Tag: jacoby

Helen’s Sons and Menelaos’ Bastards

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In Homer, Helen and Menelaos have a single child, Hermione and there is a reference to Menelaos’ son Megapenthes. But there are no mentions of Helen having children with anyone else. The mythographical tradition fixes this.

Jacoby BNJ 758 F 6 = Scholia on Euripides, Andromache 898

“Lysimachus and some others report that Nikostratos was also born from Helen. But the one who gathered the Cypriot tales says that it was Pleisthenes who came to Cyprus with Aganos and that he was the child born to Alexander from Helen.”

Λυσίμαχος καὶ ἄλλοι τινὲς ἱστοροῦσιν γενέσθαι ἐξ ῾Ελένης καὶ Νικόστρατον. ὁ δὲ τὰς Κυπριακὰς ἰστορίας συντάξας Πλεισθένην φησί, μεθ᾽ οὗ εἰς Κύπρον ἀφῖχθαι καὶ τὸν ἐξ αὐτῆς τεχθέντα ᾽Αλεξάνδρωι ῎Αγανον.

Apollodorus 3.133

“Menelaos fathered Hermione from Helen and according to some others Nikostraos; Akousilaos claims that [Menelaos] fathered Megapenthes with a servant girl who was Aitolian in race (she was named Pieres, or, it was Tereis who was Pierian; according to Eumelos he gave birth to a son named Xenodamos from a nymph named Knossia.”

Μενέλαος μὲν οὖν ἐξ ῾Ελένης ῾Ερμιόνην ἐγέννησε καὶ κατά τινας Νικόστρατον, ἐκ δούλης <δὲ> [Πιερίδος] γένος Αἰτωλίδος ἤ, καθάπερ ᾽Ακουσίλαός φησι, <Πιερίδος> [Τηρηίδος], Μεγαπένθη, ἐκ Κνωσσίας δὲ νύμφης κατὰ Εὐμηλον Ξενόδαμον.

File:Helen Menelaus Louvre G424.jpg
Detail of an Attic red-figure crater, ca. 450–440 BC, found in Gnathia (now Egnazia, Italy). Louvre.

 

Moon-People Or People Before the Moon?

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I am still not quite sure what to make of this fragment. So, here it is.

Theodoros of Samothrace, fr. 2 (BNJ 62 f2) = Schol. ad Ap. Rhodes 4.264

“The Arcadians who are supposed to have lived before even the moon…”

᾽Αρκάδες οἳ καὶ πρόσθε σεληναίης ὑδέονται ζώειν]

“The Arcadians seem to have been born before the moon was, as Eudoxos also claims in his Global Tour. Theodôros reports in his 22nd book that the moon came into view before Herakles’ war with the giants. Aristias the Khian in his Foundations and Dionysian the Khalkidean in the first book of his Foundations report that the Selêntians [moon-people] are Arkadian ethnically.”

οἱ ᾽Αρκάδες δοκοῦσι πρὸ τῆς σελήνης γεγονέναι, ὡς καὶ Εὐδοξος ἐν Γῆς Περιόδωι. Θεόδωρος δὲ ἐν κ̄β̄ ὀλίγωι πρότερόν φησι τοῦ πρὸς τοὺς Γίγαντας πολέμου Ηρακλέους τὴν σελήνην φανῆναι. καὶ ᾽Αριστίας ὁ Χῖος ἐν ταῖς Κτίσεσι καὶ Διονύσιος ὁ Χαλκιδεὺς ἐν ᾱ Κτίσεων καὶ ἔθνος φασὶν ᾽Αρκαδίας Σεληνίτας εἶναι.

 

Image | Attic red figure vase painting
Selene, the Moon

Moon-People; And People Before the Moon

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I am not quite sure what to make of this fragment. So, here it is.

