Ovid's Metamorphoses(Book-II)

Key Points

Book-I

Ovid asks the gods for help in singing a song about metamorphoses, starting
at the beginning of the world, and then carrying through to the present day.
Then Ovid starts telling us about the beginning of the world.
In the beginning, everything was a total mess. Then some god (we aren't told
who) came along and put everything in order.
He let fire, the lightest element, shoot up to its natural place at the furthest
reaches of the universe. Below fire came air, a slightly heavier element.
Below that was where he put all the heavy elements - dirt, rocks, and s0 on.
All this stuff collected at the center of the universe. (That's right, for Ovid the
earth is the center of the universe.) Then he let water flow all over it.
Now that he had gotten everything on the right shelves, so to speak, it was
time to put them in order.
He did some fancy decorating, made the mountains and fields, organized the
different regions of the earth and sky, and sent all the different winds to their
individual stations.
Now the stars thought it was safe to come out, so they did.
Then the god made animals to inhabit all the different regions of the word.
Then Ovid lets us pick what comes next - sort of like a choose-your-own
adventure story. He says that human beings definitely came next, but he isn't
sure whether they were made by the same god who made everything, or
instead by Prometheus, son of lapetus.
the credit.
He spends more time telling us the version where Prometheus gets
mixture of mud and
According to Ovid, Prometheus made humans from a
rainwater. That might not sound too nice except that the mud had only
had some fancy heavenly seeds in
recently been part of the sky, and so it still
of the gods.
it. Oh yeah, and he made man in the shape
T h e first age of human existence was
the Age of Gold. life truly
At this time,
blackberries, and
was a bowl of cherries
and strawberries, arbutus fruit,
to
Humans ate all of this stuff back then without having
acorns, yes, acorns.
to plough their fields to get wheat. Plus
work for it. They didn't even have and
kind and the steams vwere full of milk
there was no war or strife of any
honey. Sweet.
But then Saturn, the godwho has in charge of the world at the time, got
who made himself the new king of
the gods.
kicked out by Jupiter, administration brought in some
The
kicked off the Age of Silver.
new
This was now cold for half the
four seasons. Since the world
changes, notably the They
first time. also started
year, humans
started living in houses for the
to get wheat.
ploving the earth than the Age of Silver, but
the Age of Bronze. It was a bit rougher
Next came
Iron.
not as bad as the Age of hell breaks
comes next? Yup,
the Age of lIron. Now all
Guess which age also start
killing each other left righ and center. They
loose, with people the earth for silver and gold.
to make ships and mining
chopping down trees

1
 Those precious metals just give them another excuse to keep killing each
other left, right, and center.
In the midst of all this chaos,
Astraea, the goddess of justice, leaves the earth.
Then the Giants rose up in a war against Jupiter and piled Mount Pelion on
top of Mount Ossa in an attempt to reach
up to Olympus
Jupiter knocked the stack of mountains over and also knocked the Giants out
cold.
Then the Earth soaked up the blood
of the Giants and made a new race in
theirimage that of humans. But wait, didn't we
-

just hear that Prometheus (or

possibly the god who created the world) made humans
What gives, Ovid? in the image of gods
Jupiter isn't pleased when he sees this; he calls the other gods
discuss it. together to
He tells them that he
plans to kill all the humans
protect all the demigods like Nymphs. apparently
means to because he
live on earth. Satyrs, and Fauns that still
He asks, "How can
they be safe if Lycaon could pull such a trick on me, the
king of the gods?"
But wait, who's Lycaon? The other gods don't know either. Now
explains it. Jupiter
He had heard rumors about what
jerks humans had turned out to be, and
went down to earth, in disguise,
just to see. Sure enough, he got treated
terribly everywhere he went.
Finally, when he came to the land of Arcadia, he revealed himself as a god.
This time, of course, all the Arcadians started
All of the Arcadians, that is, except for their
worshipping him.
tyrant, Lycaon.
Lycaon didn't believe that Jupiter was a god, but he decided to test him
anyway. He planned to murder Jupiter in his sleep, to test out if he was
immortal or not. Also, in secret or so he thought - he killed an emissary from
a neighboring tribe, butchered him, and served him to
Jupiter for supper.
In response to this outrage, Jupiter got outraged. He flattened
Lycaon's
palace with a thunderbolt, and then drOve Lycaon out into the wild. There,
Lycaon was changed into a wolf. From now on, his savagery ill be purely
spent on ravaging sheep.
That is the end of Jupiter's story. He concludes by saying he wishes he had
destroyed many more of the humans' houses than just the palace of Lycaon.
The other gods approve of Jupiter's decision to bring justice to bear against
the ingrate humans, but they aren't so keen on the idea of wiping all the
humans off the face of the planet. Where would they get sacrifices from, for
one thing?
Their reservations don't end up mattering much in the end. Jupiter at first
considers scorching the earth with fire, but then decides to flood it instead.
In addition to the water coming down from the heavens, he also enlists the
help of his brother, Neptune, the god of the sea, who passes the message
along to his subordinates - the river gods. Working together, these guys
drown the entire world.
The entire world, that is, except for two people Deucalion
and his wife
-

a mountain peak, he
Pyrrha. VWhen Jupiter sees these two cowering on top of
He calls off
remembers how they were both always pious towards the gods.
the waters, to spare their lives

