Ovid - The Metamorphoses: Index - BCD

Babylonius

Bk II:227-271. Of Babylon, the ancient Mesopotamian capital of the Babylonians, in modern Iraq.

Bacchantes, Maenades, Maenads, Bassarids

Bk XI:85-145. The female followers of Bacchus-Dionysus, noted for their ecstatic worship of the god.

Bk III:692-733. They celebrate the rites on Mount Cithaeron.

Bk VII:234-293. Medea has the appearance of a Bacchante.

Bk XI:1-66. They kill Orpheus.

Bacchiadae

Bk V:385-424. An ancient royal family of Corinth, descended from Bacchis, one of the Heraclidae, founder of Syracuse.

Bacchus, Bacheus (=Bacchic)

The god Dionysus, the ‘twice-born’, the god of the vine. The son of Jupiter and Semele. His worship was celebrated with orgiastic rites borrowed from Phrygia. His female followers are the Maenades. He carries the thyrsus, a wand tipped with a pine-cone, the Maenads and Satyrs following him carrying ivy-twined fir branches as thyrsi. (See Caravaggio’s painting –Bacchus – Uffizi, Florence)

Bk III:273-315. Snatched from his mother Semele’s womb when she is destroyed by Jupiter’s fire, he is sewn into Jupiter’s thigh, reared by Ino and hidden by the nymphs of Mount Nysa. (See Charles Shannon’s painting – The Childhood (or Education) of Bacchus – Private Collection)

Bk III:528-571. His worship comes to Thebes and is opposed there by Pentheus and at Argos by Acrisius.

Bk III:597-637. Acoetes tells how Bacchus was discovered on Chios. Bacchus asks to be put ashore on Naxos his home. Acoetes may be a manifestation of Bacchus himself.

Bk III:638-691. Bacchus transforms the ship and crew.

Bk III:692-733. His Maenads destroy Pentheus.

Bk IV:1-30. His names, features, deeds and rites. He is Dionysus Sabazius, the barley-god of Thrace and Phrygia, ‘formosissimus alto conspiceris caelo’ the morning and evening star, the star-son, identified by the Jews with Adonis, consort of the Great Goddess Venus Aphrodite or Astarte, and therefore manifested with her in the planet Venus. Later he is the horned Lucifer, ‘son of the morning’.

Bk IV:389-415. He turns the daughters of Minyas into bats.

Bk IV:512-542. Juno mocks at Ino his foster-mother, invoking his name.

Bk IV:604-662. He is worshipped in India and by all of Greece.

Bk IV:753-803. Bk VI:486-548. Bk VII:425-452,

Bk XII:536-579. Bk XIII:623-639. Wine at the marriage feast or banquet is his gift. (See Velázquez’s painting – The Drinkers, or the Triumph of Bacchus – Prado, Madrid) (Note: Wine in Ancient Greece contained honey, aloes, thyme, myrtle berries etc. to form a thick sweet syrup which was diluted when drinking, hence the mixing bowls etc. at the banquets.)

Bk VI:571-619. His triennial festival, the trietericus, is celebrated on Mount Rhodope by the young Thracian women.

Bk VIII:152-182. He rescues Ariadne on Dia, and sets her crown among the stars as the Corona Borealis.

Bk VIII:260-328. He receives libations of wine from the harvest.

Bk XI:85-145. He grants Midas a gift, and takes it away when Midas is plagued by his golden touch.

Bk XIII:640-674. He gave Anius’s daughters the power to change everything into corn, wine and olives, and ultimately rescued them by turning them into doves.

Bk XV:391-417. His worship conquered India, and from there he took the lynxes that follow him.

Bactrius

Of the city of Bactria in Persia.

Bk V:107-148. The native place of Halcyoneus.

Baiae

Bk XV:622-745. The modern Baia, opposite Pozzuoli on the Bay of Pozzuoli, once the fashionable bathing place of the Romans, owing its name, in legend, to Baios, the navigator of Odysseus. The Emperors built magnificent palaces there. Part now lies beneath the sea due to subsidence.

Balearic, Balearicus

Bk II:708-736. Bk IV:706-752. Of the Balearic islands between Africa and Spain.

Battus

Bk II:676-701. A countryman changed by Mercury into a flint (touchstone, the ‘informer’)

Baucis

Bk VIII:611-678. The wife of Philemon. They are visited by the gods, Jupiter and Mercury, disguised as mortals.

Bk VIII:679-724. They are both turned into trees, she into a lime tree and he into an oak. (See the painting by Rubens – Landscape with Philemon and Baucis – Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna)

Belides, Danaïdes

The fifty daughters of Danaüs, granddaughters of Belus, king of Egypt.

Bk IV:416-463. They were forced to marry their cousins, the fifty sons of Aegyptus, and, with one exception, Hypermnestra, who saved the life of Lynceus, because he preserved her virginity, killed them on their wedding night. The others were punished in Hades by having to fill a bottomless cistern with water carried in leaking sieves.

Bk X:1-85. Their punishment in the underworld ceases for a time at the sound of Orpheus’s song.

Bellona

Bk V:149-199. The goddess of war, and sister of Mars.

Belus

Bk IV:190-213. Founder of the line of Achaemenian Kings of Persia. Not the ancestor of the Belides.

Bk IV:604-662. Ancestor of the Belides, King of Egypt, brother of Agenor, and son of Neptune. Acrisius is his descendant through Danaüs.

Berecyntius heros

Bk XI:85-145. Midas, son of Cybele, from Mount Berecyntus (Bk XI:1-66.) in Phrygia.

Beroë

Bk III:273-315. Semele’s nurse.

Bienor

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur.

Bisaltis

Bk VI:103-128. Theophane, daughter of Bilsaltes, loved by Neptune, and depicted by Arachne.

Bistonius

Bk XIII:123-381. Of the Bistones, a people of Thrace.

Boebe

A lake in Thessaly.

Bk VII:179-233. Medea gathers magic herbs there by its reedy shores.

Boeotia

Bk II:227-271. A country in mid-Greece containing Thebes.

Bk III:1-49. Cadmus is instructed to found Thebes.

Bk XII:1-38. The Greek ships assemble there at Aulis.

Bona Copia

Bk IX:1-88. The goddess of plenty. The Naiades give her the horn of plenty lost by Acheloüs in his fight with Hercules.

Bootës

Bk II:150-177. The constellation of the Waggoner, or Herdsman, or Bear Herd. The nearby constellation of Ursa Major is the Waggon, or Plough, or Great Bear. He holds the leash of the constellation of the hunting dogs, Canes Venatici. He is sometimes identified with Arcas son of Jupiter and Callisto. Arcas may alternatively be the Little Bear.

Bk VIII:183-235. Icarus is warned not to fly too near the constellation.

Bk X:431-502. Identified with Icarius the father of Erigone. Led to his grave by his dog Maera, she committed suicide by hanging, and was set in the sky as the constellation Virgo. The Latin text says Icarus, a valid alternative, but I have translated it as Icarius to avoid confusion with Daedalus’s son.

Boreas

Bk I:52-68. The North Wind. Eurus is the East Wind,Zephyrus is the WestWind, and Auster is the South Wind.

Book VI:675-721. He is identified with Thrace and the north. He steals Orithyia, daughter of Erectheus of Athens, and marries her. She bears him the two Argonauts, Calais and Zetes. (See Evelyn de Morgan’s painting–Boreas and Orithyia– Cragside, Northumberland)

Bk XII:1-38. He prevents the Greeks sailing from Aulis.

Bk XIII:399-428. He blows the Greeks home from Troy. (These are the Meltemi or Etesian winds that blow over the northen Aegean in the summer months. On their reliability the Northern Aegean civilisation was based. See Ernle Bradford’s ‘Ulysses Found’ Ch.4)

Botres

Bk VII:350-403. The son of Eumelus, killed by his father for desecrating the sacrifice to Apollo. Apollo pitied the father and changed the boy into a bird, the bee-eater, merops apiaster.

Britanni

Bk XV:745-842. The peoples of ancient Britain. Julius Caesar had two campaigns in Britain in 55 and 54BC.

Bromius

Bk IV:1-30. An epithet of Bacchus meaning ‘The noisy one’.

Bromus

Bk XII:429-535. A centaur.

Broteas(1)

Bk V:107-148. A famous boxer. A twin brother of Ammon, killed by Phineus.

Broteas(2)

Bk XII:245-289 One of the Lapithae. Killed by Gryneus at the battle of Lapiths and Centaurs.

Bruttium

A region of southern Italy, in modern Calabria. The ancient capital of the Bruttians was at Cosentia, modern Cosenza, and was taken by the Romans in 204BC. It was an important halt on the Via Popilia linking Rome with Reggio and Sicily. (Ovid does not mention it directly in the text)

Bubasis

Bk IX:595-665. Of Bubasos, a town in Caria passed by Byblis.

Bubastis

Bk IX:666-713. A town in Egypt. The lioness, later cat goddess (Bast, Bastet) worshipped there, equated with Diana.

