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169 Theog. 590.—

Ἐκ τῆς γὰρ γένος ἐστὶ γυναικῶν θηλυτεράων,

Τῆς γὰρ ὀλώιόν ἐστι γένος· καὶ φῦλα γυναικῶν,

Πῆμα μέγα θνητοῖσι μετ᾽ ἀνδράσι ναιετάουσι, etc.

170 Opp. Di. 105.—

Οὕτως οὔτι πῆ ἐστὶ Διὸς νόον ἐξαλέασθαι.

171 Theog. 534. Οὕνεκ᾽ ἐρίζετο βουλὰς ὑπερμενέϊ Κρονίωνι.

172 Theog. 521-532.

173 Of the tragedy called Προμηθεὺς Λυόμενος some few fragments yet remain: Προμηθεὺς Πύρφορος was a satyric drama, according to Dindorf. Welcker recognizes a third tragedy, Προμηθεὺς Πύρφορος, and a satyric drama, Προμηθεὺς Πυρκαεύς (Die Griechisch. Tragödien, vol. i. p. 30). The story of Promêtheus had also been handled by Sapphô in one of her lost songs (Servius ad Virgil. Eclog. vi. 42).

174 Apollodôrus too mentions only the theft of fire (i. 7. 1).

175 Æsch. Prom. 442-506.—

Πᾶσαι τέχναι βροτοῖσιν ἐκ Προμηθέως.

176 Æsch. Prom. 231.—

βροτῶν δὲ τῶν ταλαιπώρων λόγον

Οὐκ ἔσχεν οὐδέν᾽, ἀλλ᾽ ἀϊστώσας γένος

Τὸ πᾶν, ἔχρῃζεν ἄλλο φιτῦσαι νέον.

177 Æsch. Prom. 198-222. 123.—

διὰ τὴν λίαν φιλότητα βροτῶν.

178 Æsch. Prom. 169-770.

179 Prometh. 2. See also the Fragments of the Promêtheus Solutus, 177-179, ed. Dindorf, where Caucasus is specially named; but v. 719 of the Promêtheus Vinctus seems to imply that Mount Caucasus is a place different from that to which the suffering prisoner is chained.

180 Appian, Bell. Mithridat. c. 103.

181 Apollodôr. ii. 1. Mr. Fynes Clinton does not admit the historical reality of Inachus; but he places Phorôneus seventeen generations, or 570 years prior to the Trojan war, 978 years earlier than the first recorded Olympiad. See Fasti Hellenici, vol. iii. c. 1. p. 19.

182 Pausan. ii. 5, 4.

183 See Düntzer, Fragm. Epic. Græc. p. 57. The Argeian author Akusilaus treated Phorôneus as the first of men, Fragm. 14. Didot ap. Clem. Alex. Stromat i. p. 321. Φορωνῆες, a synonym for Argeians; Theocrit. Idyll. xxv. 200.

184 Apollodôr. ii. 1, 1; Pausan. ii. 15, 5; 19, 5; 20, 3.

185 Apis in Æschylus is totally different: ἰατρόμαντις or medical charmer, son of Apollo, who comes across the gulf from Naupactus, purifies the territory of Argos from noxious monsters, and gives to it the name of Apia (Æschyl. Suppl. 265). Compare Steph. Byz. v. Ἀπίη; Soph. Œdip. Colon. 1303. The name Ἀπία for Peloponnêsus remains still a mystery, even after the attempt of Buttmann (Lexilogus, s. 19) to throw light upon it.

Eusebius asserts that Niobê was the wife of Inachus and mother of Phorôneus, and pointedly contradicts those who call her daughter of Phorôneus—φασὶ δέ τινες Νιόβην Φορωνέως εἶναι θυγατέρα, ὅπερ οὐκ ἀληθές (Chronic. p. 23, ed. Scalig.): his positive tone is curious, upon such a matter.