2
 ne
sea-god Triton blows his conch-shell, the
retreat. The waters signal for all of the waters
At this point, after
pull back, and the world is revealed again.
and says, "Wow. This
they both pray to various gods, Deucalion turns to Pyrrha
It turns out that
totally sucks."
Deucalion's dad is Prometheus; he says that he wishes he
had daddy's power to craft some more humans.
They go to the shrine of the goddess Themis and ask her what to do.
Themis tells them to veil their heads, loosen their belts, and walk around
throwing "the bones / of the great mother" over their shoulders.
At first, Pyrrha freaks out, because she doesn't want to throw her mother's
bones around.
But then Deucalion says he's figured out what the goddess was saying: "The
great mother is the earth; her bones are rocks. We should walk around
throwing rocks Over our shoulders."
They figure they have nothing to lose, so they do just that.
Sure enough, wherever a rock lands, it changes into a person. The rocks that
Deucalion throws turn into men, and those that Pyrrha throws turn into
women.
Then the other animals are formed from the moist ground, warmed by the
blazing sun.
Some of the creatures that the earth created had existed before the flood, but
some were new. Among the new ones was the horrible Python.
The god Apollo, also known as Phoebus, didn't like the look of this varmint,
and so he shot him the death with arrows. To commemorate this event, he
instituted the Pythian athletic contests.
Pleased as punch with his victory, Apollo runs into Cupid, the god of sexual
desire, who is stringing his own bow.
Apollo tells Cupid to stick to inflaming people with his torch, and leave
shooting arrows to him.
Cupid says, "No way, man," and flutters off to Mount Parnassus. There, he
draws two arrows from his quiver: one, made of gold, has a sharp tip. It
kindles desire. The other, made of lead, has a blunt tip; whomever it strikes
will reject all love.
Cupid shoots Apollo with the golden arrow, and shoots the nymph Daphne
with the leaden one.
to
The result? Apollo totally gets the hots for Daphne, whereas she swears
remain a virgin forever.
One day, Apollo starts chasing Daphne, begging her to stop running and give
but it
herself to him. He tries the old, "I'm a god, you know" pick-up line,
doesn't work.
to her father,
Just when Apollo is about to catch her, however, Daphne prays
the river god Peneus for help.
and turns into...an
Help is granted. All of a sudden, Daphne stops running want to check
olive tree. Yep. (If this is a little hard to picture, you might
renaissance sculptor Bernini; we're giving you
out this sculpture by the Italian
can take in the full awesomeness.)
pictures from multiple angles so you
In fact, he tells her (in Mandelbaum's
But Apollo doesn't stop loving her.
be my wife, you'll be my tree." With that, he
translation), "since / you cannot He also
swears to wear olive leaves
in his hair, and on his lyre and his quiver.

3
 institutes the tradition of Roman jenerals wanring olive wreiilhs to (GilGDria

their victorles.
Daphne the laurel tree nods hor branchos in aggroenont.
Meanwhile, in the valloy of Tempe in mainland Greco, the various river (ois
are gathering around Peneus, Daphne's father. Thoy dorn't know whether thg
console him for his loss or comfort bim for the now honor Daphne has won
One river god isn't prosent: lnachus, who is worriod sick about his daughter,
lo. She hasn't come home, and she hasn't called, toxted, omailed, twittered,
or sent a message by passonger pigeon (the original twitter)
Now Ovid tells us what Inachus doesn't know. Apparently, Jupiter Gaught sight
of her as she was wandering through the
countrysido.
He tried to convince her to sleep with him in the woods, but she kept on
walking. In response, he veiled the land with a cloud of mist and then raped
her.
Up in the heavens, Juno, queen of the gods, and Jupiter's wife, notir.ed that a
large tract of land down on the ground was covered with clouds. She
Suspected that her husband is up to no gjood.
But Jupiter saw her coming. Just before Juno dispersed the clouds, Jupiter
turned lo into a white heifer (female cow).
After making some chit-chat about what a nice cow Jupiter had, Juno asked to
keep it as a pet.
In his mind, Jupiter went back and forth over whether he should do it or not,
but eventually he decided to give her over. He was worried that, if he made
too big a fuss about it, Juno would realize that lo wasn't really a cow
In the end, he decided to give lo up.
But Juno still suspected something was up; she entrusted lo to the crazy giant
Argus, who had a hundred eyes. When he slept, he would only close two eyes
and use all the rest for watching
Argus let lo graze by day, but at night he locked her up. To put it in the
simplest terms, lo's life pretty much sucked from this point on.
Eventually, in her wanderings, she reached the river of Inachus, her father.
She started hanging around there, but he didn't know who she was.
Speaking of not knowing things, it also seems that Ovid has now caught us up
on the back-story, because what's happening now seems to be after the
meeting of the river gods that Inachus missed. Are you with us on this? OK,
agreed: back-story's over.
.One day, lo succeeds in revealing her identity by scratching words in the dirt
with her hoof.
Now her dad is majorly depressed this is worse than anything he could have
imagined.He that he would kill himself except that, as an immortal, he
says
-

can't.
Then the tearful reunion is cut short by Argus, who drives lo away to other

pastures.
Eventually, however, Jupiter decides that enough is enough. He
sends
Mercury, the messenger god, down to earth. His mission? Kill Argus.
as a shepherd, finds Argus.He walks by. playing
Mercury, disguised
enchanted by the music that he asks him to sit
panpipes, and Argus Is so
down.
Argus asks Mercury to
I t turns out that panpipes were only recently invented.
tell him how they came into existence.

