The
knowledge
could not cure his infatuation and merely
showed him that its object was unattainable.
showed him that its object was unattainable.
Ovid - 1934 - Metamorphoses in European Culture - v1
Apparently the Greeks
adopted the savage idea of a father's having a share in childbirth,
but they altered it from an habitual occurrence, to a single and re-
markable event.
When Bacchus emerged from Jupiter's thigh, the Manual continued,
he was reared for a while by his aunt and uncle, Ino and Athamas.
Hoping to avoid the notice of Juno, they disguised him as a girl. The
goddess discovered the ruse and brought destruction on the foster
parents. But Bacchus escaped: Jupiter, transforming him into a kid,
conveyed him to the nymphs of Nysa. These nymphs, who now reared
the young god of the vine, were quite appropriately the Bringers of
Rain and later entered heaven as the constellation of the Hyades.
Nysa, the region in which Bacchus grew up, seems to have been an
imaginary country, so called probably to explain the latter half of
his Greek name, Dionysus.
Nicander retold the myth of Semele, adding that before visiting
her Juno assumed the form of an old woman called Beroe.
In the Metamorphoses Ovid took his outline from the Manual but
greatly improved the tale. Beginning with Juno, he caused the god-
dess to meditate in a soliloquy on Jupiter's courtship of Semele and
the approaching birth of the child. The tone and many of the ideas
he adapted from the similar passages of Vergil's Aeneid, which had
helped him already in the tale of Callisto (Bk. 2). But he showed the
goddess complaining further that she had hardly been so fortunate as
to bear a child to Jupiter. The complaint was justifiable; the Iliad
spoke of Jupiter and Juno as parents of three deities--Vulcan, Hebe,
and Mars; but later tradition declared Vulcan and Hebe children of
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
Juno without a father, and Ovid in the Fasti was to report the same
of Mars.
The disguise as Beroe, Ovid took from Nicander. But the details
of her appearance he added from Vergil's description of Allecto visit-
ing Turnus. Then he made a judicious innovation. Both Euripides
and the Manual had implied that Semele mentioned the divinity of her
lover to her sisters and that the sisters suspected, after the tragedy,
that the lover was only a mortal masquerading as Jove. Ovid showed
Semele mentioning the divinity of her lover to the disguised Juno and
Juno raising the suspicion. Before accepting so unlikely a claim,
Juno continued, let Semele require proof of his good faith; let him
appear in the splendor which he displayed before Juno.
Although Semele had now a better reason for asking Jupiter to
appear in splendor, Ovid caused her to begin cautiously by asking
merely for a favor. Thus he gave Jupiter occasion for his rash
promise. And to show that the promise must be kept, Ovid added the
pledge by the river Styx. In the tale of Phaethon (Bk. 2) Ovid had
imagined that it would be possible to avoid the consequences, if Phae-
thon should withdraw the request, and he had made this the occasion
for a dialogue adding much to the interest of the story. But in the
tale of Semele he could gain no such advantage and he wisely assumed
that there was no escape.
After introducing a fine description of Jupiter's return to heaven,
Ovid added the further idea that Jupiter tried to lessen the evil con-
sequences. Recalling the two arrows of differing effect, which Cupid
had used in the tale of Daphne (Bk. 1), Ovid invented two armories
of differing brilliance for Jupiter. But even the milder of these was
fatal to Semele.
The latter part of the tale Ovid dismissed briefly. He indicated
the various stages in the nurture of Bacchus, but the destruction of
Ino and Athamas he preferred to tell later and under different circum-
stances (Bk. 4).
By judicious changes and inventions Ovid had far surpassed his
predecessors. He had given the story motivation, poetic beauty, and
even a touch of grandeur. To him, therefore, men looked in later
times whenever they thought of Semele.
In the sphere of Saturn Beatrice did not smile, lest her brightness
should bring the fate of Semele on Dante. Spenser described as fol-
lows a tapestry in the House of Busyrane:
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? TIRESIAS
Then shewed it how the Theban Semele,
Deceived of jealous Juno, did require
To see him in his sovereign majesty
Armed with his thunderbolts and lightning fire,
Whence dearly she with death bought her desire.
In Milton's Latin elegy, The Coming of Spring, Earth prayed the
Sun to embrace her, disclaiming any dread of Semele's fate. And
Schiller retold the tale in a narrative poem.
Semele was a theme for the painters Schiavone, Rubens, and L.
Boulogne.
Tiresias
After the nurture of Bacchus, the Manual had recounted his wan-
dering in the east and his return to battle with Pentheus in his native
Thebes. Thinking the wanderings unsuitable for his purpose, Ovid
proceeded instead to the career of the blind Tiresias. Tiresias had
been the most noted seer of the heroic age. The Odyssey showed
Ulysses obliged to obtain his counsel even by voyaging to the world
of the dead; Sophocles, Euripides, and the Manual introduced him
prominently in the mythical history of Thebes; and Euripides had
related him to the story of Pentheus. Wishing to profit as much
as possible by the famous seer, Ovid did not proceed immediately to
the myth of Pentheus. He approached it gradually by way of two
other myths which had grown up independent of the Theban Cycle.
The first interpolation dealt with Tiresias and the cause of his
blindness. Of the various explanations offered by Greek writers, two
had become famous.
Callimachus recorded one of them in his Bath of Pallas. Tiresias,
he said, had intruded on Athena accidentally, while she was bathing.
The goddess punished him with blindness. At this his mother, a
favorite attendant of Athena, complained bitterly, and the goddess
gave Tiresias in compensation wisdom and length of life. The same
tale was repeated by the Manual. For Ovid this account was unsuit-
able. It had no metamorphosis and it was too like the tale of Actaeon.
But in the Ibis, Ovid showed that, even when these objections no longer
applied, he preferred another version.
In the Melampodia, there had appeared a different story, related
with an early belief that it is dangerous even to witness the copulation
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
of serpents. The tale ran as follows: while wandering on Mt.
Cithaeron, Tiresia*s intruded on two serpents and killed the female.
For this he was transformed into a woman. Some time laterv Tiresias
again encountered two serpents and killed the male. By this means
he became once more a man. Repeated alteration of sex was recorded
of Caeneus (Bk. 12) and later of Sithon (Bk. 4) ; but in one particu-
lar the experience of Tiresias had been unique. Therefore, continued
the Melampodia, Jupiter and Juno chose him arbiter of a dispute
which had arisen between them. Siding with Jupiter, Tiresias in-
formed them that the pleasure of the female exceeded that of the male
in the proportions of ten to one. But Tiresias, like Midas (Bk. 11),
had not protected himself from the consequences of his decision. Juno
punished him with loss of sight. Jupiter tried to lighten the affliction
by giving wisdom and length of days.
