Epitome

Apollodorus

Apollodorus. The Library. Frazer, James George, Sir, editor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd. 1921

But the infatuated Icarus, disregarding his father's injunctions, soared ever higher, till, the glue melting, he fell into the sea called after him Icarian, and perished.[*](Compare Strab. 14.1.19; Lucian, Gallus 23; Arrian, Anabasis vii.20.5; Zenobius, Cent. iv.92; Tzetzes, Chiliades i.498ff.; Severus, Narr. 5, in Westermann's Mythographi Graeci, Appendix Narrationum, 32. p. 373; Scholiast on Hom. Il. ii.145; Ov. Met. 8.183-235; Hyginus, Fab. 40; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini, ed. Bode, i. pp. 16, 117 (First Vatican Mythographer 43, Second Vatican Mythographer 125). According to one account, Daedalus landed from his flight at Cumae, where he dedicated his wings to Apollo. See Verg. A. 6.14ff.; Juvenal iii.25. The myth of the flight of Daedalus and Icarus is rationalized by Diod. 4.77.5ff. and Paus. 9.11.4ff. According to Diodorus, the two were provided by Pasiphae with a ship in which they escaped, but in landing on a certain island Icarus fell into the sea and was drowned. According to Pausanias, father and son sailed in separate ships, scudding before the wind with sails, which Daedalus had just invented and spread for the first time to the sea breeze. The only writer besides Apollodorus who mentions the name of Icarus's mother is Tzetzes; he agrees with Apollodorus, whom he may have copied, in describing her as a slave woman named Naucrate.) But Daedalus made his way safely to

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Camicus in Sicily.

And Minos pursued Daedalus, and in every country that he searched he carried a spiral shell and promised to give a great reward to him who should pass a thread through the shell, believing that by that means he should discover Daedalus. And having come to Camicus in Sicily, to the court of Cocalus, with whom Daedalus was concealed, he showed the spiral shell. Cocalus took it, and promised to thread it, and gave it to Daedalus;

and Daedalus fastened a thread to an ant, and, having bored a hole in the spiral shell, allowed the ant to pass through it. But when Minos found the thread passed through the shell, he perceived that Daedalus was with Cocalus, and at once demanded his surrender.[*](The story of the quaint device by which Minos detected Daedalus is repeated by Zenobius, Cent. iv.92, who probably copied Apollodorus. The device was mentioned by Sophocles in a lost play, The Camicians, in which he dealt with the residence of Daedalus at the court of Cocalus in Sicily. See Athenaeus iii.32, p. 86 CD; The Fragments of Sophocles, ed. A. C. Pearson, ii.3ff. ) Cocalus promised to surrender him, and made an entertainment for

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Minos; but after his bath Minos was undone by the daughters of Cocalus; some say, however, that he died through being drenched with boiling water.[*](Compare Zenobius, Cent. iv.92; Diod. 4.79.2; Tzetzes, Chiliades i.508ff.; Scholiast on Hom. Il. ii.145; Scholiast on Pind. N. 4.59(95); Ovid, Ibis 289ff., with the Scholia. The account of Zenobius agrees closely with that of Apollodorus, except that he makes the daughters of Cocalus pour boiling pitch instead of boiling water on the head of their royal guest. The other authorities speak of boiling water. The Scholiast on Pindar informs us that the ever ingenious Daedalus persuaded the princesses to lead a pipe through the roof, which discharged a stream of boiling water on Minos while he was disporting himself in the bath. Other writers mention the agency of the daughters of Cocalus in the murder of Minos, without describing the mode of his taking off. See Paus. 7.4.6; Conon 25; Hyginus, Fab. 44. Herodotus contents himself with saying (Hdt. 7.169ff.) that Minos died a violent death at Camicus in Sicily, whither he had gone in search of Daedalus. The Greek expression which I have translated “was undone” (ἔκλυτος ἐγένετο) is peculiar. If the text is sound (see Critical Note), the words must be equivalent to ἐξελύθη, “was relaxed, unstrung, or unnerved.” Compare Aristot. Prob. 862b 2ff., κατεψυγμένου παντὸς τοῦ σώματος καὶ ἐκλελυμένου πρὸς τοὺς πόνους. Aristotle also uses the adjective ἔκλυτος to express a supple, nerveless, or effeminate motion of the hands (Aristot. Physiog. 80a 14); and he says that tame elephants were trained to strike wild elephants,ἕως ἂν ἐκλύσωσιν ʽαὐτούσ̓, “until they relax or weaken them” (Aristot. Hist. anim. 9.610a 27). Isocrates speaks of a mob ʽὁ̓́χλοσ̓ πρὸς τὸν πόλεμον ἐκλελυμένος (Isoc. 4.150). The verb ἐκλύειν is used in the sense of making an end of something troublesome or burdensome (Soph. OT 35ff. with Jebb's note); from which it might perhaps be extended to persons regarded as troublesome or burdensome. We may compare the parallel uses of the Latin dissolvere, as applied both to things (Hor. Carm. 1.9.5, dissolve frigus) and to persons (Sallust, Jugurtha 17, plerosque senectus dissolvit).)

Theseus joined Hercules in his expedition against the Amazons and carried off Antiope, or, as some say, Melanippe; but Simonides calls her Hippolyte.[*](As to Theseus and the Amazons, see Diod. 4.28; Plut. Thes. 26-28; Paus. 1.2.1; Paus. 1.15.2; Paus. 1.41.7; Paus. 2.32.9; Paus. 5.11.4 and Paus. 5.11.7; Zenobius, Cent. v.33. The invasion of Attica by the Amazons in the time of Theseus is repeatedly referred to by Isocrates (Isoc. 4.68, 70, 4.42, 7.75, 12.193). The Amazon whom Theseus married, and by whom he had Hippolytus, is commonly called Antiope (Plut. Thes. 26; Plut. Thes. 28; Diod. 4.28; Paus. 1.2.1; Paus. 1.41.7; Seneca, Hippolytus 927ff.; Hyginus, Fab. 30). But according to Clidemus, in agreement with Simonides, her name was Hippolyte (Plut. Thes. 27), and so she is called by Isocrates (Isoc. 12.193). Pausanias says that Hippolyte was a sister of Antiope (Paus. 1.41.7). Tzetzes expressly affirms that Antiope, and not Hippolyte, was the wife of Theseus and mother of Hippolytus (Scholiast on Lycophron 1329). The grave of Antiope was shown both at Athens and Megara (Paus. 1.2.1; Paus. 1.41.7).)

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Wherefore the Amazons marched against Athens, and having taken up a position about the Areopagus[*](According to Diod. 4.28.2, the Amazons encamped at the place which was afterwards called the Amazonium. The topography of the battle seems to have been minutely described by the antiquarian Clidemus, according to whom the array of the Amazons extended from the Amazonium to the Pnyx, while the Athenians attacked them from the Museum Hill on one side and from Ardettus and the Lyceum on the other. See Plut. Thes. 27.) they were vanquished by the Athenians under Theseus. And though he had a son Hippolytus by the Amazon,