4
 Mercury clears his throat and begins. He explains how, in the land of Arcadia,
e ved a nymph named Syrinx, who looked very similar to the huntress
goddess, Diana. Like Diana, she had taken a vow of chastity
one day, as Syrinx was going about her business, she was spotted by Pan-
the weird half-goat god of the Greeks.
At this point, Mercury stops telling his story. Instead, Ovid steps in and tells
what he would have told Argus but didn't.
Ovid explains that Pan chased Syrinx until she came to the banks of a river.
for
There, she asked the water nymphs They changed her into a bunch
help.
of reeds.
and he decided
When Pan picked up the reeds, his sighs made them vibrate,
in ancient Greece
to turn them into a musical instrument- the panpipe, which,
and Rome, was known as a "syrinx," after the name of the unfortunate nymph
about it - comes
(Our modern word "syringe" also a hollow tube, if you think
-

from the same word.)

told it, except that he
That's the end of Ovid's story. Mercury would have
stories about nymphs turning into
noticed that Argus who apparently thought
-

musical instruments were boring- had just shut his hundred eyes.

Seeing opportunity,
his Mercury first strikes Argus with his wand, which
causes sleep (better safe than sorry); then, with a sword curved like a scythe,
he cuts his head off.
When Juno sees what happened to her henchman, she takes his hundred
eyes and puts them onto the tail-feathers of her favorite bird - the peacock.

Then she sends one the Furies down to torment lo.

The Fury chases lo all over the place, until she eventually comes to the Nile.
There, lo lifts up her nose to the heavens and moos for help.
won't have
Jupiter hears her and begs Juno to relent, telling her that he
won't ever cheat
anything more to do with lo. (Note that he doesn't say he
again with women other than lo.)
her old form
Juno accepts and lets lo change back into a human. She regains
the Ovid tells
completely, except she preserves the striking whiteness of
cow.

us that,in his own time, lo is celebrated as the goddess Isis.

l o ends up having a son, Epaphus. (Jupiter is suspected as the father.)
of the Sun.
Epaphus is the same age as Phaethon, the son of the god have
Before we move on to tell you what happened to Phaethon, however, we

to take a break to bring you an Urgent Mythological Update!

as they're known
So what mythological misconception (or, "mythconception,"
and the Sun-god are
in the biz) are we busting today? The idea that Apollo
the same guy. The truth? They're not. OK, OK, it's a little more complicated
there were different traditions floating around in ancient times, and some
modern
people did say that Apollo was the god of the sun, which is why
readers tend to blur them together.
Ovid's Metamorphoses, they are
But this is missing the point. The point is, in
and healing and prophecy and
two different guys: Apollo is the god of poetry
is a guy called "Sol." Because
archery, and all that nifty stuff. The Sun-god the translator
"Sol" is just the Latin word for "sun," we at Shmoop (following
"Sun."
Allen Mandelbaum) will just refer to him as the
Ovid will sometimes use the name
Now, there's just one catch. To be sneaky,
make you think
"Phoebus" to refer to both Apollo and the Sun. This might
root meaning of "Phoebus"
they're the same guy but that's not the idea. The
-
 is "radiant," a word that could
obviously apply to the sun, as well as to a
fancy-shmancy divinity like Apollo.
To keep things simple, here on
refer Shmoop, we will use the name "Phoebus" to
only to Apollo; whenever the Sun-god comes
"Sun." That said, when up, we will just call him
name "Phoebus,"
you're reading Ovid's poem and you come across the
you should pay attention to the context to see which
being referred to. god is
We now return
you to your regularly scheduled
Having the Sun as your father program.
age: perhaps inevitably, Phaethon definitely sets you apart from other kids
your
starts
Epaphus, along "my dad can beat up yourboasting that he's better than
dad" lines.
But Epaphus tells him that his
mom lied to him, and
insult, since it also implies thatsomebody
dad. (This is a double else was his
around.) his mom was sleepin9
Phaethon doesn't like that one bit and
name is Clymene.
runs crying home to his mom, whose
He demands that she
prove to him that the Sun was his
Clymene, eager to defend her honor, reaches her hands father
up to the
Phaethon's father. Then she tells him thatsky
swears that the Sun was and
visit his dad's palace i t isn't far from he can go
where they are.
Phaethon says, "Hot diggity!" and sets out. After
Sure enough, he crossing Ethiopia and India,
gets there in no time.
Book-II

The palace of the sun turns out to be made

entirely of
far superior to anything featured on MTV's Cribs.
previous metals, and
Ovid tells us that what was most
stupendously awesome, however, was the
artwork on the doors. There, Vulcan, the god of fire and technology, had
created a picture of the world through metal-working.
When Phaethon reaches the palace, he heads straight to see the Sun.
The Sun greets him, calling him his son. (Trust us, that sounds less
confusing
in the original Latin.) But Phaethon still demands
proof.
The Sun reassures him that he is his father; he says, "Here's what, to prove it
to you, ask me for anything and I'll give it to you. I swear it by the fearsome
waters of Styx, the river of the underworld."
In response to this, Phaethon says, "Cool. Then let me drive the chariot of the
sun for one day."
The Sun says, "Uh-oh. I really wish I hadn't made that promise. You don't
even have your sun-chariot learner's permit yet! I know, I know, kids yourage,
they always think they're immortal - but trust me, you're not. I'm the only one

who can drive this chariot- not even the other gods can do it! Please, askfor
something else."
But Phaethon insists, and his dad has to keep his word
T h e Sun leads him over to where the golden chariot is waiting, and helps him

get ready.
Then, just before it's time for Phaethon to head out, the Sun gives him some
to be
advice. He tells him not to whip the horses; they'll be eager enough
the sky, and to keep
going. Also, he tells him to steer a middle course through
his altitude at a medium level.

