Before mentioning
Athena's journey to the forbidding home of Envy, Ovid described the
goddess appropriately in her older character of a warrior maid.
Athena's journey to the forbidding home of Envy, Ovid described the
goddess appropriately in her older character of a warrior maid.
Ovid - 1934 - Metamorphoses in European Culture - v1
In
the House of Busyrane Spenser mentioned a painting of Apollo's
grief for Coronis and added that she became a sweet briar.
The tale of Erichthonius inspired a painting of Piombo and two
important works of Rubens.
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? OCYRHOE AND AESCULAPIUS
OCYEHOE AND AESCULAPIUS
From the death of Coronis, Ovid could pass naturally to the care
of her son by the centaur Chiron and the strange transformation of
Chiron's daughter. This event Euripides had recorded in his
Melanippe the Wise. Although the centaur was only half human in
form, he said, his daughter Ocyrhoe was at first entirely human. From
her father she inherited the gift of prophecy. But so incautiously did
she use her power that Jupiter transformed her to a mare. Nicander
seems to have repeated the tale and made it available for Ovid.
The myth of Ocyrhoe was in itself appropriate and picturesque.
But to Ovid it offered a further advantage. Both Aesculapius, child
of Apollo and Coronis, and Chiron, his foster father, had become well
known mythological characters and had taken a leading part in re-
markable events. Ovid was anxious to include their adventures in his
poem. But he did not think it wise to recount them at length. He
was glad, therefore, to present them as foreshadowed vaguely in the
prophecy of Ocyrhoe. It will be of interest to suggest both the nature
of these events and the cause of Ovid's reticence.
Aesculapius was in prehistoric times a local god of healing, wor-
shiped in southern Thessaly, and related with savage beliefs about the
snake. Many early people imagined that the snake was gifted with
unusual cunning, that he understood the principles of medicine, and
that he had learned by casting his skin to renew his youth and be-
come immortal. Accordingly the serpent was often associated with a
god of healing. The Egyptians associated him with Isis, as Ovid was
to imply later in the tale of Ianthe (Bk. 9), and the Thessalians
related him frequently to Aesculapius. They believed that the god
himself was apt to appear in serpent form. A tradition of this kind
Ovid himself was to repeat, when he told how the Romans brought the
god from Epidaurus in the form of a great crested snake (Bk. 15).
In time the Thessalians came to prefer Apollo, a god of healing in
human form. They then regarded Aesculapius as his son and a mortal
who became a celebrated physician. The Iliad mentioned this belief,
and the Homeric Hymn to Aesculapius made him the child of Apollo
and Coronis. In the Catalogues we hear first of his dying by a
thunderbolt from Jupiter.
Pindar told the story in some detail. Aesculapius, he said, was
reared by Chiron. He grew famous for healing all manner of sickness.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
At length a splendid offer of gold tempted him to revive even a dead
man. But this was usurping a power allowed only to the gods, and
Jupiter destroyed both the physician and his patient. Pindar's ac-
count was not the usual tradition.
Ordinarily we hear that Aesculapius perished, but the resurrected
man continued living. To this Aeschylus alluded ruefully in his
Agamemnon and Euripides in his Alcestis. Later authors wished to
identify the revived man quite variously. In the Aeneid Vergil de-
clared that the physician acted at the request of Diana and restored
the life of her favorite, Hippolytus--a version which Ovid was glad
to use later in his myth of Egeria (Bk. 15).
Still another tradition recorded that, although Jupiter at first pun-
ished Aesculapius with death, he afterwards consoled Apollo by giving
the physician immortality as the constellation of the Serpent Holder
(Ophiuchus). This tradition Ovid followed in the prophecy of
Ocyrhoe. But he was unconventional in important details: he declared
that Aesculapius was not a mortal but a god and that to restore the
dead would have been his privilege, if the power had not been abused.
To the metamorphosis as the Serpent Holder, Ovid made only a vague
allusion. He was to need this event later in his Fasti.
Chiron was a centaur but unlike either Nessus (Bk. 9) or the troop
which battled with the Lapithae (Bk. 12). By nature he was intelli-
gent and humane. He lived on Mt. Pelion, in southern Thessaly, a
district rich in medicinal herbs, and since the Iliad he had been famed
as the teacher of Achilles. The Theogony had made him child of the
sea nymph Philyra. Apollonius and Vergil added that his father was
Saturn, who had taken the form of a magnificent horse, and this
Ovid himself was to mention in the tale of Arachne (Bk. 6).
Following the usual practice of ancient myth, Chiron should have
been mortal, and according to one tradition this was the case.
Eratosthenes declared that while showing Achilles trophies which
Hercules had left, Chiron dropped an arrow poisoned with the venom
of the hydra. The point struck Chiron's foot; he died and entered
heaven as the constellation of the Centaur. This Ovid was to tell in
the Fasti.
A more famous version of the story had been alluded to as early as
The Shield of Hercules. Aeschylus told it at some length in his
Prometheus Unbound. Chiron, he said, was born immortal. During
the battle of the Centaurs and the Lapithae, he was present and acci-
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? BATTUS AND MERCURY
dently was wounded by one of the poisoned arrows of Hercules. The
wound proved incurable and gave him intolerable pain. He persuaded
the gods to make him mortal and grant him escape by death. This
story gave Ovid a different metamorphosis from the one which he was
to use in the Fasti. But he could not introduce it conveniently in his
battle of the Centaurs. He was glad, therefore, to include it in the
prophecy of Ocyrhoe. Euripides and others had shown Chiron himself
able to foretell coming events. But Ovid found it expedient to imply
the contrary.
Battus and Mercury
In parts of India men have imagined a divine patron of thieves.
This office the ancient Greeks accorded to Mercury. They reported
that he had been able to steal cattle even from the god Apollo. This
event Ovid told in his story of Battus. The idea that Mercury was a
patron of thieves he was to use again for the tale of Daedalion
(Bk. 11).
Before Ovid's time, the story of the theft had been treated in four
quite different ways. In the Homeric Hymn to Mercury, Apollo
seems to have been caring voluntarily for a herd which belonged to the
gods. Finding these cattle in the extreme north of Greece, Mercury
drove fifty of them southward past Onchestus in the central part of
the country. He noticed that an old man tending vines had observed
him and he offered the old man a rich harvest, if he would be silent.
