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[German version] (Ἴφιτος; Íphitos). Son of  Eurytus [1] of Oechalia and Antiope (or Antioche) who was killed by Hercules because his father and brothers (except for I.: Apollod. 1,128) did not give Hercules  Iole as his wife, as had been promised to him as a prize for his winning at archery. The legend is told in Hom. Od. 21,14ff. (where the bow of Odysseus is a gift from I.), in the lost epic Oichalías hálōsis, and also in Soph. Trach. 225ff., Diod. Sic. 4,31,2ff. and Apollod. 2,127ff. According to another version, I. arrived at the stronghold of Tiryns searching for…

[German version] ἀλληγορία ( allēgoría; first documented as a rhetorical term in Cic. Att. 2,20,3), from ἀλληγορέω ( allēgoréō; ‘I say something other [than I mean]’); Lat. translatio, inversio, immutatio, permutatio. In rhetoric, allegory does not refer to a hermeneutical method ( Allegorical poetry,  Allegoresis). Instead, rhetoric deals with the production of allegories and with their effectiveness as a strategy of argumentation (  argumentatio ). However, the rhetorical treatment of allegory also faces fundamental questions of languag…

(Καῦνος; Kaûnos). [German version] [1] Eponym of the Carian town C. [2] Eponym of the Carian town C. [2], who gains contours chiefly in connection with his twin sister  Byblis. The myths depict various constellations of their incestuous relationship (Parthenius 11). Walde, Christine (Basle) Bibliography S. Jackson, Apollonius of Rhodes: the Cleite and Byblis Suicides, in: SIFC 14, 1997, 48-54. [German version] [2] Coastal town in the border areas between Caria and Lycia This item can be found on the following maps: Theatre | Lycii, Lycia | Pergamum | Pe…

[German version] (Πολύμνια/ Polýmnia, less often Πολυύμνια/ Polyýmnia, one 'with many songs' or 'polyphonic choral song'; cf. Diod. Sic. 4,7,2 ff.). One of the nine canonical Muses, seldom mentioned individually in verse (Ov. Fast. 5,9-54). Despite her unambiguous name, her sphere of activity is non-specific and multifaceted. In Horace (Carm. 1,1), P. is to be understood as a Muse who immortalizes great matters with great songs. She is known as the inventor of the lyre (schol. Apoll. Rhod. 3,1-5a) and …

[German version] (Latin 'old age'; Greek Γῆρας/ Gḗras). Daughter of Erebus and Nyx/Night (Cic. Nat. D. 3,17,44), personification of old age (Hor. Epod. 8,4), often mentioned in connection with illnesses and human suffering (cf. Sen. Epist. 108,28: “senectus enim morbus est”): Verg. Aen. 6,275; Sen. Herc. f. 696; Sil. Pun. 13,583 et passim. Walde, Christine (Basle)

[German version] Daughter of Hippomenes [2]. Walde, Christine (Basle)

[German version] (Κέραμβος, Kérambos). Son of Euseirus (son of Poseidon) and the nymph Eidothea; a shepherd on the Othrys, he invents the panpipes and the lyre, and his playing sets the nymphs dancing. He does not follow Pan's advice to flee from the imminent, icy cold winter. C. and his flock freeze to death under the mass of snow. The nymphs transform him into a beetle with long feelers resembling a lyre (Antoninus Liberalis 22; Cerambyx: stag beetle; cf. Hsch. s.v. Κεράμβυξ). However Ovid in con…

[German version] (Κάμβλης; Kámblēs, also Κάμβης; Kámbēs). Mythological king of Lydia. His insatiable appetite (perhaps caused by poison given to him by his enemies) drives him to cannibalism. Driven mad by hunger, he devours even his own wife. Upon waking the next morning with the rest of her hand in his mouth and realizing what he had done, he kills himself (Xanthus, Lydiaca, fr. 12., FHG vol. I, 36ff.; Nicolaus of Damascus FGrH 2 A 90 F 28; Ael. VH 1,27). Walde, Christine (Basle)

Name of a widely-branched Roman plebeian family who became well known from the beginning of the 2nd cent. BC on, but only achieved the consulate for the first time at the end of the cent. I. Republican Period [German version] [I 1] R. Lupus, P. Consul in 90 BC Praetor no later than 93 BC; consul in 90. During the Social War [3], he received the command of the northern army; against the advice of his legate C. Marius [I 1], he was lured into an ambush by the Marsi and was killed in the valley of the Tolnus (modern Turano; Liv. Per. 73; App. B Civ. 1,191-194; Oros. 5,18,11 f.). MRR 2,25. Elvers, Karl-Ludwig…

Walde, Christine (Basle) [German version] A. Definition and Historical Overview of the Development of the Genres of Speech (CT) Already in the epics of Homer, the Attic tragedies, among historiographers and in philosophy, the prominent areas of public speech become crystallised in reflection, however sublimated, of socio-cultural reality: speeches of advice, defence and accusation, epitaphs and encomia. Yet it was Aristotle, in his Rhetoric (Book I), who created the first reference text, influential to this day, of a canonic threefold division of the genres of speech (Greek: génē …

[German version] (Κέλμις, Kélmis; older form evidently Σκέλμις in Callim. Fr. 100,1 Pf. and Nonnus, Dion. 14,39; 37,164). One of the  Daktyloi Idaioi skilled in the blacksmith's craft. Proverbially, C. ἐν σιδήρῳ (Zenob. 4,80) according to a passage in the Sophoclean satyr play Kōphoí (TGF, fr. 337 N.2) is used to describe excessively power-conscious persons. C., who is the playmate of the boy Zeus in Ovid (Met. 4,281f.), is transformed into steel because he reviles Rhea. Walde, Christine (Basle)