6
 At the last minute, Phoebus tries once more to convince Phaethon to back
down from his madness, but
Phaethon doesn't answer. Instead, he whips up
the horses and rides off.
he horses sense the difference - Phaethon holds the reins with a lot less
strength - and they start running wild.
Various animals of the zodiac get scorched when he flies too close. Phaethon
Wishes he had never gotten proof of who his father was.
Then, when Phaethon is nearing the constellation Scorpio - the scorpion- he
gets afraid that it will attack him. In terror, he drops the reins.
Not good. The horses of the sun run all over the place, completely out of
control. They collide with stars, set clouds on fire, and then veer down
towards earth and destroy a number of mortal cities.
But that isn't all; he also scorches numerous rivers; parches the earth so that
deep cracks appear in it, shining light into the underworld; and dries up parts
of the ocean.
In the midst of all this chaos, the goddess of Earth calls out to Jupiter for help.
She tells him that he'd better act quickly; even if he doesn't care about
least be worried that heaven itself will
everyone else's sufferings, he should at
be burned up in the flames.
Hearing her, Jupiter calls all the other gods to assembly. He makes them all
including the Sun bear witness that he doesn't have any choice in what he's
-

about to do.
Then, he climbs to the highest point of the heavens, aims his lightning bolt,
and throws it, striking Phaethon and killing him
Phaethon plummets to the earth. He is found by some Naiads (water-
nymphs), who bury him near the Po, a river in Northern ltaly.
Clymene, his mother, wanders the earth in grief, looking for her lost son.
Eventually she finds him - and weeps over his grave.
Then the Heliades, Clymene's daughters (and Phaethon's sisters) join in the
lament.
Then, for no particular reason, they turnpoplar trees and their tears turn
into
to amber. Ovid tells us that the amber droplets end up becoming jewelry
worn

by fashionable Roman women of his day. beside his

Then Cycnus, a friend of Phaethon's, also shows up to weep
swan. Ovid speculates that this bird's
grave. In no time, he turns into a
his friend's
characteristics reflect the fact that Cycnus was traumatized by
and
death: swans don't like flying (hence they avoid Jupiter's thunderbolts),
they stay close to water (the opposite of fire). Phaethon and threatens to stop
Meanwhile, the Sun is wracked with grief for
convince him not to be stupid,
driving the chariot of the sun. The other gods
however.
assess the damage from the fire. On
Then Jupiter wanders around, trying to
the goddess Diana's favorite
his wanderings, he spies the nymph Callisto,
crush on her.
handmaiden. He immediately develops a
shade of a nearby forest.
He watches as she goes into the
of Diana, her mistress. In this disguise
Then, he approaches her in the shape
her. Callisto tries to resist, but isn't
he greets her, kisses her..and then rapes
strong enough.
while Callisto tries to pretend like
Jupiter then goes back to the heavens, when Diana and her
nine months later,
nothing happened. Unfortunately,
 other nymphs are about to go bathing, someone rips off Callisto's clothes and
everyone can see she's pregnant. Because only virgins could hang out with
Diana, Callisto becomes an outcast.
Soon afterward, Callisto gives birth to a son, Arcas.
After this, Juno reveals that it was she who had brought to pass Callisto's
pregnancy and motherthood, as punishment for sleeping with her husband,
Jupiter
But that isn't all. As a final punishment for attracting her husband's eye, Juno
turns Callisto into a bear.
Sixteen years later, Callisto's son, Arcas is out
He comes upon his mother, the bear. hunting.
She vaguely recognizes him, and
signals him to come closer. He obviously doesn't recognize her because,
know, she's a bear. you
Before Arcas can kill her with his spear,
however, Jupiter intervenes. He
sCoops both of them up and puts them in the sky - turning them into the
constellations the Big and Little Bear, or, as we sometimes call
and Little Dipper. them, the
Big
Now Juno is really ticked off, because
becoming a constellation is a high
honor. (Get it, high? Heh.)
She goes down to complain to her friends, the
god Ocean and his wife
Tethys, a sea-goddess. She tells them that, in punishment, they should never
let the skanky Great Bear touch their waters.
(Of course, viewed from most
regions in the Northern hemisphere, the stars of the Great Bear do never dip
beneath the horizon into the ocean.)
Then Juno heads back up to the heavens. Ovid tells us that, around this
time,
the raven transformed froma white bird into a black bird.
Here's the scoop:
the god Apollo has a girlfriend, named Coronis, who lives in the region of
Larissa. One day, Apollo's bird, the raven discovers that Coronis has been
cheating on him. He immediately flies off to warn his master.
On his way, he is overtaken by a crow. The crow wants to know what's up.
Once theraven tells him, however, the crow tells him to spare his effort- and
not disturb his master with the bad news. Then she (the crow is a she) tells a
story to explain why. Let's listen to the crow's story:
The crow says that a long time ago, the god Vulcan fathered a son,
Erichthonius, under strange circumstances. (OK, we're not exactly sure how
to put this, but, he tried to rape Minerva but didn't succeed. Instead, his "seed"
fell down to earth; from where it landed, up sprang Erichthonius.)
Anyway, Minerva seemed to want to cover the whole thing up, so she hid the
child in a basket. She then made this basket the responsibility of the three
daughters of Cecrops, an ancient king of Athens. Then she made them swear
never to look inside it.
Two of the daughters, Pandrosos and Herse, obeyed the goddess, but the
third, Aglauros, peeked inside - and a saw a baby with a serpent curled up

beside him.
The crow, as it turns out, had been watching this whole thing. Then she went
to Minèrva and tattled on Aglauros. Unfortunately, this was before the phrase
"don't shoot the messenger" had become widely known. Minerva was so
from that
ticked off that she forbade the crow to be her special bird any longer,
point on, she and owls were pals instead.

