Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology Part 15

CHAPTER VII.

_G.o.ds of the Sea._

NEPTUNE was the son of Saturn, and Rhea or Ops, and brother of Jupiter.

When arrived at maturity, he a.s.sisted his brother Jupiter in his expeditions, for which that G.o.d, on attaining to supreme power, a.s.signed him the sea and the islands for his empire. Whatever attachment Neptune might have had to his brother at one period, he was at another expelled heaven for entering into a conspiracy against him, in conjunction with several other deities; whence he fled, with Apollo, to Laomedon, king of Troy, where Neptune having a.s.sisted in raising the walls of the city, and being dismissed unrewarded, in revenge, sent a sea-monster to lay waste the country.

On another occasion, this deity had a contest with Vulcan and Minerva, in regard to their skill. The G.o.ddess, as a proof of her's, made a horse, Vulcan a man, and Neptune a bull, whence that animal was used in the sacrifices to him, though it is probable that, as the victim was to be black, the design was to point out the raging quality and fury of the sea, over which he presided. The Greeks make Neptune to have been the creator of the horse, which he produced from out of the earth with a blow of his trident, when disputing with Minerva who should give the name to Cecropia, which was afterwards called Athens, from the name in Greek of Minerva, who made an olive tree spring up suddenly, and thus obtained the victory.

In this fable, however, it is evident that the horse could signify nothing but a s.h.i.+p; for the two things in which that region excelled being s.h.i.+ps and olive-trees, it was thought politic by this means to bring the citizens over from too great a fondness for sea affairs, to the cultivation of their country, by showing that Pallas was preferable to Neptune, or, in other words, _husbandry to sailing_, which, without some further meaning, the production of a horse could never have done.

It notwithstanding appears that Neptune had brought the management of the horse, as likewise the art of building s.h.i.+ps, to very great perfection; insomuch that Pamphus, who was the most ancient writer of hymns to the G.o.ds, calls him the benefactor of mankind, in bestowing upon them horses and s.h.i.+ps which had stems and decks that resembled towers.

If Neptune created the horse, he was likewise the inventor of chariot-races; hence Mithridates, king of Pontus, threw chariots, drawn by four horses, into the sea, in honor of Neptune: and the Romans inst.i.tuted horse-races in the circus during his festival, at which time all horses ceased from working, and the mules were adorned with wreaths of flowers.

Neptune, represented as a G.o.d of the sea, makes a considerable figure: he is described with black or dark hair, his garment of an azure or sea-green color, seated in a large sh.e.l.l drawn by whales, or sea-horses, with his trident in his hand, attended by the sea-G.o.ds Palaemon, Glaucus, and Phorcys; the sea-G.o.ddesses Thetis, Melita, and Panopea, and a long train of Tritons and sea-nymphs.

The inferior artists represent him sometimes with an angry and disturbed air; and we may observe the same difference in this particular between the great and inferior poets as there is between the bad and the good artists. Thus Ovid describes Neptune with a sullen look, whereas Virgil expressly tells us that he has a mild face, even where he is representing him in a pa.s.sion. Even at the time that he is provoked, and might be expected to have appeared disturbed, and in a pa.s.sion, there is serenity and majesty in his face.

On some medals he treads on the beak of a s.h.i.+p, to show that he presided over the seas, or more particularly over the Mediterranean sea, which was the great, and almost the only scene for navigation among the old Greeks and Romans. He is standing, as he generally was represented; he most commonly, too, has his trident in his right hand: this was his peculiar sceptre, and seems to have been used by him chiefly to rouse up the waters; for we find sometimes that he lays it aside when he is to appease them, but he resumes it when there is occasion for violence.

Virgil makes him shake Troy from its foundation with it; and in Ovid it is with the stroke of this that the waters of the earth are let loose for the general deluge. The poets have generally delighted in describing this G.o.d as pa.s.sing over the calm surface of the waters, in his chariot drawn by sea-horses. The fine original description of this is in Homer, from whom Virgil and Statius have copied it.

