Classical Mythology of Milton's English Poems - Hardcover

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1900 Excerpt: ...different sense. The fifth book of Paradise Lost opens: Now Morn, her rosy steps in the eastern clime Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl. The passage evidently refers to the legend mentioned by Ovid (Met. 13. 621). Memnon, the son of Aurora, was slain by Achilles at Troy. His mother gives herself up to her grief, 'piasque Nunc quoque dat lacrimas et toto rorat in orbe.' A similar idea appears in the 1 lumine conserit arva' of Lucretius 2. 211. See also Leucothea and Cephalus, BAOOHTJS.-P. h. 4. lis I 7. M1 VI1. M 0. 40, Bacchus is represented by Milton as the son of Amalthea (P. L. 4. 279; see Rhea), and the father of Euphrosyne (L.'Al. 16; see Graces). In the passage last cited he is 'ivy-crowned.' The ivy was one of his best known symbols. Euripides in the Phasnissa 650 ff., says that in the Aonian plains Bacchus was born, ' whom the wreathed ivy twining around him (irepiares) instantly, while yet a babe, blessed and covered with its verdant shady branches.' The worshipper of Bacchus was 'crowned with ivy' (Bacchce 81), as is the god himself in fr. 46 of Pindar (Bergk). Bacchus was a wine-god only in post-Homeric times. Plato in the Laws (2. 672 A) speaks of him as the giver of wine, and a scholium on Od. 9. 198 calls him the discoverer of wine. The story of the transformed mariners in C. 46 ff. is told by Ovid (Met. 3. 583 ff.). Some Tyrrhene pirates, 'qui postea Tusci sunt dicti' (Hyg. Fab. 134), engaged to carry Bacchus to Naxos, but as they turned aside to sell him into slavery, their ship became wreathed with ivy, their oars became serpents, and the sailors dolphins (cf. Horn. Hy. 7; Apollod. 3. 5. 3). The classics recount no adventure of Bacchus with Circe. The supposed location of the JEee&n isle of Circe in the Tyrrhene sea may have ...