Buris

Bk XV:259-306. A city near the coast of Achaia, on the Coronthian Gulf destroyed by earthquake. Possibly Pausanias’s Boura, see Pausanias VII 25, though it was not on the coast, its destruction was linked with the destruction of Helice.

Busiris

Bk IX:159-210. A king of Egypt who sacrificed strangers. See the entry for Hercules.

Butes

Bk VII:453-500. A son of Pallas, an Athenian prince. Goes with Cephalus on an embassy to Aegina. Brother of Clytos.

Buthrotos, Buthrotum

Bk XIII:705-737. A city in Epirus. There Helenus, the Trojan seer, built a replica of Troy. (See Virgil Aeneid III:290-350). Aeneas lands there and Helenus foretells his future.

Byblis

The daughter of Miletus, and Cyanee, twin sister of Caunus.

Bk IX:439-516. The twins are noted for their beauty. Byblis falls in love with Caunus and decides to woo him incestuously.

Bk IX:517-594. She declares her love in a letter to Caunus, and is rejected.

Bk IX:595-665. She follows him as he flees her, and, on Mount Chimaera in Lycia, is turned into an ever-weeping fountain.

Cadmeïs

Bk III:273-315. Semele, daughter of Cadmus.

Cadmus

Bk III:1-49. The son of the Phoenician king Agenor who searches for his sister Europa stolen by Jupiter. The founder of Thebes.

Bk III:50-94. He kills the serpent sacred to Mars.

Bk III:115-137. He founds Thebes.

Bk III:528-571. He reproves his grandson Pentheus, son of his daughter Agave, for his attempt to lay hands on the god Bacchus.

Bk IV:464-511. His son-in-law is Athamas, husband of his daughter Ino, who are both maddened by the Fury.

Bk IV:563-603. Cadmus and Harmonia are turned into serpents. There is a tradition that this happened in a cave on the coast of Dalmatia near Dubrovnik (Ragusa), see Rebecca West ‘Black Lamb and Grey Falcon’ p251. It was ten miles north of an ancient Dalmatian Epidaurus (now Tsavtat) founded by Greek colonists.

Bk VI:204-266. Amphion is his descendant.

Bk IX:273-323. The Theban women are ‘of Cadmus’

Caeneus

A youth of Thessaly, called Atracides from the city of Atrax. He was born a girl, Caenis, but changed to a youth by Neptune as a gift and made invulnerable. He became a king of the Lapithae.

Bk VIII:260-328. He is present at the Calydonian Boar Hunt.

Bk XII:146-209. Nestor tells his story.

Bk XII:210-244. He is present at the battle of the Lapithae and the Centaurs.

Bk XII:429-535. He is killed, despite his invulnerability to wounds, by being buried under a weight of trees, and is turned into a unique bird with tawny wings.

Caenis

Bk XII:146-209. The daughter of Elatus of Thessaly, raped by Neptune, and changed into the youth and invulnerable warrior Caeneus at her request.

Bk XII:429-535. Latreus taunts Caeneus calling him Caenis.

Caesar, Julius

Bk XV:745-842. The Roman general and Tribune. His deeds, death and deification. (As ‘king of Rome’ he was also the high-priest of Vesta, ‘marrying’ her, the incarnation of Tauric Diana, as described by Fraser in ‘The Golden Bough’ – Ch.1 et.seq.)

Bk I:199-243. His assassination mentioned.

Bk XV:843-870. He confesses that Augustus has surpassed him. Venus sets him among the stars.

Caïcus

Bk II:227-271. Bk XV:259-306. A river in Mysia in Asia Minor near Pergamum.

Bk XII:64-145. Achilles slaughtered the surrounding peoples.

Caïeta

Bk XIV:154-222. Bk XV:622-745. The old nurse of Aeneas. The place in Italy where she died and was buried (modern Gaeta).

Bk XIV:435-444. Her epitaph.

Calaïs

Book VI:675-721. One of the winged sons of Boreas and Orithyia. One of the Argonauts.

Bk VII:1-73. Drives away the Harpies.

Calaurea

Bk VII:350-403. An island off the coast of Argolis.

Calchas

A seer and priest, the son of Thestor, who accompanied the Greeks to Troy.

Bk XII:1-38. He foresees the long duration of the war and the ultimate Greek victory, and that the sacrifice of Iphigenia to Diana at Aulis will bring the Greeks favourable winds.

Calliope

The Muse of epic poetry. The mother of Orpheus.

Bk V:332-384. She sings the song that defeats the Emathides.

Bk V:642-678. The Muses through her efforts defeat the Emathides and then change them into magpies.

Bk X:143-219. Orpheus asks his mother for inspiration.

Callirhoë

Bk IX:394-417. The daughter of Acheloüs. Themis prophesies the events following the war of the Seven against Thebes, when as Alcmaeon’s second wife, she unwittingly unleashes a chain of events involving the fatal necklace of Harmonia, and the murder of Alcmaeon. She begs Jupiter to age her infant sons so that they can avenge the murder.

Bk IX:418-438. Jupiter explains to the gods that he can grant this only because fate wills it also.

Callisto

Bk II:401-416. A nymph of Nonacris in Arcadia, a favourite of Phoebe-Diana. The daughter of Lycaon.

Bk II:417-440. Jupiter rapes her.

Bk II:441-465. Pregnant by Jupiter she is expelled from the band of Diana’s virgin followers by Diana as Cynthia, in her Moon goddess mode. Gives birth to a son Arcas.

Bk II:466-495. She is turned into a bear by Juno.

Calydon

An ancient city in Aetolia on the River Euenus.

Bk VI:401-438. Its ruler goes to Thebes to show sympathy for the death of Amphion and his children.

Bk VIII:260-328. Bk XIV:512-526. Its King is Oeneus. The people ask Theseus’s help against Diana’s avenging wild boar.

Bk VIII:451-514. Althaea brings down vengeance on Calydon.

Bk VIII:515-546. Meleager’s action brings down the house of Parthaon.

Bk VIII:547-610. The victim of Diana’s vengeance.

Bk VIII:725-776. Bk IX:1-88. Acheloüs is a river-god of Calydon.

Bk IX:89-158. Deianira is from Calydon.

Bk XV:745-842. Diomede’s spear is Calydonian.

Calydonian Boar-Hunt

Bk VIII:260-328. A famous hunt attended by all the heroes of Greece, caused by Diana, seeking revenge for being slighted. She sent a fierce wild boar against Calydon.

Calymne

An island in the Aegean Sea near Ionia.

Bk VIII:183-235. Daedalus and Icarus fly towards it after leaving Crete.

Camenae

Bk XV:479-546. Ancient Italian nymphs, with the gift of prophecy, later identified with the Muses.

Canace, see Aeolia virgo

Bk VI:103-128. Depicted by Arachne.

Cancer

Bk II:63-89. The constellation of the Crab, and the zodiacal sun sign. It represents the crab that attacked Hercules while he was fighting the multi-headed Hydra and was crushed underfoot but subsequently raised to the stars. The sun in ancient times was in this constellation when furthest north of the equator at the summer solstice (June 21st). Hence the latitude where the sun appeared overhead at noon on that day was called the Tropic of Cancer (23.5 degrees north).

Bk IV:604-662. Seen three times by the storm-driven Perseus.

Bk X:106-142. The sun is in Cancer when Cyparissus kills the stag.

Canens

Bk XIV:320-396. The daughter of Janus and Venilia, and wife of Picus, noted for her singing.

Bk XIV:397-434. She wastes away with grief at the loss of Picus.

Canopus

Bk XV:745-842. A city in Egypt in the Nile delta, from where, Cleopatra ruled.

Capaneus

Bk IX:394-417. An Argive leader, one of the Seven against Thebes.

A synonym for pride in the Middle Ages.

Capella

Bk III:572-596. The ‘she-goat’, the sixth brightest star in the sky, now part of the constellation Auriga the Charioteer, but once part of the Olenian Goat, representing Aege daughter of Olenos.

Capetus

Bk XIV:609-622. One of the Alban kings.

Caphereus

Bk XIV:445-482. A rocky promontory on the coast of Euboea where the returning Greek fleet came to grief.

Capitolium

Bk I:553-567. Bk II:531-565. Bk XV:552-621.

Bk XV:745-842. The hill in Rome, the Tarpeian citadel, on which stood a temple of Jupiter. Properly the southern summit of the Capitoline Hill.

Capreae

Bk XV:622-745. An island in the Bay of Naples. The isle of Capri, mountainous, with an inaccessible, precipitous coast, abounding in caves and fantastic rocks. It has perennial sunshine, pure air, and almost tropical vegetation. Tiberius Caesar retired there in 27AD. See Suetonius ‘The Twelve Caesars’, and Tacitus.

Capys

Bk XIV:609-622. An Alban king.

Caria, Cares

The country in Asia Minor bordering the southern Aegean containing Miletus and Halicarnassus. Its inhabitants the Cares or Carians.

Bk IX:595-665. The country of Byblis and Caunus.

Carpathius

Bk XI:221-265. Of the island of Carpathos in the Aegean Sea. An epithet for Proteus.

Cartheïus

Bk VII:350-403. From Carthaea, a town on the island of Ceos in the Aegean.