Pindar alluded to the same myth. With minor variations, it re-
appeared in the Manual and in the work of many mythographers.
Both Tibullus and Propertius mentioned it briefly. Nicander retold
the adventure with the serpents. Tiresias, he said, merely hit the two
creatures with his staff. After living seven years as a woman, Tiresias
again met with the two serpents. Feeling that on the whole it was more
desirable to be a man, he struck them again and returned to his
former state.
In retelling the well known myth, Ovid used the Manual for the dis-
pute and Nicander for the adventure on Mt. Cithaeron. He felt that
a controversy of this nature was rather beneath the dignity of Jupiter
and Juno and he suggested, therefore, that it arose in a time of
drunken frivolity. The idea that it was not lawful for one divinity
to oppose directly the wishes of another, he probably introduced from
the Hippolytus of Euripides. It is curious that Ovid should give the
autumn, and not the spring, as the time for the breeding of serpents.
Inspired probably by Ovid, Giorgione made a painting of Tiresias
transformed to a woman.
Nakcissus
By inventing a prophecy of Tiresias to Liriope, Ovid found occa-
sion for telling another independent myth. He recounted the trans-
formation of Narcissus, a theme which at that time was known to
comparatively few but with Ovid's brilliant handling became one of
the most famous tales of his masterpiece.
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? NARCISSUS
For the thoughtful modern reader, enjoyment is marred by the
prominence of unnatural vice. It is well that we are sensitive to a
defect of this nature; yet it is instructive to remember the extenuating
circumstances. The fault was not of Ovid's introduction, for it oc-
curred even more prominently in the work of his Alexandrian prede-
cessors. And it was not peculiar to the story of Narcissus. It was
rather a fault general to the literary taste and perhaps to the ethical
standard of ancient times and its history is interesting as evidence of
a change for the better in European literature and life.
Although this form of vice may never have been of frequent occur-
rence in Greek communities, it was regarded with a measure of toler-
ance during even the better periods and seems to have been indulged
in by enough men of rank to give it a certain respectability. Both the
Iliad and Pindar spoke of it as practised by Jove. Anacreon made
it a theme for lyric poetry, and Aristophanes used it occasionally as
matter for satirical jest.
With the rather degenerating Alexandrian age, the idea affected
literature much more widely and deeply. It disfigured for the modern
reader several of the finest idylls of Theocritus and became the subject
of a much admired work by the poet Phanocles. It occurred fre-
quently in the myths told by Nicander and later in many of the stories
used incidentally by Nonnus.
The Roman poets at first were occupied entirely with other themes.
They shared the Alexandrian interest in philosophy, in the tragedy
of Euripides, and in more natural forms of love. But the exploiting
of unnatural vice followed not long after and before Augustan times
had infected some of the greatest poets of the age. Vergil made it
important in his Eclogues, and retained it incidentally even in the
Aeneid. Tibullus gave the subject even greater prominence, and it
appeared often in the famous lyrics of Horace. From Ovid's amatory
poetry, this fault was happily absent. In the Metamorphoses and the
Fasti Ovid often omitted or lessened it from considerations of literary
effect. But on moral grounds he felt no scruple and he often implied
it obviously even in his most famous tales. His contemporaries had
not thought such themes a defect in the work of Vergil and Horace
and they were not stricter with Ovid. Although he offended the moral
standards of the more serious, his treatment of such themes was not
regarded as part of his offense. Nevertheless the Augustan period
was the last in which this vice was treated with sympathy by poets of
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
the first rank. In subsequent Roman literature Martial mentioned it
occasionally with disfavor, but other leading poets did not find it of
interest.
With the advent of Christianity, a much higher standard came into
Graeco-Roman life. To the ancient Hebrews such unnatural vice had
always been abhorrent. They felt in all probability that it would
bring on the community both sterility and famine. And more than
one passage of the Old Testament bore witness to the extraordinary
effort which they would make to prevent its occurrence A similar
abhorrence was inherited from them by the Christians and inspired the
invective of Clement of Alexandria. The same feeling prevailed
through the entire medieval period. Many ancient works which
offended in this way happened to be inaccessible or little known to
medieval readers. The poetry of Ovid and of others, which continued
to be popular, was explained as allegory and the objectionable pas-
sages were omitted from medieval treatments of the tales. Dante so
detested this vice that he pictured even his admired master, Brunetto
Latini, as wandering forever under the fiery rain of Hell.
The Renaissance tended to revive the faults, as well as the merit,
of ancient poetry. Chiefly under Ovid's influence, we find Marlowe
and perhaps a few others experimenting with the same unworthy
theme. And the phrasing, without the subject, of such poetry often
appeared in the Sonnets of Shakespeare. But the revival of interest
occurred only in a few authors and a small number of experimental
works. It was absent from the masterpieces and from almost all of
the lesser writings of the time. Since then the subject has not inter-
ested any author important in the history of European letters.
The flower of the narcissus from early times had been related vari-
ously to Greek mythology and superstition. In the Homeric Hymn
to Ceres and the Oedipus at Colonus of Sophocles it was associated
with the abduction of Proserpina. And probably for this reason the
flower was symbolic of an early death.
In harmony with this belief, another tradition grew up at Thespiae,
a few miles west of Thebes. The new myth developed from a popular
belief that the soul of a human being might be present in his reflected
image. Hence, if the image should appear in a body of water, the
soul might fall a prey to the water spirits. It was thought bad luck
for a man to see his reflection in any pool or stream. An example was
the beautiful youth Narcissus. Observing his reflected image in a
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? NARCISSUS
spring, he mistook it for a real person and fell in love with it. The
object of his affection proved unattainable and finally reduced him to
despair. Narcissus killed himself with a sword, and from his blood
there grew a flower which bears his name. The idea of a youth enam-
ored of himself was not peculiar to this Boeotian myth, for afterwards
Plutarch was to record a like experience of a certain Eutelidas. The
parents of Narcissus were usually imagined to be the nymph Liriope
(the Soft Voiced) and Cephissus, the god of a river flowing not far
to the north of Thespiae.
That Narcissus should be unable to distinguish between an image
and a real person was improbable. Alexandrian authors rejected this
idea. They retained the peculiar infatuation but explained it as the
effect of a curse. 1
One Alexandrian version probably entered literature during the
first half of the third century, B. C. It survives, however, only in the
work of Conon, a Greek prose writer contemporary with Vergil. The
beautiful Narcissus, he tells us, was courted by many young men. He
repulsed them coldly and occupied himself with hunting. One youth
named Amenias was especially persistent. Faring no better than the
others, Amenias at length grew desperate and prayed that Narcissus,
too, might experience love and despair. He killed himself, the cruel
Narcissus even providing him with a sword. But Nemesis heard and
fulfilled the curse. While drinking from a clear pool, Narcissus ob-
served his reflection and became enamored. In vain he realized his
mistake.
