Chapter XXI: Book THE SIXTH: Fable I. Vi.1-145 (1)

Arachne, vain-glorious of her ingenuity, challenges Minerva to a
contest of skill in her art. The Goddess accepts the challenge, and,
being enraged to see herself outdone, strikes her rival with her
shuttle; upon which, Arachne, in her distress, hangs herself. Minerva,
touched with compassion, transforms her into a spider.

Tritonia had {meanwhile} lent an ear to such recitals as these, and she approved of the songs of the Aonian maids, and their just resentment. Then {thus she says} to herself: “To commend is but a trifling matter; let us, too, deserve commendation, and let us not permit our divine majesty to be slighted without {due} punishment.” And {then} she turns her mind to the fate of the Mæonian Arachne; who, as she had heard, did not yield to her in the praises of the art of working in wool. She was renowned not for the place {of her birth}, nor for the origin of her family, but for her skill {alone}. Idmon, of Colophon,[1] her father, used to dye the soaking wool in Phocæan[2] purple.[3] Her mother was dead; but she, too, was of the lower rank, and of the same condition with her husband. Yet {Arachne}, by her skill, had acquired a memorable name throughout the cities of Lydia; although, born of a humble family, she used to live in the little {town} of Hypæpæ.[4] Often did the Nymphs desert the vineyards of their own Tymolus, that they might look at her admirable workmanship; {often} did the Nymphs of the {river} Pactolus[5] forsake their streams. And not only did it give them pleasure to look at the garments when made, but even, too, while they were being made, so much grace was there in her working. Whether it was that she was rolling the rough wool into its first balls, or whether she was unravelling the work with her fingers, and was softening the fleeces worked over again with long drawings out, equalling the mists {in their fineness}; or whether she was moving the {smooth} round spindle with her nimble thumb, or was embroidering with the needle, you might perceive that she had been instructed by Pallas.

This, however, she used to deny; and, being displeased with a mistress so famed, she said, “Let her contend with me. There is nothing which, if conquered, I should refuse {to endure}.” Pallas personates an old woman; she both places false gray hair on her temples, and supports as well her infirm limbs by a staff. Then thus she begins to speak: “Old age has not everything which we should avoid; experience comes from lengthened years. Do not despise my advice; let the greatest fame for working wool be sought by thee among mortals. {But} yield to the Goddess, and, rash woman, ask pardon for thy speeches with suppliant voice. She will grant pardon at my entreaty.” {The other} beholds her with scowling {eyes}, and leaves the threads she has begun; and scarcely restraining her hand, and discovering her anger by her looks, with such words as these does she reply to the disguised Pallas: “Thou comest {here} bereft of thy understanding, and worn out with prolonged old age; and it is thy misfortune to have lived too long. If thou hast any daughter-in-law, if thou hast any daughter {of thy own}, let her listen to these remarks. I have sufficient knowledge for myself in myself, and do not imagine that thou hast availed anything by thy advice; my opinion is {still} the same. Why does not she come herself? why does she decline this contest?”

Then the Goddess says, “Lo! she is come;” and she casts aside the figure of an old woman, and shows herself {as} Pallas. The Nymphs and the Mygdonian[6] matrons venerate the Goddess. The virgin alone is not daunted. But still she blushes, and a sudden flush marks her reluctant features, and again it vanishes; {just} as the sky is wont to become tinted with purple, when Aurora is first stirring, and after a short time to grow white from the influence of the Sun. She persists in her determination, and, from a desire for a foolish victory, she rushes upon her own destruction. Nor, indeed, does the daughter of Jupiter decline {it}, or advise her any further, nor does she now put off the contest. There is no delay; they both take their stand in different places, and stretch out two webs {on the loom} with a fine warp. The web is tied around the beam; the sley separates the warp; the woof is inserted in the middle with sharp shuttles, which the fingers hurry along, and being drawn within the warp, the teeth notched in the moving sley strike it. Both hasten on, and girding up their garments to their breasts, they move their skilful arms, their eagerness beguiling their fatigue. There both the purple is being woven, which is subjected to the Tyrian brazen vessel,[7] and fine shades of minute difference; just as the rainbow, with its mighty arch, is wont to tint a long tract of the sky by means of the rays reflected by the shower: in which, though a thousand different colors are shining, yet the very transition eludes the eyes that look upon it; to such a degree is that which is adjacent the same; and yet the extremes are different. There, too, the pliant gold is mixed with the threads, and ancient subjects are represented on the webs.

Pallas embroiders the rock of Mars[8] in {Athens}, the citadel of Cecrops, and the old dispute about the name of the country. Twice six[9] celestial Gods are sitting on lofty seats in august state, with Jupiter in the midst. His own proper likeness distinguishes each of the Gods. The form of Jupiter is that of a monarch. She makes the God of the sea to be standing {there}, and to be striking the rugged rocks with his long trident, and a wild {horse} to be springing forth[10] out of the midst of the opening of the rock; by which pledge {of his favor} he lays claim to the city. But to herself she gives the shield, she gives the lance with its sharp point; she gives the helmet to her head, {and} her breast is protected by the Ægis. She {there} represents, too, the earth struck by her spear, producing a shoot of pale olive with its berries, and the Gods admiring it. Victory is the end of her work. But that the rival of her fame may learn from precedents what reward to expect for an attempt so mad, she adds, in four {different} parts, four contests bright in their coloring, and distinguished by diminutive figures. One corner contains Thracian Rhodope and Hæmus, now cold mountains, formerly human bodies, who assumed to themselves the names of the supreme Gods. Another part contains the wretched fate of the Pygmæan matron.[11] Her, overcome in a contest, Juno commanded to be a crane, and to wage war against her own people. She depicts, too, Antigone,[12] who once dared to contend with the wife of the great Jupiter; {and} whom the royal Juno changed into a bird; nor did Ilion protect her, or her father Laomedon, from assuming wings, and {as} a white crane, from commending herself with her chattering beak. The only corner that remains, represents the bereft Cinyras;[13] and he, embracing the steps of a temple, {once} the limbs of his own daughters, and lying upon the stone, appears to be weeping. She surrounds the exterior borders with peaceful olive. That is the close; and with her own tree she puts an end to the work.

