The Greek Myths, Volume 1 Read Online Free PDF Page B
Author: Robert Graves
grassy verge to slake his thirst, he fell in love with his reflection. At first he tried to embrace and kiss the beautiful boy who confronted him, but presently recognized himself, and lay gazing enraptured into the pool, hour after hour. How could he endure both to possess and yet not to possess? Grief was destroying him, yet he rejoiced in his torments; knowing at least that his other self would remain true to him, whatever happened.
e . Echo, although she had not forgiven Narcissus, grieved with him;she sympathetically echoed ‘Alas! Alas!’ as he plunged a dagger in his breast, and also the final ‘Ah, youth, beloved in vain, farewell!’ as he expired. His blood soaked the earth, and up sprang the white narcissus flower with its red corollary, from which an unguent balm is now distilled at Chaeronea. This is recommended for affections of the ears (though apt to give headaches), and as a vulnerary, and for the cure of frost-bite. 2
1 . Ovid: Metamorphoses iii. 341–401.
2 . Pausanias: viii. 29.4 and ix. 31. 6; Ovid: Metamorphoses 402–510; Conon: Narrations 24; Pliny: Natural History xxi. 75.
1 . The ‘narcissus’ used in the ancient wreath of Demeter and Persephone (Sophocles: Oedipus at Colonus 682–4), and also called leirion was the three-petalled blue fleur-de-lys or iris: sacred to the Triple-goddess, and worn as a chaplet when the Three Solemn Ones (see 115. c ), or Erinnyes, were being placated. It flowers in late autumn, shortly before the ‘poet’s narcissus’, which is perhaps why Leiriope has been described as Narcissus’s mother. This fanciful moral tale – incidentally accounting for the medicinal properties of narcissus-oil, a well-known narc otic, as the first syllable of ‘Narcissus’ implies – may be deduced from an icon which showed the despairing Alcmaeon (see 107. e ), or Orestes (see 114. a ), lying crowned with lilies, beside a pool in which he has vainly tried to purify himself after murdering his mother; the Erinnyes having refused to be placated. Echo, in this icon, would represent the mocking ghost of his mother, and Ameinius his murdered father.
2 . But – issus , like –inthus , is a Cretan termination, and both Narcissus and Hyacinthus seem to have been names for the Cretan springflower-hero whose death the goddess bewails on the gold ring from the Mycenaean Acropolis; elsewhere he is called Antheus (see 159. 4), a surname of Dionysus. Moreover, the lily was the royal emblem of the Cnossian king. In a painted relief found among the Palace ruins, he walks, sceptre in hand, through a lily-meadow, wearing a crown and necklace of fleur-de-lys.
87
ARION
A RION of Lesbos, a son of Poseidon and the Nymph Oneaea, was a master of the lyre, and invented the dithyramb in Dionysus’s honour. One day his patron Periander, tyrant of Corinth, reluctantly gave him permission to visit Taenarus in Sicily, where he had been invited to compete in a musical festival. Arion won the prize, and his admirers showered on him so many rich gifts that these excited the greed of the sailors engaged to bring him back to Corinth.
‘We much regret, Arion, that you will have to die,’ remarked the captain of the ship.
‘What crime have I committed?’ asked Arion.
‘You are too rich,’ replied the captain.
‘Spare my life, and I will give you all my prizes,’ Arion pleaded.
‘You would only retract your promise on reaching Corinth,’ said the captain, ‘and so would I, in your place. A forced gift is no gift.’
‘Very well,’ cried Arion resignedly. ‘But pray allow me to sing a last song.’
When the captain gave his permission, Arion, dressed in his finest robe, mounted on the prow, where he invoked the gods with impassioned strains, and then leaped overboard. The ship sailed on.
b . However, his song had attracted a school of music-loving dolphins, one of which took Arion on his back, and that evening he overtook the ship and reached the port of Corinth several days before it
e . Echo, although she had not forgiven Narcissus, grieved with him;she sympathetically echoed ‘Alas! Alas!’ as he plunged a dagger in his breast, and also the final ‘Ah, youth, beloved in vain, farewell!’ as he expired. His blood soaked the earth, and up sprang the white narcissus flower with its red corollary, from which an unguent balm is now distilled at Chaeronea. This is recommended for affections of the ears (though apt to give headaches), and as a vulnerary, and for the cure of frost-bite. 2
1 . Ovid: Metamorphoses iii. 341–401.
2 . Pausanias: viii. 29.4 and ix. 31. 6; Ovid: Metamorphoses 402–510; Conon: Narrations 24; Pliny: Natural History xxi. 75.
1 . The ‘narcissus’ used in the ancient wreath of Demeter and Persephone (Sophocles: Oedipus at Colonus 682–4), and also called leirion was the three-petalled blue fleur-de-lys or iris: sacred to the Triple-goddess, and worn as a chaplet when the Three Solemn Ones (see 115. c ), or Erinnyes, were being placated. It flowers in late autumn, shortly before the ‘poet’s narcissus’, which is perhaps why Leiriope has been described as Narcissus’s mother. This fanciful moral tale – incidentally accounting for the medicinal properties of narcissus-oil, a well-known narc otic, as the first syllable of ‘Narcissus’ implies – may be deduced from an icon which showed the despairing Alcmaeon (see 107. e ), or Orestes (see 114. a ), lying crowned with lilies, beside a pool in which he has vainly tried to purify himself after murdering his mother; the Erinnyes having refused to be placated. Echo, in this icon, would represent the mocking ghost of his mother, and Ameinius his murdered father.
2 . But – issus , like –inthus , is a Cretan termination, and both Narcissus and Hyacinthus seem to have been names for the Cretan springflower-hero whose death the goddess bewails on the gold ring from the Mycenaean Acropolis; elsewhere he is called Antheus (see 159. 4), a surname of Dionysus. Moreover, the lily was the royal emblem of the Cnossian king. In a painted relief found among the Palace ruins, he walks, sceptre in hand, through a lily-meadow, wearing a crown and necklace of fleur-de-lys.
87
ARION
A RION of Lesbos, a son of Poseidon and the Nymph Oneaea, was a master of the lyre, and invented the dithyramb in Dionysus’s honour. One day his patron Periander, tyrant of Corinth, reluctantly gave him permission to visit Taenarus in Sicily, where he had been invited to compete in a musical festival. Arion won the prize, and his admirers showered on him so many rich gifts that these excited the greed of the sailors engaged to bring him back to Corinth.
‘We much regret, Arion, that you will have to die,’ remarked the captain of the ship.
‘What crime have I committed?’ asked Arion.
‘You are too rich,’ replied the captain.
‘Spare my life, and I will give you all my prizes,’ Arion pleaded.
‘You would only retract your promise on reaching Corinth,’ said the captain, ‘and so would I, in your place. A forced gift is no gift.’
‘Very well,’ cried Arion resignedly. ‘But pray allow me to sing a last song.’
When the captain gave his permission, Arion, dressed in his finest robe, mounted on the prow, where he invoked the gods with impassioned strains, and then leaped overboard. The ship sailed on.
b . However, his song had attracted a school of music-loving dolphins, one of which took Arion on his back, and that evening he overtook the ship and reached the port of Corinth several days before it