Continuing southward to Arcadia, Mercury hid the stolen cattle near
the river Alpheus. Meanwhile Apollo had been following the trail.
He, too, observed the old man. Questioned by Apollo, the old man
promptly told all that he knew. This version appears later to have
inspired Alcaeus and Horace.
The Catalogues gave a quite different story. They declared that
Apollo tended cattle as a punishment and that the herd did not belong
to the gods. According to the Catalogues, the tending of cattle was
a sequel to Jupiter's destroying Aesculapius. Angered at the death
of his son, Apollo killed the Cyclopes, who had made the bolt. Jupiter
exiled him from Olympus and required him to spend a certain time
as herdsman of a mortal. In a charming satyr drama, The Trackers,
Sophocles added that the mortal was Admetus, king of southern
Thessaly, and that Mercury stole cattle from him. Euripides in the
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Alcestis alluded to the same story, and the Manual retold it in some
detail. Nothing was said of the old informer.
Callimachus offered a still different version. With the Homeric
Hymn he declared that Apollo tended cattle voluntarily, and with the
Catalogues he agreed that Apollo became herdsman of Admetus. But
he differed from both in regard to Apollo's motive. The god, he said,
undertook this humble labor because of his affection for the young
Admetus. Rhianus altered the new account in two particulars.
Apollo, he said, was swayed by love of Hymenaeus, a great grandson
of Athamas (cf. Bk. 4), and in order to be near him gathered a herd
of his own. These poets, too, ignored the incident of the old informer.
Nicander gave a fourth version. He agreed with Rhianus that
Apollo became a herdsman for the sake of Hymenaeus and that Apollo's
preoccupation with the lad gave Mercury a chance to drive off his
cattle. But he proceeded from this to the adventure with the informer,
improving the tale in several ways. The old man's name, he said, was
Battus. Instead of offering a good harvest, Mercury gave the more
tangible bribe of some money. But, fearing treachery, the god re-
turned later in a different guise and himself questioned the old man.
By offering a robe, he soon got the desired information. Mercury then
hit Battus with a staff and turned him into a rock which always con-
tains both fire and frost. This account Ovid mentioned in his Ibis.
In the Metamorphoses Ovid associated the tale of Battus with that
of Ocyrhoe. Apollo, he said, was unable to help Chiron during the
transformation of his daughter, because he was absent, tending cattle.
Ovid followed the outline of Nicander's version, making a number of
improvements. Since Hymenasus belonged to a later time, Ovid merely
said that Apollo became a pastoral lover. Nicander had shown the
god tending cattle in southern Thessaly; but this would have taken
him only a few miles from the residence of Chiron and would make it
appear that he was still accessible. Ovid supposed that Apollo had
gone rather to the far southwest of Greece and, to make the locality
clearer, he named the fields of Pylos. This country both the Iliad
and the Odyssey had rendered famous as the home of Nestor. To the
same distant region Ovid transferred Battus and made him a herds-
man of Nestor's father, Neleus. In the Homeric Hymn Mercury
drove the stolen cattle the entire length of Greece, and in the other
versions he drove them at least half that distance. This allowed the
poet to amuse his Greek readers by mentioning a number of places
I
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? AGLAUROS AND MERCURY
along the way, and alluding to their well known peculiarities. But
for Ovid's readers it would have seemed both extravagant and tedious.
Ovid imagined instead that Mercury drove the cattle only from Pylos
to the foot of some nearby mountains.
Nicander had meant to show Battus ready to break his agreement
as soon as he was offered a larger bribe. But the difference in value
was not obvious between a sum of money and a robe. Ovid made the
first bribe a cow and the second a cow and a bull besides. Such
bribes were also more likely to be offered by a stealer of cattle. Ovid
enlivened the tale with dialogue. And he closed wittily with the remark
that Battus was still known as index, which to the Romans meant both
informer and flint.
Ovid's myth suggested an interesting passage to Petrarch. In a
vision Laura appeared to her lover disguised so that he did not recog-
nize her and thus beguiled him into an avowal of his presumptuous
affection. Then, resuming his usual appearance, she punished him
with transformation to a rock.
Ovid inspired also a painting by Claude Lorrain.
Aglauros and Mercury
In the tale of Aglauros and Mercury, Ovid gave the sequel to the
story which the crow had told of Erichthonius and the three daugh-
ters of Cecrops (see Coronis). In Ovid's version, Aglauros alone had
disobeyed Athena. He now told how she offended further and incurred
a memorable punishment.
In a tradition recorded by the Manual, Herse, a sister of Aglauros,
was loved by Mercury and became the mother of the hero Cephalus.
With this tradition Nicander related the punishment . of Aglauros.
Not content with disobeying Athena, he said, she interfered between
Mercury and Herse and would not allow the god to approach her
sister until he bribed her with a large sum of gold. Incensed at this
new evidence of her presumption, Athena cursed Aglauros with envy
of her sister's good fortune. Aglauros then tried to prevent Mercury
from entering at all; but he changed her into stone. Ovid followed
Nicander's myth, with some important changes for the better. But he
avoided all reference to Cephalus, whom he was to introduce with
a different parentage and much later (Bk. 7).
The preceding tale of Battus was very much like the tale of
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? >> METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Aglaitros in its theme. Both showed a person guilty of unusual
effrontery turned into stone. Under these circumstances Ovid would
ordinarily have sought variety by keeping the two stories far apart.
But in this case he gained the same end by a remarkable contrast in
the treatment. The tale of Battus he told simply and briefly with
the mere suggestion that the man became shapeless rock. The story
of Aglauros he told with brilliant simile, elaborate incident, and de-
tailed metamorphosis of the girl into a livid statue. Never did he
show more skill or obtain a happier effect.
After a striking account of Mercury soaring above Athens and
gazing enamored at Herse, the leader of a festival, Ovid showed the
god preparing to visit her, according to the style of a Roman gallant.
By having Mercury approach in a courteous and dignified manner, he
emphasized the churlishness of Aglauros. He was careful also to
make clear the nature of her accumulated offense.