The knowledge could not cure his infatuation and merely
showed him that its object was unattainable. He remembered his
cruelty to others and admitted the justice of his punishment. Then
he killed himself. The story in this form belonged to a class popular
with the Alexandrians, which recorded the punishment of those who
repel their suitors cruelly. A more pleasing myth of this kind Ovid
was to repeat in the tale of Iphis and Anaxarete (Bk. 14). This
earlier Alexandrian account of Narcissus, Ovid mentioned in the
Fasti. He spoke of Narcissus as one of several mythical youths whose
blood Flora transformed into a flower.
1 The same improbability in the popular myth impressed the traveler Pausanias.
He retold the tale in the following attractive form: Narcissus had a twin sister
almost identical in appearance. They were exceedingly fond of each other and
delighted in hunting. After her death, the brother used often to wander disconso-
late in the familiar groves or sit by a clear pool gazing fondly on the image which
so closely resembled her.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
A later Alexandrian version made several important innovations.
This version was probably the work of Nicander. According to the
second version, Narcissus attracted not only young men but also
young women. His cold indifference brought despair not only to the
youth Amenias but also to the oread Echo. The author told her story
first. While Narcissus was hunting, Echo observed and loved him.
Concealing herself in the thicket, she followed him and found an oppor-
tunity to reveal her affection. Rebuffed, she hastily withdrew. Tak-
ing refuge in wild and lonely hills, Echo wasted away to nothing but
a voice. The author then repeated the story of Amenias and his
imprecation. Probably he took pains to contrast the gentleness of
Echo with the violence of Amenias. He showed also how Narcissus
realized that he had fallen in love with his own image. But at this
point he altered the story. Narcissus, he said, was not aware that he
was punished for cruelty and did not take his own life. He pined
away and died. A similar change from suicide to wasting away
occurred in an Alexandrian account of Byblis (Bk. 9) and may have
influenced the author here. The youth, he continued, was lamented
by the nymphs and dryads. His body vanished mysteriously from
the shore and on the spot there appeared the white and yellow blossom.
In this form the story afforded a contrast between Echo who pined
away and became a voice and Narcissus who pined away and became
a flower. The second Alexandrian version inspired at least two Pom-
peian frescoes.
Ovid found the tale congenial and endowed it with extraordinary
beauty and splendor of style. He improved also on the conception of
Echo and Narcissus and on the chief incidents given by the later
Alexandrian.
In the opening lines, Ovid introduced from a great marriage ode
of Catullus the graceful repetition of phrases. He invented the idea
that Echo detained Juno with her talk, in order that Juno might not
interrupt the amours of Jove, and that the goddess punished her by
inability to do more than to repeat the words of others. He added
also the remarkable dialogue in which Echo courted Narcissus in the
forest by repeating his own calls to his comrades. By these changes
Ovid not only suggested the modesty of Echo but prepared for a
quite different effect in the similar adventure of Salmacis courting
Hermaphroditus (Bk 4). After elaborating somewhat the wasting of
Echo to a voice, Ovid added that her bones became shapeless rock.
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? NARCISSUS
The idea, though natural enough from her association with cliffs and
caverns, was a little inconsistent with her being described as a freely
moving voice. Echo attenuating to a responsive sound later sug-
gested to Ovid a transformation of Canens into air (Bk. 14).
Ovid came now to the parallel story of Amenias. But after the
attractive and marvellous adventure with Echo, he felt that this more
ordinary courtship would be an anticlimax. He desired, moreover, to
have the reader in sympathy with Narcissus. This would be possible
if he were to present the boy as merely unresponsive. It would not be
possible, if he were to present him as avowedly cruel. Ovid omitted
both the name and the fate of Amenias. He retained only the curse of
a disappointed lover.
The Odyssey and the Hippolytus of Euripides had indulged in de-
scription of charming bodies of water. Theocritus and other Alexan-
drian writers gladly followed their example again and again. And
Ovid often profited by their work, as well as his own observation of
nature. Perhaps we might find anticipated by one or another Alex-
andrian predecessor every detail which Ovid noted in portraying the
lovely pool of Narcissus. Yet he gave freshness and vividness to the
familiar theme; and no predecessor was so delightful in the total
effect. Ovid had wisely avoided a description of the beautiful youth
until the moment when he was startled by the reflected image. Then
he described Narcissus with care, taking many details from an Alex-
andrian painting of the scene. Thus Ovid was able to show not only
the attractiveness of Narcissus but its effect on himself.
Ovid had now awakened the reader's sympathy for the youth and
interested him keenly in the strange adventure. By concealing his
art and encouraging his reader to look entirely at the poor youth
gradually dying of hopeless love, he could have attained a tragic
pathos. And he would have enjoyed the further advantage that the
nature of his tragedy was unique. This opportunity Ovid improved
only in part. He repeated and enlarged on the incidents given by
his predecessor with considerable appropriateness and pathos. But
unhappily he was struck by the paradox of a young man dying for
love of himself. He could not resist the temptation to divert the
reader's thought from the sad death of the youth to the preposterous
cause and the dexterity of his own presentation.
In a celebrated Elegy for Adonis, Bion had spoken of Echo's re-
peating the sad cries uttered by Venus over the body of her lover.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
Although only a single line, the passage may have suggested to Ovid
the idea that Echo repeated the laments of the dying Narcissus. Ovid's
use of the incident was much the more effective, for he could show
more poignantly that the nymph had cause to be distressed. And it
added to the gentleness of Echo's character.
Ovid's treatment gave the story fame. In later times it occasioned
almost every brief reference and affected every version of any length.
The earliest allusion appeared in a Life of St. Galgaric composed
during the eleventh century. About a hundred years later, Petrus
Cantor remarked that the minstrels of Provence, when other subjects
failed to please, could always rely on Narcissus. And a century after
this, the Flamenca mentioned it as still a favorite theme. Meanwhile
the tale had become very popular in northern France and was soon
to be mentioned in Italy and England. Even writers unable to read
the Latin were familiar with the theme and able to retell the tale in
versions of their own. Yet medieval authors admired the story with
reservations. They tried to remove all suggestion of unnatural vice
and they avoided any metamorphosis of Echo or Narcissus.