Bk X:106-142. The home of Cyparissus.

Cassandra

The daughter of Priam and Hecuba, gifted with prophecy by Apollo, but cursed to tell the truth and not be believed. Taken back to Greece by Agamemnon. (See Aeschylus: The Agamemnon)

Bk XIII:399-428. Dragged from the burning temple by her hair as Troy falls.

Bk XIV:445-482. Her rape by Ajax causes Minerva’s anger to fall on the returning Greeks.

Cassiopeia, Cassiope

The mother of Andromeda and wife of Cepheus. The queen of Ethiopia. She is represented by the constellation Cassiopeia between Cepheus and Andromeda, and is depicted sitting in a chair. The constellation is identifiable by its distinctive W shape.

Bk IV:663-705. She foolishly boasted that she and her daughter were more beautiful than the Nereids, who complained to Neptune who sent a sea monster to devastate Cepheus’s kingdom. The Oracle of Jupiter Ammon told Cepheus to sacrifice his daughter Andromeda. Cassiope and Cepheus accepted Perseus’s offer to rescue Andromeda on condition that she became his wife. For breaking faith with Perseus, Neptune set Cepheus and Cassiopeia as a warning among the stars.

Bk IV:706-752. She rejoices at Perseus’s defeat of the sea-serpent.

Castalius, Castalian

Bk III:1-49. Of the spring of Castalia and cave on Mount Parnassus and the oracle of Apollo there. The spring is sacred to the Muses.

Castor

The son of Tyndareus of Sparta and Leda, and twin brother of Pollux.

Bk VIII:260-328. He joins the Calydonian Boar Hunt.

Bk VIII:329-375. The brothers hurl their spears.

Bk XII:393-428. Noted for his horses and horsemanship.

Castrum Inui

Bk XV:622-745. An ancient city of the Rutuli.

Caucasus

Bk II:201-226. The mountain range in Asia.

Bk V:74-106. The native place of Abaris.

Bk VIII:777-842. The haunt of Famine.

Caulon

Bk XV:622-745. A city in Bruttium. (Near the modern Monastarece Marina on the Ionian Sea, ancient Caulonia, the original Achaean colony was destroyed by Syracuse in 389BC. What is now modern Caulonia, inland, was founded by the survivors.)

Caunus

The son of Miletus and the nymph Cyanee, daughter of the river god Maeander, hence called Maeandrius.

Bk IX:439-516. His twin sister Byblis falls incestuously in love with him, and decides to declare her love in a letter.

Bk IX:517-594. He is horrifed and rejects her.

Bk IX:595-665. Fleeing his sister he founds the city of Caunus in Caria.

Caÿstros, Caÿster

Bk II:227-271. Bk V:385-424. A river famous for its swans in Lydia in Asia Minor. Ephesus is near its mouth.

Cea, Ceos

Bk VII:350-403. An island of the Cyclades, off Cape Sunium. Its ancient city was Carthaea.

Bk X:106-142. Cyparissus was a beautiful boy of the island.

Cebrenis

Bk XI:749-795. Hesperie, daughter of Cebren a river god of the Troad.

Cecropides

Bk VII:453-500. Theseus, as a descendant of Cecrops. The Cecropidae, are therefore the Athenians.

Bk VIII:547-610. Theseus in Acarnania.

Cecropis, Cecropides

Bk II:812-832. Aglauros as daughter of Cecrops. The Cecropides, are the daughters of Pandion, that is Procne and Philomela, as Athenians.

Cecropius

Bk VI:70-103. Bk VI:438-485. Bk XI:85-145. Athenian. From Cecrops the founder of Athens.

Cecrops

Bk II:531-565. Bk XV:418-452. The mythical founder of Athens. He was a son of mother Earth like Erechthonius (who some think was his father). He was part man and part serpent. His three daughters were Aglauros, Herse and Pandrosus who were goddesses of the Acropolis in Athens.

Celadon(1)

Bk V:107-148. An adversary of Perseus, killed in the fight with Phineus.

Celadon(2)

Bk XII:245-289. One of the Lapithae. He is killed by Amycus at the battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs.

Celmis

Bk IV:274-316. One of the Dactyls (‘fingers’), born when Rhea pressed her fingers into the earth as she was bearing Jupiter. They were ironsmiths who guarded the infant Jupiter’s cradle. Their sisters taught the mysteries on the island of Samothrace. Celmis was turned into adamantine steel as a punishment for insulting Rhea.

Cenaeus

Bk IX:89-158. An epithet of Jupiter worshipped by Hercules at Cenaeum, the north western point of Euboea.

Cenchreïs

Bk X:431-502. The mother of Myrrha, and wife of Cinyras. Her absence from Cinyras’s bed during the festival of Ceres allows Myrrha to commit her incest.

Centaurs

Creatures, half-man and half-horse living in the mountains of Thessaly, hence called biformes, duplex natura, semihomines, bimembres.

They were the sons of Ixion, and a cloud, in the form of Juno.

Bk II:633-676. Chiron the centaur and Ocyrhoë his daughter.

Bk IX:89-158. The story of Nessus the centaur and Hercules.

Bk IX:159-210. Hercules fought with Pholus and the Centaurs and wounded Chiron with an arrow poisoned with the Hydra’s venom. Chiron’s agony was ended when he exchanged his immortality for Prometheus’s mortal fate.

Bk XII:210-244. Invited to the marriage feast of Pirithoüs and Hippdamia, Eurytus precipitates a fight with the Lapithae.

Bk XII:536-579. Nestor finishes telling the story of the battle.

Cephalus

An Athenian prince, the grandson of Aeolus, hence Aeolides.

Book VI:675-721. Married happily to Procris, daughter of Erectheus King of Athens.

Bk VII:453-500. Goes to Aegina to seek help from an ally.

Bk VII:501-613. He hears the history of the plague from Aeacus.

Bk VII:661-758. He is unfaithful to his wife Procris and then tempts her into disloyalty. They are reconciled. She gives him a magic hound and a magic javelin, gifts of Diana.

Bk VII:759-795. He recounts the story of Laelaps the hound.

Bk VII:796-865. He tells how through an error he was led to kill Procris, unwittingly, with the magic spear that was her gift.

Bk VIII:1-80. He returns to Athens with the Aeacides.

Cephenes

Bk IV:753-803. Bk V:1-29. Bk V:74-106. A name for the Ethiopians from their king Cepheus.

Cepheus

The king of Ethiopia, husband of Cassiope, and father of Andromeda. He is represented by the constellation Cepheus near Cassiopeia which includes the prototype of the Cepheid variable stars used as standard light sources for measurement of distances in space.

Bk IV:663-705. He accepts Perseus’s offer to rescue Andromeda.

Bk IV:706-752. He promises Perseus a kingdom as dowry for defeating the sea serpent and winning Andromeda.

Cephisius

Narcissus, as the son of the river god Cephisus.

Cephisus

Bk I:348-380. A river in Phocis.

Bk III:1-49. Cadmus passes by it, following the heifer.

Bk III:339-358. Father of Narcissus, by the nymph Liriope.

Bk VII:350-403. Mourns for his grandson changed into a seal by Apollo.

Bk VII:425-452. The location where Theseus defeated Procrustes.

Cerambus

Bk VII:350-403. A mythical character, whose home was near Mount Othrys, who escaped Deucalion’s flood. He was saved by the nymphs, who changed him to a scarabeus, and he flew to the summit of Mount Parnassus.

Cerastae

Bk X:220-242. A horned people of Cyprus turned into wild bullocks by Venus, for the crime of sacrificing strangers and guests on their altars.

Cerberus

Bk IV:416-463. The three-headed watchdog of the Underworld. He bays at Juno entering the city of Dis.

Bk IV:464-511. The foam from his jaws forms part of Tisiphone’s venom of the Furies.

Bk VII:404-424. It also produces the plant wolfsbane, or monkshood, the aconite used by Medea as a poison.

Bk IX:159-210. In the Twelfth Labour he is captured by Hercules and dragged out of the Underworld.

Bk X:1-85. Mentioned by Orpheus. He has snaky hair.

Bk XIV:1-74. Scylla is surrounded by jaws, like Cerberus’s, below the waist.

Cercopes

Bk XIV:75-100. A Lydian people. Jupiter changed them into monkeys, because of their trickery and deceit, and sent them to Pithecusae which took its name from them. (pithecium, a little ape)

Cercyon

Bk VII:425-452. A king of Eleusin, who required all travellers to wrestle with him, and killed them when they were defeated. He was defeated by Theseus. The wrestling-ground was on the road to Megara.

Ceres

Bk I:113-124. The Corn Goddess. The daughter of Saturn and Rhea, and Jupiter’s sister. As Demeter she is represented in the sky by the constellation and zodiacal sign of Virgo, holding an ear of wheat, the star Spica. It contains the brightest quasar, 3C 273. The constellation alternatively depicts Astraea. The worship of her and her daughter Persephone, as the Mother and the Maiden, was central to the Eleusinian mysteries, where the ritual of the rebirth of the world from winter was enacted. Ceres was there a representation of the Great Goddess of Neolithic times, and her daughter her incarnation, in the underworld and on earth.