Before mentioning
Athena's journey to the forbidding home of Envy, Ovid described the
goddess appropriately in her older character of a warrior maid.
He then proceeded to improve Nicander's myth by this justly
famous adventure. And thus he found opportunity to excel all
predecessors in the art of personifying an abstract idea. In the Hymn
to Apollo Callimachus had spoken of a personified Envy. From him
Ovid may have taken the initial suggestion. But when he pictured
Athena travelling to summon the baleful spirit of Envy, he profited by
far more illustrious example. The Iliad had often referred incidentally
to personified abstractions, a practice followed by many subsequent
authors of narrative poetry. And sometimes it had given such char-
acters an important part in the action. Sleep cooperated at length in
Juno's plan for diverting the attention of Jove and announced her
success to Neptune. And later Sleep and Death bore home to Lycia
the body of great Sarpedon. The Shield of Hercules gave prominence
to a monster called Darkness of Death. Aeschylus introduced such
characters into tragedy. He showed Strength not only dragging
Prometheus to the place of torture but exhorting Vulcan in a dialogue
of some length. Euripides assigned an important role to Death in
his Alcestis and to Madness in his Hercules Furens. And in the
Aeneid Vergil had shown Iarbus warned by the celebrated personifi-
cation of Fame. With the Iliad and the Alcestis Ovid was undoubt-
edly familiar and on several occasions he was to show his interest in
Vergil's Fame.
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? AGLAUROS AND MERCURY
While using personification, the author of the Iliad thought only
of the action: he introduced Sleep in order that Jupiter might be
lulled opportunely to rest. And for a reader, the effect was the same
in the work of Aeschylus and Euripides. Thus Death appeared
chiefly because Alcestis was going to die. But the Shield of Hercules
had been interested in Darkness of Death for her own sake and had
given a careful description of her hideous appearance. Vergil com-
bined the two methods. He made Fame an agent in the action and
he gave a brilliant portrayal of her character and appearance. But
Ovid carried the process a step further. He not only gave Envy an
essential part in the destruction of Aglauros; and portrayed in full
her hideous appearance and baleful nature; but he intensified the effect
by describing first the region in which Envy found a congenial home.
And from every point of view Ovid excelled all his predecessors by his
vivid and definite detail. Later he was to use the same methods for his
equally famous accounts of Famine (Bk. 8), Sleep (Bk. 11), and
Fame (Bk. 12).
Ovid's tale of Aglauros interested many authors of later times.
Dante, ascending to the Mount of Purgatory, heard warning voices
repeating to the envious, "I was Aglauros who became a rock. "
Chaucer's Troilus invoked Mercury, recalling his love of Herse
For which Pallas was with Aglauros wroth.
In the opera Psyche Moliere and Corneille took from Ovid's Aglauros
both the name and the character of the more envious sister.
The adventure with Envy had an unusually important influence.
In the Romance of the Rose Guillaume Lorris profited by it for his
own description of the character. Spenser, narrating the return of
Sir Artegal, recalled Ovid for a long and splendid description of
Envy. Each poet had the advantage in certain respects. But
Spenser gained much by contrasting the relatively passive Envy with
the aggressive Detraction.
Especially interesting to later poets were the details of Envy's
flight to Athens. Tasso imitated Ovid, when he told how Allecto, on
her way to arouse Soliman, parched the fields and made the sun look
pale. In a Latin poem Milton remembered Envy's grieving at the
sight of prosperous Athens and attributed a like grief to Satan when
he beheld prosperous England. Envy's destructive effect on the coun-
try he imitated with far more grandeur in Paradise Lost, when Sin
and Death
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Their course through thickest constellations held,
Spreading their bane; the blasted stars looked wan,
And planets, planet-struck, real eclipse
Then suffered.
But the influence of Ovid's Envy was not merely direct. During
the Middle Ages personification of abstractions became a very fre-
quent practice. Much of this work may have been the result of
medieval theology. But in the depiction of Envy and the later per-
sonifications of the Metamorphoses Ovid had given examples of extra-
ordinary merit. They were well known and enthusiastically admired
and they could not fail both to encourage personification and to sug-
gest the methods of medieval poets. The practice influenced pro-
foundly the work of Dante and became obvious in the Romance of the
Rose and the early poetry of Chaucer. During the Renaissance the
same tendency became pervasive in the Morality Plays and "the prose
of Bunyan. But the most wonderful of all personifications occurred in
the master work of Spenser and Milton. Both poets showed careful
study of Ovid. They began with an appropriate setting; they de-
picted the character vividly; and they gave it a suitable part in the
action. They excelled Ovid chiefly by associating their personification
with a theme of surpassing beauty and grendeur.
The Flemish painter, Van Baelen, showed Mercury looking down
at Herse and Aglauros in the procession. Turner pictured Mercury
and Herse. Pierre depicted Aglauros.
EUROPA AND JUPITEK
By supposing that Jupiter employed Mercury to drive down
Agenor's herd, Ovid passed from Aglauros to the famous myth of
Europa.
The story had grown up in Crete, where Europa was worshiped as
a goddess. Like the myths of Io and the Cretan Pasiphae, it may have
originated from an early Phoenician worship of deities in the shape of
cattle.
In the Iliad Europa appeared as a daughter of Phoenix who was
loved by Jupiter and became the mother of Minos and Rhadamanthus.
The Catalogues told the story to the following effect: Jupiter saw
Europa and her attendant maidens gathering flowers in a meadow.
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? EUROPA AND JUPITER
Loving her, he appeared in the shape of a bull and breathed from his
mouth a crocus. The flower attracted the princess and subjected her
to a magical influence. She allowed the god to take her on his back
and convey her to Crete. Here Jupiter left her at the court of
Asterion, who afterwards married her and adopted her sons. The
story was retold in lost poems of Eumelus and Bacchylides.
Meanwhile a word "Europe" had entered the Greek language as
a geographical name. It may have originated from an Assyrian
term, ereb, meaning land of the sunset. In the Homeric Hymn to
Apollo the author introduced this new word to designate only the
northern half of Greece. But Pindar and Aeschylus extended the
meaning to include the continent which we recognize today. Thus
far the geographical name "Europe" had been wholly independent of
the abducted princess Europa. But by Alexandrian times the re-
semblance was observed, and, although Europa had gone only to the
outlying island of Crete, she was supposed to have given her name to
the entire continent with which Crete was then associated.