The Mæonian Nymph delineates Europa, deceived by the form of the bull; and you would think it a real bull, and real sea. She herself seems to be looking upon the land which she has left, and to be crying out to her companions, and to be in dread of the touch of the dashing waters, and to be drawing up her timid feet. She drew also Asterie,[14] seized by the struggling eagle; and made Leda, reclining beneath the wings of the swan. She added, how Jupiter, concealed under the form of a Satyr, impregnated {Antiope},[15] the beauteous daughter of Nycteus, with a twin offspring; {how} he was Amphitryon, when he beguiled thee, Tirynthian[16] dame; how, turned to gold, he deceived Danaë; {how}, changed into fire, the daughter of Asopus;[17] {how}, as a shepherd, Mnemosyne;[18] and as a speckled serpent, Deois.[19] She depicted thee too, Neptune, changed into a fierce bull, with the virgin daughter[20] of Æolus. Thou, seeming to be Enipeus,[21] didst beget the Aloïdæ; as a ram, thou didst delude {Theophane}, the daughter of Bisaltis.[22] Thee too the most bounteous mother of corn, with her yellow hair, experienced[23] as a steed; thee, the mother[24] of the winged horse, with her snaky locks, received as a bird; Melantho,[25] as a dolphin. To all these did she give their own likeness, and the {real} appearance of the {various} localities. There was Phœbus, under the form of a rustic; and how, {besides}, he was wearing the wings of a hawk at one time, at another the skin of a lion; how, too, as a shepherd, he deceived Isse,[26] the daughter of Macareus. How Liber deceived Erigone,[27] in a fictitious bunch of grapes; {and} how Saturn[28] begot the two-formed Chiron, in {the form of} a horse. The extreme part of the web, being enclosed in a fine border, had flowers interwoven with the twining ivy.

Pallas could not blame that work, nor could Envy {censure} it. The yellow-haired Virgin grieved at her success, and tore the web embroidered with the criminal acts of the Gods of heaven. And as she was holding her shuttle {made of boxwood} from Mount Cytorus, three or four times did she strike the forehead of Arachne, the daughter of Idmon. The unhappy creature could not endure it; and being of a high spirit, she tied up her throat in a halter. Pallas, taking compassion, bore her up as she hung; and thus she said: “Live on indeed, wicked one,[29] but still hang; and let the same decree of punishment be pronounced against thy race, and against thy latest posterity, that thou mayst not be free from care in time to come.” After that, as she departed, she sprinkled her with the juices of an Hecatean herb;[30] and immediately her hair, touched by the noxious drug, fell off, and together with it her nose and ears. The head of herself, {now} small as well throughout her whole body, becomes very small. Her slender fingers cleave to her sides as legs; her belly takes possession of the rest {of her}; but out of this she gives forth a thread; and {as} a spider, she works at her web as formerly.

[Footnote 1: _Colophon._--Ver. 8. Colophon was an opulent city of
Lydia, famous for an oracle of Apollo there.]

[Footnote 2: _Phocæan._--Ver. 9. Phocæa was a city of Æolia, in
Ionia, on the shores of the Mediterranean, famous for its purple
dye.]

[Footnote 3: _Purple._--Ver. 9. ‘Murex’ was a shell-fish, now
called ‘the purple,’ the juices of which were much used by the
ancients for dyeing a deep purple color. The most valuable kinds
were found near Tyre and Phocæa, mentioned in the text.]

[Footnote 4: _Hypæpæ._--Ver. 13. This was a little town of Lydia,
near the banks of the river Cayster. It was situate on the descent
of Mount Tymolus, or Tmolus, famed for its wines and saffron.]

[Footnote 5: _Pactolus._--Ver. 16. This was a river of Lydia,
which was said to have sands of gold.]

[Footnote 6: _Mygdonian._--Ver. 45. Mygdonia was a small territory
of Phrygia, bordering upon Lydia, and colonized by a people from
Thrace. Probably these persons had come from the neighboring
country, to see the exquisite works of Arachne. As the Poet tells
us, many were present when the Goddess discovered herself, and
professed their respect and veneration, while Arachne alone
remained unmoved.]

[Footnote 7: _Brazen vessel._--Ver. 60. It seems that brazen
cauldrons were used for the purposes of dyeing, in preference to
those of iron.]

[Footnote 8: _Rock of Mars._--Ver. 70. This was the spot called
Areiopagus, which was said to have received its name from the
trial there of Mars, when he was accused by Neptune of having
slain his son Halirrothius.]

[Footnote 9: _Twice six._--Ver. 72. These were the ‘Dii
consentes,’ mentioned before, in the note to Book i., l. 172. They
are thus enumerated in an Elegiac couplet, more consistent with
the rules of prosody than the two lines there quoted:--

‘Vulcanus, Mars, Sol, Neptunus, Jupiter, Hermes,
Vesta, Diana, Ceres, Juno, Minerva, Venus.’]

[Footnote 10: _To be springing forth._--Ver. 76-7. Clarke renders
‘facit--e vulnere saxi Exsiluisse ferum,’ ‘she makes a wild horse
bounce out of the opening in the rock.’]

[Footnote 11: _Pygmæan matron._--Ver. 90. According to Ælian, the
name of this queen of the Pigmies was Gerane, while other writers
call her Pygas. She was worshipped by her subjects as a Goddess,
which raised her to such a degree of conceit, that she despised
the worship of the Deities, especially of Juno and Diana, on which
in their indignation, they changed her into a crane, the most
active enemy of the Pygmies. These people were dwarfs, living
either in India, Arabia, or Thrace, and they were said not to
exceed a cubit in height.]

