No More Learning

Callimachus in his Hymn to Delos discussed the dependence of nymphs
on their oak trees. And Ovid in the Fasti repeated a tradition that
Cybele destroyed a certain hamadryad by cutting down her tree.
Apollonius told a more elaborate story of this kind. The father of
a certain Paraebius, he said, was felling trees on a mountain of Thrace.
He came to an oak inhabited by a dryad. She wept and besought him to
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK EIGHT
spare the tree on which she had relied through all the years of her long
life. He disregarded her plea, and before dying she punished him with a
curse. As a result of it, both the offender and his children had to toil for
their living, and they continually toiled harder and fared worse. At last
the seer Phineus taught Paraebius how to obtain relief by due prayer
and sacrifice. Ovid decided to bring a similar incident into the tale of
Erysichthon. He imagined the presence of a dryad whose life should end
with the fall of the sacred tree, and he planned to have her lay a similar
curse on her destroyer.
But he decided to enhance the effect with still another idea. In many
countries men have thought that a spirit inhabiting a tree is so nearly
identical with it that, if the tree should be cut or broken, the injured
place would bleed. In the Aeneid, Vergil used the idea with striking effect.
The spirit of Polydorus had entered into a thicket of cornels and myrtles
that sprouted on his grave. When Aeneas began pulling up the stems,
blood dripped from the torn roots and bark. When he cautiously per-
sisted, Polydorus groaned beneath the earth, protested, and told Aeneas
who it was. Ovid planned to imitate the incident, adding further detail.
As Erysichthon raised the axe to strike, the great oak trembled
and groaned. Pallor spread through its leaves and all the length of its
branches. As the steel cut into the trunk, blood gushed forth, as freely
as if a priest had cut through the neck of a huge sacrificial bull. All the
attendants were aghast. One of them even ventured to interfere. Ery-
sichthon scornfully cut off his head. Then, as the impious man struck
repeated blows, the dryad spoke within the tree, declaring herself a
nymph loved by Ceres and warning him that vengeance was to follow her
death. Still he persisted in the crime. If Erysichthon intended to fell an
oak of such dimensions -- seven feet in diameter, he probably would have
done some preliminary work with the axe and then called for a saw. It
seems unlikely that he would have attempted to cut down the tree with an
axe and incredible that he could have finished the task in a single period
of work. But Ovid assumed the contrary. Weakened by persistent cut-
ting and pulled by the ropes, the tree crashed down, overwhelming a
wide stretch of the surrounding grove.
Ovid imagined that during these tragic events Ceres was absent and
unaware of the sacrilege. He implied later that she was in some other
part of Thessaly. The dryads, clad in mourning, went to her and prayed
for redress. In the tale of Lycaon (Bk. 1), Ovid had spoken of Jupiter
as moving earth and sky when he shook his head. He now observed that
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? ERYSICHTHON
Ceres, when she nodded, shook the fields of yellow grain. Following tra-
dition, he wisely omitted the idea of her receiving aid from Bacchus. Cal-
limachus had noted that she reduced Erysichthon to a pitiable condition.
Ovid declared that his condition would have been such, if his crime had
not excluded pity.
The Theogony had personified Famine as a daughter of Strife, and
Vergil spoke of her as one of the shades guarding the entrance to Hades.
Ovid saw a chance to personify Famine and make her the avenger em-
ployed by Ceres. But he imagined her as residing on earth and, drawing
on his previous description of Athena employing Envy (Bk. 2), he gave
a remarkable account of her. Athena had been so opposite to Envy that
she could not enter her abode. For a similar reason Ceres could not visit
even the country of Famine.
Calling a mountain nymph, she gave her instructions about the
journey. Envy had breathed into Aglauros, infecting her vitals. Famine
was to do the same with Erysichthon and to overcome the utmost power
of Ceres to feed him. Ovid had not given Envy a definite locality. But
he showed Ceres describing the country of Famine as the remotest part
of icy Scythia. For this long journey Ceres lent the nymph the same
dragon car that she formerly had provided for Triptolemus (Bk. 5).
