Oreads: Nymphs of mountains and grottoes
Date: Saturday, October 16 @ 13:29:53 EDT
Topic: Mystical Races
Oreads: Nymphs of mountains and grottoes.. KEYWORDS: oread oreads mountain nymph grotto nymphs greek mythology nymphs mystical creatures mythical creatures Britomartis Cynosura Echo Oenone Pleiades Aero Asterope Dryope Electra Maia Merope Taygete Celaeno Alcyone
In Greek mythology, Oreads (ὄñïò, "mountain") were a type of nymph that lived in mountains and grottoes. They were associated with Aphrodite.
The Oreads:
Britomartis
In Greek mythology, Britomartis ("sweet maid", "good maiden", "sweet virgin") was a nymph (an Oread) also known as Aphaea and Diktynna. She was also associated with Potnia and Artemis.
Britomartis was worshipped as the Minoan goddess of mountains and hunting.
Britomartis was a daughter of Carme, the daughter of Euboulos, by Zeus. She was pursued by Minos and threw herself into nets to escape him. Artemis made her a goddess (here named Diktynna), patron of mountains, shores, nets and ports. Alternatively, she fled to Aegina, where she was worshipped as Aphaea.
In Minoan art, and on coins, seals and rings and the like throughout Greece, Britomartis is depicted with demonic features, carrying a double-handed axe and accompanied by feral animals.
In Chersonesos and Olous, she was often portrayed on coins and was heavily worshipped in those cities; the festival Britomarpeia was held in her honor.
As Diktynna, her face was pictured on Cretan coins of Kydonia, Polyrrhenia and Phalasarna as the nurse of Zeus.
On Crete, she was connected with the mountain where Zeus was said to have been born--Mt. Dikte. Though temples existed to her in Athens and Sparta, she was primarily a goddess of local importance in Western Crete, such as Lysos and West of Kydonia. Her temples were said to be guarded by vicious dogs stronger than bears.
As Aphaea, Britomartis was worshipped primarily on the island of Aegina in Mycenaean times, where the temple "Athena Aphaea" was later located. A temple to her also existed on the outskirts of Athens, at the Aspropirgos.
Many scholars believe that Britomartis was the name of a Minoan deity, who later diversified into Aphaea on Aegina and Diktynna in Western Crete. Eventually, both goddesses were subsumed into the cult of Artemis.
As Britomart, she figures in Edmund Spenser's knightly epic The Faerie Queene, where she is an allegorical figure as the virgin Knight of Chastity, representing English virtue in particular English military power in association Brit- and Mars (Martis here thought as of Mars, the Roman war god), connotating the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth I of England.
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Cynosura
In Greek mythology, Cynosura was a nymph (an Oread) on Mount Ida, Crete. According to some legends, she nursed Zeus when he was being hidden from his father, Cronus. In gratitude, Zeus placed her in the stars when she died.
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Echo
In Greek mythology, Echo (Greek Ç÷ù) was an Oread who had the job of talking incessantly to Hera, the Queen of the Gods, so that her husband, Zeus, wouldn't get caught in his numerous affairs. According to some sources, Hera caught on to Echo's trick and cursed her to only be able say what others had just said--hence our modern word "echo".
Echo fell in love with a human named Narcissus but he loved only the image of himself, reflected in water. Echo pined away with love for him but Narcissus was unmoved. Gradually, Echo faded until nothing was left but her voice, repeating the last words of others. Narcissus turned into a daffodil.
Alternatively, Echo was a nymph who was a great singer and dancer and scorned the love of any man. This angered Pan, a lecherous god, and he instructed his followers to kill her. Echo was torn to pieces and spread all over the Earth. The goddess of the earth, Gaia, received the pieces of Echo, whose voice remains repeating the last words of others. In some versions, Echo and Pan first had one child: Iambe.
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Oenone
In Greek mythology, Oenone ("wine woman") was the first wife of Paris.
She was a mountain nymph (an Oread) on Mount Ida in Phrygia, a mountain associated with the Mother Goddess Cybele. Her father was Cebren, a river-god. Her very name links her to the natural but civilizing gift of wine.
Paris the exiled Trojan prince (it was already known that he would bring disaster to Troy) was keeping sheep on the slopes. He kidnapped her and they were wed; Oenone gave birth to Corythus.
When Paris later abandoned her to return to Troy and sail across the Aegean to claim Helen, Queen of Sparta, Oenone predicted the disastrous results of Paris' attempt at Helen: the Trojan War and Paris' death.
Alternatively, when Paris was mortally wounded he asked for her to heal him since she was known as a healer. Oenone refused to leave Mount Ida and Paris died; she regretted her action and threw herself onto his burning funeral pyre at Troy.
A third possibility sometimes cited was her attempts at breaking up Paris and Helen. She sent Corythus to drive a rift between Paris and Helen but Paris didn't recognize his son and killed him.
