Curetes (mythology)

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Curetes dance around the Zeus child

In Greek mythology, which provide Kuretes ( Greek  Κουρῆτες ) a powerful nine-member squad weapons bristling demons . They protect the newborn god Zeus before his father Kronos , who tries to kill his own son. Their wild war chants and the clank of arms are so loud that they drown out the infant's screams.

The Greek poet Korinna (approx. 500 BC) sings about it:

The Curetes, they hid
the lofty scion of the goddess
In the dark rock cave
Before the suspicious Kronos,
Until the goddess Rhea stole him.

They also made noises when Leto , Zeus' lover, gave birth to her children Artemis and Apollo on Delos (Ortygia) , so that Hera would not notice.

When the Kuretes at the instigation Heras to Epaphos , the child of Io and Zeus kidnap, Zeus kills the Curetes with a flash.

Diodorus Siculus (1st century BC) describes the Curetes as particularly wise men or descendants of gods who lived on Crete in the Dikti Mountains and made useful discoveries and inventions - such as B. the production of honey .

The term curetes for certain population groups is not limited to Crete, because in ancient literature there are references to curetes for some other regions of Greece; their origin has been controversial since Strabo . At Homer , the Curetes of Aitolia and the Aitolians fight for Kalydon , and Kurets are also claimed for Chalkis on Evia , who fled with their mother Kombe from their father Sokos to Crete and then to Phrygia , only to return to Marathon from there . Titus Lucretius Carus reports of "Phrygian Curetes" who imitate the Cretan myth .

In Ephesus , the curetes were also responsible as cult servants for performing the mystery acts on the occasion of the birthday celebrations of the city goddess Artemis Ephesia (Ἀρτεμίσιον Ἐφέσιον), which were celebrated on the 6th of Thargelión (May-June). Because of the apparently strict secrecy, there are hardly any records of these cult celebrations. In Strabo there is a reference to a festival of sacrifices, which in essence is probably a reenactment of the birth story of Zeus described above. The Kurets went to Ortygia, the birthplace of Artemis, where the festival of sacrifice was celebrated, via the processional path known today as Kuretenstrasse , which leads from the Prytaneion to the former city center.

Often the curetes are confused with the corybants because of their origin - demonic beings from Phrygia. These appear in the service of the Cybele by performing a weapon dance and like the Cretan curetes clashing their shields.

Remarks

  1. See Immisch, Sp. 1598–1599
  2. ^ Libraries of Apollodorus 1, 1, 6
  3. http://www.gottwein.de/Grie/lyr/LyrKorin01.php
  4. ^ Libraries of Apollodorus 2, 1, 3
  5. Diodorus 5, 65, 1-4
  6. ^ Strabo, Geographica 10, 3
  7. ^ Titus Lucretius Carus, De rerum natura 2, 630
  8. Rainer Schwindt: The world view of the letter to the Ephesians. A religious-historical-exegetical study . Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2002, ISBN 3-16-147848-7 , p. 108
  9. ^ Strabo, Geographica 14, 1
  10. Selahattin Erdemgil: Ephesus. Ruins and museum. NET, Istanbul 1988, ISBN 978-975-479-082-5 , p. 20

literature