Proceeding northeastwards to the region of the Caucasus Moun-
tains, the nymph left her car on a frozen peak and continued the search
on foot. She discovered Famine in a stony field, plucking scanty herbs
with her nails and teeth. Apparently Famine was naked and showed in
detail her hideous and emaciated condition. Ovid described it impres-
sively. Probably for this reason he afterwards gave no details about the
similar wasting of Erysichthon. Athena had found Envy so repulsive
that she delivered her message and departed as soon as possible. Ovid
recorded a similar experience of the nymph, adding that she did not
venture even to approach the monster. Nevertheless, she departed with
feelings of hunger. Although Famine was by nature contrary to Ceres,
she carried out her instructions. Like Envy, she travelled through the
air and arrived by night in the chamber of her victim. Since Ovid had
pictured Envy's baleful effect as she passed through the intervening
country, he did not describe the journey of Famine.
The Iliad had personified Sleep and had spoken of him as able to
journey through the air. Greek artists added that he had wings, and
Alexandrian authors followed their example. Ovid spoke of him as hov-
ering on peaceful wings and soothing the impious Erysichthon. But the
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK EIGHT
visitation of Famine was having its effect. The sleeping man dreamed of
feasts and wearied his jaws with champing empty air. Awaking he
burned with hunger.
Ovid described his banquets only in general terms and gave a strong
impression of their immensity. Whatever sea, land, or air produces
Erysichthon demanded. With loaded tables before him, he complained
of hunger. What would have been enough to feed cities or a whole nation
was not enough for him. The more he devoured the more he wanted.
Callimachus had said that it was as if the food had gone into the sea,
and tradition had given Erysichthon the name Consuming Fire. Ovid
improved both ideas. Erysichthon was like the sea, that swallows up all
rivers of the world and is not filled, or like fire, that devours all the fuel
it receives and, as it is given more, becomes ever more greedy. For him
any food was only an occasion for more food, and always he became
empty by eating. This time Ovid's witty paradoxes seemed happily to
bring out the point. The reader was not supposed to feel sympathy or
to be stirred by any tragic emotion. He needed only to appreciate the
man's incredible predicament.
Although all the wealth of Erysichthon was exhausted, Famine still
raged in his vitals. There remained only the princess, his daughter. Im-
pressed by his predecessor's account of her filial devotion, Ovid called
her worthy of a better father. The king sold her to a life of slavery and
dishonor. He descended even to an expedient so cynical and without
shame -- the nadir of his wickedness. Ovid suggested this idea, although
he did not give it emphasis.
To indicate the father's wickedness more clearly, Ovid altered the
previous account of Hypermnestra. When her father sold her, he im-
plied, she had no means of escape. Although Neptune had ravished her,
he had still to offer any compensation. Recoiling from the thought of
slavery, she fled along the sea shore and prayed Neptune for deliverance.
By the new version, Ovid not only improved the story but also made it
differ from his later account of Caenis (Bk. 12). Remembering that in
one of Hypermnestra's transformations she became a man, Ovid ob-
served that Neptune responded by transforming her into a fisherman.
He noted that her master had been pursuing her along the shore and
from a distance had seen her as she stood with dishevelled hair appealing
to Neptune. Apparently Ovid thought of the shore as curving in such a
way that, when the master came nearer, it turned landwards and hid the
girl from view. The man pushed on, expecting either to see her again or
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? ERYSICHTHON
to trace her by footprints in the wet sand. To his surprise he discovered
only the fisherman occupying an untrodden shore. Ovid invented a hu-
morous dialogue, in which the girl, well pleased to be questioned about
herself, denied seeing anyone else in that vicinity. Her master gave up
the pursuit, Ovid continued, and did not even seek redress from her
father. This was in accord with tradition, but was improbable under the
circumstances which Ovid had given. The girl received her original form
again. Her father took advantage of her ability by selling her repeat-
edly, and she escaped by assuming successively the forms of many dif-
ferent animals.
Wishing to speak later about Autolycus and his power of retaining
what he took (Bk. 11), Ovid thought it unwise to tell of his keeping
Hypermnestra. It also was unnecessary. Tradition had insisted that no
provisions would be enough to relieve the hunger of her father. Inevit-
ably his condition would become desperate. Ovid observed that it did.
In the Georgics Vergil had told how the horse dying of plague at last
tore his own flesh with greedy teeth. This, said Ovid, was the final resort
of Erysichthon. He began to tear his flesh with greedy teeth and fed
himself by consuming his own body.
Eliminating such normal human traits as appeared in the version of
Callimachus, Ovid had made his chief character a veritable ogre. But he
obtained a clear and single effect. And he enhanced it by introducing
new elements of great interest. His version of the tale was by far the
most impressive.