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Pleiades
The Pleiades, companions of Artemis, were the seven daughters of the Titan Atlas and the sea-nymph Pleione born on Mt. Cyllene. They are the sisters of Calypso, Hyas, the Hyades, and the Hesperides. The Pleiades were nymphs in the train of Artemis, and together with the seven Hyades were called the Atlantides, Dodonides, or Nysiades, nursemaids and teachers to the infant Bacchus.
The Seven Sisters
Indeed, the Pleiades must have had considerable charms, for several of the most prominent male Olympian gods (including Zeus, Poseidon, and Ares) engaged in affairs with the seven heavenly sisters - and inevitably, these relationships resulted in the birth of children:
Celaeno was mother of Lycus by Poseidon.
Alcyone was mother of Hyrieus by Lycus.
Electra was mother of Dardanus and Iasion by Zeus.
Maia, eldest of the seven Pleiades, was mother of Hermes by Zeus.
Sterope (also Asterope) was mother of Oenomaus by Ares.
Taygete was mother of Lacedaemon, also by Zeus.
All of the Pleiades, except Merope, had affairs with gods.
After Atlas was forced to carry the world on his shoulders, Orion began to pursue all of the Pleiades, and Zeus transformed them first into doves, and then into stars to comfort their father. The constellation of Orion is said to still pursue them across the night sky.
In the Pleiades star cluster only six of the stars shine brightly, the seventh, Merope, shines dully because she is shamed for eternity for having an affair with a mortal. Some myths also say that the star that doesn't shine is Electra, mourning the death of Dardanus, though a few myths say it is Sterope.
One of the most memorable myths involving the Pleiades is the story of how these sisters became, quite literally, stars. According to some versions of the tale, all seven sisters committed suicide because they were so saddened by either the fate of their father, Atlas, or the loss of their siblings, the Hyades.
In turn Zeus, the ruler of the Greek gods, immortalized the sisters by placing them in the sky. There these seven stars formed the constellation known thereafter as the Pleiades.
The Greek poet Hesiod mentions the Pleiades several times in his Works and Days. As the Pleiades are primarily summer stars, they feature prominently in the ancient agricultural calendar. Here is a bit of advice from Hesiod:
"And if longing seizes you for sailing the stormy seas,
when the Pleiades flee mighty Orion
and plunge into the misty deep
and all the gusty winds are raging,
then do not keep your ship on the wine-dark sea
but, as I bid you, remember to work the land."
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Aero
See Merope
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Asterope
Asterope was one of the Pleiades.
Also named Hesperia, the wife or desired lover of Aesacus and daughter of Cebren.
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Dryope
In Greek mythology, Dryope was the daughter of Dryops or of Eurytus (and hence half-sister to Iole). She was sometimes thought of as one of the Pleiades. There are two stories of her metamorphosis into a black poplar.
According to the first, Apollo seduced her by a trick. Dryope had been accustomed to play with the nymphs of the woods. Apollo chased her, and in order to win her favours turned himself into a tortoise, of which the girls made a pet.
When Dryope had the tortoise on her lap, he turned into a snake. She tried to flee, but he coiled around her legs and held her arms tightly against her sides as he raped her. The nymphs then abandoned her, and she eventually gave birth to her son Amphissus. She married Andraemon.
Amphissus eventually built a temple to his father Apollo in the city that he founded, Aphissa. Here the nymphs came to converse with Dryope, but one day Apollo again returned in the form of a serpent and coiled around her while she stood by a spring. This time Dryope was turned into a poplar tree.
In Ovid's version of the story, Dryope was wandering by a lake, suckling her baby Amphissus, when she saw the bright red flowers of the lotus tree, formerly the nymph Lotis who, when fleeing from Priapus, had been changed into a tree.
Dryope wanted to give the blossoms to her baby to play with, but when she picked one the tree started to tremble and bleed. She tried to run away, but the blood of the tree had touched her skin and she found her feet rooted to the spot.
She slowly began to turn into a black poplar, the bark spreading up her legs from the earth, but just before the woody stiffness finally reached her throat and as her arms began sprouting twigs her husband Andraemon heard her cries and came to her. She had just enough time to warn her husband to take care of their child and make sure that he did not pick flowers.
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Electra
In Greek mythology, several persons were named Electra (also spelled Elektra):
Daughter of Oceanus and Tethys, mother of Dardanus, Iasion and Harmonia, by Zeus.
A Pleiade or Oceanid, mother of Iris and the Harpies by Thaumas.
(Most famous "Electra") Daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra.
Alternative: Laodice
According to the story, Electra (daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra) was absent from Mycenae when her father, King Agamemnon, returned from the Trojan War and was murdered by Aegisthus, Clytemnestra's lover, and/or by Clytemnestra herself. Aegisthus and Clytemnestra also killed Cassandra, Agamemnon's lover.