Hellanikus in his Argolica stated that Phorôneus had three sons, Pelasgus, Iasus and Agênôr, who at the death of their father divided his possessions by lot. Pelasgus acquired the country near the river Erasinus, and built the citadel of Larissa: Iasus obtained the portion near to Elis. After their decease, the younger brother Agênôr invaded and conquered the country, at the head of a large body of horse. It was from these three persons that Argos derived three epithets which are attached to it in the Homeric poems—Ἄργος Πελασγικὸν, Ἴασον, Ἱππόβοτον (Hellanik. Fr. 38, ed. Didot; Phavorin. v. Ἄργος). This is a specimen of the way in which legendary persons as well as legendary events were got up to furnish an explanation of Homeric epithets: we may remark as singular, that Hellanikus seems to apply Πελασγικὸν Ἄργος to a portion of Peloponnêsus, while the Homeric Catalogue applies it to Thessaly.

186 Apollod. l. c. The mention of Strymôn seems connected with Æschylus Suppl. 255.

187 Akusil. Fragm. 17, ed. Didot; Æsch. Prometh. 568; Pherekyd. Fragm. 22, ed. Didot; Hesiod. Ægimius. Fr. 2, p. 56, ed. Düntzer: among the varieties of the story, one was that Argos was changed into a peacock (Schol. Aristoph. Aves, 102). Macrobius (i. 19) considers Argos as an allegorical expression of the starry heaven; an idea which Panofska also upholds in one of the recent Abhandlungen of the Berlin Academy, 1837, p. 121 seq.

188 Apollod. ii. 1, 1; Pausan. ii. 16, 1; Æsch. Prom. v. 590-663.

189 Æschyl. Prom. v. 790-850; Apollod. ii. 1. Æschylus in the Supplices gives a different version of the wanderings of Iô from that which appears in the Promêtheus: in the former drama he carries her through Phrygia, Mysia, Lydia, Pamphylia and Cilicia into Egypt (Supplic. 544-566): nothing is there said about Promêtheus, or Caucasus or Scythia, etc.

The track set forth in the Supplices is thus geographically intelligible, that in the Promêtheus (though the most noticed of the two) defies all comprehension, even as a consistent fiction; nor has the erudition of the commentators been successful in clearing it up. See Schutz, Excurs. iv. ad Prometh. Vinct. pp. 144-149; Welcker, Æschylische Trilogie, pp. 127-146, and especially Völcker, Mythische Geographie der Griech. und Römer, part i. pp. 3-13.

The Greek inhabitants at Tarsus in Cilicia traced their origin to Argos: their story was, that Triptolemus had been sent forth from that town in quest of the wandering Iô, that he had followed her to Tyre, and then renounced the search in despair. He and his companions then settled partly at Tarsus, partly at Antioch (Strabo, xiv. 673; xv. 750). This is the story of Kadmos and Eurôpê inverted, as happens so often with the Grecian mythes.

Homer calls Hermês Ἀργειφόντης; but this epithet hardly affords sufficient proof that he was acquainted with the mythe of Iô, as Völcker supposes: it cannot be traced higher than Hesiod. According to some authors, whom Cicero copies, it was on account of the murder of Argos that Hermês was obliged to leave Greece and go into Egypt: then it was that he taught the Egyptians laws and letters (De Natur. Deor. iii. 22).

190 The story in Parthênius (Narrat. 1) is built upon this version of Iô’s adventures.

191 Herodot. i. 1-6. Pausanias (ii. 15, 1) will not undertake to determine whether the account given by Herodotus, or that of the old legend, respecting the cause which carried Iô from Argos to Egypt, is the true one: Ephorus (ap. Schol. Apoll. Rhod. ii. 168) repeats the abduction of Iô to Egypt, by the Phœnicians, subjoining a strange account of the Etymology of the name Bosporus. The remarks of Plutarch on the narrative of Herodotus are curious: he adduces as one proof of the κακοήθεια (bad feeling) of Herodotus, that the latter inserts so discreditable a narrative respecting Iô, daughter of Inachus, “whom all Greeks believe to have been divinized by foreigners, to have given name to seas and straits, and to be the source of the most illustrious regal families.” He also blames Herodotus for rejecting Epaphus, Iô, Iasus and Argos, as highest members of the Perseid genealogy. He calls Herodotus φιλοβάρβαρος (Plutarch, De Malign. Herodoti, c. xi. xii. xiv. pp. 856, 857).