Authors of later times often recalled Ovid's work. Many of them
were interested in the destruction of the sacred tree. Lucan attributed
similar conduct to Julius Caesar. When the soldiers hesitated to cut
down a sacred grove, Caesar himself took an axe and struck at an airy
oak. Lucan added, however, that gods have to reserve their anger for
the unfortunate and that Caesar destroyed the grove with impunity.
Tasso imitated Ovid in more detail. As the hero Tancred made his way
through an enchanted forest, he came to a great cypress on which there
was inscribed a warning to spare the tree. He struck the trunk with his
sword, and blood gushed from the severed bark. He struck again, in-
tending to fell the tree. Then a voice within the trunk declared the
cypress was his loved Clorinda.
Dante in his account of the Suicides' Wood and Ariosto in the epi-
sode of Alcina's isle told of trees which bled and protested against injury.
Both poets evidently recalled Vergil's account of Polydorus, but they
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK EIGHT
seem to have adopted Ovid's idea that words of protest came directly
from the tree. To Shakespeare Ovid's incident of the attendant who
interrupted Erysichthon's crime may have suggested that remarkable
incident in King Lear of the servant who interrupted Cornwall's abuse of
Gloster.
A few authors recalled the latter part of Ovid's tale. Seneca in his
Hercules Furens appears to have remembered it, when he spoke of Fam-
ine as having a sad appearance and foul jaws. To Dante, Ovid's Famine
suggested his description of gluttons famished on the mount of Purga-
tory. But Dante likened them to the emaciated Erysichthon just before
he began to devour himself. To Milton this final incident suggested the
lines in Comus, describing Evil, when,
settled to itself
It shall be in eternal restless change,
Self-fed and self-consumed.
Ovid showed Acheloiis mentioning himself as his third example of
power to assume varied forms. According to older Greek tradition their
number seems to have been unlimited. But Sophocles in the Trachinian
Women had mentioned only three -- the god's usual form of a man with
bull horns on his forehead, and those of a serpent and a bull. Ovid,
anxious to make each of his examples differ from the rest, imagined that
Acheloiis was limited to these three. All of them often have been at-
tributed to water spirits, in the lore of many countries. Acheloiis now
had lost one of his bull horns, as Theseus could see. The god's lament at
this misfortune gave Ovid occasion for the initial story of his next book.
The Eighth Book included only ten stories, a number that is re-
markably small. Of the six which Ovid made important, five were of
early origin. Greek authors and artists often had treated three of these
-- the stories of the Minotaur and Ariadne, of Icarus, and of Meleager.
Greek authors of the Alexandrian era had been fond of the tale of
Erysichthon. And, although the story of Philemon and Baucis was of
late origin and little known, it belonged to a class of tales which long
had been exceedingly popular. In almost all the chief stories Greek
predecessors had provided Ovid with an abundance of material, from
which it was his problem to select and improve the best. Of the four lesser
tales in the Eighth Book, the story of Proteus was old and familiar; the
other three were of Alexandrian origin and were virtually unknown.
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? BOOK EIGHT
Roman authors before Ovid's time had shown interest only in the
three tales of Scylla, the Minotaur and Ariadne, and Proteus. It was
Ovid who made the others easily accessible to his countrymen. Roman
authors after Ovid's time took little notice of any story treated in the
Eighth Book. With the fall of Rome, Greek versions of the material were
lost to view, and Vergil's treatments of the tales of Scylla and Proteus
became almost unknown.
It was Ovid who preserved nine of the ten stories
for medieval times. He gave the tales of Icarus, Meleager, and Erysich-
thon their fame. And three others, including the celebrated tale of Phile-
mon and Baucis, he saved from oblivion.
In developing the tale of Meleager, Ovid owed much to the Iliad and
Euripides and to the boar hunt of the Odyssey. He used the Odyssey
again for his account of Proteus. For the other tales he was content
with more recent material. In the earlier half of the book the Manual
provided his background and usually the outline of the story. Both in
the earlier and the later half, Callimachus was more important than at
any time since Book Five. For the tales of Icarus and Perdix he was
Ovid's chief authority, and he contributed much to the tales of Philemon
and Erysichthon. Apollonius suggested an important event in the tale
of Erysichthon, and Parthenius afforded many ideas for the account of
Scylla. Nicander gave relatively little -- only the transformations in
the tales of Meleager and Erysichthon. During the latter half of the
book Alexandrian authors whom we cannot identify became the chief
source of almost every story. Alexandrian artists provided striking de-
tails for the stories of Meleager and Erysichthon.
