereis climbs the rocks, and under cover of the shades of night brushes the sea-water from her eyes with a leafy vine-spray, and snatches sweet clusters from the hills. Often is the vintage sprinkled by the neighbouring foam; Satyri plunge into the waters, and Panes from the mountain are fain to grasp the Sea-Nympha as she flies naked through the waves."
Apuleius, The Golden Ass 6. 24 ff (trans. Walsh) (Roman novel C2nd A.D.) :
"[At the wedding of Cupid (Eros) and Psyche:] She [Aphrodite] had organized the performance so that the Musae sang in chorus, a Satyrus played the flute, and a Paniscus [a Pan] sang to the shepherd's pipes."
PANES ATTENDANTS OF DIONYSUS & RHEA
Strabo, Geography 10. 3. 15 (trans. Jones) (Greek geographer C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :"They [the poets] also invented some of the names by which to designate the ministers, choral dancers, and attendants upon the sacred rites [of Rhea and Dionysos], I mean Kabeiroi and Korybantes and Panes and Satyroi (Satyrs) and Tityroi."
Philostratus the Elder, Imagines 1. 19 (trans. Fairbanks) (Greek rhetorician C3rd A.D.) :
"[From a description of an ancient Greek painting depicting Dionysos and the pirates:] A mission ship and a pirate's ship. Dionysos steers the former, on board the latter are Tyrrhenians, pirates who ravage their own sea . . He [Dionysos] is accompanied only by Lydian women and Satyroi and fluteplayers, and an aged narthex-bearer, and Maronian wine, and by Maron himself. Hearing that Panes sail with him in the form of goats, they [the pirates] planned to carry off the Bakkhai (Bacchae) for themselves and to turn over to the Panes she-goats, such as are raised in the land of the Tyrrhenians."
Ovid, Fasti 1. 391 ff (trans.Boyle) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) :
"You were holding, Greece, the feast of grape-crowned Bacchus [Dionysos], celebrated by custom each third winter. The gods who serve Lyaeus [Dionysos] also attended and whoever is not hostile to play, namely Panes and young Satyri and goddesses who haunt streams and lonely wilds [and Seilenos and Priapos] . . . They discovered a grove suitable for party pleasures and sprawled on grass-lined couches. Liber [Dionysos] supplied wine, they had brought their own garlands, a brook gave water for frugal mixing."
Propertius, Elegies 3. 17 (trans. Goold) (Roman elegy C1st B.C.) :
"Dircean Thebes will beat the wanton tambourine [in the worship of Dionysos], and goat-foot Panes will play on pipes of reed."
Seneca, Phaedra 783 ff (trans. Miller) (Roman tragedy C1st A.D.) :
"For thy slumbers the frolicsome goddesses of the groves will lay their snares, the Dryads, who pursue Panes wandering on the mountains."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 9. 200 ff (trans. Rouse) (Greek epic C5th A.D.) :
"Thus he [Dionysos] grew up beside cliffloving Rheia [in the mountains of Phrygia], yet a boy in healthy youth, mountainbred. Circles of Panes among the rocks came about the dancebeating son of Thyone, skipping around the crags on shaggy-knee legs and crying ‘Euoi!’ to Bakkhos; and the goatfoot hooves rattled in their capers, as they went round and round in the dance."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 11. 113 ff :
"The Panes have their cithern and their melodious tootling pipes [as gifts from Dionysos]; the Satyroi (Satyrs) have the roundrattling tomtom from your patron Dionysos; even the mountainranging Bassarids ride on the backs of lions."
Suidas s.v. Backhai (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek lexicon C10th A.D.) :
"Bakkhai (Bacchae): [Bacchantes] and Satyroi (Satyrs) and Panes and Silenoi, attendants of Dionysos."