[Footnote 12: _Antigone._--Ver. 93. She was the daughter of
Laomedon, king of Troy, and was remarkable for the extreme beauty
of her hair. Proud of this, she used to boast that she resembled
Juno; on which the Goddess, offended at her presumption, changed
her hair into serpents. In compassion, the Deities afterwards
transformed her into a stork.]

[Footnote 13: _Cinyras._--Ver. 98. Cinyras had several daughters
(besides Myrrha), remarkable for their extreme beauty. Growing
insolent upon the strength of their good looks, and pretending to
surpass even Juno herself in beauty, they incurred the resentment
of that Goddess, who changed them into the steps of a temple, and
transformed their father into a stone, as he was embracing the
steps.]

[Footnote 14: _Asterie._--Ver. 108. She was the daughter of Cæus,
the Titan, and of Phœbe, and was ravished by Jupiter under the
form of an eagle. She was the wife of Perses, and the mother of
Hecate. Flying from the wrath of Jupiter, she was first changed by
him into a quail; and afterwards into a stone.]

[Footnote 15: _Antiope._--Ver. 110. Antiope was the daughter of
Nycteus, a king of Bœotia. Being seduced by Jupiter under the form
of a Satyr, she bore two sons, Zethus and Amphion. On being
insulted by Dirce, she was seized with madness, and was cured by
Phocus, whom she is said to have afterwards married.]

[Footnote 16: _Tirynthian._--Ver. 112. Tirynthus was a city near
Argos, where Hercules was born and educated, and from which place
his mother, Alcmene, derived her present appellation.]

[Footnote 17: _Daughter of Asopus._--Ver. 113. Jupiter changed
himself into fire, or, according to some, into an eagle, to seduce
Ægina, the daughter of Asopus, king of Bœotia. By her he was the
father of Æacus.]

[Footnote 18: _Mnemosyne._--Ver. 114. This Nymph, as already
mentioned, became the mother of the Nine Muses, having been
seduced by Jupiter.]

[Footnote 19: _Deois._--Ver. 114. Proserpine was called Deois, or
Dêous Δηοῦς κόρη, from her mother Ceres, who was called Δηὼ by the
Greeks, from the verb δήω, ‘to find;’ because as it was said, when
seeking for her daughter, the universal answer of those who wished
her success in her search, was, δήεις, ‘You will find her.’]

[Footnote 20: _Virgin daughter._--Ver. 116. This was Canace, or
Arne, the daughter of Æolus, whom Neptune seduced under the form
of a bull.]

[Footnote 21: _Enipeus._--Ver. 116. Under the form of Enipeus,
a river of Thessaly, Neptune committed violence upon Iphimedeia,
the wife of the giant Aloëus, and by her was the father of the
giants Otus and Ephialtes.]

[Footnote 22: _Bisaltis._--Ver. 117. Theophane was the daughter of
Bisaltis. Changing her into a sheep, and himself into a ram,
Neptune begot the Ram with the golden fleece, that bore Phryxus to
Colchis.]

[Footnote 23: _Experienced._--Ver. 119. ‘Te sensit,’ repeated
twice in this line, Clarke translates, not in a very elegant
manner, ‘had a bout with thee,’ and ‘had a touch from thee.’ By
Neptune, Ceres became the mother of the horse Arion; or, according
to some, of a daughter, whose name it was not deemed lawful to
mention.]

[Footnote 24: _Thee the mother._--Ver. 119. This was Medusa, who,
according to some, was the mother of the horse Pegasus, by
Neptune, though it is more generally said that it sprang from her
blood, when she was slain by Perseus.]

[Footnote 25: _Melantho._--Ver. 120. Melantho was the daughter
either of Proteus, or of Deucalion, and was the mother of Delphus,
by Neptune.]

[Footnote 26: _Isse._--Ver. 124. She was a native of either
Lesbos, or Eubœa. Her father, Macareus, was the son of Jupiter and
Cyrene.]

[Footnote 27: _Erigone._--Ver. 125. She was the daughter of
Icarus, and was placed among the Constellations.]

[Footnote 28: _How Saturn._--Ver. 126. By Phillyra, Saturn was the
father of the Centaur Chiron. We may here remark, that Arachne was
not very complimentary to the Gods, in the choice of her subjects;
probably it was not her intention or wish to be so.]

[Footnote 29: _Wicked one._--Ver. 136. Clarke translates
‘improba,’ ‘thou wicked jade.’]

[Footnote 30: _An Hecatean Herb._--Ver. 139. This was aconite, or
wolfsbane, said to have been discovered by Hecate, the mother of
Medea. She was the first who sought after, and taught the
properties of poisonous herbs. Some accounts say, that the aconite
was produced from the foam of Cerberus, when dragged by Hercules
from the infernal regions.]

EXPLANATION.

The story of Arachne is most probably based upon the simple fact, that
she was the most skilful artist of her time, at working in silk and
wool. Pliny the Elder tells us, that Arachne, the daughter of Idmon,
a Lydian by birth, and of low extraction, invented the art of making
linen cloths and nets; which invention was also by some attributed to
Minerva. This competition, then, for the merit of the invention, is
the foundation of the challenge here described by the Poet. As,
however, Arachne is said to have hanged herself in despair, she
probably fell a prey to some cause of grief or discontent, the
particulars of which, in their simple form, have not come down to us.
Perhaps the similarity of her name and employment with those of the
spider, as known among the Greeks, gave rise to the story of her
alleged transformation; unless we should prefer to attribute the story
to the fact of the Hebrew word “arag,” signifying to spin, and, in
some degree, resembling her name.