Profiting by this new idea, Moschus retold the myth in an elaborate
and beautiful form. He carefully related the abduction to the future
name of the continent and made it the result of well planned action by
several deities. While telling of the events in the meadow he expanded
the earlier account pleasantly and gave an interesting description of
the bull. The creature cast the spell by licking Europa's neck. As
she was being carried over the sea, Moschus continued, Europa la-
mented her fate, and the bull replied, informing her of his identity and
her illustrious future. This version inspired a treatment by Horace.
But Horace imagined that Europa did not complain until after reach-
ing Crete and that she was reassured by Venus. From Moschus Ovid
may have taken some details for his Fasti, including the idea that
Europa's name suggested the name of the continent.
A different version of the myth had been implied by Herodotus. He
made Europa the daughter of Agenor, king of Sidon, and the sister
of Cadmus, who later founded Thebes. Her brothers, Cadmus and Cilix,
he said, had been sent out to recover her. In the Phcenissce, Euripides
made further changes. Phoenix, he declared, was not Europa's father
but a third brother, and Europa's great-great grandmother was Io.
The Manual repeated this genealogy, adding that the mother of
Europa was Telephassa. It retold the story given in the Catalogues
but said nothing of Jupiter's using magic. Not only the brothers, but
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Telephassa and a youth named Thasus, took part in the quest. This
account Nicander repeated. He may have added that, after Jupiter
brought the princess to Crete, the bull entered heaven as the constella-
tion Taurus. This event Ovid was to use in his Fasti.
In ancient art the myth was exceedingly popular. It appeared in
sculpture, painting, and representations of jewelry and coins.
In the Metamorphoses Ovid assumed that his readers were familiar
with the tale. He began abruptly with the arrival of Jupiter in the
field; gave no account of Europa's attractiveness; and did not even
mention her name. He felt the incongruity of the great god Jupiter's
descending to a clandestine love affair and was amused at his un-
dignified masquerade as a bull. The outline of the tale he took from
the Manual. But the white color and pleasing appearance of the bull
and the yellow sand of the shore he found in works of art. Realizing
the improbability of Europa's trusting herself to an unknown bull,
Ovid tried to make the incident plausible. He took care to show that
the creature was very mild and that Europa was at first a little afraid
and only gradually became so bold as to ride on his back. For the
brief description of the voyage Ovid turned again to a work of art.
A better description he reserved for the tale of Arachne (Bk. 6) and
the Fasti. In the tale of Scylla (Bk. 8) he added that Europa was
the mother of King Minos of Crete.
In later times the story of Europa continued to be very popular.
Many of its details could be gathered from the Fasti and numerous
references in Ovid's other poems; but the Metamorphoses afforded the
most convenient, and during many centuries the only, source of in-
formation for the story as a whole.
Dante, looking down from the constellation of the Twins, beheld
the Earth from Cadiz eastward almost to the shore where Europa
made herself a welcome load. Chaucer referred to the story twice in
his Troilus. Spenser, describing a pageant of the seasons, said of
April
Upon a bull he rode, the same which led
Europa floating through the Argolic floods;
His horns were gilden all with golden studs,
And garnished with garlands goodly dight
Of all the fairest flowers and freshest buds
Which the earth brings forth; and wet he seemed in sight
With waves, through which he waded for his Love's delight.
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? EUROPA AND JUPITER
Shakespeare was impressed chiefly by the undignified metamorphosis
of Jove and often used it as a matter for jest. He referred to it in
The Merry Wives of Windsor, Much Ado About Nothing, and Troilus
and Cressida. But he treated the myth seriously in the following
lines from his Taming of the Shrew
O yes, I saw sweet beauty in her face,
Such as the daughter of Agenor had
That made great Jove to humble him to her hand,
When with his knees he kissed the Cretan strand;
Hawthorne used Ovid's description of the bull and of the stages by
which Europa was persuaded to mount on his back for a delightful
version in The Wonder Book. Landor retold the tale in his poem
Europa and Her Mother. Ovid's myth inspired in part a carefully
finished lyric of Andre Chenier and this in turn suggested the Europa
of Victor Hugo.
In modern art the myth was a favorite theme. Filarete sculptured
Europa riding on the bull for a door panel of St. Peter's. The story
was treated in various ways by the painters Riccio, Albani, Titian,
Van Baelen, Van Poelenburgh, Le Clerc, Claude Lorrain, and Genelli.
It suggested two pictures by Guido Reni and two of Moreau. It in-
spired masterpieces of Paolo Veronese and Rubens, and Boucher de-
picted it in one of six glorious tapestries entitled The Loves of the
Gods.
For the Second Book Ovid used many tales which were old and
often treated in Greek literature. But he combined them with others
which were of purely Alexandrian origin. Although seldom men-
tioned by Roman authors, the stories were often familiar to Ovid's
contemporaries and allowed him to take much for granted. In every
tale he followed an Alexandrian version. The Manual helped him
occasionally; but his chief source was Nicander.
In the treatment of his material, much adjustment was necessary.
Although Ovid found a number of tales combined by Nicander, many
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
others were quite unrelated. Ovid needed often to supply the con-
nection, to arrange the stories in order of time, and to beware of in-
consistency with other parts of his work. In almost every case he had
to avoid duplication of material which he was to use for the Fasti.
The story as told by Ovid's predecessor was often brief and dry: Ovid
had to animate the characters; reveal the motive; and describe the
scene. When possible he borrowed from other great poets--the Iliad,
Euripides, Callimachus, and Vergil and often he profited by ancient
works of art. But even while borrowing he frequently improved what
he took and quite as often he relied on his own invention.
Although some stories were hardly noticed by later times, the book
as a whole had an important effect. It influenced authors such as
Andre Chenier and Blackmore, who seem otherwise to have ignored
Ovid entirely. Many tales interested Dante and Shakespeare and
some affected markedly the work of Chaucer, Spenser, Corneille, and
Milton. Addison translated the entire book. Macaulay pronounced
it by far the best in the poem.