Ovid often improved this Greek material with ideas from earlier
Roman poets. Catullus offered important suggestions for the tale of the
Minotaur and Ariadne, Horace for that of Philemon, Propertius for that
of Scylla. Vergil gave many and valuable contributions, especially in the
latter half of the book. Ovid recalled an unusual number of his poems,
both major and minor, and displayed much skill in giving his ideas a
new setting, although he sometimes invited unfortunate comparison with
the Aeneid. For a number of tales Ovid took suggestions from his own
work in earlier books of the Metamorphoses. And for the tales of Ariadne
and Philemon he seems to have drawn on personal observation.
As usual, Ovid found a difficult problem of adjustment. Previous
authors had given the tales in the first half of the book only a loose rela-
tion to one another. Ovid was content with lessening the difficulty and
with keeping it in the background. The tales of the second half had no
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK EIGHT
previous relation to one another. Ovid solved this problem by having a
group of people tell them at a banquet, a device that he afterwards re-
peated in his Twelfth Book. In the tales of Scylla and Meleager, Ovid
encountered the problem of reconciling inconsistent versions of his
predecessors. In this he attained only partial success. A number of the
stories Ovid had treated elsewhere, and the story of Philemon was very
similar to> that of Hyrieus in his Fasti. For the tales of Meleager and
Proteus he selected a different version, and he was able skilfully to alter
the incidents of Philemon. But he made the story of the Minotaur and
Ariadne so obscure that for readers unacquainted with other authorities
it would be unintelligible. For the tale of Icarus, Ovid boldly rewrote
and on the whole improved his own previous account.
At several points the Eighth Book was unique in Ovid's poem. The
tale of Ariadne included the only transformation to stars. The tale of
Erysichthon offered the most appropriate use of witty paradox, and the
story of Meleager offered the only example of heroic dignity. In one
respect the Book was unique in Ovid's entire poetical work. Only in the
tale of Philemon did he give his whole attention to describing simple
country life.
A number of tales in the Eighth Book became popular during the
Middle Ages and continued so through the Renaissance. Both in medieval
and in modern times the story of Ariadne attracted attention to a theme
that other ancient versions made very popular. In modern times the ac-
count of Proteus had similar importance. The tale of Philemon and
Baucis, which won little favor until the seventeenth century, became af-
terwards one of the most important of all.
The Eighth Book attracted authors such as Swift and Gray who
rarely took notice of Ovid. It suggested notable passages of Tansillo,
Tasso, La Fontaine, and Goethe. Many of the tales interested Dante.
But the most pervasive influence appeared in the work of Chaucer and
Shakespeare. The tales of Ariadne, Icarus, Meleager, and Philemon at-
tracted a number of modern painters and inspired several masterpieces.
The tales of Ariadne and Icarus attracted modern sculptors, and the
tale of Philemon won a distinguished place in opera.
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? BOOK NINE
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? CONTENTS OF BOOK NINE
PAGE
Achelous and Hercules . . . . . . . . 225
Nessus and the Death of Hercules . . . . . . 287
Galanthis 264
Dryope . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
Iolaus 272
Byblis 278
Iphis and Ianthe 294
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? I
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? ACHELOUS AND HERCULES
AcHELOUS AND HERCULES
Answering a question of Theseus, the river god Acheloiis began to
tell about the loss of his horn, first tying up with reeds his unadorned
locks of hair. The tale was concerned with Hercules and introduced
Ovid's longest discussion of that famous hero.
The Greek tradition of Hercules probably originated with an actual
hero of the Argive people, who became a remarkable hunter and fighter.
He seems to have been a native of Tiryns, a village located a few miles
north of Argos ; for Diodorus gave Tiryns as the birthplace of Hercules,
and Vergil and Ovid still referred to him as Tirynthian. But, after a
prehistoric conquest of Argos by the inhabitants of Boeotia, Hercules
appears to have been identified with some Boeotian hero, and he usually
was said to have been born and reared at Thebes.
His mother was said to have been Alcmena, a princess of Tiryns,
who was living in exile. His father was Jupiter. This account of his
origin appeared as early as the Iliad, and Ovid had alluded to it in his
tale of Arachne (Bk. 6). Nevertheless Hercules often was called a son
of Alcmena's husband, Amphitryon. The poet of the Iliad referred to
him indifferently first as son of Jupiter and then as child of Amphitryon.