Bk V:107-148. Ampycus is one of her priests.

Bk V:332-384. The Muse Calliope sings of her.

Bk V:385-424. Her daughter Proserpine (Persephone) is raped and abducted by Dis.

Bk V:425-486. She searches for her throughout the world. Cyane gives evidence of the abduction, in Sicily, and Ceres blights that land. (On the way she drinks the mixture of water and meal known as the kykeion, the partaking of which was an element of the ritual surrounding the Eleusinian Mysteries.)

Bk V:487-532. She finds that Persephone is in Hades, and asks Jupiter to intercede. He agrees so long as Persephone has not eaten while in the underworld, a decree made by the Fates.

Bk V:533-571. She is allowed her daughter for six months of each year.

Bk V:572-641. She asks Arethusa to tell her story.

Bk V:642-678. She sends Triptolemus, of Eleusis, with her gift of the crops to the barbarian king of Scythia, Lyncus. He attacks Triptolemus and she changes Lyncus into a lynx.

Bk VI:103-128. Neptune lay with her in the form of a horse.

Bk VII:425-452. Eleusis is sacred to her.

Bk VIII:260-328. She is offered the first fruits of the crops.

Bk VIII:260-328. A synonym for the harvest.

Bk VIII:725-776. Erysichthon violates her sacred oak grove.

Bk VIII:777-842. She asks Famine to torment him to death.

Bk IX:418-438. She wishes she could win renewed youthfulness for Iasion, whom she fell in love with at the marriage of Cadmus and Harmonia, and lay with in the thrice-ploughed field.

Bk X:1-85. A synonym for nourishment.

Bk X:431-502. The festival of the first fruits (in Attica, the Thesmophoria) held annually in her honour, where married women dressed in white brought corn garlands as offerings, and sexual union and the touch of a man were forbidden for nine nights.

Bk XI:85-145. Bk XIII:623-639. Bread is her gift.

Ceyx

Bk VII:350-403. The son of Lucifer. The husband of Alcyone, turned into a kingfisher with her.

Bk XI:266-345. He gives sanctuary to Peleus in his kingdom of Trachin, and tells the story of his brother Daedalion.

Bk XI:346-409. His wife Alcyone begs him not to fight against the wolf from the marshes.

Bk XI:410-473. He goes to consult the oracle of Apollo at Claros.

Bk XI:474-572. He is drowned in the tempest.

Bk XI:573-649. Morpheus is sent to Alcyone, taking on his form.

Bk XI:650-709. Morpheus tells Alcyone of his death.

Bk XI:710-748. His body returns on the tide and he is transformed with her into a halcyon.

Chalciope

Bk VII:1-73. The sister of Medea whom Aeetes had given in marriage to Phrixus.

Chaonian oaks

The sacred oak grove of Chaonia at Dodona in Epirus, the site of an ancient oracle of Jupiter (Zeus).

Bk X:86-105. The oracular oak is among the gathering of trees when Orpheus sings.

Chaonis, Chaonius

Of Chaonia, the region in Epirus.

Bk V:149-199. The native country of Molpeus.

Bk XIII:705-737. Passed by Aeneas.

Charaxus

Bk XII:245-289. One of the Lapithae. He was killed by Rhoetus at the battle of Lapiths and Centaurs.

Chariclo

Bk II:633-675. A water nymph, the mother of Ocyroë by Chiron the Centaur.

Charon

Bk X:1-85. The ferryman who carries the dead across the River Styx in the underworld, whose tributary is the Acheron. (See Dante’s Inferno). He prevents Orpheus crossing the Styx for a second time.

Charops

Bk XIII:123-381. A Lycian, killed by Ulysses.

Charybdis

Bk VII:1-73. Bk VIII:81-151. The whirlpool between Italy and Sicily in the Messenian straits. Charybdis was the voracious daughter of Mother Earth and Neptune, hurled into the sea, and thrice, daily, drawing in and spewing out a huge volume of water.

Bk XIII:705-737. Bk XIV:75-100. Aeneas passes by it.

Chersidamas

Bk XIII:123-381. A Lycian, killed by Ulysses.

Chimaera

A fire-breathing monster with a lion’s head, goat’s body and serpent’s tail.

Bk VI:313-381. Its native country is Lycia in Asia Minor.

Bk IX:595-665. Byblis travels to Mount Chimeara there and becomes a fountain.

Chione

Bk XI:266-345. The daughter of Daedalion, loved by Apollo and Mercury. She bore twin sons, Philammon to Apollo, and Autolycus to Mercury. She was killed by Diana for criticising the goddess’s beauty and boasting of her own.

Chios, Chius (of Chios)

Bk III:597-637. The island in the north-eastern Aegean off the coast of Ionia where Acoetes lands and finds Bacchus.

Chiron

Bk II:612-632. One of the Centaurs, half-man and half-horse. He was the son of Philyra and Saturn. Phoebus Apollo took his new born son Aesculapius to his cave for protection. He is represented in the sky by the constellation Centaurus, which contains the nearest star to the sun, Alpha Centauri.

Bk II:633-675. Father of Ocyroë, by Chariclo the water-nymph.

Bk VI:103-128. Begot by Saturn disguised as a horse.

Bk VII:350-403. His home is on Mount Pelion.

Chromis(1)

Bk V:74-106. A companion of Phineus who kills the old man Emathion in the fight with Perseus.

Chromis(2)

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur.

Chromius

Bk XIII:123-381. A Lycian, killed by Ulysses.

Chrysaor

Bk IV:753-803. The brother of Pegasus the winged horse, the warrior born from the blood of Medusa, and clasping a golden falchion. A son of Neptune. The father of Geryon.

Chryse, Chrysa

A coastal city in the Troad near Mount Ida.

Bk XIII:123-381. Captured by Achilles.

Chthonius

Bk XII:429-535. A centaur.

Cicones

Book VI:675-721. A Thracian people.

Bk X:1-85. The country of Orpheus.

Bk XI:1-66. The crazed Ciconian women are the Maenads who murder Orpheus.

Bk XV:307-360. Their river with strange properties.

Cilix

Bk II:201-226. Of Cilicia in Asia Minor.

Cilla

A city of the Troad.

Bk XIII:123-381. Captured by Achilles.

Cimmerians

A fabled people, said to live in caves in perpetual darkness, ‘beyond the north Wind.’

Bk XI:573-649. Their country is the home of Somnus, Sleep.

Cimolus

An island in the Cyclades. Described as chalky-soiled.

Bk VII:453-500. Allied to Crete.

Cinyphius

Of the River Cinyps in Africa.

Bk V:107-148. Pelates comes from there.

Bk VII:234-293. Medea uses one of its water snakes as an ingredient for her magic potion.

Bk XV:745-842. Juba’s place of origin.

Cinyras(1)

Bk VI:70-102. An Assyrian King. His daughters were changed into the stone steps of the temple, for their presumption.

Cinyras(2)

The son of Paphos, and the father of Myrrha, and by her incestuously of Adonis. Bk X:708-739. Adonis is therefore called Cinyreïus.

Bk X:298-355. Myrrha conceives a passion for him.

Bk X:356-430. He, innocently, asks her to choose a husband.

Bk X:431-502. He is deceived into admitting her to his bed, and impregnating her, driving her out when he realises what has happened.

Cipus

Bk XV:552-621. A fabled Roman praetor. He grows horns and is prophesied as a king who will enslave Rome if he enters the city, but declares himself instead, and is rewarded with honours.

Circe

Bk IV:190-213. Bk XV:622-745. The sea-nymph, daughter of Sol and Perse, and the granddaughter of Oceanus. (Kirke or Circe means a small falcon). She was famed for her beauty and magic arts and lived on the ‘island’ of Aeaea, which is the promontory of Circeii. (Cape Circeo between Anzio and Gaeta, on the west coast of Italy, now part of the magnificent Parco Nazionale del Circeo extending to Capo Portiere in the north, and providing a reminder of the ancient Pontine Marshes before they were drained, rich in wildfowl and varied tree species.) Cicero mentions that Circe was worshipped religiously by the colonists at Circei. (‘On the Nature of the Gods’, Bk III 47)

(See John Melhuish Strudwick’s painting – Circe and Scylla – Walker Art Gallery, Sudley, Merseyside, England: See Dosso Dossi’s painting - Circe and her Lovers in a Landscape- National gallery of Art, Washington)

Bk XIII:898-968. Glaucus seeks her home.

Bk XIV:1-74. She refuses him a love potion to make Scylla love him, and instead transforms Scylla into a monster.

Bk XIV:223-319. She transforms Ulysses’s men into beasts. Mercury gives him the plant moly to enable him to approach her. He marries her and frees his men, staying for a year on her island. (Moly has been variously identified as ‘wild rue’, wild cyclamen, and a sort of garlic, allium moly. John Gerard’s Herbal of 1633 Ch.100 gives seven plants under this heading, of which the third, Moly Homericum, is he suggests the Moly of Theophrastus, Pliny and Homer – Odyssey XX- and he describes it as a wild garlic.)

