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HISTORY/ BACKGROUNDThe Muses, the group of Greek goddesses who preside over the arts and sciences, were born at Pieria at the base of Mount Olympus. Their father was Zeus and their mother was Mnemosyne, the personification of Memory and the sister of Hyperion and Rheia who seems not to have been a complete deity; there are no cults associated with her. According to Hesiod, Zeus "made love [for nine days] to Mnemosyne with beautiful hair, / From whom nine Muses with golden diadems were born, / And their delight is in festivals and the pleasures of song" (Theogony 920). They were raised by their nurse, Eupheme, and her son, Crotus the hunter, who was transported into the sky as Sagittarius upon his death.
In the Greek culture, all learning was under the patronage of the Muses, and
they served as the source of inspiration for poetry, music, and art. Farewell Zeus's daughters, and bestow the song that beguiles. / Make known the eerie brood of the eternal Immortals / Who were born of Earth and starry Sky, / And of dusky Night, and whom the salt Sea bore. / Tell how first the gods and earth came into being / And the rivers and the sea, endless and surging, / And the stars shining and the wide sky above; / How they divided wealth and allotted honors, / And first possessed deep-ridged Olympos. / Tell me these things, Olympian Muses (Theogony 105) This invocation requests that the Muses sing directly through Hesiod, allowing the mortals that hear his poems to know the divine history as the gods themselves know it. The
Muses have always been seen as a group of sister goddesses whose central cult
was on Mount Helicon in Boeotia, Greece, hence their epithet "Helikonian
Muses" (Theogony 001). There
are many places that were dedicated to the Muses, such as the famous Valley of
the Muses. Every four or five years on the eastern slopes of Mt. Helikon,
“Mouseai” festivals were held by the Thespians, or dramatists.
Poets and musicians from all over Greece participated in various games,
such as the writing and performing of epics, poetry, satyric poetry, and tragic
and comedic dramas. It was also
common for ancient schools to have a shrine to the Muses called mouseion,
from which is derived the modern word “museum.” The famous Museum of Alexandria was a temple dedicated to the Muses. The Muses attend the festivals on Olympus and entertain and inspire the other gods with their wit and charm. Apollo (1)*, a devotee of the Muses, replaces his bow with his lyre and joins them in singing and dancing; it is from this communion of interests that Apollo has the surname "Musagetes." When Hesiod explains the nature of his inspiration, he says the Muses "gave me a staff, a branch of good sappy laurel," which was the iconographic identifier of Apollo (Theogony 31).
Some of the Muses' other common companions include the Charities,
Eros (2),
Dionysus
(3),
and Aphrodite (4). Athena caught and tamed the winged horse Pegasus and gave him to the
Muses. Among the Muses'
disciples
are the Sphinx, who learned her riddle from the Muses, Aristaeus, who
learned the arts of healing and prophecy from them, and Echo, whom they taught to
play music. There
are many small stories that are applied to the Muses. One of them is the story of the singer and poet Thamyris, who
was said to have challenged the Muses to a musical contest at Dorium in Messenia.
If he won he would take pleasure from all of them.
The Muses, of course, won the contest and punished him for making light
of their skills. They took out his
eyes and he lost his memory, no longer able to recite any of his songs or
poems. While
the Muses are typically imagined as the providers of the gifts of talent and
insight, they are also able to revoke their blessing, viciously if they so
choose. King Pierus boasted that
his daughters rivaled the beauty and talent of the Muses, and because of this
all nine of his daughters were turned into magpies. In Ovid's version of the same myth, it was the daughters
themselves who confronted the Muses, initiating a contest to see who could sing
a fairer song. The representative
from the nine sisters sang of the battle between the gods and the giants
(5), and
Calliope sang an ode to Ceres
(6), winning the competition as judged by the
nymphs. The sisters turned into
magpies for their audacity and their disagreement with the clear verdict. (Metamorphosis
V). Socrates claimed that locusts, before the birth of the
Muses, were once men. When song
appeared with the birth of the Muses, these men were so overcome with delight that they sang
constantly, forgetting to eat or drink until they eventually died.