In this story, Ovid takes the opportunity of touching upon several
fables, the subjects whereof he states to have been represented in the
works of Minerva and Arachne. He alludes, among other matters, to the
dispute between Neptune and Minerva, about giving a name to the city
of Athens. St. Augustine, on the authority of Varro, says, that
Cecrops, in building that city, found an olive tree and a fountain,
and that the oracle at Delphi, on being consulted, stating that both
Minerva and Neptune had a right to name the city, the Senate decided
in favor of the Goddess; and this circumstance, he says, gave rise to
the story. According to some writers, it was based on the fact, that
Cranaüs changed the name of the city from Poseidonius, which it was
called after Neptune, to Athenæ, after his own daughter Athena: and as
the Areiopagus sanctioned this change, it was fabled that Neptune had
been overcome by the judgment of the Gods.

The Jesuit Tournemine suggests the following explanation of the
story:--He says, that the aborigines of Attica, being conquered by the
Pelasgians, learned from them the art of navigation, which they turned
to account by becoming pirates. Cecrops, bringing a colony from Saïs,
in Egypt, tried to abolish this barbarous custom, and taught them a
more civilized mode of life; and, among other things, he showed them
how to till the earth, and to raise the olive, for the cultivation of
which he found the soil very favorable. He also introduced the worship
of Minerva, or Athena, as she was called, a Goddess highly honored at
Saïs, and to whom the olive tree was dedicated. Her the Athenians
afterwards regarded as the patroness of their city, which they called
after her name. Athens becoming famous for its olives, and,
considerable profit arising from their cultivation, the new settlers
attempted to wean the natives from piracy, by calling their attention
to agricultural pursuits. To succeed in this, they composed a fable,
in which Neptune was said to be overcome by Minerva; who, even in the
judgment of the twelve greater deities, had found out something of
more utility than he. This fable Tournemine supposes to have been
composed in the ancient language of the country, which was the
Phrygian, mingled with many Phœnician words; and, as in those
languages the same word signifies either a ship or a horse, those who
afterwards interpreted the fable, took the word in the latter
signification, and spoke of a horse instead of a ship, which was
really the original emblem employed in the fiction.

Vossius thinks that the fable originated in a dispute between the
sailors of Athens, who acknowledged Neptune for their chief, and the
people, who followed the Senate, governed by Minerva. The people
prevailed, and a life of civilization, marked by attention to the
pursuits of agriculture, was substituted for one of piracy; which gave
occasion for the saying, that Minerva had overcome Neptune.

With reference to the intrigues and lustful actions attributed to the
various Deities by Arachne in the delineations on her embroidery, we
may here remark, by way of elucidating the origin of these stories in
general, that, in early times, when the earth was sunk in ignorance
and superstition, and might formed the only right in the heathen
world, where a king or petty chieftain demanded the daughter of a
neighbor in marriage, and met with a refusal, he immediately had
recourse to arms, to obtain her by force. Their standards and ships,
on these expeditions, carrying their ensigns, consisting of birds,
beasts, or fabulous monsters, gave occasion to those who described
their feats of prowess to say, that the ravisher had changed himself
into a bull, an eagle, or a lion, for the purpose of effecting his
object. The kings and potentates of those days, being frequently
called Jupiter, Apollo, Neptune, etc., and the priests of the Gods so
named often obtaining their ends by assuming the names of the
Divinities they served, we can account the more easily for the number
of intrigues and abominable actions, attended by changes and
transformations, which the poets and mythologists attribute to many of
the Deities.

Palæphatus suggests a very ingenious method of accounting for these
stories; founded, however, it must be owned, on a very low estimate of
female virtue in those times. He says, that these fabulous narratives
originate in the figures of different animals which were engraved on
the coins of those times; and that, when money was given to buy over
or to procure the seduction of a female, it was afterward said that
the lover had himself taken the figure which was represented on the
coin, by means of which his object had been effected.

Ovid, in common with many of the ancient historians, geographers, and
naturalists, mentions the Pygmies, of which, from the time of Homer
downwards, a nation was supposed to exist, in a state of continual
warfare with the Cranes. Aristotle, who believed in their existence,
placed them in Æthiopia; Pliny, Solinus, and Philostratus in India,
near the source of the Ganges; others again, in Scythia, on the banks
of the Danube. Some of the moderns have attempted to explain the
origin of this prevalent notion. Olaüs Magnus thinks the Samoeids and
Laplanders to have been the Pygmies of Homer. Gesner and others fancy
that they have found their originals in Thuringia; while Albertus
Magnus supposed that the Pygmies were the monkeys, which are so
numerous in the interior of Africa, and which were taken for human
beings of diminutive stature. Vander Hart, who has written a most
ingenious treatise on the subject, suggests that the fable originated
in a war between two cities in Greece, Pagæ and Gerania, the
similarity of whose names to those of the Pygmies and the Cranes, gave
occasion to their neighbors, the Corinthians, to confer on them those
nicknames. It is most probable, however, that the story was founded
upon the diminutive stature of some of the native tribes of the
interior of Africa.

As to the fable of Pygas being changed into a crane, Banier suggests,
that the origin of it may be found in the work of Antoninus Liberalis,
quoting from the Theogony of Bœus. That poet, whose works are lost,
says, that among the Pygmies there was a very beautiful princess,
named Œnoë, who greatly oppressed her subjects. Having married
Nicodamas, she had by him a son, named Mopsus, whom her subjects
seized upon, to educate him in their own way. She accordingly raised
levies against her own subjects; and that circumstance, together with
the name of Gerane, which, according to Ælian, she also bore, gave
rise to the fable, which said that she was changed into a crane; the
resemblance which it bore to ‘geranos,’ the Greek for ‘a crane,’
suggesting the foundation of the story.

FABLE II. [VI.146-312]

The Theban matrons, forming a solemn procession in honor of Latona,
Niobe esteems herself superior to the Goddess, and treats her and her
offspring with contempt; on which, Apollo and Diana, to avenge the
affront offered to their mother, destroy all the children of Niobe;
and she, herself, is changed into a statue.