(Ἴων; Íōn). [German version] [1] Hero of the Ionians Eponymous hero of the Ionians ( Iones). Several traditions of his ancestry emphasizing Athens' political primacy are extant. The earliest and most influential versions present I. as the son of  Xuthus and Creusa, thus as the grandson of  Hellen, progenitor of the Hellenes, and of the Athenian king  Erechtheus (Str. 8,383; Paus. 7,1,2). I.'s brother is Achaeus [1], progenitor of the Achaeans, his paternal uncles are  Aeolus [1] and  Dorus. With his wife…

[German version] ('Lack of clarity' sc. of expression); corresponds with the Greek noun σκότος ( skótos, 'darkness') with the adjective σκοτεινός ( skoteinós); ἀσάφεια ( asápheia, 'unclearness'). Obscuritas is a central term in ancient rhetorical and literary-aesthetic discussions. For the Greeks, obscuritas has a positive connotation in the context of solemn inspirational mantic art and oracles in particular, but as a quality of the language of poetry , it is a matter of controversy. In the Frogs of Aristophanes, the archaic-obscure Aeschylus and the modern-perspicuous …

(Θάλεια/ Tháleia, Θαλία/ Thalía, Lat. Thalia; related to the Greek θάλλειν/ thállein, ‘to sprout, grow, thrive’, esp. in reference to fruit trees; cf. Diod. Sic. 4,7). Hesiod counts T. among (1) the Muses, (2) the Nereids and (3) the Charites; generally, she is related to the realm of fertility. Later literary references show a deliberately vague distinction between Muses and Charites. [German version] [1] Muse One of the Muses (Hes. Theog. 77), associated with comedies (e.g. Anth. Pal. 9,504; attribute: comic theatre mask; ‘the light muse’, cf. T.-Theater, Hamburg) as well as mi…

(λαβύρινθος; labýrinthos, labyrinthus). [German version] A. The concept The term ‘labyrinth’ denotes in current usage either the labyrinth in the narrow sense; or in the broad sense, any maze or confusing, large building (especially since the Hellenistic period as a motif in literature or in the pictorial arts); or else in a figurative sense, it is used as a metaphor or allegory for the vagaries and deceptions of human life. This last sense can increasingly be observed after the 3rd cent. AD. Walde, Christine (Basle) [German version] B. The labyrinth in the narrow sense The labyrinth in …

[German version] (Αἷμος; Haîmos). Mountain range in Thrace, the Balkan mountains (Turkish Balkan, Bulgarian Stara Planina. The name is probably Thracian). The H. stretches from Timacus to Pontus and represents a distinctive watershed. According to ancient opinion the H. began at the Adriatic (Str. 7, fr. 10). As it is not very high but hard to cross it was often also an ethnic and political border. The first mention is in Hecataeus (FGrH 1 F 169). Numerous myths are connected with the H. (Apollod. 1,6,3; Ps.-Plut. De fluviis 11,3; Serv. Aen. 1,317; 321; Steph. Byz. s.v. Αἷ.). Ovid gives th…

(Κάπυς; Kápys; Lat. Capys). [German version] [1] Vater des Anchises Trojan, descendant of Dardanus ( Dardanidae), father of  Anchises (Hom. Il. 20.239). According to some myths, his grandson Aeneas [1] founded the Arcadian Kap(h)yae (Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 1.49.1; Steph. Byz. s.v. Καφύαι), his great-grandson Rhomus founded Capua (Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 1.73.3) and named it after him. Stoevesandt, Magdalene (Basle) [German version] [2] Founder of Capua In Virgil and others (Verg. Aen. 10.145 with Servius ad loc.), a Trojan of the same name from the generation of Ae…

[German version] (Greek Κύκλωπες; Kýklōpes, singular Κύκλωψ; Kýklōps, Latin Cyclopes, singular Cyclops; etymology see below). C. is the term used to describe about 18 groups or individual figures in Greek myth who differ not just in their descent and location but also in their outward form and characteristics. As early as antiquity, Hellanicus (FGrH 4 F 88) was the first to undertake systematization and to attempt to trace them back to a single ancestor, Cyclops, son of  Uranus and/or the king of Thrace (Schol. Eur. Or. 965). People distinguished in particular between: 1. the C. w…

Terminology: Greek μεταμόρφωσις ( metamórphōsis; ‘transformation’); Latin transfiguratio, mutatio, with the verbs mutare, refigurari, transformare. [German version] A. Definition Metamorphoses are specific types of myths, particularly widespread in Ancient Greece, whence they found their way into Roman literature. Two types may be distinguished: (1) temporary transformations of gods (for instance Zeus in various erotic adventures), magicians, or tricksters for deceptive purposes, etc.; (2) lasting transformations …

[German version] (Greek Κλείω; Kleíō, Latin Clio; on the etymology from κλεός, ‘fame’ cf. Diod. Sic. 4,19; Plut. Symp. 9,14; Cornutus 14). One of the Muses ( Muses; Hes. Theog. 77); as a nymph of the springs (Plut. De Pyth. or. 17,402c-d) or an  Oceanid (Verg. G. 4,341), C. is also a goddess of the waters, which is frequently associated with poetic inspiration [1]. Since Pindar (e.g., Pind. Nem. 3, 1-2; Pind. Ep. 3,3; 12,1-29; Pind. Ol. 2,1-2; cf. Hor. Carm. 1,12,2) and Bacchyl. (3,1-3; 12,1-3; 13,9,2…