COMMENTARY.1

[It is hoped that this Commentary may be useful to general readers, and to teachers in the secondary schools, as well as to pupils. The section-numbers correspond with those of the text in the body of the book. The letter C appended to a number indicates Commentary.]

§§ 1-10. For information concerning mythical characters mentioned in these sections such as Pandora, Prometheus, Endymion, Artemis, Aphrodite, Hermes, Bellerophon - consult Index and the references as there

indicated.

§ 11. Homer is also called Melesigenes, son of Meles—the stream on which Smyrna was built. The Homerida, who lived on Chios, claimed to be descended from Homer. They devoted themselves to the cultivation of epic

poetry.

Arion. See George Eliot's poem beginning

"Arion, whose melodic soul

Taught the dithyramb to roll."

Other Greek Poets of Mythology to be noted are Callimachus (260 B.C.), whose Lock of Berenice is reproduced in the elegiacs of Catullus, and from whose Origins (of sacred rites) Ovid drew much of his information. Also Nicander (150 B.C.), whose Transformations, and Parthenius, whose Metamorphoses furnished material to the Latin poet. With Theocritus should be read Bion and Moschus, both exquisite masters of the idyl and elegy. See Andrew Lang's translation of Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus; and the verses by Dobson and Gosse with which Lang prefaces the translation. Lycophron (260 B.C.) wrote a poem called Alexandra, on the consequences of the voyage of Paris to Sparta. The Loves of Hero and Leander were probably written by a grammarian, Musæus, as late as 500 A.D. This poem contains admirable verses, and has a pretty" fancy.

66

1 For assistance in collecting references to English poetry the author is indebted to Miss M. B. Clayes, a graduate of the University of California.

407

Translations of Greek Poets. The best verse translations of Homer are those of Chapman, Pope, the Earl of Derby, and Cowper.

An excellent prose translation of the Iliad is that of Lang, Leaf, and Myers (Macmillan & Co.) Lond.: 1889; of the Odyssey, that by Butcher and Lang (Macmillan & Co.) Lond.: 1883; or the translation into rhythmical prose by G. H. Palmer (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.) Boston, 1892.

The Tragic Poets. - Plumptre's translations of Eschylus and Sophocles (Routledge) 2 v., N. Y.: 1882; Wodhull's translation of Euripides in Morley's Universal Library; Potter's Æschylus, Francklin's Sophocles, Wodhull's Euripides; 5 v., Lond.: 1809.

Other Poets. Lang's translation of Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus. Pindar: — Odes, transl. by F. A. Paley, Lond.: 1868; by Ernest Myers, Lond. 1874. Translations of Greek Lyric Poets: - Collections from the Greek Anthology, by Bland and Merivale, Lond.: 1833; The Greek Anthology, by Lord Neaves, Anc. Classics for Engl. Readers Series, Lond. 1874; Bohn's Greek Anthol., by Burges, Lond.: 1852.

On Homer, Hesiod, Theocritus, the tragic poets, Pindar, etc., see, also, Collins' excellent series of Ancient Classics for English Readers (Lippincott, Phila.); and the series entitled "English Translations from Ancient and Modern Poems," by Various Authors, 3 v., Lond.: 1810. Of Æschylus read the Prometheus Bound, to illustrate §§ 25, 26; the Agamemnon, Choëphori, and Eumenides, to illustrate §§ 167, 170; and the Seven against Thebes, for § 163. Of Sophocles read Edipus Rex, Edipus at Colonus, Antigone, with § 158, etc.; Electra, with § 170; Ajax and Philoctetes, with the Trojan War; Women of Trachis, with § 143. Of Euripides read Medea, Ion, Alcestis, Iphigenia in Aulis and in Tauris, Electra. Other translations of Eschylus, are J. S. Blackie's: 1850; T. A. Bucklie's (Bohn): Lond.: 1848; E. A. A. Morshead's: 1881; of Sophocles, Thos. Dale's, into verse, 2 v., 1824; R. Whitelaw's, into verse, 1883; the Oxford Translators', into prose (Bohn): 1863; of Euripides, T. A. Bucklie's (Bohn) 2 v., Lond.: 1854-58.

§ 12. Roman Poets. - Horace (65 B.C.) in his Odes, Epodes, and Satires makes frequent reference and allusion to the common stock of mythology, sometimes telling a whole story, as that of the daughters of Danaüs. Catullus (87 B.C.), the most original of Roman love-poets, gives us the Nuptials of Peleus and Thetis (for selections in English hexameters, see §§ 153 and 165 a), the Lock of Berenice, and the Atys. Manilius of the age of Augustus wrote a poem on Astronomy, which contains a philosophic statement of starmyths. Valerius Flaccus (d. 88 A.D.) based his Argonautics upon the poem of that name by Apollonius of Rhodes. Statius (61 A.D.) revived in the brilliant verses of his Thebaid and his Achilleid the epic myths and epic machinery, but not the vigor and naturalness of the ancient style. To a prose writer,

Hyginus, who lived on terms of close intimacy with Ovid, a fragmentary work called, the Book of Fables, which is sometimes a useful source of information, and four books of Poetical Astronomy, have been attributed. The works, as we have them, could not have been written by a friend of the cultivated Ovid.