Bk XIV:320-396. She loves Picus, but, thwarted in her love, turns him into the green woodpecker, picus viridis.

Bk XIV:397-434. She turns Picus’s companions into wild beasts.

Bk XIV:435-444. She had warned Ulysses’s and his crew of the dangers they must still face.

Ciris

Bk VIII:81-151. The bird into which Scylla, daughter of Nisus was changed. Nisus was changed into the sea eagle. Elsewhere, and interpolated in this translation, the bird is described as having a purple breast and red legs. From the habits of the sea eagle, that preys on it, from its description, and the sacredness of the dove to Cer, the Cretan Bee-Goddess, this translator takes it to be the rock dove, columba livia. The followers of Cer, the Curetes, shaved their locks. Megara was said to have been founded by Car or Ker, a follower of the goddess. See the entry for Scylla.

Cithaeron

Bk II:201-226. A mountain in Boeotia, near Thebes.

Bk III:692-733. The place chosen for the worship of Bacchus.

Clanis(1)

Bk V:107-148. The brother of Clytius. A companion of Phineus, killed by Perseus.

Clanis(2)

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur.

Clarius

Bk XI:410-473. An epithet of Apollo from Claros (Clarus) a city in Ionia, where there was an oracle and temple of the god.

Claros

Bk I:504-524. A town in Ionia between Smyrna and Ephesus. See Clarius.

Cleatus

The son of Actor, and brother of Eurytus.

Bk VIII:260-328. He is present at the Calydonian Boar Hunt.

Cleonae

A town in the Argolis.

Bk VI:401-438. Its ruler goes to Thebes to show sympathy for the death of Amphion and his children.

Cleopatra

Bk XV:745-842. Queen of Egypt, mistress of Julius Caesar and Antony. She fell from power and committed suicide when she and Antony were defeated at the battle of Actium. (See Suetonius ‘The Twelve Caesars’ and, of course, Shakespeare.)

Clitorius

Bk XV:307-360. Of the city of Clitor (Kleitor) in Arcadia, in the fork of the Kleitor and Karnesi rivers. See Pausanias VIII 21.

Clymene

Bk I:747-764. Daughter of Oceanus and Tethys, wife of the Ethiopian king Merops, mother of Phaethon by Phoebus (Sol)

Bk II:329-343. She mourns for her dead son.

Clymeneïus

Bk II:1-30. An epithet of Phaethon from his mother Clymene.

Clymenus

Bk V:74-106. A companion of Phineus.

Clytaemnestra

The wife of Agamemnon, daughter of Tyndareus of Sparta, and Leda. Sister or half-sister of Helen, and of the Dioscuri. Mother of Orestes, Electra (Laodice), and Iphigenia.

Bk XIII:123-381. Tricked by Ulysses into yielding up Iphigenia for sacrifice.

Clytie

Bk IV:190-213. One of the daughters of Oceanus, who loves Sol.

(See the painting by Lord Leighton – Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, on loan to Leighton House, London).

Bk IV:214-255. She tells Leucothoë’s father about her and Sol.

Bk IV:256-273. Sol disdains her and she wastes away, becoming a plant, the heliotrope, that follows the sun.

Clytius

Bk V:107-148. The brother of Clanis. A companion of Phineus, killed by Perseus.

Clytus(1)

Bk V:74-106. A companion of Phineus, killed by Perseus.

Clytus(2)

Bk VII:453-500. A son of Pallas, an Athenian prince. Goes with Cephalus on an embassy to Aegina. The brother of Butes.

Cnidos

Bk X:503-559. A city in Caria. A haunt of Venus, and famous for its fish, associated with the goddess.

Cnosiacus

Bk III:206-231. Bk VII: 453-500. Bk VIII:1-80. Bk VIII:81-151. Cnosius, from Cnosos (Cnossos), a city in Crete, therefore Cretan.

Bk IX:666-713. The royal city of Crete.

Coae matres

Bk VII:350-403. The women of the island of Cos in the Sporades in the Eastern Aegean off Halicarnassus, angered by Hercules because he dressed in women’s clothes to escape detection. They abused him, and were given horns like cows, by Juno.

Cocalus

The mythical king of Sicily whom Daedalus sought refuge with. Daedalus threaded a spiral Triton shell for him, using an ant to pull the thread, lured by honey.

Bk VIII:260-328. He defends Daedalus against Minos of Crete.

Cocinthius

Bk XV:622-745. Of the promontory of Cocinthus in Bruttium, somewhere between Croton and Caulon.

Coeranus

Bk XIII:123-381. A Lycian, killed by Ulysses.

Coeus

Bk VI:146-203. Bk VI:313-381. A Titan, father of Latona and Asterie.

Colchis, Colchus

Bk VII:100-158. Bk XIII:1-122. A country in Asia south east of the Black Sea. The destination of the Argonauts and home of Medea.

Bk VII:294-349. Bk VII:294-349. Bk VII:350-403. Medea as the witch of Colchis.

Colophonius

BkVI:1-25. Of Colophon a city in Asia Minor, near the coast, north-west of Ephesus and the mouth of the River Caÿster. The home city of Idmon.

Combe

Bk VII:350-403. The daughter of Ophius, mother of the Aetolian Curetes, changed into a bird.

Cometes

Bk XII:245-289. One of the Lapithae. He was killed by Rhoetus at the battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs.

Corinth, Ephyre, Corinthus

Bk II:227-271. Bk XV:479-546. The city north of Mycenae, on the Isthmus between Attica and the Argolis. (Built on the hill of Acrocorinth it and Ithome were ‘the horns of the Greek bull’, whoever held them held the Peloponnese. It was destroyed by the Roman general Mummius in 146BC and rebuilt by Julius Caesar in 44BC.)

Bk V:385-424. Origin of the Bacchiadae who founded Syracuse.

Bk VI:401-438. Its ruler goes to Thebes to show sympathy for the death of Amphion and his children. It is famous for bronze.

Bk VII:350-403. Jason having claimed the throne is king there. Its ancient name is Ephyre. It is famous for the spring of Pirene on the citadel (rebuilt in marble by Herodes Atticus in the 2ndc. AD).

Cornix

Bk II:566-595. The daughter of Coroneus king of Phocis. She was turned into a Crow by Minerva.

Coronae, Coroni

Bk XIII:675-704. Two youths who sprang from the ashes of the daughters of Orion.

Coroneus

Bk II:566-595. A king of Phocis. The father of Cornix who was turned into a Crow by Minerva.

Coronides

Bk XV:622-745. An epithet of Aesculapius as the son of Coronis and Apollo.

Coronis

Bk II:531-565. The daughter of Phlegyas of Larissa, King of the Lapiths and Ixion’s brother. She lived on the shores of Lake Beobis in Thessaly. She was loved by Apollo.

Bk II:566-595. She is unfaithful to Apollo and killed by him. Bk II:612-632. Apollo saves their unborn child Aesculapius and gives him into the care of Chiron the Centaur.

Corvus

Bk II:531-565. The Raven, whose feathers are turned from white to black by Apollo for bringing him the news of Coronis’s unfaithfulness.

Corycides

Bk I:313-347. Nymphs of the Corycian cave on Parnassus.

Corythus(1)

Bk V:107-148. A warrior from Marmarica, friend to Perseus.

Corythus(2)

Bk VII:350-403. The son of Paris and Oenone, the fountain-nymph daughter of the river Oeneus. He was sent by Oenone, in jealousy of Helen, to guide the avenging Greeks to Troy.

Corythus(3)

Bk XII:290-326. One of the Lapithae.

Coüs

Bk VII:350-403. From the island of Cos.

Cragos

Bk IX:595-665. A mountain in Lycia.

Crantor

Bk XII:290-326. The armour bearer of Peleus.

Crataeis

Bk XIII:738-788. A nymph, the mother of Scylla.

Crathis

Bk XV:307-360. A river in Arcadia, into which the corrosive waters of the Arcadian Styx flow. Aegae is at its mouth. Pausanias describes the complex of rivers and towns near Mount Cyllene and Mount Chelmos: Clitor (Kleitor), and Nonacris, the Crathis, and the Arcadian Styx that is its tributary, in Pausanias VIII 17 and 18. He does not confirm Ovid’s comments about hair being turned to gold, but does elaborate on the marvellous properties of the Styx. (Robert Graves has an interesting digression on this, and the Proetides, in ‘The White Goddess’ p353 and p354.)

Alternatively, and since Crathis seems to be coupled here with Sybaris, Ovid is referring to properties of the Italian river Crathis (modern Crati) which may have been what Ovid calls the Sybaris, on which the ancient town of Sybaris probably stood. These properties of the river may have been transferred in legend by Greek colonists from the Greek Crathis.

Crenaeus

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur.

Cressa, Telethusa

Bk IX:666-713. A Cretan woman. Telethusa.

Crete

Bk III:1-49. The island in the Mediterranean Sea. Dictaean from Mount Dicte.

Bk VII:425-452. Famous for its bull-worship in Minoan times. Hercules lets a white bull of Crete loose on the plains of Marathon which Theseus overcomes.