Modern painters showed special fondness for the Second Book and
created from it a number of masterpieces.
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? BOOK THREE
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the House of Busyrane Spenser mentioned a painting of Apollo's
grief for Coronis and added that she became a sweet briar.
The tale of Erichthonius inspired a painting of Piombo and two
important works of Rubens.
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? OCYRHOE AND AESCULAPIUS
OCYEHOE AND AESCULAPIUS
From the death of Coronis, Ovid could pass naturally to the care
of her son by the centaur Chiron and the strange transformation of
Chiron's daughter. This event Euripides had recorded in his
Melanippe the Wise. Although the centaur was only half human in
form, he said, his daughter Ocyrhoe was at first entirely human. From
her father she inherited the gift of prophecy. But so incautiously did
she use her power that Jupiter transformed her to a mare. Nicander
seems to have repeated the tale and made it available for Ovid.
The myth of Ocyrhoe was in itself appropriate and picturesque.
But to Ovid it offered a further advantage. Both Aesculapius, child
of Apollo and Coronis, and Chiron, his foster father, had become well
known mythological characters and had taken a leading part in re-
markable events. Ovid was anxious to include their adventures in his
poem. But he did not think it wise to recount them at length. He
was glad, therefore, to present them as foreshadowed vaguely in the
prophecy of Ocyrhoe. It will be of interest to suggest both the nature
of these events and the cause of Ovid's reticence.
Aesculapius was in prehistoric times a local god of healing, wor-
shiped in southern Thessaly, and related with savage beliefs about the
snake. Many early people imagined that the snake was gifted with
unusual cunning, that he understood the principles of medicine, and
that he had learned by casting his skin to renew his youth and be-
come immortal. Accordingly the serpent was often associated with a
god of healing. The Egyptians associated him with Isis, as Ovid was
to imply later in the tale of Ianthe (Bk. 9), and the Thessalians
related him frequently to Aesculapius. They believed that the god
himself was apt to appear in serpent form. A tradition of this kind
Ovid himself was to repeat, when he told how the Romans brought the
god from Epidaurus in the form of a great crested snake (Bk. 15).
In time the Thessalians came to prefer Apollo, a god of healing in
human form. They then regarded Aesculapius as his son and a mortal
who became a celebrated physician. The Iliad mentioned this belief,
and the Homeric Hymn to Aesculapius made him the child of Apollo
and Coronis. In the Catalogues we hear first of his dying by a
thunderbolt from Jupiter.
Pindar told the story in some detail. Aesculapius, he said, was
reared by Chiron. He grew famous for healing all manner of sickness.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
At length a splendid offer of gold tempted him to revive even a dead
man. But this was usurping a power allowed only to the gods, and
Jupiter destroyed both the physician and his patient. Pindar's ac-
count was not the usual tradition.
Ordinarily we hear that Aesculapius perished, but the resurrected
man continued living. To this Aeschylus alluded ruefully in his
Agamemnon and Euripides in his Alcestis. Later authors wished to
identify the revived man quite variously. In the Aeneid Vergil de-
clared that the physician acted at the request of Diana and restored
the life of her favorite, Hippolytus--a version which Ovid was glad
to use later in his myth of Egeria (Bk. 15).
Still another tradition recorded that, although Jupiter at first pun-
ished Aesculapius with death, he afterwards consoled Apollo by giving
the physician immortality as the constellation of the Serpent Holder
(Ophiuchus). This tradition Ovid followed in the prophecy of
Ocyrhoe. But he was unconventional in important details: he declared
that Aesculapius was not a mortal but a god and that to restore the
dead would have been his privilege, if the power had not been abused.
To the metamorphosis as the Serpent Holder, Ovid made only a vague
allusion. He was to need this event later in his Fasti.
Chiron was a centaur but unlike either Nessus (Bk. 9) or the troop
which battled with the Lapithae (Bk. 12). By nature he was intelli-
gent and humane. He lived on Mt. Pelion, in southern Thessaly, a
district rich in medicinal herbs, and since the Iliad he had been famed
as the teacher of Achilles. The Theogony had made him child of the
sea nymph Philyra. Apollonius and Vergil added that his father was
Saturn, who had taken the form of a magnificent horse, and this
Ovid himself was to mention in the tale of Arachne (Bk. 6).
Following the usual practice of ancient myth, Chiron should have
been mortal, and according to one tradition this was the case.
Eratosthenes declared that while showing Achilles trophies which
Hercules had left, Chiron dropped an arrow poisoned with the venom
of the hydra. The point struck Chiron's foot; he died and entered
heaven as the constellation of the Centaur. This Ovid was to tell in
the Fasti.
A more famous version of the story had been alluded to as early as
The Shield of Hercules. Aeschylus told it at some length in his
Prometheus Unbound. Chiron, he said, was born immortal. During
the battle of the Centaurs and the Lapithae, he was present and acci-
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? BATTUS AND MERCURY
dently was wounded by one of the poisoned arrows of Hercules. The
wound proved incurable and gave him intolerable pain. He persuaded
the gods to make him mortal and grant him escape by death. This
story gave Ovid a different metamorphosis from the one which he was
to use in the Fasti. But he could not introduce it conveniently in his
battle of the Centaurs. He was glad, therefore, to include it in the
prophecy of Ocyrhoe. Euripides and others had shown Chiron himself
able to foretell coming events. But Ovid found it expedient to imply
the contrary.
Battus and Mercury
In parts of India men have imagined a divine patron of thieves.
This office the ancient Greeks accorded to Mercury. They reported
that he had been able to steal cattle even from the god Apollo. This
event Ovid told in his story of Battus. The idea that Mercury was a
patron of thieves he was to use again for the tale of Daedalion
(Bk. 11).
Before Ovid's time, the story of the theft had been treated in four
quite different ways. In the Homeric Hymn to Mercury, Apollo
seems to have been caring voluntarily for a herd which belonged to the
gods. Finding these cattle in the extreme north of Greece, Mercury
drove fifty of them southward past Onchestus in the central part of
the country. He noticed that an old man tending vines had observed
him and he offered the old man a rich harvest, if he would be silent.