192 It would be an unprofitable fatigue to enumerate the multiplied and irreconcilable discrepancies in regard to every step of this old Argeian genealogy. Whoever desires to see them brought together, may consult Schubart, Quæstiones in Antiquitatem Heroicam, Marburg, 1832, capp. 1 and 2.

The remarks which Schubart makes (p. 35) upon Petit-Radel’s Chronological Tables will be assented to by those who follow the unceasing string of contradictions, without any sufficient reason to believe that any one of them is more worthy of trust than the remainder, which he has cited:—“Videant alii, quomodo genealogias heroicas, et chronologiæ rationes, in concordiam redigant. Ipse abstineo, probe persuasus, stemmata vera, historiæ fide comprobata, in systema chronologiæ redigi posse: at ore per sæcula tradita, a poetis reficta, sæpe mutata, prout fabula postulare videbatur, ab historiarum deinde conditoribus restituta, scilicet, brevi, qualia prostant stemmata—chronologiæ secundum annos distributæ vincula semper recusatura esse.”

193 Apollod. ii. 1. The Supplices of Æschylus is the commencing drama of a trilogy on this subject of the Danaïdes,—Ἱκετίδες, Αἰγύπτιοι, Δαναΐδες. Welcker, Griechisch. Tragödien, vol. i. p. 48: the two latter are lost. The old epic poem called Danaïs or Danaïdes, which is mentioned in the Tabula Iliaca as containing 5000 verses, has perished, and is unfortunately very little alluded to: see Düntzer, Epic. Græc. Fragm. p. 3; Welcker, Der Episch. Kyklus, p. 35.

194 Apollod. 1. c.; Pherekyd. ap. Schol. Hom. Odyss. xv. 225; Hesiod, Fragm. Marktsch. Fr. 36, 37, 38. These Fragments belong to the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Apollodôrus seems to refer to some other of the numerous Hesiodic poems. Diodôrus (iv. 68) assigns the anger of Dionysos as the cause.

195 Odyss. xv. 240-256.

196 Herod. ix. 34; ii. 49: compare Pausan. ii. 18, 4. Instead of the Prœtides, or daughters of Prœtos, it is the Argeian women generally whom he represents Melampus as having cured, and the Argeians generally who send to Pylus to invoke his aid: the heroic personality which pervades the primitive story has disappeared.

Kallimachus notices the Prœtid virgins as the parties suffering from madness, but he treats Artemis as the healing influence (Hymn. ad Dianam 235).

197 The beautiful fragment of Simonidês (Fragm. vii. ed. Gaisford. Poet. Min.), describing Danaê and the child thus exposed, is familiar to every classical reader.

198 Paus. ii. 15, 4; ii. 16, 5. Apollod. ii. 2. Pherekyd. Fragm. 26, Dind.

199 Odyss. ii. 120. Hesiod. Fragment. 154. Marktscheff.—Akusil. Fragm. 16. Pausan. ii. 16, 4. Hekatæus derived the name of the town from the μύκης of the sword of Perseus (Fragm. 360, Dind.). The Schol. ad Eurip. Orest. 1247, mentions Mykêneus as son of Spartôn, but grandson of Phêgeus the brother of Phorôneus.

200 Pausan. ii. 18, 4.

201 Herodot. vi. 53.

202 In the Hesiodic Shield of Hêraklês, Alkmênê is distinctly mentioned as daughter of Elektryôn; the genealogical poet, Asios, called her the daughter of Amphiaraos and Eriphyle (Asii Fragm. 4, ed. Markt. p. 412). The date of Asios cannot be precisely fixed; but he may be probably assigned to an epoch between the 30th and 40th Olympiad.

Asios must have adopted a totally different legend respecting the birth of Hêraklês and the circumstances preceding it, among which the deaths of her father and brothers are highly influential. Nor could he have accepted the received chronology of the sieges of Thêbes and Troy.

203 So runs the old legend in the Hesiodic Shield of Hêraklês (12-82). Apollodôrus (or Pherekydês, whom he follows) softens it down, and represents the death of Elektryôn as accidentally caused by Amphitryôn. (Apollod. ii. 4, 6. Pherekydês, Fragm. 27, Dind.)