Chretien de Troyes in his romance of Sir Cliges compared Narcissus
to his own hero and contrasted him with another character,
Loredamors. >> He omitted the idea that Narcissus was courted by
young men and became the victim of a curse. The Roman a"' Alixandre
repeated Ovid's narrative briefly and with the same omission.
Guillaume Lorris in the Romance of the Rose caused Echo to give the
fatal curse. He represented her as a proud medieval lady and made
her in general less attractive than Ovid's heroine. His Narcissus be-
came a young gentleman of medieval times. These innovations re-
appeared in a rather long romance, Floris and Liriope, by Robert of
Blois. Somewhat later an unknown French poet carried the same
tendencies still further. He made the heroine a princess and the hero
a youth of humble origin. Thus he was able to present an unattrac-
tive struggle between violent love and the restraint of convention. He
showed both hero and heroine dying under pathetic circumstances as
the result of the heroine's curse.
These authors all implied that both Echo and Narcissus died of
grief. But the ancient writer Eustathius in his comment on the Iliad
had recorded a different version. The deluded youth, he said, had
plunged into the water and perished by drowning. This idea was
mentioned in the Flamenca and affected the story as repeated in the
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? NARCISSUS
Cento Novelle Antiche. Later it influenced an allusion by Marlowe
and the allusions in Shakespeare's two narrative poems.
The chief poets of modern literature have generally shown interest
in the tale of Narcissus. Dante, mistaking for shadows the dim spirits
in the heaven of the moon, observed that his error was opposite to
that which kindled love between the youth and the fountain. Petrarch
compared his Laura to the young Narcissus, who found his own
image so beautiful that he cruelly despised all suitors. He saw
Narcissus and Echo led captive in the triumph of Love and briefly re-
peated their story. Chaucer in the Knight's Tale mentioned their
fate as depicted on the walls of the temple of Venus. Boiardo recalled
Ovid in a passage where Angelica grieved at the coldness of Rinaldo.
The intentness of Narcissus gazing into the water, Tasso compared
to that of Armida looking at Rinaldo asleep. To Guarini, Ovid's
dialogue between Narcissus and Echo suggested the remarkable scene
where Silvio defied the god of Love and the god was able, by returning
from time to time a closing word or syllable, to predict Silvio's defeat.
And both Camoens describing the Isle of Venus and Spenser portray-
ing the Garden of Adonis associated the unfortunate Narcissus with
the flower which bore his name.
Shirley retold the tale in a long narrative poem. In Comus Milton
showed his lady invoking the assistance of Echo and likening her
brothers to Narcissus. In Paradise Lost he told how the newly created
Eve gazed with surprise and delight at her responsive likeness in a
pool until admonished by the divine voice. Calderon and Rousseau
each made Narcissus the theme of a play. Fielding recalled him twice
in Joseph, Andrews, to illustrate the misfortune of one loving a maiden
who was unattainable, in the first case because she was a creation of
the imagination, in the second because she repulsed her lover coldly.
Goethe in Wilhelm Meister gave his name to a young official who was
unduly fond of himself. Schiller touched on his delusion for an attrac-
tive song. And Lewis Morris repeated the tale of Narcissus at con-
siderable length, using it to symbolize the quest of an ideal attained
only with death.
To Echo Chaucer referred somewhat inaccurately in the Clerk's
Envoy and the Franklin's Tale. Shakespeare mentioned her trans-
formation in Romeo and Juliet. Shelley pictured Echo silent with
grief for Adonais, dearer to her than Narcissus for whose disdain she
pined away into a shadow of all sounds.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
To the dramatist Fletcher Ovid's description of the pool may have
suggested the charming lines of his Faithful Shepherdess in which
Amoret gave the river her blessing.
In the Amoretti, Spenser declared his grief as paradoxical as that
of Narcissus and repeated an important conceit of the youth's lament.
Although aware, Spenser said, that the lady was the cause of his
suffering, his eyes could not remove from her
In their amazement, like Narcissus vain,
Whose eyes him starved; so plenty makes me poor.
And by a strange irony Dryden used the same passage to show the evil
of Ovid's ill timed wit.
Ovid's tale of Narcissus inspired paintings of Boltraffio, Curradi,
Tintoretto, Dubois, Grebier, and a disciple of Boucher. Waterhouse
painted Echo and Narcissus; Anning Bell pictured Echo alone. In
sculpture the theme was treated by Cortot, Charpentier, and Hiolle.
Gliick transformed Ovid's myth into an opera with a happy ending.
j . , . ii . .
Pentheus
The strange fate of Narcissus, Ovid observed, was one of many
events which verified the predictions of Tiresias and made him revered
as a seer. But this reputation was challenged by Pentheus, king of
Thebes. Thus Ovid returned to the Theban myths recorded in the
Manual and to the later career of Bacchus.
The famous tale of Pentheus was only one of several myths which
assumed that the new worship encountered opposition before it pre-
vailed in Greece. In all probability some such opposition was an his-
torical fact. When the Bacchic religion entered Greece, it was asso-
ciated with the barbaric people of Thrace and its rites were marked by
frenzy and excess. Such a religion could not easily win the civilized
Greeks, a people ordinarily sane and temperate in every way.
In myths dealing with opposition to Bacchus a remarkable circum-
stance is the active aid which the new god received from women. That
the women of a Greek community should accept him the more readily
was natural. Greek tragedy implies often that in the Heroic Age
many of them had come as the spoils of successful war. And such war-
fare might often bring female captives from the neighboring countries
of Thrace and of Phrygia, where the religion of Bacchus prevailed.
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? PENTHEUS
But a number of other myths dealing with Bacchic rites, imply that
even after the new religion triumphed, it regularly gave the women an
important part. Examples are Ovid's tales of Philomela (Bk. 6),
Myrrha (Bk. 10), and Orpheus (Bk. 11). Underlying this, there
appears to have been a profound belief that, in order to obtain a good
harvest for the year, the community must observe chastity for a short
period during the time of planting. At the appointed season, there-
fore, the women left their husbands and departed in a body to pro-
pitiate the god with mystic rites. A similar theory and practice
affected the Egyptian worship of Isis and the religious customs of
many savages in modern times. And in ancient Greece, as in parts of
modern Australia, the women entraced in a secret worship, from which
men were excluded on pain of death.
During early times the spring festivals of Bacchus tended regularly
to a climax of violence and ferocity. With the added fear of perse-
cution, it is probable that they led occasionally to murder of an
atrocious kind. Yet stories of such crimes do not appear until many
centuries after the supposed events and therefore may be suspected of
exaggeration. With the beginning of history, civilized Greece had
toned down the barbaric features of Bacchic worship and laid
emphasis on its doctrine of ascetic purity and spiritual immortality.
