The most celebrated story in which the harpies play a part is that of King Phineus of Thrace, who was given the gift of prophecy by Zeus. COMPARATIVE TABLE OF NAMES AND FAMILY OF HARPIES ACCORDING TO VARIOUS SOURCES
The swift horse Arion was also said to begotten by loud-piping Zephyrus on a harpy (probably Podarge), as attested by Quintus Smyrnaeus. Other progeny of Podarge were Phlogeus and Harpagos, horses given by Hermes to the Dioscuri, who competed for the chariot-race in celebration of the funeral games of Pelias. Homer called the harpy Podarge as the mother of the two horses ( Balius and Xanthus) of Achilles sired by the West Wind Zephyrus while according to Nonnus, Xanthus and Podarkes, horses of the Athenian king Erechtheus, were born to Aello and the North Wind Boreas. Aello, is sometimes also spelled Aellopus or Nicothoe Ocypete, sometimes also spelled Ocythoe or Ocypode. Homer knew of a harpy named Podarge ("fleet-foot"). They are named Aello ("storm swift") and Ocypete ("the swift wing"), and Virgil added Celaeno ("the dark") as a third. According to Valerius, Typhoeus ( Typhon) was said to be the father of these monsters while a different version by Servius told that the harpies were daughters of Pontus and Gaea or of Poseidon. The harpies possibly were siblings of the river-god Hydaspes and Arke, as they were called sisters of Iris and children of Thaumas. This can be explained by the fact that Ozomene was another name for Electra. Hyginus, however, cited a certain Ozomene as the mother of the harpies but he also recounted that Electra was also the mother of these beings in the same source. Hesiod calls them two "lovely-haired" creatures, the daughters of Thaumas and the Oceanid Electra and sisters of Iris. Their abode is either the islands called Strophades, a place at the entrance of Orcus, or a cave in Crete. Later writers listed the harpies among the guardians of the underworld among other monstrosities including the Centaurs, Scylla, Briareus, Lernaean Hydra, Chimera, Gorgons and Geryon. The harpies were called "the hounds of mighty Zeus" thus "ministers of the Thunderer (Zeus)". In this form they were agents of punishment who abducted people and tortured them on their way to Tartarus. Thus, they carried off the daughters of king Pandareus and gave them as servants to the Erinyes. When a person suddenly disappeared from the earth, it was said that he had been carried off by the harpies. Their name means "snatchers" or "swift robbers" and they steal food from their victims while they are eating and carry evildoers (especially those who have killed their family) to the Erinyes. The harpies seem originally to have been wind spirits (personifications of the destructive nature of wind). "They are said to have been feathered, with cocks' heads, wings, and human arms, with great claws breasts, bellies, and female parts human." Functions and abode "Bird-bodied, girl-faced things they (Harpies) are abominable their droppings, their hands are talons, their faces haggard with hunger insatiable" Hyginus I have never seen the tribe that produced this company, nor the land that boasts of rearing this brood with impunity and does not grieve for its labor afterwards." Virgil Once before I saw some creatures in a painting, carrying off the feast of Phineus but these are wingless in appearance, black, altogether disgusting they snore with repulsive breaths, they drip from their eyes hateful drops their attire is not fit to bring either before the statues of the gods or into the homes of men. No! Not women, but rather Gorgons I call them and yet I cannot compare them to forms of Gorgons either. "Before this man an extraordinary band of women slept, seated on thrones. The Pythian priestess of Apollo recounted the appearance of the harpies in the following lines: ".the Harpyiai (Harpies) of the lovely hair, Okypete (Ocypete) and Aello, and these two in the speed of their wings keep pace with the blowing winds, or birds in flight, as they soar and swoop, high aloft." Aeschylusīut even as early as the time of Aeschylus, they are described as ugly creatures with wings, and later writers carry their notions of the harpies so far as to represent them as most disgusting monsters. To Hesiod, they were imagined as fair-locked and winged maidens, who surpassed winds and birds in the rapidity of their flight. Pottery art depicting the harpies featured beautiful women with wings. Roman and Byzantine writers detailed their ugliness. They were generally depicted as birds with the heads of maidens, faces pale with hunger and long claws on their hands.
0 kommentar(er)