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THE PANES & THE INDIAN WAR OF DIONYSOS
Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana 3. 13 (trans. Conybeare) (Greek biography C1st to C2nd A.D.) :"Now [in India] the hill the summit of which is inhabited by the sages is, according to the account of our travellers, of about the same height as the Akropolis of Athens; and it rises: straight up from the plain, though its natural position equally secures it from attack for the rock surrounds it on all sides. On many parts of this rock you see traces of cloven feet and outlines of beards and of faces, and here and there impressions of backs as of persons who had slipt--and rolled down. For they say that Dionysos, when he was trying to storm the place together with Herakles, ordered the Panes to attack it, thinking that they would be strong enough to take it by assault; but they were thunderstruck by the sages and fell one, one way, and another, another; and the rocks as it were took the print of the various postures in which they fell and failed."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 14. 67 ff (trans. Rouse) (Greek epic C5th A.D.) :
"[Rheia summons the rustic spirits to the army Dionysos for a campaign against the Indians:] The rockdwellers came also from their self-vaulted caves, bearing all the name of Pan their father the ranger of the wilderness, all armed to join the host; they have human form, and a shaggy goat's head upon it with horns. Twelve horned Panes there were, with this changeling shape and hornbearing head, who were begotten of the one ancestral Pan their mountainranging father. One they named Kelaineus (Blackie) as his looks bore witness, and one Argennos (Whitey) after his colour; Aigikoros (Goatgluts) was well dubbed, because he glutted himself with goat's-milk which he pressed from nannies udders in the flock. Another masterly Pan was called Eugeneios (Longbeard), from a throat and chin which was a thick meadow of hair. Daphoineus (the Bloody) came along with Omester (Eat-em-raw); Phobos (the Fright-away) with shaggy-legged Philamnos (the Lamb's Friend). Glaukos with Xanthos, Glaukos glaring like the bright sea, with a complexion to match. Xanthos had a mane of hair like a bayard, which gave that name to the horned frequenter of the rocks. Then there was bold Argos with a shock of hair as white as snow . . . Along with these came Phorbas (Fear) to join their march, savage and insatiate."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 17. 136 ff :
"[During Dionysos' war against the Indians:] The Panes madly made battle skipping with light foot over the peaks. One of them gript and enemy's neck tight with encircling hands, and ript him with his goat's-hooves, tearing through the flank and strong corselet together. Another caught a fugitive Indian and ran him through this middle where he stood, then lifting him on the curved points of his two longbranching antlers, sent him flying high through the airy ways, rolling over himself like a tumbler. Another waved in his hand the strawcutting sickle of sheafbearing Deo, and reaped the enemy crops with clawcurved blade, like cornears of conflict, like gavels of the battlefield. There was a revel for Ares [i.e. War], there was harvest-home for Dionysos, when the enemy's heads were cut! He offered the curved blade to watching Bakkhos, dabbled with human dew, and so poured a blood-libation to Dionysos, and made the Moirai (Fates) drunken with the battlecup he filled for them. Another man was standing, when one goatfoot Pan twined both hands interlacing about his neck, and struck his wellcorseted emeny with his horn, tearing his flank with the double point. Another met a fellow rushing on him with a blow from his cudgel, and smashed his forehead right between the ends of his eyebrows."
Nonnus, Dionsyiaca 18. 48 ff :
"The Panes [in Dionysos' army], high on their familiar rocks, danced in the dust with nimble feet, passing over the headlands of those untrodden precipices."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 21. 178 ff :
"[When the god Dionysos was driven into the sea by Lykourgos (Lycurgus):] The Satyros so full of energy showed a face unsmiling, and languished in sorrow strange to him. The Panes wandered wild through the woods with hillranging hoof, Panes in search of Dionysos, and heard no word of him . . . So they [the companions of Dionysos] were all restless and sad."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 22. 39 ff :
"The Panes then, roaming about the craggy ravines sped on nimble hooves through the trackless hills; in terrible places, where even that light traveller the bird would not dare to fly, or traverse with his pair of beating wings in his lofty course."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 23. 155 ff :
"[The Indian river Hydaspes tries to drown the troops of Dionysos as they cross his stream:] He curved his own stream, and leapt upon Bakkhos with a volley of foaming surf . . . The syrinx of Pan was floating on the surface and rolling of itself on the waves, tossed about beside the double pipes."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 24. 35 ff :
"Spare my reeds [set on fire], which . . . spare the harmonious tune of the pan-pipes which guides your [Dionysos's] own mystic song!"