Listening to tales of earlier violence and murder, thoughtful Greeks
may well have demurred at a god who promoted such crime.
adopted the savage idea of a father's having a share in childbirth,
but they altered it from an habitual occurrence, to a single and re-
markable event.
When Bacchus emerged from Jupiter's thigh, the Manual continued,
he was reared for a while by his aunt and uncle, Ino and Athamas.
Hoping to avoid the notice of Juno, they disguised him as a girl. The
goddess discovered the ruse and brought destruction on the foster
parents. But Bacchus escaped: Jupiter, transforming him into a kid,
conveyed him to the nymphs of Nysa. These nymphs, who now reared
the young god of the vine, were quite appropriately the Bringers of
Rain and later entered heaven as the constellation of the Hyades.
Nysa, the region in which Bacchus grew up, seems to have been an
imaginary country, so called probably to explain the latter half of
his Greek name, Dionysus.
Nicander retold the myth of Semele, adding that before visiting
her Juno assumed the form of an old woman called Beroe.
In the Metamorphoses Ovid took his outline from the Manual but
greatly improved the tale. Beginning with Juno, he caused the god-
dess to meditate in a soliloquy on Jupiter's courtship of Semele and
the approaching birth of the child. The tone and many of the ideas
he adapted from the similar passages of Vergil's Aeneid, which had
helped him already in the tale of Callisto (Bk. 2). But he showed the
goddess complaining further that she had hardly been so fortunate as
to bear a child to Jupiter. The complaint was justifiable; the Iliad
spoke of Jupiter and Juno as parents of three deities--Vulcan, Hebe,
and Mars; but later tradition declared Vulcan and Hebe children of
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
Juno without a father, and Ovid in the Fasti was to report the same
of Mars.
The disguise as Beroe, Ovid took from Nicander. But the details
of her appearance he added from Vergil's description of Allecto visit-
ing Turnus. Then he made a judicious innovation. Both Euripides
and the Manual had implied that Semele mentioned the divinity of her
lover to her sisters and that the sisters suspected, after the tragedy,
that the lover was only a mortal masquerading as Jove. Ovid showed
Semele mentioning the divinity of her lover to the disguised Juno and
Juno raising the suspicion. Before accepting so unlikely a claim,
Juno continued, let Semele require proof of his good faith; let him
appear in the splendor which he displayed before Juno.
Although Semele had now a better reason for asking Jupiter to
appear in splendor, Ovid caused her to begin cautiously by asking
merely for a favor. Thus he gave Jupiter occasion for his rash
promise. And to show that the promise must be kept, Ovid added the
pledge by the river Styx. In the tale of Phaethon (Bk. 2) Ovid had
imagined that it would be possible to avoid the consequences, if Phae-
thon should withdraw the request, and he had made this the occasion
for a dialogue adding much to the interest of the story. But in the
tale of Semele he could gain no such advantage and he wisely assumed
that there was no escape.
After introducing a fine description of Jupiter's return to heaven,
Ovid added the further idea that Jupiter tried to lessen the evil con-
sequences. Recalling the two arrows of differing effect, which Cupid
had used in the tale of Daphne (Bk. 1), Ovid invented two armories
of differing brilliance for Jupiter. But even the milder of these was
fatal to Semele.
The latter part of the tale Ovid dismissed briefly. He indicated
the various stages in the nurture of Bacchus, but the destruction of
Ino and Athamas he preferred to tell later and under different circum-
stances (Bk. 4).
By judicious changes and inventions Ovid had far surpassed his
predecessors. He had given the story motivation, poetic beauty, and
even a touch of grandeur. To him, therefore, men looked in later
times whenever they thought of Semele.
In the sphere of Saturn Beatrice did not smile, lest her brightness
should bring the fate of Semele on Dante. Spenser described as fol-
lows a tapestry in the House of Busyrane:
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? TIRESIAS
Then shewed it how the Theban Semele,
Deceived of jealous Juno, did require
To see him in his sovereign majesty
Armed with his thunderbolts and lightning fire,
Whence dearly she with death bought her desire.
In Milton's Latin elegy, The Coming of Spring, Earth prayed the
Sun to embrace her, disclaiming any dread of Semele's fate. And
Schiller retold the tale in a narrative poem.
Semele was a theme for the painters Schiavone, Rubens, and L.
Boulogne.
Tiresias
After the nurture of Bacchus, the Manual had recounted his wan-
dering in the east and his return to battle with Pentheus in his native
Thebes. Thinking the wanderings unsuitable for his purpose, Ovid
proceeded instead to the career of the blind Tiresias. Tiresias had
been the most noted seer of the heroic age. The Odyssey showed
Ulysses obliged to obtain his counsel even by voyaging to the world
of the dead; Sophocles, Euripides, and the Manual introduced him
prominently in the mythical history of Thebes; and Euripides had
related him to the story of Pentheus. Wishing to profit as much
as possible by the famous seer, Ovid did not proceed immediately to
the myth of Pentheus. He approached it gradually by way of two
other myths which had grown up independent of the Theban Cycle.
The first interpolation dealt with Tiresias and the cause of his
blindness. Of the various explanations offered by Greek writers, two
had become famous.
Callimachus recorded one of them in his Bath of Pallas. Tiresias,
he said, had intruded on Athena accidentally, while she was bathing.
The goddess punished him with blindness. At this his mother, a
favorite attendant of Athena, complained bitterly, and the goddess
gave Tiresias in compensation wisdom and length of life. The same
tale was repeated by the Manual. For Ovid this account was unsuit-
able. It had no metamorphosis and it was too like the tale of Actaeon.
But in the Ibis, Ovid showed that, even when these objections no longer
applied, he preferred another version.
In the Melampodia, there had appeared a different story, related
with an early belief that it is dangerous even to witness the copulation
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
of serpents. The tale ran as follows: while wandering on Mt.
Cithaeron, Tiresia*s intruded on two serpents and killed the female.
For this he was transformed into a woman. Some time laterv Tiresias
again encountered two serpents and killed the male. By this means
he became once more a man. Repeated alteration of sex was recorded
of Caeneus (Bk. 12) and later of Sithon (Bk. 4) ; but in one particu-
lar the experience of Tiresias had been unique. Therefore, continued
the Melampodia, Jupiter and Juno chose him arbiter of a dispute
which had arisen between them. Siding with Jupiter, Tiresias in-
formed them that the pleasure of the female exceeded that of the male
in the proportions of ten to one. But Tiresias, like Midas (Bk. 11),
had not protected himself from the consequences of his decision. Juno
punished him with loss of sight. Jupiter tried to lighten the affliction
by giving wisdom and length of days.