All Lydia is in an uproar, and the rumor of the fact goes through the town of Phrygia, and fills the wide world with discourse {thereon}. Before her own marriage Niobe had known her,[31] at the time, when still single, she was inhabiting Mæonia and Sipylus.[32] And yet by the punishment of her countrywoman, Arachne, she was not warned to yield to the inhabitants of Heaven, and to use less boastful words. Many things augmented her pride; but yet, neither the skill of her husband, nor the descent of them both, nor the sovereignty of a mighty kingdom, pleased her so much (although all of them did please her) as her own progeny; and Niobe might have been pronounced the happiest of mothers, if she had not so seemed to herself.

For Manto, the daughter of Tiresias, foreknowing the future, urged by a divine impulse, had proclaimed through the middle of the streets, “Ye women of Ismenus, go all of you,[33] and give to Latona, and the two children of Latona, the pious frankincense, together with prayers, and wreathe your hair with laurel; by my mouth does Latona command {this}.” Obedience is paid; and all the Theban women adorn their temples with leaves {of laurel}, as commanded, and offer frankincense on the sacred fires, and words of supplication. Lo! Niobe comes, surrounded with a crowd of attendants, conspicuous for the gold interwoven in her Phrygian garments, and beautiful, so far as anger will allow; and tossing her hair, hanging down on both shoulders, with her graceful head, she stands still; and as she loftily casts around her haughty eyes, she says, “What madness is this to prefer the inhabitants of Heaven, that you have {only} heard of, to those who are seen? or why is Latona worshipped at the altars, {and} my Godhead is still without its {due} frankincense? Tantalus was my father, who alone was allowed to approach the tables of the Gods above. The sister of the Pleiades[34] is my mother; the most mighty Atlas is my grandsire, who bears the æthereal skies upon his neck. Jupiter is my other grandsire; of him, too, I boast as my father-in-law.[35] The Phrygian nations dread me; the palace of Cadmus is subject to me as its mistress; and the walls that were formed by the strings of my husband’s {lyre}, together with their people, are governed by me and my husband; to whatever part of the house I turn my eyes, immense wealth is seen. To this is added a face worthy of a Goddess. Add to this my seven daughters,[36] and as many sons, and, at a future day, sons-in-law and daughters-in-law. Now inquire what ground my pride has {for its existence}; and presume to prefer Latona the Titaness, the daughter of some obscure Cæus, to whom, when in travail,[37] the great earth once refused a little spot, to myself. Neither by heaven, nor by earth, nor by water, was your Goddess received; she was banished the world, till Delos, pitying the wanderer, said, “Thou dost roam a stranger on the land, I in the waves;” and gave her an unstable place {of rest}. She was made the mother of two children, that is {but} the seventh part of my issue. I am fortunate, and who shall deny it? and fortunate I shall remain; who, too, can doubt of that? Plenty has made me secure; I am too great for Fortune possibly to hurt; and, though she should take away many things from me, {even then} much more will she leave me: my {many} blessings have now risen superior to apprehensions. Suppose it possible for some part of this multitude of my children to be taken away {from me}; still, thus stripped, I shall not be reduced to two, the number of Latona; an amount, by the number of which, how far, {I pray}, is she removed from one that is childless? Go from the sacrifice; hasten away from the sacrifice, and remove the laurel from your hair!”

They remove it, and the sacrifice they leave unperformed; and what they can do, they adore the Divinity in gentle murmurs. The Goddess was indignant; and on the highest top of {Mount} Cynthus, she spoke to her two children in such words as these: “Behold! I, your mother, proud of having borne you, and who shall yield to no one of the Goddesses, except to Juno {alone}, am called in question whether I am a Goddess, and, for all future ages, I am driven from the altars devoted {to me}, unless you give me aid. Nor is this my only grief; the daughter of Tantalus has added abusive language to her shocking deeds, and has dared to postpone you to her own children, and (what {I wish} may fall upon herself), she has called me childless; and the profane {wretch} has discovered a tongue like her father’s.”[38] To this relation Latona was going to add entreaties, when Phœbus said, “Cease thy complaints, ’tis prolonging the delay of her punishment.” Phœbe said the same; and, by a speedy descent through the air, they arrived, covered with clouds, at the citadel of Cadmus.

There was near the walls a plain, level, and extending far and wide, trampled continually by horses, where multitudes of wheels and hard hoofs had softened the clods placed beneath them. There, part of the seven sons of Amphion are mounting upon their spirited steeds, and press their backs, red with the Tyrian dye, and wield the reins heavy with gold; of these, Ismenus, who had formerly been the first burden of his mother, while he is guiding the steps of the horses in a perfect circle, and is curbing their foaming mouths, cries aloud, “Ah, wretched me!” and, pierced through the middle of his breast, bears a dart {therein}; and the reins dropping from his dying hand, by degrees he falls on his side, over {the horse’s} shoulder. The next {to him}, Sipylus, on hearing the sound of a quiver in the air, gives rein[39] {to his horse}; as when the pilot, sensible of the storm {approaching}, flies on seeing a cloud, and unfurls the hanging sails on every side, that the light breeze may by no means escape them. He gives rein, {I said}; while thus giving it, the unerring dart overtakes him, and an arrow sticks quivering in the top of his neck, and the bare steel protrudes from his throat. He, as he is bending forward, rolls over the neck, {now} let loose, and {over} the mane, and stains the ground with his warm blood. The unhappy Phædimus, and Tantalus, the heir to the name of his grandsire, when they had put an end to their wonted exercise {of riding}, had turned to the youthful exercises of the palæstra, glowing with oil;[40] and now had they brought[41] breast to breast, struggling in a close grapple, when an arrow, sped onward from the stretched bow, pierced them both, just as they were united together. At the same instant they groaned aloud, and together they laid their limbs on the ground, writhing with pain; together as they lay, for the last time, they rolled their eyeballs, and together they breathed forth their life.