In searching for the mythological sense of the fable, we must again have recourse to Egypt, that kingdom which, above all others, has furnished the most ample harvest for the reaper of mysteries. The Egyptians, to denote navigation, and the return of the Phnician fleet, which annually visited their coast, used the figure of an Osiris borne on a winged horse, and holding a three-forked spear, or harpoon. To this image they gave the name of Poseidon, or Neptune, which, as the Greeks and Romans afterwards adopted, sufficiently proves this deity had his birth here.

Thus the maritime Osiris of the Egyptians became a new deity with those who knew not the meaning of the symbol.

TRITON. It is not agreed who were the parents of Triton; but he was a sea-deity, the herald and trumpeter of Ocea.n.u.s and Neptune. He sometimes delighted in mischief, for he carried off the cattle from the Tanagrian fields, and destroyed the smaller coasting vessels; so that to appease his resentment, the Tanagrians offered him libations of new wine.

Pleased with its flavor and taste, he drank so freely that he fell asleep, and tumbling from an eminence, one of the natives cut of his head. He left a daughter called Tristia.

The poets ordinarily attribute to Triton, the office of calming the sea, and stilling of tempests: thus in the Metamorphoses we read, that Neptune desiring to recall the waters of the deluge, commanded Triton to sound his trumpet, at the noise of which they retired to their respective channels, and left the earth again habitable, having swept off almost the whole human race.

This G.o.d is exhibited in the human form from the waist upwards, with blue eyes, a large mouth, and hair matted like wild parsley; his shoulders covered with a purple skin, variegated with small scales, his feet resembling the fore feet of a horse, and his lower parts terminating in a double forked tail: sometimes he is seen in a car, with horses of a bright cerulean. His trumpet is a large conch, or sea-sh.e.l.l.

There were several Tritons, but one chief over all, the distinguished messenger of Neptune, as Mercury was of Jupiter, and Iris of Juno.

OCEa.n.u.s, oldest son of Clus and Terra, or Vesta. He married Tethys, and besides her had many other wives. He had several sisters, all Nymphs, each of whom possessed an hundred woods and as many rivers. Ocea.n.u.s was esteemed by the ancients as the father both of G.o.ds and men, who were said to have taken their beginning from him, on account of the ocean's encompa.s.sing the earth with its waves, and because he was the princ.i.p.al of that radical moisture diffused through universal matter, without which, according to Thales, nothing could either be produced or subsist.

Homer makes Juno visit Ocea.n.u.s at the remotest limits of the earth, and acknowledge him and Tethys as the parents of the G.o.ds, adding, that she herself had been brought up under their tuition. Many of his children are mentioned in poetical story, whose names it would be endless to enumerate, and, indeed, they are only the appellations of the princ.i.p.al rivers of the world. Ocea.n.u.s was described with a bull's head, to represent the rage and bellowing of the ocean when agitated by storms.

Ocea.n.u.s and Tethys are ranked in the highest cla.s.ses of sea-deities, and as governors in chief over the whole world of waters.

NEREUS, a sea-deity, was son of Ocea.n.u.s, by Tethys. Apollodorus gives him Terra for his mother. His education and authority were in the waters, and his residence, more particularly, the aegean seas. He had the faculty of a.s.suming what form he pleased. He was regarded as a prophet; and foretold to Paris the war which the rape of Helen would bring upon his country. When Hercules was ordered to fetch the golden apples of the Hesperides, he went to the Nymphs inhabiting the grottoes of Erida.n.u.s, to know where he might find them; the Nymphs sent him to Nereus, who, to elude the inquiry, perpetually varied his form, till Hercules having seized him, resolved to hold him till he resumed his original shape, on which he yielded the desired information. Nereus had, by his sister Doris, fifty daughters called Nereids. Hesiod highly celebrates him as a mild and peaceful old man, a lover of justice and moderation. Nereus and Doris, with their descendants the Nereids, or Oceaniads, so called from Ocea.n.u.s, are ranked in the third cla.s.s of water deities.

PALaeMON, _or_ MELICERTES, was son of Athamas, king of Thebes and Ino.