Theodoros of Samothrace, fr. 2 (BNJ 62 f2) = Schol. ad Ap. Rhodes 4.264

 

“The Arcadians who are supposed to have lived before even the moon…”

᾽Αρκάδες οἳ καὶ πρόσθε σεληναίης ὑδέονται ζώειν]

“The Arcadians seem to have been born before the moon was, as Eudoxos also claims in his Global Tour. Theodôros reports in his 22nd book that the moon came into view before Herakles’ war with the giants. Aristias the Khian in his Foundations and Dionysian the Khalkidean in the first book of his Foundations report that the Selêntians [moon-people] are Arkadian ethnically.”

οἱ ᾽Αρκάδες δοκοῦσι πρὸ τῆς σελήνης γεγονέναι, ὡς καὶ Εὐδοξος ἐν Γῆς Περιόδωι. Θεόδωρος δὲ ἐν κ̄β̄ ὀλίγωι πρότερόν φησι τοῦ πρὸς τοὺς Γίγαντας πολέμου Ηρακλέους τὴν σελήνην φανῆναι. καὶ ᾽Αριστίας ὁ Χῖος ἐν ταῖς Κτίσεσι καὶ Διονύσιος ὁ Χαλκιδεὺς ἐν ᾱ Κτίσεων καὶ ἔθνος φασὶν ᾽Αρκαδίας Σεληνίτας εἶναι.

 

Image | Attic red figure vase painting
Selene, the Moon

Helen’s Sons and Menelaos’ Bastards

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In Homer, Helen and Menelaos have a single child, Hermione and there is a reference to Menelaos’ son Megapenthes. But there are no mentions of Helen having children with anyone else. The mythographical tradition fixes this.

Jacoby BNJ 758 F 6 = Scholia on Euripides, Andromache 898

“Lysimachus and some others report that Nikostratos was also born from Helen. But the one who gathered the Cypriot tales says that it was Pleisthenes who came to Cyprus with Aganos and that he was the child born to Alexander from Helen.”

Λυσίμαχος καὶ ἄλλοι τινὲς ἱστοροῦσιν γενέσθαι ἐξ ῾Ελένης καὶ Νικόστρατον. ὁ δὲ τὰς Κυπριακὰς ἰστορίας συντάξας Πλεισθένην φησί, μεθ᾽ οὗ εἰς Κύπρον ἀφῖχθαι καὶ τὸν ἐξ αὐτῆς τεχθέντα ᾽Αλεξάνδρωι ῎Αγανον.

Apollodorus 3.133

“Menelaos fathered Hermione from Helen and according to some others Nikostraos; Akousilaos claims that [Menelaos] fathered Megapenthes with a servant girl who was Aitolian in race (she was named Pieres, or, it was Tereis who was Pierian; according to Eumelos he gave birth to a son named Xenodamos from a nymph named Knossia.”

Μενέλαος μὲν οὖν ἐξ ῾Ελένης ῾Ερμιόνην ἐγέννησε καὶ κατά τινας Νικόστρατον, ἐκ δούλης <δὲ> [Πιερίδος] γένος Αἰτωλίδος ἤ, καθάπερ ᾽Ακουσίλαός φησι, <Πιερίδος> [Τηρηίδος], Μεγαπένθη, ἐκ Κνωσσίας δὲ νύμφης κατὰ Εὐμηλον Ξενόδαμον.

 

Image result for Helen and Menelaus

Hesiod is a Gardener; Homer is a Weaver — Simondes fr. 6.3 (Jacoby)

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“Simonides said that Hesiod is a gardener while Homer is a garland-weaver—the first planted the legends of the heroes and gods and then the second braided together them the garland of the Iliad and the Odyssey.”

GNOMOL. VAT. GR. 1144 (= Hesiod. T 18d Jac): Σιμωνίδης τὸν ῾Ησίοδον κηπουρὸν ἔλεγε, τὸν δὲ ῞Ομηρον στεφανηπλόκον, τὸν μὲν ὡς φυτεύσαντα τὰς περὶ θεῶν καὶ ἡρώων μυθολογίας, τὸν δὲ ὡς ἐξ αὐτῶν συμπλέξαντα τὸν᾿Ιλιάδος καὶ Οδυσσείας στέφανον.