8
 That's the end of the crow's story. Then she says to the raven, "Now, you
ight think that I never was Minerva's special bird in the first place. It you d,
ou're way wrong." To prove it. the crow now starts telling a second story.
Here is the crow's second story:
The croW says that, a long time ago, she used to be a beautiful princess, with
many suitors. But then, one day, while she was walking along the beach, the
god the Ocean saw her and got all hot and bothered.
He pursued her, and she prayed to the gods for help. The only one who
listened was Minerva, herself a virgin, who transformed the princess into a
crow. This crow then became Minerva's bird.
That's the end of the crow's second story. She rounds it off by complaining
that Minerva's new bird. the owl, also used to be a princess - who was a total

slut
In response to this, however, the raven says, "Whatever. I'm still going to
deliver my message to Apollo."
The raven flies up and delivers his message. Apollo is so angry that he strings
up his bow and immediately shoots an arrow into the breast of Coronis, his
girlfriend.
Just before she dies, Coronis reveals that she was pregnant.
After this killing, Apollo becomes consumed with grief. He attends Coronis's
funeral and mourns over her body. Then, he snatches the unborn child out of
her womb and carries it off to the cave of the centaur, Chiron. He also turns
the white raven black. So that's that.
Meanwhile, Chiron is happy to have received the unborn child - who

apparently isn't dead. He is happy to raise this divine offspring, whose name
is Aesculapius.
Then in walks Chiron's daughter, Ocyrhoe. She has been given the gift of
prophecy, and now she busts it out.
She foretells that Aesculapius will become a great healer, able to raise the
dead. In anger over this power, Jupiter will kill him with a thunderbolt; then,
Aesculapius himself will be raised from the dead and will become a god.
As for Chiron, her father, he will one day suffer from poisoning so severe that
he will wish he weren't immortal. Eventually, the gods will take away his
immortality, so death can put an end to his suffering
After delivering this prophecy, Ocyrhoe turns into a mare (female horse). Her
new name is "Hippe," meaning... "female horse."
Chiron laments this and calls out to Apollo for help. But even if Apollo could
have done something about it, he's too busy right now crying about his
girlfriend Coronis whom he murdered.
-

Apollo is so consumed with grief that he doesn't even keep an eye on his
herds of cattle.
That leaves a window of opportunity open for Mercury, who is, among other
things, the god of trickery. Mercury steals all the cattle and hides them
woods.
sees him do it. an old man named Battus.
Only one person
Mercury goes up to Battus and promises him a cow if he keeps his mouth
shut. Battus says, "No problem, your secret is safe with me."
Then, to test him out, Mercury walks off, and then comes back in disguise.
Now he asks Battus if he's seen anyone pass by driving cattle, he promises a
cow and a bull if he tells him.

9
 Battus lets the cat out the bag - pointing out where the cattle are. Mercury is
furious and turns Battus to stone. In particular, he turns him into the first
touchstone" - a stone used to determine the purity of precious metals

Hence, he becomes, appropriately, a stone that reveals the truth.

Then Mercury flies off. In his flight, he passes Athens, where he spots the
daughters of Cecrops. He finds Herse especially beautiful, and immediately
decides he has to have her.
After making sure his clothes
are all in order, he sneaks into Cecrops's palace
at night. Aglauros- the same daughter who had peeked in the basket and
seen the infant
Aesculapius now sees Mercury coming.
Mercury reveals that he's there for Herse. Aglauros promises to keep her
mouth shut if Mercury will give her lots of riches.
-

Minerva, meanwhile, has been watching the whole thing. She is mad that
Aglauros is getting away with yet another sleazy act.
Determined to punish her, Minerva goes off to see the
Envy. Minerva tells Envy to infect Aglauros with venom.goddess personified
of
Envy goes down to earth and does just that. Now, over the coming days and
nights, Aglauros is consumed with jealousy for her sister Herse, and her little
fling with Mercury.
One day, Aglauros sits in the
doorway to Herse's room and refuses to get out
of the way when Mercury arrives.
In response, Mercury turns her into a statue.
Then, when he's finished his visit
with Herse, he flies back up to the heavens.
When he gets up to heaven, Jupiter sends him on another mission. He
tells
him to go to the land of Sidon (in the Middle East); when he
gets there, he will
see a herd of cattle. He should then drive this herd into the sea.
doesn't give any explanation for this.)
(Jupiter
Mercury does as he's told, finds the cattle, and drives them into the sea.
Meanwhile, Jupiter turns himself into a bull and heads down to the beach. The
cattle Mercury is driving belong to Ageno, the local king. Jupiter heads
straight for Europa, the king's beautiful daughter.
He acts friendly and nuzzles her hand. Eventually, his gentleness makes
Europa trust in him so much that she sits on his back.
That's just what he's been waiting for- now Jupiter races out into the open
sea, carrying Europa away with him on his shoulders.