Pindar alluded to the same myth. With minor variations, it re-
appeared in the Manual and in the work of many mythographers.
Both Tibullus and Propertius mentioned it briefly. Nicander retold
the adventure with the serpents. Tiresias, he said, merely hit the two
creatures with his staff. After living seven years as a woman, Tiresias
again met with the two serpents. Feeling that on the whole it was more
desirable to be a man, he struck them again and returned to his
former state.
In retelling the well known myth, Ovid used the Manual for the dis-
pute and Nicander for the adventure on Mt. Cithaeron. He felt that
a controversy of this nature was rather beneath the dignity of Jupiter
and Juno and he suggested, therefore, that it arose in a time of
drunken frivolity. The idea that it was not lawful for one divinity
to oppose directly the wishes of another, he probably introduced from
the Hippolytus of Euripides. It is curious that Ovid should give the
autumn, and not the spring, as the time for the breeding of serpents.
Inspired probably by Ovid, Giorgione made a painting of Tiresias
transformed to a woman.
Nakcissus
By inventing a prophecy of Tiresias to Liriope, Ovid found occa-
sion for telling another independent myth. He recounted the trans-
formation of Narcissus, a theme which at that time was known to
comparatively few but with Ovid's brilliant handling became one of
the most famous tales of his masterpiece.
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? NARCISSUS
For the thoughtful modern reader, enjoyment is marred by the
prominence of unnatural vice. It is well that we are sensitive to a
defect of this nature; yet it is instructive to remember the extenuating
circumstances. The fault was not of Ovid's introduction, for it oc-
curred even more prominently in the work of his Alexandrian prede-
cessors. And it was not peculiar to the story of Narcissus. It was
rather a fault general to the literary taste and perhaps to the ethical
standard of ancient times and its history is interesting as evidence of
a change for the better in European literature and life.
Although this form of vice may never have been of frequent occur-
rence in Greek communities, it was regarded with a measure of toler-
ance during even the better periods and seems to have been indulged
in by enough men of rank to give it a certain respectability. Both the
Iliad and Pindar spoke of it as practised by Jove. Anacreon made
it a theme for lyric poetry, and Aristophanes used it occasionally as
matter for satirical jest.
With the rather degenerating Alexandrian age, the idea affected
literature much more widely and deeply. It disfigured for the modern
reader several of the finest idylls of Theocritus and became the subject
of a much admired work by the poet Phanocles. It occurred fre-
quently in the myths told by Nicander and later in many of the stories
used incidentally by Nonnus.
The Roman poets at first were occupied entirely with other themes.
They shared the Alexandrian interest in philosophy, in the tragedy
of Euripides, and in more natural forms of love. But the exploiting
of unnatural vice followed not long after and before Augustan times
had infected some of the greatest poets of the age. Vergil made it
important in his Eclogues, and retained it incidentally even in the
Aeneid. Tibullus gave the subject even greater prominence, and it
appeared often in the famous lyrics of Horace. From Ovid's amatory
poetry, this fault was happily absent. In the Metamorphoses and the
Fasti Ovid often omitted or lessened it from considerations of literary
effect. But on moral grounds he felt no scruple and he often implied
it obviously even in his most famous tales. His contemporaries had
not thought such themes a defect in the work of Vergil and Horace
and they were not stricter with Ovid. Although he offended the moral
standards of the more serious, his treatment of such themes was not
regarded as part of his offense. Nevertheless the Augustan period
was the last in which this vice was treated with sympathy by poets of
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
the first rank. In subsequent Roman literature Martial mentioned it
occasionally with disfavor, but other leading poets did not find it of
interest.
With the advent of Christianity, a much higher standard came into
Graeco-Roman life. To the ancient Hebrews such unnatural vice had
always been abhorrent. They felt in all probability that it would
bring on the community both sterility and famine. And more than
one passage of the Old Testament bore witness to the extraordinary
effort which they would make to prevent its occurrence A similar
abhorrence was inherited from them by the Christians and inspired the
invective of Clement of Alexandria. The same feeling prevailed
through the entire medieval period. Many ancient works which
offended in this way happened to be inaccessible or little known to
medieval readers. The poetry of Ovid and of others, which continued
to be popular, was explained as allegory and the objectionable pas-
sages were omitted from medieval treatments of the tales. Dante so
detested this vice that he pictured even his admired master, Brunetto
Latini, as wandering forever under the fiery rain of Hell.
The Renaissance tended to revive the faults, as well as the merit,
of ancient poetry. Chiefly under Ovid's influence, we find Marlowe
and perhaps a few others experimenting with the same unworthy
theme. And the phrasing, without the subject, of such poetry often
appeared in the Sonnets of Shakespeare. But the revival of interest
occurred only in a few authors and a small number of experimental
works. It was absent from the masterpieces and from almost all of
the lesser writings of the time. Since then the subject has not inter-
ested any author important in the history of European letters.
The flower of the narcissus from early times had been related vari-
ously to Greek mythology and superstition. In the Homeric Hymn
to Ceres and the Oedipus at Colonus of Sophocles it was associated
with the abduction of Proserpina. And probably for this reason the
flower was symbolic of an early death.
In harmony with this belief, another tradition grew up at Thespiae,
a few miles west of Thebes. The new myth developed from a popular
belief that the soul of a human being might be present in his reflected
image. Hence, if the image should appear in a body of water, the
soul might fall a prey to the water spirits. It was thought bad luck
for a man to see his reflection in any pool or stream. An example was
the beautiful youth Narcissus. Observing his reflected image in a
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? NARCISSUS
spring, he mistook it for a real person and fell in love with it. The
object of his affection proved unattainable and finally reduced him to
despair. Narcissus killed himself with a sword, and from his blood
there grew a flower which bears his name. The idea of a youth enam-
ored of himself was not peculiar to this Boeotian myth, for afterwards
Plutarch was to record a like experience of a certain Eutelidas. The
parents of Narcissus were usually imagined to be the nymph Liriope
(the Soft Voiced) and Cephissus, the god of a river flowing not far
to the north of Thespiae.
That Narcissus should be unable to distinguish between an image
and a real person was improbable. Alexandrian authors rejected this
idea. They retained the peculiar infatuation but explained it as the
effect of a curse. 1
One Alexandrian version probably entered literature during the
first half of the third century, B. C. It survives, however, only in the
work of Conon, a Greek prose writer contemporary with Vergil. The
beautiful Narcissus, he tells us, was courted by many young men. He
repulsed them coldly and occupied himself with hunting. One youth
named Amenias was especially persistent. Faring no better than the
others, Amenias at length grew desperate and prayed that Narcissus,
too, might experience love and despair. He killed himself, the cruel
Narcissus even providing him with a sword. But Nemesis heard and
fulfilled the curse. While drinking from a clear pool, Narcissus ob-
served his reflection and became enamored. In vain he realized his
mistake.