The latter fearing the rage of her husband, who in his madness had killed his son Learchus, took Melicertes in her arms, and leaped with him from the rock Molyris into the sea. Neptune received them with open arms, and gave them a place among the marine G.o.ds, only changing their names, Ino being called Leucothea, or Leucothoe, and Melicertes, Palaemon. Ino, under the name Leucothea, is supposed, by some, to be the same with Aurora: the Romans gave her the name of Matuta, she being reputed the G.o.ddess that ushers in the morning; and Palaemon, they called Portumnus, or Portunnus, and painted him with a key in his hand, to denote that he was the guardian of harbors. Adorations were paid to him chiefly at Tenedos, and the sacrifice offered to him was an infant.

Pausanias says that the body of Melicertes was thrown on the Isthmus of Corinth where Sisyphus, his uncle, who reigned in that city, inst.i.tuted the Isthmian games in his honor. For this fable we are indebted to the fertile invention of the Greeks, Melicertes being no other than the Melcarthus or the Hercules of Tyre, who, from having been drowned in the sea, was called a G.o.d of it, and from his many voyages, the guardian of harbors.

GLAUCUS, a sea-deity. His story, which is very fanciful, shows the extravagance of poetical fiction amongst the ancients. Before his deification, Glaucus is said to have been a fisherman of Anthedon, who having one day remarked that the fishes which he laid on a particular herb revived and threw themselves into the sea, resolved himself to taste it, and immediately followed their example: the consequence was, that he became a Triton, and ever after was reputed a marine deity, attending with the rest on the car of Neptune.

The descent of this deity is exceeding dubious. He is said to have carried off Ariadne from the island Dia, for which Bacchus bound him fast with vine-twigs. The s.h.i.+p Argo is said to have been constructed by him, and he is not only mentioned as commanding her, when Jason fought with the Tyrrhenians, but as being the only one of her crew that came off without a wound. He dwelt some time at Delos, and, besides prophesying with the Nereids, is affirmed to have instructed Apollo in the art.

SCYLLA was the daughter of Phorcus, or Phorcys, by Ceto. Glaucus, being pa.s.sionately fond of Scylla, after vainly endeavoring to gain her affections, applied to Circe, and besought her, by her art, to induce her to return his affection. On this, Circe disclosed to him her pa.s.sion, but Glaucus remaining inexorable, the enchantress vowed revenge, and by her magic charms so infected the fountain in which Scylla bathed, that on entering it, her lower parts were turned into dogs; at which the nymph, terrified at herself, plunged into the sea, and there was changed to a rock, notorious for the s.h.i.+pwrecks it occasioned.

Authors are disagreed as to Scylla's form; some say she retained her beauty from the neck downwards, but had six dog's heads: others maintain, that her upper parts continued entire, but that she had below the body of a wolf, and the tail of a serpent. The rock named Scylla, lies between Italy and Sicily, and the noise of the waves beating on it is supposed to have occasioned the fable of the barking of dogs, and howling of wolves, ascribed to the imaginary monster.

CHARYBDIS was a rapacious woman, a female robber, who, it is said, stole the oxen of Hercules, for which she was thunder-struck by Jupiter, and turned into a whirlpool, dangerous to sailors. This whirlpool was situated opposite the rock Scylla, at the entrance of the Faro from Messina, and occasioned the proverb of running into one danger to avoid another. Some affirm that Hercules killed her himself; others, that Scylla committed this robbery, and was killed for it by Hercules.

CHAPTER VIII.

_Tartarus and its Deities._

TARTARUS _or_ h.e.l.l, the region of punishment after death. The whole imaginary world, which we call h.e.l.l, though according to the ancients it was the receptacle of all departed persons, of the good as well as the bad, is divided by Virgil into five parts: the first may be called the previous region; the second is the region of waters, or the river which they were all to pa.s.s; the third is what we may call the gloomy region, and what the ancients called Erebus; the fourth is Tartarus, or the region of torments; and the fifth the region of joy and bliss, or what we still call Elysium.

The first part in it Virgil has stocked with two sorts of beings; first, with those which make the real misery of mankind upon earth, such as war, discord, labor, grief, cares, distempers, and old age; and, secondly, with fancied terrors, and all the most frightful creatures of our own imagination, such as Gorgons, Harpies, Chimaeras and the like.