Book-lll

When Jupiter arrives at Crete, still carrying the princess Europa, he abandons
his bull shape and turns back into himself.
At the same time, King Agenor, whose daughter had just been carried off,
sends Cadmus, his son, to bring her back.
Cadmus wanders over the entire world, but doesn't see any sign of his
missing sister
Eventually, realizing his search is futile, but knowing he can't go home, he
asks the oracle of Apollo what he should do.
The oracle tells Cadmus to keep an eye out for a heifer (female cow) standing
alone, one that has never pulled a plow. He should follow this heifer, and

10
 wnerever she stops to rest, that's where he should found a settlement. He is
instructed to call the region Boeotia. (The name "Boeotia," an actual region in
Greece, sounds like the Latin word for cow, "bos." This word is related to the
English word "bovine.")
when Cadmus leaves the shrine, sure enough, he sees a heifer matching that
description walking by.
e follows the heifer and, after some time, it starts bellowing and lies down in
the grass. Cadmus knows this was th spot.
At this point, the appropriate thing to do is offer a sacrifice to Jupiter. For this,
however, he would need some fresh spring water. Accordingly, he sends his
men out into the forest to get some.
Unfortunately, In the cave where they go to get their water, there lurks a giant
snake, sacred to the god Mars. He kills all of Cadmus's men.
By the time noon rolls around, Cadmus is wondering where all his men went.
Finally, he goes in search of them. When he gets to the cave, a grisly scene
confronts him.
Cadmus battles the snake and eventually kills it, pinning it with his spear
against an oak tree.
While Cadmus is staring at the snake, however, he suddenly hears a voice
call out, "What do you think you're staring at? Don't you know that you'll be a
snake too one day?"
Then, all of sudden, the goddess Minerva appears. She tells him to plow the
ground and plant the snake's teeth in the furrows.
He does as he's commanded. When he's done, the snake's teeth germinate
into a race of warriors who rise out of the soil. For apparent reason, these
warriors all start kiling each other, until only five are left. These five then
make peace with each other.
Now Ovid tells us that Cadmus ended up having a prety sweet life beautiful
wife, nice kids, and so on. But, he reminds us, don't consider a man happy
until he's dead. He tells us that, in Cadmus's case, the trouble started when
his grandson, Actaeon, was turned into a stag.
Now we flash forward a bunch of years to see what in the world Ovid is talking
about.
On the day in question, young Actaeon and his buddies are out hunting in the
forest. They kill lots of animals, and the ground is stained with blood. Nice
Nearby, there is a valley containing a cave. In this cave, there is a spring,
where Diana and her nymphs like to bathe.
. I tjust so happens that Diana had picked this day to go there wi h her nymphs.
. I t also just so happens that Actaeon wanders into this cave just when Diana
and the nymphs are all splashing around in their birthday suits.
.When he walks in, they are shocked, and all crowd around Diana to hide her.
Then, Diana splashes water on Actaeon.
A t that instant, he transforms into a stag (male deer). He races out of the
cave
Now it isn't long before his own hunting dogs pick up his scent - though of

cOurse they don't know who he is.

Soon enough, the hounds catch up to him and start mauling him.
Actaeon's friends wonder where he is. They are sorry he is missing the action,
and cheer on the dogs. Eventually, Actaeo1n dies from his wounds

11
 When Juno hears about this, she's glad. She's pleased so long as a
descendent of King Agenor the father of Europa, whom Jupiter carried away
Is suffering. (Remember: Agenor's son was Cadmus; Cadmus's grandson
was Actaeon.
But then Juno gets another piece of bad news. It turns out that Jupiter has
been fooling around with yet another mortal babe - the Theban princess
Semele. The unfortunate girl is already
sporting a baby-bumnp.
Junoconsiders punishing her husband for this, but decides to take out her
wrath on Semele instead.
She goes down to Thebes, disquising herself in the shape of Semele's nurse,
Beroe. In this shape, she asks Semele how she really knows that it was
Jupiter who got her preynant,. She says that, when Jupiter sleeps with Juno,
he appears in all his divine
glory. She convinces Semele to demand equal
treatment.
Poor Semele. The next time Jupiter visits
him, she asks him to grant her a gift.
He swears a solemn oath by the River
Styx that he will grant whatever she
wishes. She repeats what Juno told her that he make love to
-

her the way he

would the queen of the gods. Jupiter doesn't want to
comply, but he is bound
by his oath he does as he's told, and Semele is incinerated.
Ovid tells us that her unborn child is later extracted from her womb and
implanted in Jupiter's thigh. When the time rolls around, that's where it's born
from. This child ends up being Bacchus, the god of wine. Weird.
In any case, a short time later, Jupiter is up on Mt. Olympus chilling out with
his wife, Juno. Maybe it was Semele's request reminding him of his love-life
with Juno, or maybe it was just the nectar he was downing. Whatever the
cause, Jupiter now tries to get Juno to admit that women enjoy sex more than
men.
Juno doesn't agree. They decide to ask a man named Tiresias, because he
has been both a man and a woman.
Here's what happened: one day, Tiresias was walking in the forest, and he
saw two snakes getting it on. For some reason, he whacked them with his
stick. Immediately afterwards, he was transformed into a woman.
Eight years later, Tiresias came upon the same two snakes, and whacked
them again. This time, he - or rather she? -was transformed back into a

man.
Anyhow, when Tiresias shows up, he sides with Jupiter: women enjoy sex
more. So now you know.
But Juno doesn't agree with this verdict. In anger at Tiresias, she strikes him
blind.
Jupiter, to make things a bit better, gives him the gift of prophecy in
compensation.
time passes, Tiresias gains a reputation for his future-telling abilities.
So, when the nymph Liriope is raped by the river-god Cephisus, she turns to
Tiresias to find out the fate of her new child.
Tiresias answers (in Mandelbaum's translation), "Yes, if he never knows
himself." No one can figure out what the heck he means.
Sixteen years later, her child, whose name is Narcissus, has matured intoa
handsome young man, beloved by both sexes. But he will have nothing to do
with anyone.