Eight years later Electra returned from Athens with her brother, Orestes. (Odyssey, iii. 306; X. 542). According to Pindar (Pythia, xi. 25), Orestes was saved by his old nurse or by Electra, and was taken to Phanote on Mount Parnassus, where King Strophius took charge of him.
In his twentieth year, Orestes was ordered by the Delphic oracle to return home and avenge his father's death. According to Aeschylus, he met Electra before the tomb of Agamemnon, where both had gone to perform rites to the dead; a recognition took place, and they arranged how Orestes should accomplish his revenge.
Orestes, after the deed (sometimes with Electra helping), goes mad, and is pursued by the Erinyes, or Furies, whose duty it is to punish any violation of the ties of family piety. Electra is not hounded by the Erinyes.
Orestes takes refuge in the temple at Delphi. Even though Apollo (to whom the Delphic temple was dedicated) had ordered him to do the deed, he is powerless to protect Orestes from the consequences of his actions.
At last Athene (also known as Areia) receives him on the Acropolis of Athens and arranges a formal trial of the case before twelve Attic judges. The Erinyes demand their victim; he pleads the orders of Apollo; the votes of the judges are equally divided, and Athena gives her casting vote for acquittal.
Later, Electra married Pylades, Orestes' close friend and son of King Strophius (the same one who had cared for Orestes while he hid from his mother and her lover).
Aeschylus, Oresteia; Euripides, Electra; Orestes; Apollodorus, Epitome VI, 23-28.
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Maia
Maia can mean several things:
Maia, in Greek mythology, is the eldest of the Pleiades, the seven daughters of Atlas and Pleione.
Maia was identified in Roman mythology with Maia Maiestas (also called Fauna, Bona Dea (the 'Good Goddess') and Ops), a goddess who may be equivalent to an old Italic goddess of spring.
In astronomy, Maia (20 Tauri) is the third brightest of the seven bright stars in the Pleiades open star cluster.
Maia City is a city in Oporto metropolitan area in Portugal.
In J. R. R. Tolkien's mythos, a Maia is one from the lesser kind of Ainur, beings of power which pre-date the creation of existence.
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Merope
In Greek mythology, several unrelated women went by the name Merope (bee-mask later reinterpreted as honey-like or eloquent), which may, therefore, have denoted a position in the cult of the Great Mother rather than a mere individual's name.
Merope, one of the Heliades
Merope, foster mother of Oedipus, wife of Polybus
Merope, one of the Oceanids, a daughter of Oceanus and Tethys, mother of Phaeton by Helios or Clymenus
Merope, one of the Pleiades, she married a mortal, Sisyphus, and was thus the faintest star in the star cluster that bears their name. With Sisyphus, she had one son: Glaucus.
Merope of Khios, consort/daughter of Oenopion, linked with Orion (q.v.) who fell in love with Merope but Oenopion did not want the marriage to happen. Orion raped Merope.
For revenge, Oenopion got Orion drunk and stabbed out his eyes, then cast him into the sea. Hephaestus took pity on the blind Orion and gave him a young boy as a guide.
The boy guided him east, where the rising sun restored Orion's sight. Orion then decided to kill Oenopion, but Hephaestus had built the king an underground chamber. Orion couldn't find the king and went to Delos, where Artemis slew him.
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Taygete
In Greek mythology, Taygete was one of the Pleiades. She was the mother of Lacedaemon by Zeus.
Zeus pursued Taygete, who prayed to Artemis. The goddess turned Taygete into a doe but Zeus raped her when she was unconscious. She thus conceived Lacedaemon, the mythical founder of Sparta.
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Celaeno
In Greek mythology, Celaeno referred to several different beings.
One of the Pleiades, Celaeno was Poseidon's lover and had one son, Lycus, with him. She may have also been the mother of Deucalion with Prometheus.
One of the harpies, Celaeno ("the dark") was also known as Podarge ("fleet-foot"). The harpies were vicious winged monsters that terrorized Phineas among others. See Phineas for more details.
Celaeno was also the mother of Xanthus and Balius, Achilles' supernatural horses by either Zephyrus or Zeus. Zephyrus was her constant lover.
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Alcyone
Alcyone was a Greek demi-goddess, sometimes regarded as one of the Pleiades. More often she was thought of as the daughter of Aeolus and wife of Ceyx, son of Eosphorus and the king of Thessaly.
They were very happy together, but, when Ceyx perished in a shipwreck, Alcyone (whose name means "queen who wards off storms") threw herself into the sea.
Out of compassion, the gods changed them into the halcyon birds. When Alcyone made her nest on the beach waves threatened to destroy it, Aeolus restrained his winds and made the waves be calm during seven days in each year, so she could lay her eggs.
These became known as the "halcyon days", when storms never occur. The halcyon has become a symbol of tranquillity.
With Anthedon, she became the mother of Glaucus.
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