The next is the water which all the departed were supposed to pa.s.s, to enter into the other world; this was called Styx, or the hateful pa.s.sage: the imaginary personages of this division are the souls of the departed, who are either pa.s.sing over, or suing for a pa.s.sage, and the master of a vessel who carries them over, one freight after another, according to his will and pleasure.

The third division begins immediately with the bank on the other side the river, and was supposed to extend a great way in: it is subdivided again into several particular districts; the first seems to be the receptacle for infants. The next for all such as have been put to death without a cause; next is the place for those who have put a period to their own lives, a melancholy region, and situated amidst the marshes made by the overflowings of the Styx, or hateful river, or pa.s.sage into the other world: after this are the fields of mourning, full of dark woods and groves, and inhabited by those who died of love: last of all spreads an open champaign country, allotted for the souls of departed warriors; the name of this whole division is Erebus: its several districts seem to be disposed all in a line, one after the other, but after this the great line or road divides into two, of which the right hand road leads to Elysium, or the place of the blessed, and the left hand road to Tartarus, or the place of the tormented.

The fourth general division of the subterraneous world is this Tartarus, or the place of torments: there was a city in it, and a prince to preside over it: within this city was a vast deep pit, in which the tortures were supposed to be performed: in this horrid part Virgil places two sorts of souls; first, of such as have shown their impiety and rebellion toward the G.o.ds; and secondly, of such as have been vile and mischievous among men: those, as he himself says of the latter more particularly, who hated their brethren, used their parents ill, or cheated their dependants, who made no use of their riches, who committed incest, or disturbed the marriage union of others, those who were rebellious subjects, or knavish servants, who were despisers of justice, or betrayers of their country, and who made and unmade laws not for the good of the public, but only to get money for themselves; all these, and the despisers of the G.o.ds, Virgil places in this most horrid division of his subterraneous world, and in the vast abyss, which was the most terrible part even of that division.

The fifth division is that of Elysium, or the place of the blessed; here Virgil places those who died for their country, those of pure lives, truly inspired poets, the inventors of arts, and all who have done good to mankind: he does not speak of any particular districts for these, but supposes that they have the liberty of going where they please in that delightful region, and conversing with whom they please; he only mentions one vale, towards the end of it, as appropriated to any particular use; this is the vale of Lethe or forgetfulness, where many of the ancient philosophers, and the Platonists in particular, supposed the souls which had pa.s.sed through some periods of their trial, were immersed in the river which gave its name to it, in order to be put into new bodies, and to fill up the whole course of their probation, in an upper world.

In each of these three divisions, on the other side of the river Styx, which perhaps were comprehended under the name of Ades, as all the five might be under that of Orcus, was a prince or judge: Minos for the regions of Erebus; Rhadamanthus for Tartarus; and aeacus for Elysium, Pluto and Proserpine had their palace at the entrance of the road to the Elysian fields, and presided as sovereigns over the whole subterraneous world.

PLUTO, son of Saturn and Ops, a.s.sisted Jupiter in his wars, and after victory had crowned their exertions in placing his brother on the throne, be obtained a share of his father's dominions, which, as some authors say, was the eastern continent, and lower regions of Asia; but, according to the common opinion, Pluto's division lay in the west. He fixed his residence in Spain, and lived in Iberia, near the Pyrrenaean mountains: Spain being a fertile country, and abounding in minerals and mines, Pluto was esteemed the G.o.d of wealth; for it must be here observed, that the poets confound Pluto, G.o.d of h.e.l.l, with Plutus, G.o.d of riches, though they were distinct deities, and always so considered by the ancients.

Pluto's regions being supposed to lie under ground; and as he was the first who taught men to bury their dead, it was thence inferred that he was king of the infernal regions, whence sprung a belief, that as all souls descended to him, so when they were in his possession, he bound them with inevitable chains, and delivered them to be tried by judges, after which he dispensed rewards and punishments according to their several deserts. Pluto was therefore called the infernal Jupiter, and oblations were made to him by the living, for the souls of their friends departed.