12
 One day, when he is out
Echo. Echo can chasing a deer in the
only repeat what other people forest,and
he megts the
nyrnph
conversation. say, can never initiatg
à
Now Ovid tells us
It turns out why Echo was like that.
that Echo used to act as the
who were
getting it on with wing-nymph for the othe nymphs
her husband, Jupiter. Everytime Juno came along looking for
Echo would stand in her way and
engage in conversation- thus
giving her friend and Jupiter time to make themselves scarce.
When Juno figured out what was
to speak-
going one, she deprived Echo of the ability
except for "echoing" (get it?) the last words that other people
say
OK, so far so good. Now let's get back to the main story. Echo sees Narcissus
roaming through the woods and instantly starts burning with desire for hin.
Because she can't initiate conversation, she has to wait for himn to make the
first move.
Time passes. Then, one day, Narcissus is out wandering again in the woods.
Somehow, he gets separated from his friends. Woried, he calls out (in
Mandelbaum's translation), "Is anyone nearby?"
To this, Echo replies, "Nearby." Then Narcissus says, "Come! Come!" But
then Echo replies, "Come! Come!" Finally, Narcissus says, "Let's meet." And
she replies, "Let's meet."
At that moment, Echo runs out to meet him. But Narcissus, when he sees her,
wants nothing to do with her, and runs away.
Echo, full of grief, begins to waste away. Soon, nothing is left but her voice.
Narcissus, meanwhile, keeps going about his business, making eveny fall in
love with him, and then rejecting them.
Finally, one of those rejected by Narcissus - a young man - prays that
Narcissus himself will feel the pain he inflicted on others.
One day, while wandering in the forest (he sure likes to do this a lot), he
comes to a pool of still water. He kneels to take a drink.
Then, all of a sudden, he sees his own reflection- and falls in love with it. He
becomes fixated on the image in the pool, and spends long hours gazing at it,
not even bothering to eat or drink.
Eventually, he figures out that it's his own image, but he doesn't care: he's too
much in love. Instead, he just keeps lying there moping. Echo, nearby, echoes
each of his groans.
Soon enough, Narcissus dies. His spirit goes down to Hades, where it keeps
staring at its own reflection in a pool of water. His body turns in to the flower
narcissus.
Sad as this story is, it definitely increases Tiresias's reputation as a seer.
The only person who doesn't respect Tiresias is Pentheus, prince of Thebes,
who makes fun of him for being blind. In response, Tiresias prophesies that
Pentheus will be killed for disrespecting the god Bacchus.
All the women of the town
Shortly afterward, the god Bacchus comes to town.
devotees of the god, participating in
instantly sign themselves up as frantic
wild, chaotic festivities.
his men to go capture Bacchus
Pentheus doesn't like this one bit. He orders
Cadmus, and others try to
and bring him back in chains. His grandfather,
dissuade him, but that just makes him even
more eager.

13
 So, his men go off, and come back a short time later with a prisoner - but not
Bacchus. Instead, the captive claims to be called Acoetes. Acoetes now tells
his own story.
Acoetes says that he is a sailor, the son of a poor fisherman. One day, when
he and his men landed on the coast of Chios, they found a young boy on the
shore and took him captive.
Something told Acoetes that the boy was a god in disguise. He prayed to the
boy to forgive them for capturing him. But then the other sailors started
laughing, and told Acoetes to knock it off. Acoetes tried and failed to get them
to see reason.
After the boy who was in fact the god Bacchus - told them he wanted to be
dropped off atthe island Naxos, the crew tried to convince Acoetes, who was
manning the tiller, to sail the other way.
Eventually, however, Bacchus got tired of leading everyone along and
revealed his true identity. Then, he made the ship stand stl in midsea and
Wreathed all its masts with grapevines. At the same time, he transformed all of
the crewmen into dolphins all that is, except for Acoetes.
That's the end of Acoetes's story. The moral? Respect Bacchus.
But Pentheus isn't impressed. Instead, he orders his men to cart Acoetes off
to a dungeon and torture him to death. What he doesn't know is that, once
they get there, the doors mysteriously burst open and the chains slip off
Acoetes - letting him escape.

But Pentheus's most ignorant act comes next: he climbs up the mountain to
see what the women are doing in their crazy parties in honor of Bacchus.
When he gets there, his mother, Agave, catches sight of him. Unfortunately,
she has been driven into a frenzy - and she mistakes him for a wild boar.

Agave leads the other women in a charge against her son. When they catch
him, they tear him limb from limb. Agave deals the death blow - when she

wrenches his head off.

14
Short Answer Type Questions and Answers( 2 marks and
4 marks) from Ovid's
Metamorphoses(Book II)
1. Who was Europa? (2)

Answer: Europa was a beautiful princess of Sidon, and the daughter of Agenor, and the sister
of Cadmus. Later Jove(Jupiter) fell in love with her, and kidnaps her. When Jove had gone to
Sidon disguised as a gorgeous bull, Europa becomes fascinated by this bull, entwines some
flowers on its homs, and sits on its back for a ride. Jove takes this opportunity to carry her
away.

2. Who was Cadmus? What was Apollo's oracle to Cadmus?(4)

Answer: Cadmus was the son of Agenor, the king of Sidon, and the brother of Europa whom
Jove abducted.

In search of his missing sister Europa when Cadmu_ consults Apollo's oracle, he receives the
following reply from Apollo:

A heifer will find you in the fields, that has never submitted to
the yoke and is unaccustomed to the curved plough. Go where
she leads, and where she finds rest on the grass build the walls
of Thebes, your city, and call the land Boeotia.