Continuing southward to Arcadia, Mercury hid the stolen cattle near
the river Alpheus. Meanwhile Apollo had been following the trail.
He, too, observed the old man. Questioned by Apollo, the old man
promptly told all that he knew. This version appears later to have
inspired Alcaeus and Horace.
The Catalogues gave a quite different story. They declared that
Apollo tended cattle as a punishment and that the herd did not belong
to the gods. According to the Catalogues, the tending of cattle was
a sequel to Jupiter's destroying Aesculapius. Angered at the death
of his son, Apollo killed the Cyclopes, who had made the bolt. Jupiter
exiled him from Olympus and required him to spend a certain time
as herdsman of a mortal. In a charming satyr drama, The Trackers,
Sophocles added that the mortal was Admetus, king of southern
Thessaly, and that Mercury stole cattle from him. Euripides in the
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Alcestis alluded to the same story, and the Manual retold it in some
detail. Nothing was said of the old informer.
Callimachus offered a still different version. With the Homeric
Hymn he declared that Apollo tended cattle voluntarily, and with the
Catalogues he agreed that Apollo became herdsman of Admetus. But
he differed from both in regard to Apollo's motive. The god, he said,
undertook this humble labor because of his affection for the young
Admetus. Rhianus altered the new account in two particulars.
Apollo, he said, was swayed by love of Hymenaeus, a great grandson
of Athamas (cf. Bk. 4), and in order to be near him gathered a herd
of his own. These poets, too, ignored the incident of the old informer.
Nicander gave a fourth version. He agreed with Rhianus that
Apollo became a herdsman for the sake of Hymenaeus and that Apollo's
preoccupation with the lad gave Mercury a chance to drive off his
cattle. But he proceeded from this to the adventure with the informer,
improving the tale in several ways. The old man's name, he said, was
Battus. Instead of offering a good harvest, Mercury gave the more
tangible bribe of some money. But, fearing treachery, the god re-
turned later in a different guise and himself questioned the old man.
By offering a robe, he soon got the desired information. Mercury then
hit Battus with a staff and turned him into a rock which always con-
tains both fire and frost. This account Ovid mentioned in his Ibis.
In the Metamorphoses Ovid associated the tale of Battus with that
of Ocyrhoe. Apollo, he said, was unable to help Chiron during the
transformation of his daughter, because he was absent, tending cattle.
Ovid followed the outline of Nicander's version, making a number of
improvements. Since Hymenasus belonged to a later time, Ovid merely
said that Apollo became a pastoral lover. Nicander had shown the
god tending cattle in southern Thessaly; but this would have taken
him only a few miles from the residence of Chiron and would make it
appear that he was still accessible. Ovid supposed that Apollo had
gone rather to the far southwest of Greece and, to make the locality
clearer, he named the fields of Pylos. This country both the Iliad
and the Odyssey had rendered famous as the home of Nestor. To the
same distant region Ovid transferred Battus and made him a herds-
man of Nestor's father, Neleus. In the Homeric Hymn Mercury
drove the stolen cattle the entire length of Greece, and in the other
versions he drove them at least half that distance. This allowed the
poet to amuse his Greek readers by mentioning a number of places
I
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? AGLAUROS AND MERCURY
along the way, and alluding to their well known peculiarities. But
for Ovid's readers it would have seemed both extravagant and tedious.
Ovid imagined instead that Mercury drove the cattle only from Pylos
to the foot of some nearby mountains.
Nicander had meant to show Battus ready to break his agreement
as soon as he was offered a larger bribe. But the difference in value
was not obvious between a sum of money and a robe. Ovid made the
first bribe a cow and the second a cow and a bull besides. Such
bribes were also more likely to be offered by a stealer of cattle. Ovid
enlivened the tale with dialogue. And he closed wittily with the remark
that Battus was still known as index, which to the Romans meant both
informer and flint.
Ovid's myth suggested an interesting passage to Petrarch. In a
vision Laura appeared to her lover disguised so that he did not recog-
nize her and thus beguiled him into an avowal of his presumptuous
affection. Then, resuming his usual appearance, she punished him
with transformation to a rock.
Ovid inspired also a painting by Claude Lorrain.
Aglauros and Mercury
In the tale of Aglauros and Mercury, Ovid gave the sequel to the
story which the crow had told of Erichthonius and the three daugh-
ters of Cecrops (see Coronis). In Ovid's version, Aglauros alone had
disobeyed Athena. He now told how she offended further and incurred
a memorable punishment.
In a tradition recorded by the Manual, Herse, a sister of Aglauros,
was loved by Mercury and became the mother of the hero Cephalus.
With this tradition Nicander related the punishment . of Aglauros.
Not content with disobeying Athena, he said, she interfered between
Mercury and Herse and would not allow the god to approach her
sister until he bribed her with a large sum of gold. Incensed at this
new evidence of her presumption, Athena cursed Aglauros with envy
of her sister's good fortune. Aglauros then tried to prevent Mercury
from entering at all; but he changed her into stone. Ovid followed
Nicander's myth, with some important changes for the better. But he
avoided all reference to Cephalus, whom he was to introduce with
a different parentage and much later (Bk. 7).
The preceding tale of Battus was very much like the tale of
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? >> METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Aglaitros in its theme. Both showed a person guilty of unusual
effrontery turned into stone. Under these circumstances Ovid would
ordinarily have sought variety by keeping the two stories far apart.
But in this case he gained the same end by a remarkable contrast in
the treatment. The tale of Battus he told simply and briefly with
the mere suggestion that the man became shapeless rock. The story
of Aglauros he told with brilliant simile, elaborate incident, and de-
tailed metamorphosis of the girl into a livid statue. Never did he
show more skill or obtain a happier effect.
After a striking account of Mercury soaring above Athens and
gazing enamored at Herse, the leader of a festival, Ovid showed the
god preparing to visit her, according to the style of a Roman gallant.
By having Mercury approach in a courteous and dignified manner, he
emphasized the churlishness of Aglauros. He was careful also to
make clear the nature of her accumulated offense.
Before mentioning
Athena's journey to the forbidding home of Envy, Ovid described the
goddess appropriately in her older character of a warrior maid.