204 Hesiod, Scut. Herc. 24. Theocrit. Idyll. xxiv. 4. Teleboas, the Eponym of these marauding people, was son of Poseidôn (Anaximander ap. Athenæ. xi. p. 498).

205 Apollod. ii. 4, 7. Compare the fable of Nisus at Megara, infra, chap. xii. p. 302.

206 Hesiod, Scut. Herc. 29. ὄφρα θεοῖσιν Ἀνδράσι τ᾽ ἀλφηστῇσιν ἀρῆς ἀλκτῆρα φυτεύσῃ.

207 Hesiod. Sc. H. 50-56.

208 Homer, Iliad, xix. 90-133; also viii. 361.—

Τὴν αἰεὶ στενάχεσχ᾽, ὅθ᾽ ἑὸν φίλον υἱὸν ὁρῷτο

Ἔργον ἀεικὲς ἔχοντα, ὑπ᾽ Εὐρυσθῆος ἀέθλων.

209 Hesiod, Theogon. 951, τελέσας στονόεντας ἀέθλους. Hom. Odyss. xi. 620; Hesiod, Eœæ, Fragm. 24, Düntzer, p. 36, πονηρότατον καὶ ἄριστον.

210 Apollod. ii. 8, 1; Hecatæ. ap. Longin. c. 27; Diodôr. iv. 57.

211 Herodot. ix. 26; Diodôr. iv. 58.

212 Pausan. ii. 5, 5; 12, 5; 26, 3. His statements indicate how much the predominance of a powerful neighbor like Argos tended to alter the genealogies of these inferior towns.

213 Schol. ad Apollôn. Rhod. iii. 1085. Other accounts of the genealogy of Deukaliôn are given in the Schol. ad Homer. Odyss. x. 2, on the authority both of Hesiod and Akusilaus.

214 Hesiodic Catalog. Fragm. xi.; Gaisf. lxx. Düntzer—

Ἤτοι γὰρ Λοκρὸς Λελέγων ἡγήσατο λαῶν,

Τούς ῥά ποτε Κρονίδης Ζεὺς ἄφθιτα μήδεα εἰδὼς,

Λεκτοὺς ἐκ γαίης λάας πόρε Δευκαλίωνι.

The reputed lineage of Deukaliôn continued in Phthia down to the time of Dikæarchus, if we may judge from the old Phthiot Pherekratês, whom he introduced in one of his dialogues as a disputant, and whom he expressly announced as a descendant of Deukaliôn (Cicero, Tuscul. Disp. i. 10).

215 The latter account is given by Dionys. Halic. i. 17; the former seems to have been given by Hellanikus, who affirmed that the ark after the deluge stopped upon Mount Othrys, and not upon Mount Parnassus (Schol. Pind. ut. sup.) the former being suitable for a settlement in Thessaly.

Pyrrha is the eponymous heroine of Pyrrhæa or Pyrrha, the ancient name of a portion of Thessaly (Rhianus, Fragm. 18, p. 71, ed. Düntzer).

Hellanikus had written a work, now lost, entitled Δευκαλιώνεια: all the fragments of it which are cited have reference to places in Thessaly, Lokris and Phokis. See Preller, ad Hellanitum, p. 12 (Dörpt. 1840). Probably Hellanikus is the main source of the important position occupied by Deukaliôn in Grecian legend. Thrasybulus and Akestodôrus represented Deukaliôn as having founded the oracle of Dôdôna, immediately after the deluge (Etm. Mag. v. Δωδωναῖος).

216 Apollodôrus connects this deluge with the wickedness of the brazen race in Hesiod, according to the practice general with the logographers of stringing together a sequence out of legends totally unconnected with each other (i. 7, 2).