3. Who was Pallas? (2)

Answer: Pallas was the Titan god of warcraft. He was the father of Victory, Rivalry, Strength
and Power by Styx.

4. Who was Actaeon? What happened to him?(4)

Answer: Actaeon was one of the grandsons of Cadmus.

One day when Actaeon was on his way to hunting, he chanced upon seeing Diana
bathing naked. When Diana realized this, she cursed him and Actaeon was changed into a
stag who was pursued and later killed by his own hounds.

5. Who is the founder of Thebes?(2)

Answer: Cadmus, the son of King Agenor, founds Thebes at the instance of Apollo.

6. Name a few hounds of Actaeon.(2)

Answer: A few hounds of Actaeon are Melampus, Ichnobates, Pampphagus, Dorceus,

Orebasus, Melanchaetes, Theridamas, to only a tew.

1
 7. Whos Semclc?
was
Why and how does Juno
punish him?(4)
Answer: Semele the
mother of Bacchus.
was
daughter of Cadmus, the beloved of Jove(Jupiter), and the

Jealous of Semele being married to her

Juno sets
husband Jove and being impregnated by him,
a
trap to punish her.
Juno assumes the disguise of Beroe, Semele's old
Epidaurian nurse, and insisted her to request Jove to reveal all his
before embracing her because power and true identity
many men had entered bedroom of chaste women in the
name of gods and had
wrongly undone their
sleeps with Juno, he appears in all his divine chastity.
Juno further says that when Jove
same. The next time Semele asks
glory, and convinces Semele to demand the
Jove to grant her a
whatever she demands. So Jove gift, and he promises to give her
appears in his full divine glory as a fulfilment to
Semele's demand, she is incinerated
by his glory.
8. Who was Bacchus? How he
was born?(4)
Answer: Bacchus is the son of Jupiter and Semele. He is also the
Roman god of wine.
After Semele was incinerated by the divine
child was later extracted from her womb, and
glory of her husband Jupiter, her unborn
from Jupiter's thigh and ended up
implanted in Jupiter's thigh. Later he was born
being Bacchus.
9. Who was Icarus? How did he die?(2+2)
Answer: Icarus was the son of the mythical famous artist Daedalus.
Daedalus and Icarus were imprisoned in Crete by King Minos. Daedalus built waxen
wings for his son and himself, and they began to escape from Crete to Sicily with the help of
these waxen wings. But Icarus become ambitious, and wanted to fly near the sun. He did not
listen to his father, and flew near the sun. Consequently, his waxen wings were melted, and
he was plunged to death.

10. Who was

Tiresias? Why was he blind?(4)
Answer: Tiresias is a famous soothsayer.

To the debate as to whether women enjoy more sex than men, Juno and Jupiter take the
help of Tiresias because he had been both a woman and a man. One day Tiresias
disturbed two snakes while mating together with a stick, and he was changed from a man
to a woman. He lived in the shape of a woman for seven years, and on the eighth year he
saw the same snakes again, and struck them again. Then he was again restored to a man.
When Tiresias confimed Jupiter's view that a woman enjoys sex more than a man, the
angry Juno curses Tiresias and turns him blind. Jupiter intervenes, and gives him the
power of prophecy in compensation.

11. Who was Narcissus?(2)

Answer: Narcissus was the handsome son of the nymph Liriope who was raped by the
He later falls in love with his own image being reflected in a lake,
river-god Cephisus.
2
 and dies there staring at his own reflection. His body turns into the flower narcissus after
that.

12. Who was

Echo?(2)
Answer: Echo was
nymph who angered Juno by helping Jove hide his infidelities. Juno
punished her by making her only able to repeat the words said by others. She falls in love
With Narcissus, who ignores her until she fades away to nothing but her voice.

S. Who was the person who does not respect Tiresias? What happens to him?(2+2=4)
Answer: The only person who doesn't respect Tiresias is Pentheus, prince of Thebes, who
makes fun of him for being blind.

In response, Tiresias prophesies that Pentheus will be killed for disrespecting the god
Bacchus. Late, as a punishment he was torm apart by his own mother and sisters who were
also the Macnads or female devotees of Bacchus.

14. Who is Acoctes? By whom and why was he captured?(2+2-4)

Answer: Acoetes was a priest of Bacchus, and hailed from Maeonia.

Pentheus ordered his men to capture Bacchus and to bring him in chains But his
followers had mistakenly captured Acoetes instead of Bacchus.

15. How did Acoetes turn into the priest of Bacchus?(4)/ Briefly introduce Acoetes.(4)

Answer: Acoetes himself relates the tale how he came to be one of Bacchus' priests.
After his parents' death, he became a sailor, and one day on his his fellow-sailors brought
home a beautiful youth, half-drunk, with the intent to do him wrong. Acoetes saw that the
youth was a god, Bacchus, and prevented the wrongdoing. Later, Bacchus convinced the
sailors to take him to Naxos; the sailors agreed, only to change course once at sea.
Bacchus realizes this, stops the ship, and turns all the sailors except for Acoetes into
dolphins. Then Acoetes became a follower of Bacchus.

16. What does the term "Metamorphoses" mean? Give two examples from Book III of
Ovid's Metamorphoses to justify the title of the text./ Justify the title of Ovid's
Metamorphoses with anytwo suitable examples from Book II.(4)

Answer: The word "meramorphosis" means a complete tYansformation.

In fact, Ovid's Metamorphoses bristles with a host of such transformation. For example in
Book III we find how the hunter Acteon was transformed into a stag by goddess Diana.
Similarly Narcissus, the beautiful boy of the nymph Liriope, was transformed into a
flower narcissus.