He then proceeded to improve Nicander's myth by this justly
famous adventure. And thus he found opportunity to excel all
predecessors in the art of personifying an abstract idea. In the Hymn
to Apollo Callimachus had spoken of a personified Envy. From him
Ovid may have taken the initial suggestion. But when he pictured
Athena travelling to summon the baleful spirit of Envy, he profited by
far more illustrious example. The Iliad had often referred incidentally
to personified abstractions, a practice followed by many subsequent
authors of narrative poetry. And sometimes it had given such char-
acters an important part in the action. Sleep cooperated at length in
Juno's plan for diverting the attention of Jove and announced her
success to Neptune. And later Sleep and Death bore home to Lycia
the body of great Sarpedon. The Shield of Hercules gave prominence
to a monster called Darkness of Death. Aeschylus introduced such
characters into tragedy. He showed Strength not only dragging
Prometheus to the place of torture but exhorting Vulcan in a dialogue
of some length. Euripides assigned an important role to Death in
his Alcestis and to Madness in his Hercules Furens. And in the
Aeneid Vergil had shown Iarbus warned by the celebrated personifi-
cation of Fame. With the Iliad and the Alcestis Ovid was undoubt-
edly familiar and on several occasions he was to show his interest in
Vergil's Fame.
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? AGLAUROS AND MERCURY
While using personification, the author of the Iliad thought only
of the action: he introduced Sleep in order that Jupiter might be
lulled opportunely to rest. And for a reader, the effect was the same
in the work of Aeschylus and Euripides. Thus Death appeared
chiefly because Alcestis was going to die. But the Shield of Hercules
had been interested in Darkness of Death for her own sake and had
given a careful description of her hideous appearance. Vergil com-
bined the two methods. He made Fame an agent in the action and
he gave a brilliant portrayal of her character and appearance. But
Ovid carried the process a step further. He not only gave Envy an
essential part in the destruction of Aglauros; and portrayed in full
her hideous appearance and baleful nature; but he intensified the effect
by describing first the region in which Envy found a congenial home.
And from every point of view Ovid excelled all his predecessors by his
vivid and definite detail. Later he was to use the same methods for his
equally famous accounts of Famine (Bk. 8), Sleep (Bk. 11), and
Fame (Bk. 12).
Ovid's tale of Aglauros interested many authors of later times.
Dante, ascending to the Mount of Purgatory, heard warning voices
repeating to the envious, "I was Aglauros who became a rock. "
Chaucer's Troilus invoked Mercury, recalling his love of Herse
For which Pallas was with Aglauros wroth.
In the opera Psyche Moliere and Corneille took from Ovid's Aglauros
both the name and the character of the more envious sister.
The adventure with Envy had an unusually important influence.
In the Romance of the Rose Guillaume Lorris profited by it for his
own description of the character. Spenser, narrating the return of
Sir Artegal, recalled Ovid for a long and splendid description of
Envy. Each poet had the advantage in certain respects. But
Spenser gained much by contrasting the relatively passive Envy with
the aggressive Detraction.
Especially interesting to later poets were the details of Envy's
flight to Athens. Tasso imitated Ovid, when he told how Allecto, on
her way to arouse Soliman, parched the fields and made the sun look
pale. In a Latin poem Milton remembered Envy's grieving at the
sight of prosperous Athens and attributed a like grief to Satan when
he beheld prosperous England. Envy's destructive effect on the coun-
try he imitated with far more grandeur in Paradise Lost, when Sin
and Death
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Their course through thickest constellations held,
Spreading their bane; the blasted stars looked wan,
And planets, planet-struck, real eclipse
Then suffered.
But the influence of Ovid's Envy was not merely direct. During
the Middle Ages personification of abstractions became a very fre-
quent practice. Much of this work may have been the result of
medieval theology. But in the depiction of Envy and the later per-
sonifications of the Metamorphoses Ovid had given examples of extra-
ordinary merit. They were well known and enthusiastically admired
and they could not fail both to encourage personification and to sug-
gest the methods of medieval poets. The practice influenced pro-
foundly the work of Dante and became obvious in the Romance of the
Rose and the early poetry of Chaucer. During the Renaissance the
same tendency became pervasive in the Morality Plays and "the prose
of Bunyan. But the most wonderful of all personifications occurred in
the master work of Spenser and Milton. Both poets showed careful
study of Ovid. They began with an appropriate setting; they de-
picted the character vividly; and they gave it a suitable part in the
action. They excelled Ovid chiefly by associating their personification
with a theme of surpassing beauty and grendeur.
The Flemish painter, Van Baelen, showed Mercury looking down
at Herse and Aglauros in the procession. Turner pictured Mercury
and Herse. Pierre depicted Aglauros.
EUROPA AND JUPITEK
By supposing that Jupiter employed Mercury to drive down
Agenor's herd, Ovid passed from Aglauros to the famous myth of
Europa.
The story had grown up in Crete, where Europa was worshiped as
a goddess. Like the myths of Io and the Cretan Pasiphae, it may have
originated from an early Phoenician worship of deities in the shape of
cattle.
In the Iliad Europa appeared as a daughter of Phoenix who was
loved by Jupiter and became the mother of Minos and Rhadamanthus.
The Catalogues told the story to the following effect: Jupiter saw
Europa and her attendant maidens gathering flowers in a meadow.
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? EUROPA AND JUPITER
Loving her, he appeared in the shape of a bull and breathed from his
mouth a crocus. The flower attracted the princess and subjected her
to a magical influence. She allowed the god to take her on his back
and convey her to Crete. Here Jupiter left her at the court of
Asterion, who afterwards married her and adopted her sons. The
story was retold in lost poems of Eumelus and Bacchylides.
Meanwhile a word "Europe" had entered the Greek language as
a geographical name. It may have originated from an Assyrian
term, ereb, meaning land of the sunset. In the Homeric Hymn to
Apollo the author introduced this new word to designate only the
northern half of Greece. But Pindar and Aeschylus extended the
meaning to include the continent which we recognize today. Thus
far the geographical name "Europe" had been wholly independent of
the abducted princess Europa. But by Alexandrian times the re-
semblance was observed, and, although Europa had gone only to the
outlying island of Crete, she was supposed to have given her name to
the entire continent with which Crete was then associated.