Bk VIII:81-151. The kingdom of Minos.

Bk VIII:183-235. Daedalus, kept there by Minos, plans to escape.

Bk VIII:260-328. Athens ceases to pay it tribute.

Bk IX:159-210. In the Seventh Labour Hercules killed a bull that was ravaging the island.

Bk IX:666-713. The country of Ligdus and Telethusa.

Bk IX:714-763. The country of monstrosities.

Bk XIII:705-737. The country of Teucer, an ancient king of Troy, and its people the Teucri.

Bk XV:479-546. Sacred to Diana.

Crimese

Bk XV:1-59. A town in Lucania.

Crocale

Bk III:165-205. One of the nymphs of Diana, daughter of the river-god Ismenus, and therefore called Ismenis.

Crocus

Bk IV:274-316. A youth who pined away from love of the nymph Smilax, and was changed into the crocus flower. Smilax became the flowering bindweed.

Cromyon

Bk VII:425-452. A village near Corinth, where Theseus destroyed a fierce and monstrous white sow, that killed the farmers and prevented them ploughing their fields. It was said to be the offspring of Typhon and Echidne.

Croton

A mythical hero who entertained Hercules at his home in Sicily.

Bk XV:1-59. Myscelus founds Crotona, taking the name from its proximity to Croton’s tomb. (This is the modern Crotone, the only harbour between Taranto and Reggio. The ancient town was founded in 710BC by settlers, sent, according to legend, by the Delphic oracle. It was an important city of the Bruttians, and with Sybaris it conrolled Magna Graecia and included colonies on the Ionian and Tyrrhenian coasts. Pythagoras made it the chief centre of his school but was later expelled from the city, when his supporters fell from power. It conquered the Sybarites in 510BC, and became subject to Syracuse in 299BC. Hannibal embarked there after his retreat from Rome.)

Ctesylla

Bk VII:350-403. The daughter of Alcidamas of Ceos. She gave birth to a dove.

Cumae

The site of an oracle of Apollo, and its prophetess, the Sibyl. A legendary entrance to the underworld. Daedalus rested there after his flight from Crete, and built a temple to Apollo, before going on to Sicily, where he made the golden honeycomb, for the goddess at Eryx. An ancient Euboean colony on the sea coast of Campania. (See Michael Ayrton’s drawings and paintings of the site.)

Bk XIV:101-153. The site of the Sibyl’s cave, the oracular priestess of Apollo. She guides Aeneas through the underworld, showing him the golden bough that he must pluck from the tree.

Bk XIV:154-222. The Sibyl guides Aeneas back to the city.

Cumaea

Bk XIV:101-153. Bk XV:622-745. An epithet of the Sibyl of Cumae who guided Aeneas to the Underworld.

Cupid, Cupido, Amor

Bk I:438-473. The god of love, son of Venus (Aphrodite). He is portrayed as a blind winged child armed with a bow and arrows, and he carries a flaming torch. He causes Apollo to fall in love with Daphne.

Bk IV:317-344. Hermaphroditus is compared with him, for beauty, by Salmacis.

Bk V:332-384. Venus asks him to make Dis fall in love with Proserpine.

Bk VII:1-73. As love, or passion affects Medea.

Bk IX:439-516. Bk IX:517-594. Byblis names him.

Bk X:298-355. He is not responsible for Myrrha’s incestuous passion.

Bk X:503-559. He accidentally wounds his mother Venus with a loose arrow in his quiver, and she falls in love with Adonis.

Cures

Bk XIV:772-804. The chief city of the Sabines.

Bk XV:1-59. Numa’s native city.

Curetes

Bk IV:274-316. They or the Dactyls guarded the infant Jupiter. They were the sons of Rhea, and stood around the golden cradle, hung on a tree, clashing their spears and shouting, to drown the noise of his wailing (like the sound of heavy rain?). They seem to have been associated with rain-making ceremonies.

Curetis

Bk VIII:152-182. Of Crete. From Cer, the Cretan Great Goddess. See her followers the Curetes.

Cyane

Bk V:385-424 A fountain nymph of Sicily whose stream flowed into the River Anapis, near Syracuse. She was loved by Anapis and wedded him. She obstructs Dis in his abduction of Proserpine and Dis opens up a way to Tartarus from the depths of her pool.

Bk V:425-486. She wastes away from grief and the desecration of her pool, but shows Ceres a sign of Persephone’s rape.

Cyaneae, Symplegades

Bk VIII:1-80. Two small rocky islands at the entrance to the Euxine Sea, that clashed together when anything approached them.

Cyanee

Bk IX:439-516. A nymph, the daughter of Maeander, and mother of Caunus and Byblis by Miletus.

Cybele

The Phrygian great goddess, personifying the earth in its savage state, worshipped in caves and on mountaintops. Merged with Rhea, the mother of the gods. Her consort was Attis, slain by a wild boar like Adonis. His festival was celebrated by the followers of Cybele, the Galli, or Corybantes, who were noted for convulsive dances to the music of flutes, drums and cymbals, and self-mutilation in an orgiastic fury.

Bk X:86-105. The pine tree is sacred to her, since it embodies the transformed Attis. It is one of the trees that gather to hear Orpheus.

Bk X:681-707. Hippomenes and Atalanta desecrate her sacred cave, with its wooden images of the elder gods. She is adorned with a turreted crown. The two sinners are turned into the lions that pull her chariot.

Bk XIV:527-565. She transforms Aeneas’s fleet of ships into Naiads, since their timbers were cut on her sacred Mount Ida.

Cyclades

Bk II:227-271. The scattered islands of the southern Aegean off the coast of Greece, forming a broken circle.

Cyclopes

Bk I:244-273. A race of giants living on the coast of Sicily of whom Polyphemus was one. They had a single eye in the centre of their foreheads. They forged Jupiter’s lightning-bolts.

Bk XIII:738-788. Bk XIII:789-869. Bk XIII:870-897.

Bk XIV:1-74. Bk XIV:154-222. Polyphemus, who loves Galatea and is blinded by Ulysses.

Bk XV:60-142. Pythagoras compares meat-eating to the practices of Polyphemus.

Cycnus(1)

Bk II:367-380. Son of Sthenelus King of Liguria, mourns Phaethon and is changed into a swan.

Cycnus(2)

Bk VII:350-403. The son of Apollo and Hyrie, a great hunter of Tempe. He is turned into a swan when he attempts suicide to spite Phylius.

Cycnus(3)

Bk XII:64-145. The son of Neptune, deemed invulnerable. He is defeated by Achilles, who chokes him to death, and turned by his father Neptune into a white swan.

Bk XII:146-209. He is unique in his invulnerability to weapons in his generation.

Cydonaeus

Bk VIII:1-80. Of Cydonia, a town in northern Crete. Hence used to mean Cretan.

Cyllarus

Bk XII:393-428. A centaur, loved by Hylonome. Inseparable in life they died together.

Cyllene

Bk I:199-243. A mountain in Arcadia, Mercury’s birthplace, hence Cyllenius, an epithet of Mercury. (Pausanias, VIII, xvii, noting it as the highest mountain in Arcadia mentions the ruined shrine of Hermes-Mercury on its summit, and says it got its name from Cyllen son of Elatus. Mercury’s statue was of juniper (thuon) and stood eight feet tall. Pausanias says that Cyllene was famous for its white (albino?) blackbirds.)

Bk I:689-721. Mercury lulls Argus to sleep and kills him.

BkII:812-832. Mercury turns Aglauros to stone.

Bk V:572-641. Passed by Arethusa in her flight.

Bk VII:350-403. The place where Menephron committed incest with his mother.

Bk XI:266-345. Mercury’s sacred mountain.

Cyllenius

Bk V:149-199. Bk XIII:123-381. Bk XIV:223-319. An epithet of Mercury from Mount Cyllene.

Bk V:294-331. The Emathides pretend that he fled to Egypt in the war between the giants and the gods, and there he hid in the form of a winged ibis.

Cymelus

Bk XII:429-535. One of the Lapithae.

Cynthia

Bk II:441-465. Bk XV:479-546. An epithet of Diana as the Moon goddess, derived from Mount Cynthus on Delos her birthplace. She expels Callisto from her band of virgin followers because Callisto is pregnant by Jupiter.

Bk VII:661-758. Procris is her follower.

Bk XV:479-546. She hides Hippolytus and sets him down at Nemi.

Cynthus

Bk II:201-226. A mountain on the island of Delos sacred to Apollo and Artemis(Diana).

Bk VI:204-266. Latona speaks to her two children Apollo and Diana there.

Cyparissus

Bk X:106-142. A youth loved by Apollo. He accidentally killed a beloved stag, sacred to the nymphs, and begged to mourn forever. Phoebus turned him into a cypress tree.

Cyprus

Bk XIV:623-697. The Island off the south coast of Asia Minor sacred to Venus.

Bk X:220-242. The city of Amathus was there.

Bk X:243-297. The whole island celebrates the festival of Venus.

It is called Paphos, after Pygmalion’s daughter.

Bk X:638-680. It contains the sacred field with the golden tree at Tamasus.