The knowledge could not cure his infatuation and merely
showed him that its object was unattainable. He remembered his
cruelty to others and admitted the justice of his punishment. Then
he killed himself. The story in this form belonged to a class popular
with the Alexandrians, which recorded the punishment of those who
repel their suitors cruelly. A more pleasing myth of this kind Ovid
was to repeat in the tale of Iphis and Anaxarete (Bk. 14). This
earlier Alexandrian account of Narcissus, Ovid mentioned in the
Fasti. He spoke of Narcissus as one of several mythical youths whose
blood Flora transformed into a flower.
1 The same improbability in the popular myth impressed the traveler Pausanias.
He retold the tale in the following attractive form: Narcissus had a twin sister
almost identical in appearance. They were exceedingly fond of each other and
delighted in hunting. After her death, the brother used often to wander disconso-
late in the familiar groves or sit by a clear pool gazing fondly on the image which
so closely resembled her.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
A later Alexandrian version made several important innovations.
This version was probably the work of Nicander. According to the
second version, Narcissus attracted not only young men but also
young women. His cold indifference brought despair not only to the
youth Amenias but also to the oread Echo. The author told her story
first. While Narcissus was hunting, Echo observed and loved him.
Concealing herself in the thicket, she followed him and found an oppor-
tunity to reveal her affection. Rebuffed, she hastily withdrew. Tak-
ing refuge in wild and lonely hills, Echo wasted away to nothing but
a voice. The author then repeated the story of Amenias and his
imprecation. Probably he took pains to contrast the gentleness of
Echo with the violence of Amenias. He showed also how Narcissus
realized that he had fallen in love with his own image. But at this
point he altered the story. Narcissus, he said, was not aware that he
was punished for cruelty and did not take his own life. He pined
away and died. A similar change from suicide to wasting away
occurred in an Alexandrian account of Byblis (Bk. 9) and may have
influenced the author here. The youth, he continued, was lamented
by the nymphs and dryads. His body vanished mysteriously from
the shore and on the spot there appeared the white and yellow blossom.
In this form the story afforded a contrast between Echo who pined
away and became a voice and Narcissus who pined away and became
a flower. The second Alexandrian version inspired at least two Pom-
peian frescoes.
Ovid found the tale congenial and endowed it with extraordinary
beauty and splendor of style. He improved also on the conception of
Echo and Narcissus and on the chief incidents given by the later
Alexandrian.
In the opening lines, Ovid introduced from a great marriage ode
of Catullus the graceful repetition of phrases. He invented the idea
that Echo detained Juno with her talk, in order that Juno might not
interrupt the amours of Jove, and that the goddess punished her by
inability to do more than to repeat the words of others. He added
also the remarkable dialogue in which Echo courted Narcissus in the
forest by repeating his own calls to his comrades. By these changes
Ovid not only suggested the modesty of Echo but prepared for a
quite different effect in the similar adventure of Salmacis courting
Hermaphroditus (Bk 4). After elaborating somewhat the wasting of
Echo to a voice, Ovid added that her bones became shapeless rock.
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? NARCISSUS
The idea, though natural enough from her association with cliffs and
caverns, was a little inconsistent with her being described as a freely
moving voice. Echo attenuating to a responsive sound later sug-
gested to Ovid a transformation of Canens into air (Bk. 14).
Ovid came now to the parallel story of Amenias. But after the
attractive and marvellous adventure with Echo, he felt that this more
ordinary courtship would be an anticlimax. He desired, moreover, to
have the reader in sympathy with Narcissus. This would be possible
if he were to present the boy as merely unresponsive. It would not be
possible, if he were to present him as avowedly cruel. Ovid omitted
both the name and the fate of Amenias. He retained only the curse of
a disappointed lover.
The Odyssey and the Hippolytus of Euripides had indulged in de-
scription of charming bodies of water. Theocritus and other Alexan-
drian writers gladly followed their example again and again. And
Ovid often profited by their work, as well as his own observation of
nature. Perhaps we might find anticipated by one or another Alex-
andrian predecessor every detail which Ovid noted in portraying the
lovely pool of Narcissus. Yet he gave freshness and vividness to the
familiar theme; and no predecessor was so delightful in the total
effect. Ovid had wisely avoided a description of the beautiful youth
until the moment when he was startled by the reflected image. Then
he described Narcissus with care, taking many details from an Alex-
andrian painting of the scene. Thus Ovid was able to show not only
the attractiveness of Narcissus but its effect on himself.
Ovid had now awakened the reader's sympathy for the youth and
interested him keenly in the strange adventure. By concealing his
art and encouraging his reader to look entirely at the poor youth
gradually dying of hopeless love, he could have attained a tragic
pathos. And he would have enjoyed the further advantage that the
nature of his tragedy was unique. This opportunity Ovid improved
only in part. He repeated and enlarged on the incidents given by
his predecessor with considerable appropriateness and pathos. But
unhappily he was struck by the paradox of a young man dying for
love of himself. He could not resist the temptation to divert the
reader's thought from the sad death of the youth to the preposterous
cause and the dexterity of his own presentation.
In a celebrated Elegy for Adonis, Bion had spoken of Echo's re-
peating the sad cries uttered by Venus over the body of her lover.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
Although only a single line, the passage may have suggested to Ovid
the idea that Echo repeated the laments of the dying Narcissus. Ovid's
use of the incident was much the more effective, for he could show
more poignantly that the nymph had cause to be distressed. And it
added to the gentleness of Echo's character.
Ovid's treatment gave the story fame. In later times it occasioned
almost every brief reference and affected every version of any length.
The earliest allusion appeared in a Life of St. Galgaric composed
during the eleventh century. About a hundred years later, Petrus
Cantor remarked that the minstrels of Provence, when other subjects
failed to please, could always rely on Narcissus. And a century after
this, the Flamenca mentioned it as still a favorite theme. Meanwhile
the tale had become very popular in northern France and was soon
to be mentioned in Italy and England. Even writers unable to read
the Latin were familiar with the theme and able to retell the tale in
versions of their own. Yet medieval authors admired the story with
reservations. They tried to remove all suggestion of unnatural vice
and they avoided any metamorphosis of Echo or Narcissus.
Chretien de Troyes in his romance of Sir Cliges compared Narcissus
to his own hero and contrasted him with another character,
Loredamors. >> He omitted the idea that Narcissus was courted by
young men and became the victim of a curse. The Roman a"' Alixandre
repeated Ovid's narrative briefly and with the same omission.
