Arethusa (mythology)
Arethusa ( ancient Greek Ἀρέθουσα Aréthousa ) is the name of a nymph from Greek mythology . She is a naiad and at the same time a sister of the Hesperides . There is one of Pindar , Ovid and Pausanias carried forward forecast to Arethusa in which the nymph flees before a greedy flow in God and a source is changed.
background
According to the mythological tales of Pindar and Ovid, Arethusa is the daughter of Hesperus and Nyx . She is the sister of the Hesperides Erytheia , Hespera, Hesperthusa and Aigle , her mythological role as a naiad (spring nymph) she only takes on later. Arethusa is also said to have been loyal to the goddess Artemis and to have been her student in the hunting arts .
Legend
The myth about Arethusa is already known to Pindar, it is told most extensively and with the greatest aftereffect in the Metamorphoses of Ovid, Ovid uses Latinized names and equates Artemis with the Roman goddess Diana .
In the Metamorphoses, the legend appears embedded in the story of the robbery of Proserpine . There it is Arethusa who rises from her source in front of the angry Ceres (mother of the kidnapped Proserpina). In her anger, Ceres plans to destroy the whole world. Arethusa asks Ceres, as the protective deity of Sicily , for mercy on the innocent earth and tells Ceres who the kidnapper is and where Proserpine is. She knows about it because she has far-reaching connections through her underground river course in the underworld. Arethusa reports to Ceres, among other things, the following:
Arethusa was once a young and beautiful nymph who enjoyed hunting and sports. On a hot, sunny day, after training, she went into the Alpheios river to bathe in it. She was surprised and harassed by the river god of the same name . On her flight, Arethusa was able to ask the well-meaning goddess Artemis for help. This enveloped Arethusa in thick fog. When this could not deter Alpheios, driven by his desires, Artemis transformed the desperate nymph into a spring whose brooks flowed underground and hidden under the Peloponnese and under the sea and emerged again on the Ortygia peninsula , part of Syracuse .
A slightly modified form of the legend of Alpheios and Arethusa can be found in Pausanias: Here Alpheios is a gifted hunter who falls in love with Arethusa on an excursion and languishes after her. When Arethusa is transformed into a spring, Alpheios literally flows into tears and turns into a small river that mixes with the spring water of the Arethusa near Syracuse and flows into the sea.
reception
Arethusa is the patron saint of named after her source already on the island of Ortygia near Syracuse in Sicily, from ancient times has been suggested that they possess an underground connection to the river Alpheus: claims Pausanias, the Fountain of Arethusa begin to spill when in Olympia , the Throats of sacrificed people and animals would be thrown into the Alpheios River. In addition, vessels that are thrown into the Alpheios river are said to reappear in the Arethusa spring.
Benjamin Britten has titled the last movement of his Six Metamorphoses after Ovid for solo oboe “Arethusa”. Karol Szymanowski named the first piece of his Mythen op. 30 for violin and piano “The Fountain of Arethusa” and describes the story onomatopoeically.
Arethusa is also the namesake of the monotypical orchid species Arethusa bulbosa .
literature
- James George Fraze: Pausanias's Description of Greece (= Pausanias's Description of Greece 6 Volume Set , 3rd volume). Cambridge University Press, 2012, ISBN 1108047254 .
- Greta Hawes: Rationalizing Myth in Antiquity . Oxford University Press, New York 2014, ISBN 0191653403 .
- Peter Jones: Reading Ovid: Stories from the Metamorphoses . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2007, ISBN 9780521849012 .
- Philip Hardie: The Cambridge Companion to Ovid . Cambridge University Press, New York / London 2002, ISBN 0521772818 .
- Neil Faulkner: A Visitor's Guide to the Ancient Olympics . Yale University Press, New Haven 2012, ISBN 0300160291 .
- Doris Ellen Ames: Orchids of Manitoba: A Field Guide . Native Orchid Conservation, Winnipeg 2005, ISBN 0973486406 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ A b c Philip Hardie: The Cambridge Companion to Ovid . Page 188–192.
- ^ A b c Neil Faulkner: A Visitor's Guide to the Ancient Olympics . Page 56.
- ^ A b c Peter Jones: Reading Ovid . Pages 142–144.
- ↑ Greta Hawes: Rationalizing Myth in Antiquity . Page 203.
- ↑ James George Fraze: Pausanias's Description of Greece . Page 483.
- ↑ Doris Ellen Ames: Orchids of Manitoba . Page 45.