Translations and Studies. For a general treatment of the great poets of Rome, the student is referred to W. L. Collins' Series of Anc. Classics for Engl. Readers (Lippincott, Phila.). For the Cupid and Psyche of Apuleius, read Walter Pater's Marius the Epicurean, Lond. 1885. Of translations, the following are noteworthy: Ovid: the Metamorphoses, by Dryden, Addison, and others; into English blank verse by Ed. King, Edin.: 1871; transl. by Riley, Lond. 1851; Englished by Geo. Sandys, Lond. 1660. Vergil's Æneid, translations: — into verse by John Conington, Lond.: 1873; into dactylic hexameter by Oliver Crane, N. Y.: 1888; the Æneids into verse by Wm. Morris, Lond.: 1876; Bks. 1-4, by Stanyhurst, 1582 (Arber's Reprint); Æneis, by Dryden. Catullus: transl. by Robinson Ellis, Lond.: 1871; by Sir Theodore Martin, Edin.: 1875. Horace: transl. by Theodore Martin, Edin.: 1881; by Smart, Lond.: 1853; Odes and Epodes in Calverley's translations, Lond. 1866; Odes, etc., by Conington, Lond. 1872; Odes and Epodes, by Lord Lytton, N.Y.: 1870.

§ 13. For Scandinavian literature, see foot-notes to pp. 30-33 and references in § 185 C.

...

Runes were "the letters of the alphabets used by all the old Teutonic tribes The letters were even considered magical, and cast into the air written separately upon chips or spills of wood, to fall, as fate determined, on a cloth, and then be read by the interpreters . . . The association of the runic letters with heathen mysteries and superstition caused the first Christian teachers to discourage, and, indeed, as far as possible, suppress their use. They were, therefore, superseded by the Latin alphabet, which in First English was supplemented by retention of two of the runes, named 'thorn' and 'wen,' to represent sounds of 'th' and 'w,' for which the Latin alphabet had no letters provided. Each rune was named after some object whose name began with the sound represented. The first letter was F, Feoh, money; the second U, Ur, a bull; the third Th, Thorn, a thorn; the fourth O, Os, the mouth; the fifth R, Rad, a saddle; the sixth C, Cen, a torch; and the six sounds being joined together make Futhorc, which is the name given to the runic A B C." Morley's English Writers, 1: 267. See also Vigfusson and Powell's Corpus Poeticum Boreale, 2: 691, under Runes and Rune-stones; Cleasby's IcelandicEnglish Dictionary; and George Stephens' Old Northern Runic Monuments, 2 v., Lond. 1866-68.

§ 14. For Translations of the Nibelungenlied, see § 185 C. For other

German lays of myth, the Gudrun, the Great Rose Garden, the Horned Siegfried, etc., see Vilmar's Geschichte der deutschen National-Litteratur, 42-101, Leipz.: 1886. See also, in general, Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie, Göttingen: 1855; Ludlow's Popular Epics of the Middle Ages, 2 v., Lond.: 1865; George T. Dippold's Great Epics of Mediæval Germany, Boston: 1891.

§ 15. Translations and Studies of Oriental Myths and Sacred Writings. — Egyptian. See Birch's Guide to the First and Second Egyptian Rooms, British Museum; Miss A. B. Edwards' A Thousand Miles up the Nile, Lond. 1876.

For the principal divinities, see Index to this work.

Indian.

- Max Müller's translation of the Rig-Veda-Sanhita; Sacred Books of the East, 35 vols., edited by Max Müller, the Upanishads, Bhagavadgita, Institutes of Vishnu, etc., translated by various scholars, Oxford: 1874-90; Müller's History of Sanskrit Literature, Lond.: 1859; Weber's History of Indian Literature, Lond.: 1878; H. H. Wilson's Rig-Veda-Sanhita, 6 v., Lond. 1850-70; Muir's Sanskrit Texts, and his Principal Deities of the RigVeda, 5 v., Lond.: 1868-73; J. Freeman Clarke's Ten Great Religions, Boston: 1880; the Mahâbhârata, translated by Protap Chundra Roy, Nos. 1-76, Calcutta: 1883-93. See Indian Idylls by Edwin Arnold. The Episode of Nala - Nalopákhyánam · translated by Monier Williams, Oxford: 1879. Of the Râmâyana, a paraphrase (in brief) is given by F. Richardson in the Iliad of the East, Lond. 1870. E. A. Reed's Hindu Literature, with translations, Chicago: 1891; W. Ward's History, Literature, and Mythology of the Hindoos, 3 vols., Lond.: 1822. On Buddhism, read Sir Edwin Arnold's Light of Asia.

For the chief divinities of the Hindus, see Index to this work.

Persian.-J. Freeman Clarke's Ten Great Religions; Johnson's Oriental Religions; Haug's Essays on the Sacred Language, Literature, etc., of the Parsis, by E. W. West, Boston: 1879. In illustration should be read Moore's Fire-Worshippers in Lalla Rookh.

§ 16. Chaos: a gap. Compare the " Beginning Gap" of Norse mythology. Eros a yearning. Erebus: black, from root meaning to cover.

§ 17. Uranus (Greek Ouranos) corresponds with the name of the Indian divinity Varunas, root var, to cover. Uranus is the starry vault that covers the earth; Varunas became the rain-giving sky. Titan: the honorable, powerful; the king; later, the signification was limited to the sun. Oceanus probably means flood. Tethys the nourisher, nurse. Hyperion: high; the sun. Thea the beautiful, shining; the moon. Homer Euryphaëssa, the far-shining. Japetus: the sender, hurler, wounder; compare the Hebrew Japhet. Themis that which is established, law.

the wanderer on She is called by