Alphenor sees this, and, beating his torn breast, flies to them, to lift up their cold limbs in his embrace, and falls in this affectionate duty. For the Delian God pierces the inner part of his midriff with the fatal steel. Soon as it is pulled out, a part of his lungs is dragged forth on the barbs, and his blood is poured forth, with his life, into the air; but no single wound reaches the unshaven Damasicthon. He is struck where the leg commences, and where the sinewy ham makes the space between the joints soft; and while he is trying with his hand to draw out the fatal weapon, another arrow is driven through his neck, up to the feathers. The blood drives this out, and itself starting forth, springs up on high, and, piercing the air, spouts forth afar. The last {of them}, Ilioneus, had raised his unavailing arms in prayer, and had said, “O, all ye Gods, in common, (not knowing that all were not to be addressed) spare me!” The {God}, the bearer of the bow, was moved, when now his arrow could not be recalled; yet he died with the slightest wound {of all}, his heart not being struck deep by the arrow.

The report of this calamity, and the grief of the people, and the tears of her family, made the mother acquainted with a calamity so sudden, wondering that it could have happened, and enraged that the Gods above had dared this, {and} that they enjoyed a privilege so great. For Amphion the father, thrusting his sword through his breast, dying, had ended his grief together with his life. Alas! how different is this Niobe from that Niobe who had lately driven the people from the altars of Latona, and, with lofty head, had directed her steps through the midst of the city, envied by her own people, but now to be pitied even by an enemy! She falls down upon the cold bodies, and with no distinction she distributes her last kisses among all her sons. Raising her livid arms from these towards heaven, she says, “Glut thyself, cruel Latona, with my sorrow; glut thyself, and satiate thy breast with my mourning; satiate, too, thy relentless heart with seven deaths. I have received my death-blow;[42] exult and triumph, my victorious enemy. But why victorious? More remains to me, in my misery, than to thee, in thy happiness. Even after so many deaths, I am the conqueror.” {Thus} she spoke; {when} the string twanged from the bent bow, which affrighted all but Niobe alone; she {became} bold by her misfortunes.

The sisters were standing in black array, with their hair dishevelled, before the biers[43] of their brothers. One of these, drawing out the weapon sticking in her entrails, about to die, swooned away, with her face placed upon her brother. Another, endeavoring to console her wretched parent, was suddenly silent, and was doubled together with an invisible wound; and did not close her mouth, until after the breath had departed. Another, vainly flying, falls down; another dies upon her sister; another lies hid; another you might see trembling. And {now} six being put to death, and having received different wounds, the last {only} remains; her mother covering her with all her body, {and} with all her garments, cries, “Leave me but one, and that the youngest; the youngest only do I ask out of so many, and {that but} one.” And while she was entreating, she, for whom she was entreating, was slain. Childless, she sat down among her dead sons and daughters and husband, and became hardened by her woes. The breeze moves no hair {of hers}; in her features is a color without blood; her eyes stand unmoved in her sad cheeks; in her form there is no {appearance} of life. Her tongue itself, too, congeals within, together with her hardened palate, and the veins cease to be able to be moved. Her neck can neither be bent, nor can her arms give any motion, nor her feet move. Within her entrails, too, it is stone.

Still did she weep on; and, enveloped in a hurricane of mighty wind, she was borne away to her native land. There, fixed on the top of a mountain,[44] she dissolves; and even yet does the marble distil tears.

[Footnote 31: _Had known her._--Ver. 148. This was the more
likely, as Tantalus, the father of Niobe, was king of both Phrygia
and Lydia.]

[Footnote 32: _Sipylus._--Ver. 149. This was the name of both a
city and a mountain of Lydia.]

[Footnote 33: _Go all of you._--Ver. 159. Clarke renders the words
‘Ismenides, ite frequentes,’ ‘Go, ye Theban ladies in general.’]

[Footnote 34: _Sister of the Pleiades._--Ver. 174. Taygete, one of
the Pleiades, was the mother of Niobe.]

[Footnote 35: _As my father-in-law._--Ver. 176. Because Jupiter
was the father of her husband, Amphion.]

[Footnote 36: _Seven daughters._--Ver. 182. Tzetzes enumerates
fourteen daughters of Niobe, and gives their names.]

[Footnote 37: _When in travail._--Ver. 187. She alludes to the
occasion on which Latona fled from the serpent Python, which Juno,
in her jealousy, had sent against her; and when Delos, which had
hitherto been a floating island, became immovable, for the
convenience of Latona, in labor with Apollo and Diana. That island
was said to have received its name from the Greek, δῆλος,
‘manifest,’ or ‘appearing,’ from having risen to the surface of
the sea on that occasion.]

[Footnote 38: _Like her father’s._--Ver. 213. Latona alludes to
one of the crimes of Tantalus, the father of Niobe, who was
accused of having indiscreetly divulged the secrets of the Gods.]

[Footnote 39: _Gives rein._--Ver. 230. This was done with the
intention of making his escape.]

[Footnote 40: _Glowing with oil._--Ver. 241. Clarke renders this
line, ‘Were gone to the juvenile work of neat wrestling.’ It would
be hard to say what ‘neat’ wrestling is. He seems not to have
known, that the ‘Palæstra’ was called ‘nitida,’ as shining with
the oil which the wrestlers used for making their limbs supple,
and the more difficult for their antagonist to grasp. Juvenal
gives the epithet ‘ceromaticum’ to the neck of the athlete, or
wrestler, which word means ‘rubbed with wrestler’s oil.’]

[Footnote 41: _Now had they brought._--Ver. 243-4. Clarke thus
translates ‘Et jam contulerant arcto luctantia nexu Pectora
pectoribus;’ ‘And now they had clapped breast to breast,
struggling in a close hug.’]