Nonnus, Dionsyiaca 24. 100 ff :
"The Satyroi (Satyrs) attended his [Dionysos's] passage, and with them Bakkhante women and Panes passed through the water."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 24. 123 ff :
"They [the Panes, Satyroi and Bakkhantes] leapt about dancing on the Indian drags, along the rocky paths; then they built shelters undisturbed in the dark forest, and spent the night among the trees. Some went deerhunting with dogs after the long-antlered stags."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 27. 25 ff :
"[Deriades addresses his Indian troops:] ‘Kill me those Panes also with devastating steel. Or if they are gods, and it is not permitted to pierce the body of unwounded Pan with cutting steel, then I make prey of the mountainranging Panes, and they shall tend herds of elephants in the wilderness. Thee are plenty of wild beasts here also, with which I will join the wildbeast Kentauroi (Centaurs) and Panes of hillranging Dionysos; or I will make them a swarm of attendants for my daughter, and waiters upon the festal table of Morrheus.’"
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 29. 313 ff :
"[During the Indian War of Dionysos:] A friendly Pan fought with his goatsfeet: with a sharp stroke of his pointed hoof he tore all down the hollow flank of [the Indian] archer Melaneus and laid open his belly."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 34. 128 ff :
"[Dionysos is driven mad by Hera was absent from the war, demoralising the army of the god:] the Panes had drunk no hot blood fresh from the veins of a lioness of the wilds, and rushed not swift as the wind frenzied into the conflict, but they were mild with fear: hesitating they pawed the ground with gentle noiseless hooves, and ceased the terrible leaps of their highland dance."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 37. 10 ff :
"[During the Indian War of Dionysos:] When Dionysos saw friendly calm instead of war, early in the morning he sent out mules and their attendant men to bring dry wood from the mountains, that he might burn with fire the dead body of Opheltes. Their leader into the forest of pines was Phaunos [Faunus] who was well practised in the secrets of the lonely thickets which he knew so well, for he had learnt about the highland haunts of Kirke (Circe) his mother. The woodman's ace cut down the trees in long rows. Many an elm was felled by the long edge of the axe, many an oak with leaves waving high struck down with a crash, many a pine lay all along, many a fir stooped its dry needles; as the trees were felled far and wide, little by little the rocks were bared. So many a Hamadryas Nymphe sought another home, and swiftly joined the unfamiliar maids of the brooks.
Parties coming up would often meet, men on the hills traversing different mountain-paths. One saw them up aloft, out in front, coming down, crossing over, with feet wandering in all directions. The sticks were packed in bundles with ropes well twisted and fastened tight and trim, and laid on the mules' backs; the animals set out in lines, and the hooves rang on the mountain-paths as they hurried along, the surface of the sandy dust was burdened by heavy logs dragged behind. Satyroi (Satyrs) and Panes were busy; some cut wood with axes, some pulled it from tree after tree with their hands, or lifted trunks with untiring arms and rattled over the rocks with dancing feet."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 38. 1 ff :
"The people retired into the recesses of the forest, and entered their huts. The rustic Panes housed themselves under shelter in the ravines, for they occupied at evening time the natural caverns of a lioness in the wilds. The Satyroi (Satyrs) dived into a bear's cave, and hollowed their little bed in the rock with sharp finger-nails in place of cutting steel; until the light-brining morning shone, and the brightness of Eos (the Dawn) newly risen showed itself peacefully to both Indians and Satyroi."
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LAMIA was a child-devouring Daimon. She was a daughter of the god Poseidon, and the mother of the sea-monsters Skylla and Akheilos. Her name and family suggest she was originally imagined as a large, aggressive shark.
In one story, Lamia was a Libyan queen loved by the god Zeus. When his jealous wife Hera learned of their affair she stole away her children. Lamia went mad with grief, and tore out her own eyes. Zeus then transformed her into a monster allowing her to exact her revenge by hunting and devouring the children of others.