Profiting by this new idea, Moschus retold the myth in an elaborate
and beautiful form. He carefully related the abduction to the future
name of the continent and made it the result of well planned action by
several deities. While telling of the events in the meadow he expanded
the earlier account pleasantly and gave an interesting description of
the bull. The creature cast the spell by licking Europa's neck. As
she was being carried over the sea, Moschus continued, Europa la-
mented her fate, and the bull replied, informing her of his identity and
her illustrious future. This version inspired a treatment by Horace.
But Horace imagined that Europa did not complain until after reach-
ing Crete and that she was reassured by Venus. From Moschus Ovid
may have taken some details for his Fasti, including the idea that
Europa's name suggested the name of the continent.
A different version of the myth had been implied by Herodotus. He
made Europa the daughter of Agenor, king of Sidon, and the sister
of Cadmus, who later founded Thebes. Her brothers, Cadmus and Cilix,
he said, had been sent out to recover her. In the Phcenissce, Euripides
made further changes. Phoenix, he declared, was not Europa's father
but a third brother, and Europa's great-great grandmother was Io.
The Manual repeated this genealogy, adding that the mother of
Europa was Telephassa. It retold the story given in the Catalogues
but said nothing of Jupiter's using magic. Not only the brothers, but
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
Telephassa and a youth named Thasus, took part in the quest. This
account Nicander repeated. He may have added that, after Jupiter
brought the princess to Crete, the bull entered heaven as the constella-
tion Taurus. This event Ovid was to use in his Fasti.
In ancient art the myth was exceedingly popular. It appeared in
sculpture, painting, and representations of jewelry and coins.
In the Metamorphoses Ovid assumed that his readers were familiar
with the tale. He began abruptly with the arrival of Jupiter in the
field; gave no account of Europa's attractiveness; and did not even
mention her name. He felt the incongruity of the great god Jupiter's
descending to a clandestine love affair and was amused at his un-
dignified masquerade as a bull. The outline of the tale he took from
the Manual. But the white color and pleasing appearance of the bull
and the yellow sand of the shore he found in works of art. Realizing
the improbability of Europa's trusting herself to an unknown bull,
Ovid tried to make the incident plausible. He took care to show that
the creature was very mild and that Europa was at first a little afraid
and only gradually became so bold as to ride on his back. For the
brief description of the voyage Ovid turned again to a work of art.
A better description he reserved for the tale of Arachne (Bk. 6) and
the Fasti. In the tale of Scylla (Bk. 8) he added that Europa was
the mother of King Minos of Crete.
In later times the story of Europa continued to be very popular.
Many of its details could be gathered from the Fasti and numerous
references in Ovid's other poems; but the Metamorphoses afforded the
most convenient, and during many centuries the only, source of in-
formation for the story as a whole.
Dante, looking down from the constellation of the Twins, beheld
the Earth from Cadiz eastward almost to the shore where Europa
made herself a welcome load. Chaucer referred to the story twice in
his Troilus. Spenser, describing a pageant of the seasons, said of
April
Upon a bull he rode, the same which led
Europa floating through the Argolic floods;
His horns were gilden all with golden studs,
And garnished with garlands goodly dight
Of all the fairest flowers and freshest buds
Which the earth brings forth; and wet he seemed in sight
With waves, through which he waded for his Love's delight.
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? EUROPA AND JUPITER
Shakespeare was impressed chiefly by the undignified metamorphosis
of Jove and often used it as a matter for jest. He referred to it in
The Merry Wives of Windsor, Much Ado About Nothing, and Troilus
and Cressida. But he treated the myth seriously in the following
lines from his Taming of the Shrew
O yes, I saw sweet beauty in her face,
Such as the daughter of Agenor had
That made great Jove to humble him to her hand,
When with his knees he kissed the Cretan strand;
Hawthorne used Ovid's description of the bull and of the stages by
which Europa was persuaded to mount on his back for a delightful
version in The Wonder Book. Landor retold the tale in his poem
Europa and Her Mother. Ovid's myth inspired in part a carefully
finished lyric of Andre Chenier and this in turn suggested the Europa
of Victor Hugo.
In modern art the myth was a favorite theme. Filarete sculptured
Europa riding on the bull for a door panel of St. Peter's. The story
was treated in various ways by the painters Riccio, Albani, Titian,
Van Baelen, Van Poelenburgh, Le Clerc, Claude Lorrain, and Genelli.
It suggested two pictures by Guido Reni and two of Moreau. It in-
spired masterpieces of Paolo Veronese and Rubens, and Boucher de-
picted it in one of six glorious tapestries entitled The Loves of the
Gods.
For the Second Book Ovid used many tales which were old and
often treated in Greek literature. But he combined them with others
which were of purely Alexandrian origin. Although seldom men-
tioned by Roman authors, the stories were often familiar to Ovid's
contemporaries and allowed him to take much for granted. In every
tale he followed an Alexandrian version. The Manual helped him
occasionally; but his chief source was Nicander.
In the treatment of his material, much adjustment was necessary.
Although Ovid found a number of tales combined by Nicander, many
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK II
others were quite unrelated. Ovid needed often to supply the con-
nection, to arrange the stories in order of time, and to beware of in-
consistency with other parts of his work. In almost every case he had
to avoid duplication of material which he was to use for the Fasti.
The story as told by Ovid's predecessor was often brief and dry: Ovid
had to animate the characters; reveal the motive; and describe the
scene. When possible he borrowed from other great poets--the Iliad,
Euripides, Callimachus, and Vergil and often he profited by ancient
works of art. But even while borrowing he frequently improved what
he took and quite as often he relied on his own invention.
Although some stories were hardly noticed by later times, the book
as a whole had an important effect. It influenced authors such as
Andre Chenier and Blackmore, who seem otherwise to have ignored
Ovid entirely. Many tales interested Dante and Shakespeare and
some affected markedly the work of Chaucer, Spenser, Corneille, and
Milton. Addison translated the entire book. Macaulay pronounced
it by far the best in the poem.
Modern painters showed special fondness for the Second Book and
created from it a number of masterpieces.
UO
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? BOOK THREE
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