217 Hesiod, Fragm. 135. ed. Markts. ap. Strabo. vii. p. 322, where the word λάας, proposed by Heyne as the reading of the unintelligible text, appears to me preferable to any of the other suggestions. Pindar, Olymp. ix. 47. Ἄτερ δ᾽ Εὐνᾶς ὁμόδαμον Κτησάσθαν λίθινον γόνον· Λαοὶ δ᾽ ὠνόμασθεν. Virgil, Georgic i. 63. “Unde homines nati, durum genus.” Epicharmus ap. Schol. Pindar. Olymp. ix. 56. Hygin. f. 153. Philochorus retained the etymology, though he gave a totally different fable, nowise connected with Deukaliôn, to account for it; a curious proof how pleasing it was to the fancy of the Greek (see Schol. ad Pind. 1. c. 68).

218 Apollod. i. 7, 2. Hellanic. Fragm. 15. Didot. Hellanikus affirmed that the ark rested on Mount Othrys, not on Mount Parnassus (Fragm. 16. Didot). Servius (ad Virgil. Eclog. vi. 41) placed it on Mount Athôs—Hyginus (f. 153) on Mount Ætna.

219 Tatian adv. Græc. c. 60, adopted both by Clemens and Eusebius. The Parian marble placed this deluge in the reign of Kranaos at Athens, 752 years before the first recorded Olympiad, and 1528 years before the Christian æra; Apollodôrus also places it in the reign of Kranaos, and in that of Nyctimus in Arcadia (iii. 8, 2; 14, 5).

The deluge and the ekpyrosis or conflagration are connected together also in Servius ad Virgil. Bucol. vi. 41: he refines both of them into a “mutationem temporum.”

220 Aristot. Meteorol. i. 14. Justin rationalizes the fable by telling us that Deukaliôn was king of Thessaly, who provided shelter and protection to the fugitives from the deluge (ii. 6, 11).

221 Pausan. i. 18, 7; 40, 1. According to the Parian marble (s. 5), Deukaliôn had come to Athens after the deluge, and had there himself founded the temple of the Olympian Zeus. The etymology and allegorization of the names of Deukaliôn and Pyrrha, given by Völcker in his ingenious Mythologie des Iapetischen Geschlechts (Giessen, 1824), p. 343, appears to me not at all convincing.

222 Such is the statement of Apollodôrus (i. 7, 3); but I cannot bring myself to believe that the name (Γραϊκοὶ) Greeks is at all old in the legend, or that the passage of Hesiod, in which Græcus and Latinus purport to be mentioned, is genuine.

See Hesiod, Theogon. 1013, and Catalog. Fragm. xxix. ed. Göttling, with the note of Göttling; also Wachsmuth, Hellen. Alterth. i. 1. p. 311, and Bernhardy, Griech. Literat. vol. i. p. 167.

223 Apollod. i. 7, 4.

224 How literally and implicitly even the ablest Greeks believed in eponymous persons, such as Hellên and Iôn, as the real progenitors of the races called after him, may be seen by this, that Aristotle gives this common descent as the definition of γένος (Metaphysic. iv. p. 118, Brandis):—

Γένος λέγεται, τὸ μὲν ... τὸ δὲ, ἀφ᾽ οὗ ἂν ὦσι πρώτου κινήσαντος εἰς τὸ εἶναι. Οὕτω γὰρ λέγονται οἱ μὲν, Ἕλληνες τὸ γένος, οἱ δὲ, Ἴωνες· τῷ, οἱ μὲν ἀπὸ Ἕλληνος, οἱ δὲ ἀπὸ Ἴωνος, εἶναι πρώτου γεννήσαντος.

225 Hesiod, Fragm. 8. p. 278, ed. Marktsch.—

Ἕλληνος δ᾽ ἐγένοντο θεμιστόπολοι βασιλῆες

Δῶρός τε, Ξοῦθός τε, καὶ Αἴολος ἱππιοχάρμης.

Αἰολίδαι δ᾽ ἐγένοντο θεμιστόπολοι βασιλῆες

Κρηθεὺς ἠδ᾽ Ἀθάμας καὶ Σίσυφος αἰολομήτης

Σαλμωνεύς τ᾽ ἄδικος καὶ ὑπέρθυμος Περιήρης.

