Iris (mythology)

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Several terms redirect here. For other uses, see Iris (disambiguation).
Iris
Goddess of the Rainbow
Pothos[1]
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In

Pothos in some versions.[1]

Etymology

The ancient Greek noun Ἶρις means both the rainbow[2] and the halo of the Moon.[6] An inscription from Corinth provides evidence for an original form Ϝῖρις (wîris) with a digamma that was eventually dropped.[6] The noun seems to be of pre-Greek origin.[7] A Proto-Indo-European pre-form *uh2i-r-i- has been suggested, although Beekes finds it 'hard to motivate.'[6]

Family

According to

Titans
. She is the goddess of the rainbow. She also serves nectar to the goddesses and gods to drink.
Pothos,[9] or alternatively they were the parents of Eros,[10] the god of love, according to sixth century BC Greek lyric poet Alcaeus, though Eros is usually said to be the son of Ares and Aphrodite. According to the Dionysiaca of Nonnus, Iris' brother is Hydaspes.[11]

She is also known as one of the goddesses of the sea and the sky. Iris links the gods to humanity. She travels with the speed of wind from one end of the world to the other[12] and into the depths of the sea and the underworld.

Mythology

Titanomachy

Winged female figure holding a caduceus: Iris (messenger of the gods) or Nike (Victory)

Iris is said to travel on the rainbow while carrying messages from the gods to mortals. In some records, Iris is a sister to fellow messenger goddess

Nereid Thetis at her wedding to Peleus, who in turn gave them to her son, Achilles, who wore them on his feet.[13] Achilles was sometimes known as podarkes (feet like [the wings of] Arke). Podarces was also the original name of Priam, the king of Troy.[14]

Messenger of the gods

Iris stands behind the seated Juno (right) in a Pompeii fresco

Following her daughter

Eleusis and made the earth barren, causing a great famine that killed off mortals, and as a result sacrifices to the gods ceased. Zeus then sent Iris to Demeter, calling her to join the other gods and lift her curse; but as her daughter was not returned, Demeter was not persuaded.[15]

In one narrative, after Leto and her children pleaded with Zeus to release Prometheus from his torment, Zeus relented, and sent Iris to order Heracles to free the unfortunate Prometheus.[16]

After Ceyx drowned in a shipwreck, Hera made Iris convey her orders to Hypnos, the god of sleep. Iris flew and found him in his cave, and informed him that Hera wished for Ceyx's wife, Alcyone, to be informed of her loved one's death in her dreams. After delivering Hera's command, Iris left immediately, not standing to be near Hypnos for too long, for his powers took hold of her, and made her dizzy and sleepy.[17]

In Aristophanes's comedy The Birds, the titular birds build a city in the sky and plan to supplant the Olympian gods. Iris, as the messenger, goes to meet them, but she is ridiculed, insulted, and threatened with rape by their leader Pisetaerus, an elderly Athenian man. Iris appears confused that Pisetearus does not know who the gods are and that she is one of them. Pisetaerus then tells her that the birds are the gods now, the deities whom the humans must sacrifice to. After Pisetaerus threatens to rape her, Iris scolds him for his foul language and leaves, warning him that Zeus, whom she refers to as her father, will deal with him and make him pay.[18]

Iris also appears several times in

Dido, so that she may die and enter Hades.[19] In book 5, Iris, having taken on the form of a Trojan woman, stirs up the other Trojan mothers to set fire to four of Aeneas' ships in order to prevent them from leaving Sicily.[20]

Iris Carrying the Water of the River Styx to Olympus for the Gods to Swear By, by Guy Head (c. 1793)

According to the Roman poet Ovid, after Romulus was deified as the god Quirinus, his wife Hersilia pleaded with the gods to let her become immortal as well so that she could be with her husband once again. Juno heard her plea and sent Iris down to her. With a single finger, Iris touched Hersilia and transformed her into an immortal goddess. Hersilia flew to Olympus, where she became one of the Horae and was permitted to live with her husband forevermore.[21][22]

Trojan War

According to the lost epic Cypria by Stasinus, it was Iris who informed Menelaus, who had sailed off to Crete, of what had happened back in Sparta while he was gone, namely his wife Helen's elopement with the Trojan Prince Paris as well as the death of Helen's brother Castor.[23]

Iris is frequently mentioned as a divine messenger in

River Styx, with which she puts to sleep all who perjure themselves. In Book XXIII, she delivers Achilles's prayer to Boreas and Zephyrus to light the funeral pyre of Patroclus.[24] In the last book, Zeus sends Iris to King Priam, to tell him that he should go to the Achaean camp alone and ransom the body of his slain son Hector from Achilles. Iris swiftly delivers the message to Priam and returns to Olympus.[25]

Other myths

Iris, Attic lekythos in Six's technique (superposed colours), circa 500–490 BC, found in Tanagra, now in Louvre.