And this became the usual practice. Other Greek authors frequently
called him Alcides, indicating that he was descended from Alcaeus, the
father of Amphitryon. Ovid, following the custom, called him Alcides in
the tale of Acheloiis and a son of Amphitryon in the tale which followed.
Among early peoples it was a rather common practice to credit a hero
both with a divine and a human father. Greek tradition made Theseus
the son both of Neptune and of Aegeus, an idea to which Ovid alluded in
the opening line of the story (cf. Origin of Aconite, Bk. 7). *
As the centuries passed, Hercules appears to have been identified
with other local heroes of the Greeks, and he was given adventures
throughout the known world. Any natural marvel or any event in myth-
ology was apt to be associated with the work of Hercules. Greek tradi-
tion seems to have been affected also by accounts of the Phoenician god
Melcart. Hercules was said to have become a god after his death, an
idea recorded first in the Odyssey. Ovid showed Acheloiis noting in the
*In a similar manner the Gospel according to Matthew told how Jesus was the
son of God and yet traced his ancestry on the father's side from Abraham down to
Joseph, husband of Mary.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK NINE
early part of his story that Hercules was not yet a god at the time of the
events in question.
For Greek authors and artists the career of Hercules always was a
favorite theme. Among Roman authors and artists the subject was
almost equally popular. Hercules was described as remarkably strong,
brave, and resourceful, but also as a somewhat comic figure, like the
Hebrew Samson.
In the traditional career of Hercules the most important phase was
the hero's enforced service of Eurystheus, king of Argos. The Iliad gave
its cause as follows. When the time came for Alcmena to bear her child,
Jupiter informed the gods that before night there should be born a
prince of Jupiter's race, who should rule over all the neighboring tribes,
meaning apparently over all the Argives. Juno, realising that he alluded
to Hercules, devised a way to frustrate his plan. After persuading him
to promise under oath that the prince should be born that day, she re-
tarded the birth of Hercules and hastened the birth of Eurystheus, who
as a descendant of Perseus was also of Jupiter's race. Therefore Eurys-
theus had authority over his kinsman Hercules and was allowed to im-
pose on him grievous labors. But Jupiter was able to lighten them some-
what by having Athena give him aid.
The motive for assigning labors to Hercules was jealousy. In the
mind of Juno he was the son of her husband's paramour Alcmena. For
Eurystheus he was a rival prince of greater merit. Feeling unable to
attack him openly, they adopted the policy of sending him against dan-
gerous enemies in the hope that he would be killed. According to the
Iliad, Proetus, king of Lycia, tried a similar method for destroying
Bellerophon and sent him on three perilous quests, from all of which he
returned successful. Later accounts of Hercules made their purpose
clear.
Although Greek authors and artists continually showed interest in
the labors, for a long time they left both their number and their nature
indefinite. The Iliad spoke as if there were several, but neither the Iliad
nor the Odyssey told of any except the capture of Cerberus (cf. Origin
of Aconite, Bk. 7). The Theogony mentioned three--killing the Nemean
lion, destroying the hydra, and seizing by force the cattle of the monster
Geryon. Pisander, about the middle of the seventh century B. C. , made
Hercules the subject of a long narrative poem. He recorded at least
two labors, those with the Nemean lion and the hydra. Probably he told
also the adventures with Geryon and with Cerberus, and he may have
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? ACHELOUS AND HERCULES
added still others; but we do not know, for his work is lost. Panyasis,
towards the middle of the fifth century B. C. , made Hercules the theme
of another long narrative poem. Concerning his account of the labors
we know only that he recorded at least those with the Nemean lion and
the hydra.
Six labors were sculptured at about the same time on the Athenian
treasury at Delphi. Sophocles enumerated six in his Trachinian Women.
He noted the killing of the Nemean lion, the destruction of the hydra, a
defeat of the centaurs, capture of the Erymanthian boar, a quest for
apples of the Hesperides, and the capture of Cerberus. But he spoke of
there being still others. Ten labors were carved on the Theseum at
Athens and on the Heracleum at Thebes.
In the latter half of the fifth century B. C. the total number was
affected by Asiatic tradition. The Babylonians attributed to the sun
god twelve adventures, corresponding to the twelve signs of the zodiac,
an idea which appeared in their epic of Gilgamesh. This tradition be-
came known to the Greeks and was associated with Hercules. Euripides
in his Hercules Furens made the number of labors twelve. Greek sculp-
tors represented the same number on the temple of Jupiter at Olympia.