226 Apollod. i. 7, 3. Ἕλληνος δὲ καὶ Νύμφης Ὀρσήϊδος (?), Δῶρος, Ξοῦθος, Αἴολος. Αὐτὸς μὲν οὖν ἀφ᾽ αὑτοῦ τοὺς καλουμένους Γραϊκοὺς προσηγόρευσεν Ἕλληνας, τοῖς δὲ παισὶν ἐμέρισε τὴν χώραν. Καὶ Ξοῦθος μὲν λαβὼν τὴν Πελοπόννησον, ἐκ Κρεούσης τῆς Ἐρεχθέως Ἀχαιὸν ἐγέννησε καὶ Ἴωνα, ἀφ᾽ ὧν Ἀχαιοὶ καὶ Ἴωνες καλοῦνται. Δῶρος δὲ, τὴν πέραν χώραν Πελοποννήσου λαβὼν, τοὺς κατοίκους ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτοῦ Δωριεῖς ἐκάλεσεν. Αἴολος δὲ, βασιλεύων τῶν περὶ τὴν Θετταλίαν τόπων, τοὺς ἐνοικοῦντας Αἰολεῖς προσηγόρευσε.

Strabo (viii. p. 383) and Conôn (Narr. 27), who evidently copy from the same source, represent Dôrus as going to settle in the territory property known as Dôris.

227 Apollod. i. 7, 6. Αἰτωλὸς ... φυγὼν εἰς τὴν Κουρήτιδα χώραν, κτείνας τοὺς ὑποδεξαμένους Φθίας καὶ Ἀπόλλωνος υἱοὺς, Δῶρον καὶ Λαόδοκον καὶ Πολυποίτην, ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτοῦ τὴν χώραν Αἰτωλίαν ἐκάλεσε. Again, i. 8, 1. Πλευρὼν (son of Ætôlus) γήμας Ξανθίππην τὴν Δώρου, παῖδα ἐγέννησεν Ἀγήνορα.

228 Herod. i. 56.

229 Schol. Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 57. Τὸν δὲ Ἐνδυμίωνα Ἠσίοδος μὲν Ἀεθλίου τοῦ Διὸς καὶ Καλύκης παῖδα λέγει.... Καὶ Πείσανδρος δὲ τὰ αὐτά φησι, καὶ Ἀκουσίλαος, καὶ Φερεκύδης, καὶ Νίκανδρος ἐν δευτέρῳ Αἰτωλικῶν, καὶ Θεόπομπος ἐν Ἐποποιΐαις.

Respecting the parentage of Hellên, the references to Hesiod are very confused. Compare Schol. Homer. Odyss. x. 2, and Schol. Apollôn. Rhod. iii. 1086. See also Hellanic. Frag. 10. Didot.

Apollodôrus, and Pherekydês before him (Frag. 51. Didot), called Protôgeneia daughter of Deukaliôn; Pindar (Olymp. ix. 64) designated her as daughter of Opus. One of the stratagems mentioned by the Scholiast to get rid of this genealogical discrepancy was, the supposition that Deukaliôn had two names (διώνυμος); that he was also named Opus. (Schol. Pind. Olymp. ix. 85).

That the Deukalidæ or posterity of Deukaliôn reigned in Thessaly, was mentioned both by Hesiod and Hekatæus, ap. Schol. Apollôn. Rhod. iv. 265.

230 Dionys. H. A. R. i. 17.

231 Pausan. vii. 1, 1-3. Herodotus also mentions (ii. 97) Archander, son of Phthius and grandson of Achæus, who married the daughter of Danaus. Larcher (Essai sur la Chronologie d’Hérodote, ch. x. p. 321) tells us that this cannot be the Danaus who came from Egypt, the father of the fifty daughters, who must have lived two centuries earlier, as may be proved by chronological arguments: this must be another Danaus, according to him.

Strabo seems to give a different story respecting the Achæans in Peloponnêsus: he says that they were the original population of the peninsula, that they came in from Phthia with Pelops, and inhabited Laconia, which was from them called Argos Achaicum, and that on the conquest of the Dôrians, they moved into Achaia properly so called, expelling the Iônians therefrom (Strabo, viii p. 365). This narrative is, I presume, borrowed from Ephorus.