Lamia often appears as a bogey-monster, a night-haunting demon which preyed on children. She was sometimes pluralised into ghostly, man-devouring demon Lamiai.
The Greek word lamia means dangerous lone-shark. Such sharks were also referred to as ketea (sea-monsters). As such it is likely that she was identified with the monstrous sea-goddess Keto. Both Lamia (Lone-Shark) and Keto (Sea-Monster) were said to have spawned the monster Skylla (the Rending One). Another child of Lamia was the boy Akheilos (the Lipless One) who was transformed into a shark by the goddess Aphrodite.
| PARENTS |
| [1.1] POSEIDON (Stesichorus Frag 220, Pausanias 10.12.2) [2.1] BELOS (Other references) |
| OFFSPRING |
| [1.1] SKYLLA (Stesichorus Frag 220, Eustathius on Homer's Odyssey 1714) [2.1] AKHEILOS (by Zeus) (Ptolemy Hephaestion Bk6) [3.1] SIBYLLA HEROPHILE (by Poseidon) (Pausanias 10.12.2) [3.2] SIBYLLA (by Apollon) (Suidas 'Sibylla) |
THE METAMORPHOSIS OF LAMIA
Bell, Women of Classical Mythology
(sourced from Diodorus Siculus 22.41; Suidas 'Lamia'; Plutarch 'On Being
a Busy-Body 2; Scholiast on Aristophanes' Peace 757; Eustathius on
Homer's Odyssey 1714) (Mythology dictionary C20th) : 
"Lamia was a daughter of Belus and a queen in Libya. She was very beautiful and attracted the attention of the ever-watchful and far-seeing Zeus. He had children by her, but Hera discovered their involvement and kidnapped the children. Their ultimate fate is unknown. This loss drove Lamia insane; in revenge and despair she snatched up the children of others and murdered them. The cruelty, which became obsessive, caused her appearance to change, and she became ugly with distorted features [a shark]. Perhaps in a well-intended gesture, Zeus inexplicably gave her the power to take out her eyes and then reinsert them."
LAMIA MOTHER OF SHARK-DAIMONES
Stesichorus, Fragment 220 (from Scholiast on Apollonius of Rhodes 4.825) (trans. Campbell, Vol. Greek Lyric III) (Greek lyric C7th to C6th B.C.) :"Stesichorus in his Scylla says that Skylla is the daughter of Lamia (perhaps Libyan Lamia, or Lamia child of Poseidon)."
Eustathius on Homer's Odyssey 1714 (Greek scholia) :
Some ancients called her the mother of Scylla.
Ptolemy Hephaestion, New History Book 6 (summary from Photius, Myriobiblon 190) (trans. Pearse) (Greek mythographer C1st to C2nd A.D.) :
"It is said that there was born also a son of Zeus and the Lamia called Akhilleus; he was of an irresistable beauty [challenged Aphrodite to a beauty contest, and was cursed with ugliness]."
LAMIA MOTHER OF SIBYLLA HEROPHILE
The Libyan Sibylla Herophile, who gave prophecies at Delphoi, was said to be a daughter of Zeus and Lamia (the Shark). This is not particularly unusual, since the oracle was frequently connected with sea-gods and creatures, especially Poseidon and the dolphin.Pausanias, Description of Greece 10. 12. 2 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue C2nd A.D.) :
"There is a rock rising up above the ground [at Delphoi]. On it, say the Delphians, there stood and chanted the oracles a woman, by name Herophile and surnamed Sibylla. The former Sibylla I find was as ancient as any; the Greeks say that she was a daughter of Zeus by Lamia, daughter of Poseidon, that she was the first woman to chant oracles, and that the name Sibylla was given her by the Libyans."
Suidas s.v. Sibylla (trans. Suda On Line) (Byzantine Greek Lexicon C10th A.D.) :
"Sibylla: [The daughter] of Apollon and Lamia, though according to some of [there were various other Sibylla] . . . An Erythraian, because she was born in a region of Erythrai . . . Some supposed her a Sicilian [Sibyl], others a Leucanian, others a Sardanan, others a Gergithian, others a Rhodian, others a Libyan, others a Samian."
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