Guillaume Lorris in the Romance of the Rose caused Echo to give the
fatal curse. He represented her as a proud medieval lady and made
her in general less attractive than Ovid's heroine. His Narcissus be-
came a young gentleman of medieval times. These innovations re-
appeared in a rather long romance, Floris and Liriope, by Robert of
Blois. Somewhat later an unknown French poet carried the same
tendencies still further. He made the heroine a princess and the hero
a youth of humble origin. Thus he was able to present an unattrac-
tive struggle between violent love and the restraint of convention. He
showed both hero and heroine dying under pathetic circumstances as
the result of the heroine's curse.
These authors all implied that both Echo and Narcissus died of
grief. But the ancient writer Eustathius in his comment on the Iliad
had recorded a different version. The deluded youth, he said, had
plunged into the water and perished by drowning. This idea was
mentioned in the Flamenca and affected the story as repeated in the
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? NARCISSUS
Cento Novelle Antiche. Later it influenced an allusion by Marlowe
and the allusions in Shakespeare's two narrative poems.
The chief poets of modern literature have generally shown interest
in the tale of Narcissus. Dante, mistaking for shadows the dim spirits
in the heaven of the moon, observed that his error was opposite to
that which kindled love between the youth and the fountain. Petrarch
compared his Laura to the young Narcissus, who found his own
image so beautiful that he cruelly despised all suitors. He saw
Narcissus and Echo led captive in the triumph of Love and briefly re-
peated their story. Chaucer in the Knight's Tale mentioned their
fate as depicted on the walls of the temple of Venus. Boiardo recalled
Ovid in a passage where Angelica grieved at the coldness of Rinaldo.
The intentness of Narcissus gazing into the water, Tasso compared
to that of Armida looking at Rinaldo asleep. To Guarini, Ovid's
dialogue between Narcissus and Echo suggested the remarkable scene
where Silvio defied the god of Love and the god was able, by returning
from time to time a closing word or syllable, to predict Silvio's defeat.
And both Camoens describing the Isle of Venus and Spenser portray-
ing the Garden of Adonis associated the unfortunate Narcissus with
the flower which bore his name.
Shirley retold the tale in a long narrative poem. In Comus Milton
showed his lady invoking the assistance of Echo and likening her
brothers to Narcissus. In Paradise Lost he told how the newly created
Eve gazed with surprise and delight at her responsive likeness in a
pool until admonished by the divine voice. Calderon and Rousseau
each made Narcissus the theme of a play. Fielding recalled him twice
in Joseph, Andrews, to illustrate the misfortune of one loving a maiden
who was unattainable, in the first case because she was a creation of
the imagination, in the second because she repulsed her lover coldly.
Goethe in Wilhelm Meister gave his name to a young official who was
unduly fond of himself. Schiller touched on his delusion for an attrac-
tive song. And Lewis Morris repeated the tale of Narcissus at con-
siderable length, using it to symbolize the quest of an ideal attained
only with death.
To Echo Chaucer referred somewhat inaccurately in the Clerk's
Envoy and the Franklin's Tale. Shakespeare mentioned her trans-
formation in Romeo and Juliet. Shelley pictured Echo silent with
grief for Adonais, dearer to her than Narcissus for whose disdain she
pined away into a shadow of all sounds.
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? METAMORPHOSES -- BOOK III
To the dramatist Fletcher Ovid's description of the pool may have
suggested the charming lines of his Faithful Shepherdess in which
Amoret gave the river her blessing.
In the Amoretti, Spenser declared his grief as paradoxical as that
of Narcissus and repeated an important conceit of the youth's lament.
Although aware, Spenser said, that the lady was the cause of his
suffering, his eyes could not remove from her
In their amazement, like Narcissus vain,
Whose eyes him starved; so plenty makes me poor.
And by a strange irony Dryden used the same passage to show the evil
of Ovid's ill timed wit.
Ovid's tale of Narcissus inspired paintings of Boltraffio, Curradi,
Tintoretto, Dubois, Grebier, and a disciple of Boucher. Waterhouse
painted Echo and Narcissus; Anning Bell pictured Echo alone. In
sculpture the theme was treated by Cortot, Charpentier, and Hiolle.
Gliick transformed Ovid's myth into an opera with a happy ending.
j . , . ii . .
Pentheus
The strange fate of Narcissus, Ovid observed, was one of many
events which verified the predictions of Tiresias and made him revered
as a seer. But this reputation was challenged by Pentheus, king of
Thebes. Thus Ovid returned to the Theban myths recorded in the
Manual and to the later career of Bacchus.
The famous tale of Pentheus was only one of several myths which
assumed that the new worship encountered opposition before it pre-
vailed in Greece. In all probability some such opposition was an his-
torical fact. When the Bacchic religion entered Greece, it was asso-
ciated with the barbaric people of Thrace and its rites were marked by
frenzy and excess. Such a religion could not easily win the civilized
Greeks, a people ordinarily sane and temperate in every way.
In myths dealing with opposition to Bacchus a remarkable circum-
stance is the active aid which the new god received from women. That
the women of a Greek community should accept him the more readily
was natural. Greek tragedy implies often that in the Heroic Age
many of them had come as the spoils of successful war. And such war-
fare might often bring female captives from the neighboring countries
of Thrace and of Phrygia, where the religion of Bacchus prevailed.
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? PENTHEUS
But a number of other myths dealing with Bacchic rites, imply that
even after the new religion triumphed, it regularly gave the women an
important part. Examples are Ovid's tales of Philomela (Bk. 6),
Myrrha (Bk. 10), and Orpheus (Bk. 11). Underlying this, there
appears to have been a profound belief that, in order to obtain a good
harvest for the year, the community must observe chastity for a short
period during the time of planting. At the appointed season, there-
fore, the women left their husbands and departed in a body to pro-
pitiate the god with mystic rites. A similar theory and practice
affected the Egyptian worship of Isis and the religious customs of
many savages in modern times. And in ancient Greece, as in parts of
modern Australia, the women entraced in a secret worship, from which
men were excluded on pain of death.
During early times the spring festivals of Bacchus tended regularly
to a climax of violence and ferocity. With the added fear of perse-
cution, it is probable that they led occasionally to murder of an
atrocious kind. Yet stories of such crimes do not appear until many
centuries after the supposed events and therefore may be suspected of
exaggeration. With the beginning of history, civilized Greece had
toned down the barbaric features of Bacchic worship and laid
emphasis on its doctrine of ascetic purity and spiritual immortality.
Listening to tales of earlier violence and murder, thoughtful Greeks
may well have demurred at a god who promoted such crime.