232 Eurip. Ion, 1590.

233 Eurip. Ion, 64.

234 See the Fragments of these two plays in Matthiae’s edition; compare Welcker, Griechisch. Tragöd. v. ii. p. 842. If we may judge from the Fragments of the Latin Melanippê of Ennius (see Fragm. 2, ed. Bothe), Hellên was introduced as one of the characters of the piece.

235 Iliad, vi. 154. Σίσυφος Αἰολίδης, etc. Again Odyss. xi. 234.—

Ἔνθ᾽ ἤτοι πρώτην Τυρὼ ἴδον εὐπατέρειαν,

Ἣ φάτο Σαλμωνῆος ἀμύμονος ἔκγονος εἶναι,

Φῆ δὲ Κρηθῆος γυνὴ ἔμμεναι Αἰολίδαο.

236 Homer, Odyss. xi. 234-257; xv. 226.

237 Diodôrus, iv. 68. Sophoklês, Fragm. 1. Τυρώ. Σαφῶς Σιδηρὼ καὶ φέρουσα τοὔνομα. The genius of Sophoklês is occasionally seduced by this play upon the etymology of a name, even in the most impressive scenes of his tragedies. See Ajax, 425. Compare Hellanik. Fragm. p. 9, ed. Preller. There was a first and second edition of the Tyrô—τῆς δευτέρας Τυροῦς. Schol. ad Aristoph. Av. 276. See the few fragments of the lost drama in Dindorf’s Collection, p. 53. The plot was in many respects analogous to the Antiopê of Euripidês.

238 A third story, different both from Homer and from Sophoklês, respecting Tyrô, is found in Hyginus (Fab. lx.): it is of a tragical cast, and borrowed, like so many other tales in that collection, from one of the lost Greek dramas.

239 Apollod. i. 9, 7. Σαλμωνεύς τ᾽ ἄδικος καὶ ὑπέρθυμος Περιήρης. Hesiod, Fragm. Catal. 8. Marktscheffel.

Where the city of Salmôneus was situated, the ancient investigators were not agreed; whether in the Pisatid, or in Elis, or in Thessaly (see Strabo, viii. p. 356). Euripidês in his Æolus placed him on the banks of the Alpheius (Eurip. Fragm. Æol. 1). A village and fountain in the Pisatid bore the name of Salmônê; but the mention of the river Enipeus seems to mark Thessaly as the original seat of the legend. But the naïveté of the tale preserved by Apollodôrus (Virgil in the Æneid, vi. 586, has retouched it) marks its ancient date: the final circumstance of that tale was, that the city and its inhabitants were annihilated.

Ephorus makes Salmôneus king of the Epeians and of the Pisatæ (Fragm. 15, ed. Didot).

The lost drama of Sophoklês, called Σαλμωνεὺς, was a δρᾶμα σατυρικόν See Dindorf’s Fragm. 483.

240 Hom. Od. xi. 280. Apollod. i. 9, 9. κρατέρω θεραπόντε Διὸς, etc.

241 Diodôr. iv. 68.

242 Νηλέα τε μεγάθυμον, ἀγαυότατον ζωόντων (Hom. Odyss. xv. 228).

243 Hom. Od. xi. 278; xv. 234. Apollod. i. 9, 12. The basis of this curious romance is in the Odyssey, amplified by subsequent poets. There are points however in the old Homeric legend, as it is briefly sketched in the fifteenth book of the Odyssey, which seem to have been subsequently left out or varied. Nêleus seizes the property of Melampus during his absence; the latter, returning with the oxen from Phylakê, revenges himself upon Nêleus for the injury. Odyss. xv. 233.

244 Hesiod, Catalog. ap. Schol. Apollôn. Rhod. i. 156; Ovid, Metam. xii. p. 556; Eustath. ad Odyss. xi. p. 284. Poseidôn carefully protects Antilochus son of Nestôr, in the Iliad, xiii. 554-563.

245 Hesiod, Catalog. ap. Schol. Ven. ad Iliad. ii. 336; and Steph. Byz. v. Γερηνία; Homer, Il. v. 392; xi. 693; Apollodôr. ii. 7, 3; Hesiod, Scut. Herc. 360; Pindar, Ol. ix. 32.