Although Pluto was brother of Jupiter, yet none of the G.o.ddesses would condescend to marry him, owing to the deformity of his person, joined to the darkness of his mansions. Enraged at this reluctance in the G.o.ddesses, and mortified at his want of issue, Pluto ascended his chariot, and drove to Sicily, where chancing to discover Proserpine with her companions gathering flowers in a valley of Enna, near mount aetna, the grisly G.o.d, struck with her charms, instantly seized her, and forcing her into his chariot, went rapidly off to the river Chemarus, through which he opened himself a pa.s.sage to the realms of night.

Orpheus says, this descent was made through the Cecropian cave in Attica, not far from Eleusis.

His whole domains are washed with vast and rapid rivers, whose peculiar qualities strike horror into mortals. Cocytus falls with an impetuous roaring; Phlegethon rages with a torrent of flames; the Acharusian fen is dreadful for its stench and filth: nor does Charon, the ferryman, who wafts souls over, occasion any less horror; Cerberus, the triple-headed dog, stands ready with open mouths to receive them; and the Furies shake at them their serpentine locks.

Thus far the common fable; but the following seems the true foundation of the story which has been so much disguised; Pluto having retired into Spain, applied himself to the working of the mines of silver and gold, which in that country, were very common, especially on the side of Cadiz, where he fixed his abode. Btica, his residence, was that province now called Andalusia, and the river Btis, now Guadalquiver, gave that name to it. This river formed of old, at its mouth, a small island, called Tartessus, which was the Tartessus of the ancients, and whence Tartarus was formed.

It may be remarked, that though Spain be not now fertile in mines, yet the ancients speak of it as a country where they abounded. Posidonius says, that its mountains and hills were almost all mountains of gold; Arienus, that near Tartessus was a mountain of silver; and Aristotle, that the first Phnicians who landed there, found such quant.i.ties of gold and of silver, that they made anchors for their s.h.i.+ps of those precious metals. This, doubtless, is what determined Pluto, who was ingenius in such operations, to fix himself near to Tartessus; and this making him pa.s.s also for a wealthy prince, procured for him the name of Pluto, instead of that of Agelestus.

The situation of Pluto's kingdom, which was low in respect to Greece, occasioned him to be looked on as the G.o.d of h.e.l.l; and as he continually employed laborers for his mines, who chiefly resided in the bowels of the earth, and there commonly died, Pluto was reputed the king of the dead. The ocean, likewise, upon whose coasts he reigned, was supposed to be covered with darkness. These circ.u.mstances united, appear to have been the foundation of the fables afterwards invented concerning Pluto and his realms of night. It is probable, for example, that the famous Tartarus, the place so noted in the empire of this G.o.d, comes from Tartessus, near Cadiz: the river Lethe not unlikely from the Guada-Lethe, which flows over against that city; and the lake Avernus, or the Acheronian fen, from the word Aharona, importing, _at the extremities_, a name given to that lake, which is near the ocean.

Pluto was extremely revered both by the Greeks and Romans. He had a magnificent temple at Pylos. Near the river Corellus, in Botia, he had also an altar, for some mystical reason, in common with Pallas. His chief festival was in February, and called Charistia, because their oblations were made for the dead. Black bulls were the victims offered up, and the ceremonies were performed in the night, it not being lawful to sacrifice to him in the day time, on account of his aversion to the light. The cypress tree was sacred to Pluto, boughs of which were carried at funerals.

He is usually represented in an ebony chariot, drawn by his four black horses, Orphnaeus, aethon, Nycteus, and Alastor. As G.o.d of the dead, keys were the ensigns of his authority, because there is no possibility of returning when the gates of his palace are locked. Sometimes he holds a sceptre, to denote his power; at other times a wand, with which he directs the movements of his subject ghosts. Homer speaks of his hemlet as having the quality of rendering the wearer invisible; and tells us that Minerva borrowed it when she fought against the Trojans, that she might not be discovered by Mars. Perseus also used this hemlet when he cut off Medusa's head.