Bk X:708-739. Venus’s destination prior to the death of Adonis.

Cytherea, Cythereïas, Cythereïs, Cythereïus, Venus, Aphrodite

Bk IV:190-213. Of Cythera, the Aegean island, sacred to Venus- Aphrodite who rose from the sea there. (See Botticelli’s the Birth of Venus: see Baudelaire’s poem ‘Voyage to Cytherea’.).

Bk IV:274-316. An epithet for Venus-Aphrodite. She is the mother of Hermaphroditus by Mercury-Hermes.

Bk X:503-559. Sacred to Venus.

Bk X:638-680. Bk X:708-739. Bk XIII:623-639.

Bk XIV:483-511. Bk XV:745-842. Venus.

Bk XIV:566-580. She obtains deification for her son Aeneas.

Bk XV:361-390. Doves are her sacred birds.

Cythereïus heros

Bk XIII:623-639. Applied to Aeneas as the son of Venus.

Cythnus

Bk V:250-293. An island of the Cyclades.

Cytoriacus

Bk IV:274-316. Of Cytorus, a mountain in Paphlagonia, with abundant boxwood. Salmacis’s comb is made from it.

Bk VI:129-145. Minerva’s shuttle is made of it.

Daedalion

Son of Lucifer, brother of Ceyx, father of Chione.

Bk XI:266-345. Mourning his daughter Chione he leaps from the summit of Parnassus but is turned by Apollo into a hawk (probably an eagle, genus: Accipiter, since Parnassus was famous for them. Note Byron’s letters Nov-Dec 1809. Seeing a flight of eagles on Parnassus he ‘seized the omen’ and wrote some stanzas for Childe Harold hoping ‘Apollo had accepted my homage’).

Daedalus

Bk VIII:152-182. The mythical Athenian architect who built the Labyrinth for King Minos of Crete.

(See Michael Ayrton’s extended series of sculptures, bronzes, and artefacts celebrating Daedalus, Icarus and the Minotaur)

Bk VIII:183-235. He makes wings of bee’s-wax and feathers to escape from Crete. Warning Icarus, his son, to follow him in a middle course, they fly towards Ionia. Between Samos and Lebinthos Icarus flies too high and the wax melts, and he drowns in the Icarian Sea and is buried on the island of Icaria.

Bk VIII:236-259. He had previously caused the death of Talos, his nephew, the son of his sister Perdix, through jealousy throwing him from the Athenian citadel, but Pallas Athene changed the boy into the partridge, perdix perdix.

Bk VIII:260-328. He finds sanctuary in Sicily (after reaching Cumae, where he built the temple of Apollo), at the court of King Cocalus who defends him from Minos. (He threaded the spiral shell for King Cocalus, a test devised by Minos, and made the golden honeycomb for the goddess at Eryx. See Vincent Cronin’s book on Sicily – The Golden Honeycomb.).

Bk IX:714-763. His name was synonymous with ingenuity, invention and technical skill.

Damasichthon

Bk VI:204-266. One of Niobe’s seven sons killed by Apollo and Diana.

Danaë

The mother of Perseus by Jupiter, and daughter of Acrisius, King of Argos.

Bk IV:604-662. She was raped by Jupiter in the form of a shower of gold, while imprisoned in a brazen tower by Acrisius, who had been warned by an oracle that he would have no sons but that his grandson would kill him. (See Titian’s painting, Museo del Prado, Madrid: See the pedestal of Benvenuto Cellini’s Perseus bronze, Loggia dei Lanzi, Florence, depicting Danaë with the child Perseus: See Jan Gossaert called Mabuse’s panel – Danaë - in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich))

Bk VI:103-128. Arachne depicts her rape by Jupiter.

Bk XI:85-145. She would have been deceived by Midas’s gold also.

Danaëius heros

Bk V:1-29. Perseus, son of Danaë.

Danai

Bk XII:1-38. Bk XII:64-145. The Greeks, the descendants of Danaus of Argos, the Pelasgians.

Danube, Hister

Bk II:227-271. The Lower Danube running to the Black Sea.

Daphne, Peneïs

Bk I:438-472. Daughter of Peneus the river-god. Loved by Phoebus Apollo.

Bk I:525-552. Turned into the laurel bough. (See Pollaiuolo’s painting – Apollo and Daphne – National Gallery, London)

Bk I:553-567. She is honoured by Phoebus.

Daphnis

Bk IV:274-316. A shepherd boy of Mount Ida, the son of Mercury, and inventor of bucolic poetry. His mother was a nymph. Pan taught him to play the pipes and he was beloved by Apollo, and hunted with Artemis. A nymph named Nomia made him swear loyalty. Her rival Chimera seduced him, and Nomia (or Mercury) turned him to stone.

Dardanidae matres

Bk XIII:399-428. Dardanian, that is Trojan women.

Dardanius

Bk XIII:1-122. An epithet applied to the descendants of Dardanus, the son of Jupiter and Electra, who came from Italy to the Troad, and was one of the ancestors of the Trojan royal house.

Bk XV:418-452. The Romans, as descendants of Aeneas.

Bk XV:745-842. Iülus, as the son of Aeneas.

Daulis

Bk V:250-293. A city in Phocis seized by Pyreneus.

Daunus

Bk XIV:445-482. An ancient king of Apulia, Iapygia in southern Italy. Diomede founded Arpi in his kingdom.

Bk XIV:483-511. Diomede’s father-in-law.

Deianira

The daughter of Oeneus, king of Calydon, hence called Calydonis, and the sister of Meleager.

Bk VIII:515-546. She is spared by Diana from being turned into a bird.

Bk IX:1-88. She is wooed by Hercules and Acheloüs.

Bk IX:89-158. She marries Hercules, and is raped by Nessus. Trying to revive Hercules love for her she unwittingly gives him the shirt of Nessus soaked in the poison of the Hydra. (See Pollaiuolo’s painting – The Rape of Deianira – Yale University Art Gallery) (See Sophocles Trachiniae)

Bk IX:273-323. Hyllus is her son by Hercules.

Deionides, Miletus

Miletus, son of Deione.

Deïphobus

The son of Priam, a Trojan Hero.

Bk XII:536-579. Cited by Nestor as an enemy.

Delia

Bk V:572-641. An epithet of Diana from her birthplace, Delos.

Delius, Apollo, Phoebus

An epithet of Apollo, from his birthplace, Delos.

Bk V:294-331. The Emathides pretend that he fled to Egypt in the war between the giants and the gods, and there he hid in the form of a crow.

Bk VI:204-266. Apollo helps to punish Niobe.

Bk XI:172-193. He gives Midas the ears of an ass.

Bk XII:579-628. He helps Paris destroy Achilles.

Bk XIII:640-674. He gave Andros the power of prophecy.

Delos

Bk I:438-473. Bk IX:324-393. The Greek island in the Aegean, one of the Cyclades, birthplace of, and sacred to, Apollo (Phoebus) and Diana (Phoebe, Artemis), hence the adjective Delian. (Pausanias VIII xlvii, mentions the sacred palm-tree, noted there in Homer’s Odyssey 6, 162, and the ancient olive.)

Bk V:572-641. Its ancient name was Ortygia.

Bk VI:146-203. Bk VI:313-381. A wandering island, that gave sanctuary to Latona (Leto). Having been hounded by jealous Juno (Hera), she gave birth there to the twins Apollo and Diana, between an olive tree and a date-palm on the north side of Mount Cynthus. Delos then became fixed in the sea. In a variant she gave birth to Artemis-Diana on the islet of Ortygia nearby.

Bk VIII:183-235. Daedalus and Icarus fly past it after leaving Crete.

Bk XIII:623-639. Aeneas arrives there. Anius is priest on Delos and they sacrifice to the Delian gods.

Bk XV:479-546. Sacred to Diana.

Delphi, Delphicus

Bk I:504-524. Bk IX:324-393. Bk XI:266-345.

Bk XV:622-745. The site of the oracle of Apollo in Phocis, on the lower slopes of Parnassus overlooking the Pleistos valley. It continued as a shrine, diminishing in importance, until closed by Theodosius in 390AD.

Bk II:531-565. Phoebus Apollo is called Delphicus.

Bk II:676-701. Phoebus Apollo as lord of Delphi.

Bk X:143-219. The navel stone in the precinct at Delphi was taken as the central point of the known world.

Bk XI:410-473. Delphi was sacked by the Phlegyans.

BkXV:143-175. Pythagoras is a devotee of the god.

Demoleon

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur.

Deoïs

Bk VI:103-128. A daughter of Deo, a name of Ceres, so Proserpina.

Deoïus

Bk VIII725-777. Of Ceres-Demeter, her oak trees.

Dercetis, Derceto, Atargatis

Bk IV:31-54. A Babylonian goddess worshipped in Syrian Palestine. She was the Syrian goddess Atar-ata, or Atargatis, consort of the Babylonian great god Adad. She was worshipped at Ascalon as half-woman and half-fish, and fish and doves were sacred to her. She was identified, by the Greeks, with Aphrodite. The mother of Semiramis.