These men became locusts, creatures capable of singing constantly until
death without the need of sustenance. When
they die, the locusts return to the Muses and report which men on earth honors
each sister, thereby endearing a worshipper to the Muse he follows. In
another myth, it was said that Hera/
Juno (7), wife of Zeus/ Jupiter, persuaded the Sirens
(8), who were described as
having the bodies of birds and the heads of beautiful women, to enter a singing
contest with the Muses. The Muses
won the competition and celebrated by plucking all of the Sirens feathers and
making crowns of them. The Greeks
typically established the nine muses as: Calliope, Clio, Erato, Euterpe,
Melpomene, Polymnia, Terpsichore, Thalia, and Urania. Calliope, also spelled Kalliope, is the patroness of epic poetry and the eldest Muse. Her name means “The Fair Voiced” and she is often depicted holding a writing tablet and sometimes with a roll of paper or a book, and crowned in gold. She judged the dispute between the goddesses Aphrodite and Persephone over Adonis (9) by giving them equal time with him while also providing Adonis a period of solitude for his own well-being. From Calliope and Apollo came Orpheus (10), the desperately melancholy poet who was slaughtered by Maenads, his still-singing head and lyre floating (11) across the Aegean Sea until Apollo freed it to Hades & Bacchus punished the maenads for the loss of the talent (Metamorphoses XI). Calliope was said to have taken a liking to Achilles, teaching him how to cheer his friends by singing at banquets. Some myths present her as the mother of Rhesus, a King of Thrace and a victim of the Trojan War (Iliad 10.449); or as the mother of Linus the musician, who was the inventor of melody and rhythm, who was later killed by Hercules (12). Clio is the patroness of history. Her name means “The Proclaimer” and she is often seen holding a scroll or accompanied by a chest of books and is sometimes represented with the heroic trumpet and the clepsydra, or water clock. She has been credited with introducing the Phoenician alphabet to Greece. After reprimanding Aphrodite for her passionate love for Adonis, Aphrodite punished Clio by making her fall in love with Pierus, the king of Macedonia. By Pierus she bore Hyacinth, a man of great beauty who was later accidentally killed by his lover Apollo, who turned him into the Hyacinth bulb in rememberance (Metamorphoses X). Melpomene, “The Songstress,” is the goddess of tragedy and lyre playing, and is represented by the tragic mask. She is sometimes seen with garland, the club of Heracles and a sword. She is often wearing cothurnes, boots traditionally worn by tragic actors, and a crown of cypress. According to some traditions, the Sirens were born from the union between Melpomene and the river god Achelous, whose horn was torn off by Hercules (Metamorphoses VIII - IX). Polyhymnia or Polymnia, “She of Many Hymns,” is the goddess of religious and sacred poetry. She brings distinction to writers whose works have won them immortal fame. She has also been called the Muse of geometry, mime, meditation, and agriculture. She is seen with a simple pensive look on her face and is often veiled. She was said in some legends to have been the mother of Triptolemus, the first priest of Demeter and the inventor of agriculture. The legends vary as to whether the father was Cheimarrhus, a son of Ares, or Celeus, king of Eleusis. Infrequently she was said to be mother to Eros, the god of love who was typically the child of Aphrodite. The
other Muses seem to be less prominent in myth but still preside over important
disciplines. Erato,
whose name is translated as “The Lovely,” is the goddess of lyric poetry and
mimicry, and is often seen with a lyre and sometimes wears a crown of roses.
Euterpe, the " Giver of Pleasure” is the goddess of Music and is often
seen carrying a flute. She is
credited as the inventor of the double flute.
A conflicting myth names her as the mother of Rhesus, the king slain by
Diomedes at Troy. Terpsichore, “The Whirler,”
is the patroness of dance. She is
usually represented dancing with a lyre as well as a plectrum, which was a
device used for plucking stringed instruments.
Thalia, “The Flourishing,” is the patron of comedy and of playful and
idyllic poetry, and is seen with a comic mask and the shepherd¹s staff. Thalia is sometimes seen with a crown of ivy and a crook.
Hesiod considered her one of the Graces
(13), the group of three goddesses born to Zeus and Eurynome who often accompany
the Muses (Theogony 912-914). By
Apollo she had the Corybantes, which were celebrants of the great Mother of the
Gods, Cybele. Urania, “The
Heavenly,” is the patron of astronomy and is represented with the staff pointed
at a celestial globe as well as a compass.
She divines the future from the positioning of the stars.
"Urania" was also occasionally used as a byname for Aphrodite. References: Bulfinch, Moncrieff, Morford, & Powell. *Artist & Title for each linked work is listed at the bottom of the Bibliography Page. |
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