Alectryon (mythology)

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For other uses, see Alectryon (Greek myth).
black-figure vase from Villa Giulia
.

Alectryon (from

rooster") in Greek mythology, was a young soldier who was assigned by Ares, the god of war, to guard the outside of his bedroom door while the god took part in a love affair with the love goddess Aphrodite. Alectryon however failed at his job when he fell asleep, allowing Helios, the god of the Sun, to see the two lovers and alert Hephaestus, the husband of Aphrodite, thereupon Ares changed him into a rooster in anger, in an etiological myth that attempts to explain the origin of roosters and the reason why they crow each morning at dawn, warning of the Sun approaching. The myth is not mentioned by Homer, who first related the story of Ares and Aphrodite's infidelity in his Odyssey
, but rather it was interpolated later by various authors.

Mythology

And in memory of why he suffered this, before the Sun god yokes his chariot he drives away men's sleep through song.

— Libanius, Progymnasmata 2.26[1]

According to

rooster which never forgets to announce the rising of the sun in the morning by its crowing, his own way of apologizing to Ares for falling asleep on the job, but this failed to make amends.[2][3][4][5][1][6]

According to Pausanias, the rooster is Helios' sacred animal, always crowing when he is about to rise.[7]

Interpretation

Both the words Alectryon and Halcyon might have been corrupted from

cock, the enemy of darkness and evil, which flee before his crowing.[8]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ a b Libanius, Progymnasmata 2.26
  2. ^ Lucian, Gallus 3
  3. Aves 835
  4. ^ Eustathius ad Homer, Odysseam 1.300
  5. ^ Ausonius, 26.2.27
  6. ISBN 978-90-420-2709-1
    .
  7. ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece 5.25.9
  8. ^ Norman MacColl, ed. (1899). The Athenaeum: A Journal of Literature, Science, the Fine Arts, Music, and the Drama. J. Francis. p. 526.

References

  • Lucian, The Dream or the Cock in The Downward Journey or The Tyrant. Zeus Catechized. Zeus Rants. The Dream or The Cock. Prometheus. Icaromenippus or The Sky-man. Timon or The Misanthrope. Charon or The Inspectors. Philosophies for Sale. Translated by A. M. Harmon. Loeb Classical Library 54. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1915.
  • Pausanias, Pausanias Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
  • Aken, Dr. A.R.A. van. (1961). Elseviers Mythologische Encyclopedie. Amsterdam: Elsevier.
  • Bartelink, Dr. G.J.M. (1988). Prisma van de mythologie. Utrecht: Het Spectrum.
  • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology
  • Vollmer, Wilhelm. (1874). Wörterbuch der Mythologie. Stuttgart, S. 27–28.
  • Pierer's Universal-Lexikon, Band 1. (1857). Altenburg, p. 284.
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