Deucalion

Bk I:313-347. King of Phthia. He and his wife Pyrrha, his cousin, and daughter of Epimetheus, were survivors of the flood. He was the son of Prometheus. (See Michelangelo’s scenes from the Great Flood, Sistine Chapel, Vatican, Rome)

Bk VII:350-403. Cerambus also escaped.

Dia

Bk III:638-691. An old name for Naxos.

Bk VIII:152-182. Ariadne is abandoned there by Theseus, but rescued by Bacchus to whom the island was sacred.

Diana, Phoebe, Artemis

Bk II:401-416. Daughter of Jupiter and Latona (hence her epithet Latonia) and twin sister of Apollo. She was born on the island of Ortygia which is Delos (hence her epithet Ortygia). Goddess of the moon and the hunt. She carries a bow, quiver and arrows. She and her followers are virgins. See Phoebe. She is worshipped as the triple goddess, as Hecate in the underworld, Luna the moon, in the heavens, and Diana the huntress on earth. (Skelton’s ‘Diana in the leaves green, Luna who so bright doth sheen, Persephone in hell’) Callisto is one of her followers. (See Luca Penni’s – Diana Huntress – Louvre, Paris, and Jean Goujon’s sculpture (attributed) – Diana of Anet – Louvre, Paris.)

Bk II:441-465. She expels Callisto from her band of virgins because Callisto is pregnant by Jupiter, having been raped by him.

Bk III:165-205. She is seen by Actaeon while she is bathing and turns him into a stag.

Bk III:232-252. Her anger is only sated when Actaeon is torn to pieces by his dogs.

Bk V:294-331. The Emathides pretend that she fled to Egypt in the war between the giants and the gods, and there she hid in the form of a cat.

Bk V:332-384. A virgin goddess.

Bk V:572-641. She conceals her amour-bearer Arethusa in a cloud. Ortygia is an epithet for her.

Bk VII:661-758. She gives Procris a magic hound, Laelaps, and a spear, both of which Procris gives to her husband, Cephalus.

Bk VIII:260-328. Slighted by King Oeneus, she sends a wild boar against Calydon.

Bk VIII:329-375. She steals the point of Mopsus’s spear in flight rendering his shot ineffectual.

Bk VIII:376-424. Ancaeus boasts in spite of her.

Bk VIII:515-546. She turns the sisters of Meleager, the Meleagrides, into guinea-hens.

Bk VIII:547-610. Acheloüs compares his anger to Diana’s.

Bk IX:89-158. The Naiades dress like her.

Bk X:503-559. Venus dresses like her, and hunts with Adonis.

Bk XI:266-345. She kills Chione for slighting her beauty.

Bk XII:1-38. Bk XIII:123-381. She is angered by some act of Agamemnon’s, and keeps the Greek fleet at Aulis until Iphigenia is sacrificed. She then snatches Iphigenia away in a mist, and leaves a hind for the sacrifice.

Bk XIV:320-396. Orestes carried her image to Aricia in Italy where she was worshipped.

Bk XV:176-198. The moon-goddess.

Bk XV:479-546. She was worshipped at the sacred grove and lake of Nemi in Aricia, as Diana Nemorensis, and the rites practised there are the starting point for Frazer’s ‘The Golden Bough’ (see Chapter I et seq.) She hid Hippolytus, and set him down at Aricia (Nemi), as her consort Virbius. The Romans identified the original Sabine goddess Diana with the Greek Artemis and established her cult on the Aventine. Strabo mentions the connection of the cult of Aricia with the Tauric Chersonese (5.3.12, C.239)

Dictaeus

Bk VIII:1-80. Bk IX:714-763. Of Mount Dicte, in Crete, hence Cretan.

Dictynna

Bk II:441-465. An epithet of Britomartis in Crete, ‘goddess of the net’, identified with Diana.

Dictys(1)

Bk III:597-637. A seaman, companion of Acoetes.

Dictys(2)

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur.

Dido

The Phoenician Queen of Carthage, a manifestation of Astarte, the Great Goddess.

Bk XIV:75-100. A Sidonian, she founded Carthage, loved Aeneas, and committed suicide when he deserted her. (See Virgil, The Aeneid, Book IV, and Marlowe’s The Tragedy of Dido, Queen of Carthage: See also Purcell’s operatic work ‘Dido and Aeneas’.)

Didyme

Two small islands near Syros in the Aegean.

Bk VII:453-500. Not allied to Crete.

Dindyma, Dindymus

Bk II:201-226. A mountain in Mysia in Asia Minor, sacred to Ceres.

Diomedes(1)

Bk XII:579-628. The son of Tydeus king of Argos, a Greek hero in the war against Troy. See Homer’s Iliad. He dare not compete for the arms of Achilles.

Bk XIII:1-122. He reproached his friend Ulysses for for abandoning Nestor in the thick of the fighting.

Bk XIII:1-122. He shared in Ulysses’s deeds.

Bk XIII:123-381. Ulysses claims his friendship and support.

Bk XIV:445-482. He founded Arpi in southern Italy (Iapygia). Turnus sends Venulus to seek his help in the war with Aeneas, but he pleads lack of resources and unacceptable risk.

Bk XIV:483-511. He tells how his friends were changed into birds.

Bk XIV:512-526. He completes his story, and Venulus leaves.

Bk XV:745-842. He wounded Venus at Troy, and Venus once saved Aeneas from his attack.

Dirce

Bk II:227-271. A famous spring near Thebes in Boeotia.

Dis

Bk IV:416-463. A name for Pluto, king of the Underworld, brother of Neptune and Jupiter. His kingdom in the Underworld described.

Bk V:332-384. At Venus’s instigation Cupid strikes him with an arrow to make him fall in love with Prosperpine.

Bk V:385-424. He rapes and abducts her, re-entering Hades through the pool of Cyane.

Bk V:533-571. Jupiter decrees that she can only spend half the year with him and must spend the other half with Ceres.

Bk X:1-85. Lord of the Underworld, visited by Orpheus to plead for the life of Eurydice.

Bk XV:479-546. He is angered when Aesculapius restores the life of Hippolytus.

Dodona

The town in Epirus in north western Greece, site of the Oracle of Jupiter-Zeus, whose responses were delivered by the rustling of the oak trees in the sacred grove. (After 1200BC the goddess Naia, worshipped there, who continued to be honoured as Dione, was joined by Zeus Naios. The sanctuary was destroyed in 391AD.)

Bk VII:614-660. The oak at Aegina is seeded from it, and sacred to Jupiter.

Bk XIII:705-737. Aeneas passes it.

Dodonaeus

Bk VII:614-660. Dodonis, of Dodona.

Dolon

A Phrygian sent by the Trojans to spy on the Greek camp.

Bk XIII:1-122. He was captured by Ulysses and Diomede and killed. Hector had promised him the horses and chariot of Achilles for his night’s spying.

Dolopes

Bk XII:290-326. A people of Thessaly. Amyntor is their king.

Don, Tanais

Bk II:227-271. The River in Scythia.

Doris

Bk II:1-30. The daughter of Oceanus and Tethys, wife of Nereus the old man of the sea who is a shape-changer, and mother of the fifty Nereids, the attendants on Thetis. The Nereids are mermaids.

Bk II:227-271. Hid from the sun when Phaethon’s chariot scorched the earth.

Bk XIII:738-788. The mother of Galatea.

Dorylas(1)

Bk V:107-148. A rich man from Nasamonia. A friend of Perseus, killed by Halcyoneus.

Dorylas(2)

Bk XII:290-326. A centaur, killed by Peleus.

Draco, The Dragon (ancient Serpens)

Bk II:150-177. The constellation of the Dragon, once confusingly called Serpens. It is said to be the dragon Ladon killed by Hercules when stealing the golden apples of the Hesperides. It contains the north pole of the ecliptic (ninety degrees from the plane of earth’s orbit) and represents the icy north.

Dryades, Dryads

Bk III:474-510. The wood-nymphs. They mourn for Narcissus.

Bk VIII:725-776. They inhabit the oak trees in Ceres sacred grove and dance at her festivals. One of them prophesies the doom of Erysichthon who had violated the grove and destroyed her.

Bk VIII:777-842. The Dryads mourn the oak and demand punishment for Erysichthon.

Bk XI:1-66. They mourn for Orpheus.

Bk XIV:320-396. They are attracted to Picus.

Dryas

The son of Mars, and brother of the Thracian Tereus.

Bk VIII:260-328. He is present at the Calydonian Boar Hunt.

Bk XII:290-326. He is present at the battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs.

Dryope

The daughter of Eurytus, king of Oechalia, mother of Amphissus by Apollo, wife of Andraemon.

Bk IX:324-393. She unwittingly offends the nymphs and is turned into a lotus-tree.

Dulichius

Bk XIII:1-122. Bk XIII:399-428. Bk XIII:705-737.

Bk XIV:223-319An epithet of Ulysses from Dulichium, an (unidentified) island near Ithaca.

Dymantis

Bk XI:749-795. Hecuba, the daughter of Dymas and the nymph Eunoë, and wife of Priam, king of Troy.

Dymas

Bk XI:749-795. The father of Hecuba.