According to the Homeric legend, Nêleus himself was not killed by Hêraklês: subsequent poets or logographers, whom Apollodôrus follows, seem to have thought it an injustice, that the offence given by Nêleus himself should have been avenged upon his sons and not upon himself; they therefore altered the legend upon this point, and rejected the passage in the Iliad as spurious (see Schol. Ven. ad Iliad. xi. 682).

The refusal of purification by Nêleus to Hêraklês is a genuine legendary cause: the commentators, who were disposed to spread a coating of history over these transactions, introduced another cause,—Nêleus, as king of Pylos, had aided the Orchomenians in their war against Hêraklês and the Thêbans (see Sch. Ven. ad Iliad. xi. 689).

The neighborhood of Pylos was distinguished for its ancient worship both of Poseidôn and of Hadês: there were abundant local legends respecting them (see Strabo, viii. pp. 344, 345).

246 About Nestôr, Iliad, i. 260-275; ii. 370; xi. 670-770; Odyss. iii. 5, 110, 409.

247 Hellanik. Fragm. 10, ed. Didot; Pausan. vii. 2, 3; Herodot. v. 65; Strabo, xiv. p. 633. Hellanikus, in giving the genealogy from Nêleus to Melanthus, traces it through Periklymenos and not through Nestôr: the words of Herodotus imply that he must have included Nestôr.

248 Herodot. v. 67; Strabo, vi. p. 264; Mimnermus, Fragm. 9, Schneidewin.

249 Iliad, ii. 715.

250 Apollodôr. i. 9, 15; Eustath. ad Iliad. ii. 711.

251 Euripid. Alkêst. init. Welcker; Griechisch. Tragœd. (p. 344) on the lost play of Sophoklês called Admêtus or Alkêstis; Hom. Iliad., ii. 766; Hygin. Fab. 50-51 (Sophoklês, Fr. Inc. 730; Dind. ap. Plutarch. Defect. Orac. p. 417). This tale of the temporary servitude of particular gods, by order of Zeus as a punishment for misbehavior, recurs not unfrequently among the incidents of the mythical world. The poet Panyasis (ap. Clem. Alexand. Adm. ad Gent. p. 23)—

Τλῆ μὲν Δημήτηρ, τλῆ δὲ κλυτὸς Ἀμφιγυήεις,

Τλῆ δὲ Ποσειδάων, τλῆ δ᾽ ἀργυρότοξος Ἀπολλὼν

Ἀνδρὶ παρὰ θνητῷ θητεύσεμεν εἰς ἐνιαυτόν·

Τλῆ δὲ καὶ ὀβριμόθυμος Ἄρης ὑπὸ πατρὸς ἀνάγκης.

The old legend followed out the fundamental idea with remarkable consistency: Laômedôn, as the temporary master of Poseidôn and Apollo, threatens to bind them hand and foot, to sell them in the distant islands, and to cut off the ears of both, when they come to ask for their stipulated wages (Iliad, xxi. 455). It was a new turn given to the story by the Alexandrine poets, when they introduced the motive of love, and made the servitude voluntary on the part of Apollo (Kallimachus, Hymn. Apoll. 49; Tibullus, Elegii. 3, 11-30).

252 Eurip. Alkêstis, Arg.; Apollod. i. 9, 15. To bring this beautiful legend more into the color of history, a new version of it was subsequently framed: Hêraklês was eminently skilled in medicine, and saved the life of Alkêstis when she was about to perish from a desperate malady (Plutarch. Amator c. 17. vol. iv. p. 53, Wytt.).

253 The legend of Akastus and Pêleus was given in great detail in the Catalogue of Hesiod (Catalog. Fragm. 20-21, Marktscheff.); Schol. Pindar Nem. iv. 95. Schol. Apoll. Rhod. i. 224; Apollod. iii. 13, 2.

254 This incident was contained in one of the earliest dramas of Euripidês, the Πελίαδες, now lost. Moses of Chorênê (Progymnasm. ap. Maii ad Euseb. p. 43), who gives an extract from the argument, says that the poet “extremos mentiendi fines attingit.”

The Ῥιζότομοι of Sophoklês seems also to have turned upon the same catastrophe (see Fragm. 479, Dindorf.).