[Footnote 42: _I have received my death-blow._--Ver. 283.
‘Efferor’ literally means, ‘I am carried out.’ ‘Effero’ was the
term used to signify the carrying of the body out of the city
walls, for the purposes of burial.]

[Footnote 43: _Before the biers._--Ver. 289. The body of the
deceased person was in ancient times laid out on a bed of the
ordinary kind, with a pillow for supporting the head and back;
among the Romans, it was placed in the vestibule of the house,
with its feet towards the door, and was dressed in the best robe
which the deceased had worn when alive. Among the better classes,
the body was borne to the place of burial, or the funeral pile, on
a couch, which was called ‘feretrum,’ or ‘capulus.’ This was
sometimes made of ivory, and covered with gold and purple.]

[Footnote 44: _Top of a mountain._--Ver. 311. This was Mount
Sipylus, in Bœotia, which, as we learn from Pausanias, had on its
summit a rock, which, at a distance, strongly resembled a female
in an attitude of sorrow. This resemblance is said to exist even
at the present day.]

EXPLANATION.

All the ancient historians agree with Diodorus Siculus and
Apollodorus, that Niobe was the daughter of Tantalus, and the sister
of Pelops; but she must not be confounded with a second Niobe, who was
the daughter of Phoroneus, and the first mortal (Homer tells us) with
whom Jupiter fell in love. Homer says that she was the mother of
twelve children, six sons and six daughters. Herodotus says, that she
had but two sons and three daughters. Diodorus Siculus makes her the
mother of fourteen children, seven of each sex. Apollodorus, on the
authority of Hesiod, says, that she had ten sons and as many
daughters; but gives the names of fourteen only. The story of the
destruction of her children is most likely based upon truth, and bears
reference to a historical fact. The plague, which ravaged the city of
Thebes, destroyed all the children of Niobe; and contagious distempers
being attributed to the excessive heat of the sun, it was fabled that
Apollo had killed them with his arrows; while women, who died of the
plague, were said to owe their death to the anger of Diana. Thus,
Homer says, that Laodamia and the mother of Andromache were killed by
Diana. Valerius Flaccus relates the sorrow of Clytie, the wife of
Cyzicus, on the death of her mother, killed by the same Goddess; so
the Scholiast on Pindar (Pythia, ode iii.) says, on the authority of
Pherecydes, that Apollo sent Diana to kill Coronis and several other
women. Eustathius distinctly asserts, that the poets attributed the
deaths of men, who died of the plague, to Apollo; and those of women,
dying a similar death, to Diana.

This supposition is based upon rational and just grounds; since many
contagious distempers may be clearly traced to the exhalations of the
earth, acted on by the intense heat of the sun. Homer, most probably,
means this, when he says that the plague came upon the Grecian camp,
on the God, in his anger, discharging his arrows against it; or, in
other words, when the extreme heat of his rays had caused a corruption
of the atmosphere. It may be here observed, that arrows were the
symbol of Apollo, when angry, and the harp when he was propitious.
Diogenes Laertius tells us, that, during the prevalence of the plague,
it was the custom to place branches of laurel on the doors of the
houses, in the hope that the God, being reminded of Daphne, would
spare the places which thereby claimed his protection.

Ovid says, that the sons of Niobe were killed while managing their
horses; but Pausanias tells us that they died on Mount Cithæron, while
engaged in hunting, and that her daughters died at Thebes. Homer says,
that her children remained nine days without burial, because the Gods
changed the Thebans into stones, and that the offended Divinities
themselves performed the funeral rites on the tenth day; the meaning
probably, is, that, they dying of the plague, no one ventured to bury
them, and all seemed insensible to the sorrows of Niobe, as each
consulted his own safety. Ismenus, her eldest son, not being able to
endure the pain of his malady, is said to have thrown himself into a
river of Bœotia, which, from that circumstance, received his name.
After the death of her husband and children, Niobe is said to have
retired to Mount Sipylus, in Lydia, where she died. Here, as Pausanias
informs us, was a rock, resembling, at a distance, a woman overwhelmed
with grief; though according to the same author, who had visited it,
the resemblance could not be traced on approaching it. On this ground,
Ovid relates, that she was borne on a whirlwind to the top of a Lydian
mountain, where she was changed into a rock.

Pausanias tells us, that Melibœa, or Chloris, and Amycle, two of her
daughters, appeased Diana, who preserved their lives; or that, in
other words, they recovered from the plague; though he inclines to
credit the version of Homer, who says that all of her children died by
the hands of Apollo and Diana. Melibœa received the surname of
Chloris, from the paleness which ensued on her alarm at the sudden
death of her sisters.

FABLE III. [VI.313-381]

Latona, fatigued with the burden of her two children, during a long
journey, and parched with thirst, goes to drink at a pond, near which
some countrymen are at work. These clowns, in a brutal manner, not
only hinder her from drinking, but trouble the water to make it muddy;
on which, the Goddess, to punish their brutality, transforms them into
frogs.

But then, all, both women and men, dread the wrath of the divinity, {thus} manifested, and with more zeal {than ever} all venerate with {divine} worship the great godhead of the Deity who produced the twins; and, as {commonly} happens, from a recent fact they recur to the narration of former events.

One of them says, “Some countrymen of old, in the fields of fertile Lycia, {once} insulted the Goddess, {but} not with impunity. The thing, indeed, is but little known, through the obscure station of the individuals, still it is wonderful. I have seen upon the spot, the pool and the lake noted for the miracle. For my father being now advanced in years, and incapable of travel, ordered me to bring thence some choice oxen, and on my setting out, had given me a guide of that nation: with whom, while I was traversing the pastures, behold! an ancient altar, black with the ashes of sacrifices, was standing in the middle of a lake, surrounded with quivering reeds. My guide stood still, and said in a timid whisper, ‘Be propitious to me;’ and with a like whisper, I said, ‘Be propitious.’ However, I asked him whether it was an altar of the Naiads, or of Faunus, or of some native God; when the stranger answered me in such words; ‘Young man, there is no mountain Divinity for this altar. She calls this her own, whom once the royal Juno banished from the world; whom the wandering Delos, at the time when it was swimming as a light island, hardly received at her entreaties. There Latona, leaning against a palm, together with the tree of Pallas, brought forth twins, in spite of their stepmother {Juno}. Hence, too, the newly delivered {Goddess} is said to have fled from Juno, and in her bosom to have carried the two divinities, her children. And now the Goddess, wearied with her prolonged toil, being parched with the heat of the season, contracted thirst in the country of Lycia, which bred the Chimæra[45] when the intense sun was scorching the fields; the craving children, too, had exhausted her suckling breasts. By chance she beheld a lake[46] of fine water, in the bottom of a valley; some countrymen were there, gathering bushy osiers, together with bulrushes, and sedge natural to fenny spots. The Titaness approached, and bending her knee, she pressed the ground, that she might take up the cool water to drink; the company of rustics forbade it. The Goddess thus addressed them, as they forbade her: ‘Why do you deny me water? The use of water is common {to all}. Nature has made neither sun, nor air, nor the running stream, the property of any one. To her public bounty have I come, which yet I humbly beg of you to grant me. I was not intending to bathe my limbs here, and my wearied joints, but to relieve my thirst. My mouth, as I speak, lacks moisture, and my jaws are parched, and scarce is there a passage for my voice therein; a draught of water will be nectar to me, and I shall own, that, together with it, I have received my life {at your hands}. In {that} water you will be giving me life. Let these, too, move you, who hold out their little arms from my bosom’; and by chance the children were holding out their arms.

“What person might not these kindly words of the Goddess have been able to influence? Still, they persist in hindering {the Goddess thus} entreating them; and moreover add threats and abusive language, if she does not retire to a distance. Nor is this enough. They likewise muddy the lake itself {with} their feet and hands; and they raise the soft mud from the very bottom of the water, by spitefully jumping to and fro. Resentment removes her thirst. For now no longer does the daughter of Cæus supplicate the unworthy {wretches}, nor does she any longer endure to utter words below {the majesty of} a Goddess; and raising her hands to heaven, she says, ‘For ever may you live in that pool.’ The wish of the Goddess comes to pass. They delight to go beneath the water, and sometimes to plunge the whole of their limbs in the deep pool; now to raise their heads, and now to swim on the top of the water; oft to sit on the bank of the pool, {and} often to leap back again into the cold stream. And even now do they exercise their offensive tongues in strife: and banishing {all} shame, although they are beneath the water, {still} beneath the water,[47] do they try to keep up their abuse. Their voice, too, is now hoarse, and their bloated necks swell out; and their very abuse dilates their extended jaws. Their backs are united to their heads: their necks seem as though cut off; their backbone is green; their belly, the greatest part of their body, is white; and {as} new-made frogs, they leap about in the muddy stream.”

[Footnote 45: _The Chimæra._--Ver. 339. The Chimæra, according to
the poets, was a monster having the head of a lion, the body of a
goat, and the tail of a dragon. It seems, however, that it was
nothing more than a volcanic mountain of Lycia, in Asia Minor,
whence there were occasional eruptions of flame. The top of it was
frequented by lions; the middle afforded plentiful pasture for
goats; and towards the bottom, being rocky, and full of caverns,
it was infested by vast numbers of serpents, that harbored there.]

[Footnote 46: _Beheld a lake._--Ver. 343. Probus, in his
Commentary on the Second Book of the Georgics, says that the name
of the spring was Mela, and that of the shepherd who so churlishly
repulsed Latona, was Neocles. Antoninus Liberalis says, that the
name of the stream was Melites, and that Latona required the water
for the purpose of bathing her children. He further tells us, that
on being repulsed, she carried her children to the river Xanthus,
and returning thence, hurled stones at the peasants, and changed
them into frogs.]

[Footnote 47: _Beneath the water._--Ver. 376. Some commentators
are so fanciful as to say, that the repetition of the words ‘sub
aqua,’ in the line ‘Quamvis sint sub aquâ, sub aquâ, maledicere
tentant,’ not inelegantly [non ineleganter] expresses the croaking
noise of the frogs. A man’s fancy must, indeed, be exuberant to
find any such resemblance; more so, indeed, than that of
Aristophanes, who makes his frogs say, by way of chorus,
‘brekekekekex koäx koäx.’ Possibly, however, that might have been
the Attic dialect among frogs.]

EXPLANATION.

This story may possibly be based upon some current tradition of Latona
having been subjected to such cruel treatment from some country
clowns; or, which is more probable, it may have been originally
invented as a satire on the rude manners and uncouth conduct of the
peasantry of ancient times. The story may also have been framed, to
account, in a poetical manner, for the origin of frogs.

FABLE IV. [VI.382-411]

The Satyr Marsyas, having challenged Apollo to a trial of skill on the
flute, the God overcomes him, and then flays him alive for his
presumption. The tears that are shed on the occasion of his death
produce the river that bears his name.

When thus one, who, it is uncertain, had related the destruction of {these} men of the Lycian race, another remembers {that of} the Satyr;[48] whom, overcome {in playing} on the Tritonian reed, the son of Latona visited with punishment. “Why,” said he, “art thou tearing me from myself? Alas! I {now} repent; alas,” cried he, “the flute is not of so much value!” As he shrieked aloud, his skin was stript[49] off from the surface of his limbs, nor was he aught but {one entire} wound. Blood is flowing on every side; the nerves, exposed, appear, and the quivering veins throb without any skin. You might have numbered his palpitating bowels, and the transparent lungs within his breast. The inhabitants of the country, the Fauns, Deities of the woods, and his brothers the Satyrs, and Olympus,[50] even then renowned, and the Nymphs lamented him; and whoever {besides} on those mountains was feeding the wool-bearing flocks, and the horned herds.