According to the "Homeric Hymn to Apollo", when Leto was in labor prior to giving birth to her twin children Apollo and Artemis, all the goddesses were in attendance except for two, Hera and Eileithyia, the goddess of childbirth. On the ninth day of her labor, Leto told Iris to bribe Eileithyia and ask for her help in giving birth to her children, without allowing Hera to find out.[26] According to Callimachus, Iris along with Ares ordered, on Hera's orders, all cities and other places to shun the pregnant Leto and deny her shelter where she could bring forth her twins.[27] After Asteria, now transformed into the island of Delos, offered shelter to Leto, Iris flew back to Hera to inform her that Leto had been allowed to give birth due to Asteria defying Hera's orders, and took her seat beside Hera.[28]

According to

Strophades ("Islands of Turning"). The brothers had driven off the monsters from their torment of the prophet Phineus, but did not kill them upon the request of Iris, who promised that Phineus
would not be bothered by the Harpies again.

After King Creon of Thebes forbade the burial of the dead Argive soldiers who had raised their arms against Thebes, Hera ordered Iris to moisturize their dead bodies with dew and ambrosia.[29]

In a lesser-known narrative, Iris once came close to being raped by the satyrs after she attempted to disrupt their worship of Dionysus, perhaps at the behest of Hera. About fifteen black-and-red-figure vase paintings dating from the fifth century BC depict said satyrs either menacingly advancing toward or getting hold of her when she tries to interfere with the sacrifice.[30] In another cup, Iris is depicted being assaulted by the satyrs, who apparently are trying to prevent Iris from stealing sacrificial meat from the altar of Dionysus, who is also present in the scene. On the other side, the satyrs are attacking Hera, who stands between Hermes and Heracles.[31] The ancient playwright Achaeus wrote Iris, a now lost satyr play, which might have been the source of those vases' subject.[31]

In

Megara.[32] Iris also prepared the bed of Zeus and Hera.[33]

Worship

Cult

Weber-Laborde head Louvre, possibly the head of Iris.
Iris, sculpture from the west pediment of the Parthenon, now at the British Museum.[34]

Unlike the other prominent messenger god of the Greeks, Hermes, Iris did not play a large part in the ancient Greek religion and was rarely worshipped. There are no known temples, shrines, or sanctuaries to Iris, or festivals held in her honour. While she is frequently depicted on vases and in bas-reliefs, few statues are known to have been made of Iris during antiquity. She was however depicted in sculpture on the west pediment of Parthenon in Athens.

Iris does appear to have been the object of at least some minor worship, but the only trace preserved of her cult is the note by Athenaeus in Scholars at Dinner that the people of Delos sacrificed to Iris, offering her cheesecakes called basyniae, a type of cake of wheat-flour, suet, and honey, boiled up together.[35]

Epithets

Iris had numerous poetic titles and

epithets, including chrysopteros (χρυσόπτερος "golden winged"), podas ōkea (πόδας ὠκέα "swift footed") or podēnemos ōkea (ποδήνεμος ὠκέα "wind-swift footed"), roscida ("dewy", Latin), and Thaumantias or Thaumantis (Θαυμαντιάς, Θαυμαντίς, "Daughter of Thaumas, Wondrous One"), aellopus (ἀελλόπους "storm-footed, storm-swift).[36]
She also watered the clouds with her pitcher, obtaining the water from the sea.

Representation

Iris is represented either as a rainbow or as a beautiful young maiden with wings on her shoulders. As a goddess, Iris is associated with

messages, the rainbow, and new endeavors. This personification of a rainbow was once described as being a link to the heavens and earth.[37]

In some texts she is depicted wearing a coat of many colors. With this coat she actually creates the rainbows she rides to get from place to place. Iris' wings were said to be so beautiful that she could even light up a dark cavern, a trait observable from the story of her visit to

Alcyone.[38]

While Iris was principally associated with communication and messages, she was also believed to aid in the fulfillment of humans' prayers, either by fulfilling them herself or by bringing them to the attention of other deities.[39]

Genealogy

Descendants of Gaia and Pontus[40]
Gaia
Pontus
Doris[41]
ThaumasElectra[42]PhorcysCetoEurybia
The Nereids[43]IRISAelloOcypete
The
Harpies
Pemphredo
EnyoEchidna?[44](Ladon)[45]
The
Graiai
Sthenno
EuryaleMedusaPoseidon[46]
The Gorgons
Callirhoe[47]
Geryon


In the sciences

In the music

Gallery

See also

Notes

  1. ^ a b Nonnus. Dionysiaca. 47.340.
  2. ^ a b Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert (1940). "ἶρις". A Greek-English Lexicon. Perseus Digital Library.
  3. ^ Etymology of ἶρις in Bailly, Anatole (1935) Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette.
  4. ^ In some rarer traditions, she is the daughter of Zeus.[citation needed]
  5. ^ Smith, s.v. Iris.
  6. ^ a b c Beekes 2009, p. 1:598.
  7. ^ Fur.: 356.
  8. ^ Hesiod, Theogony 265; cf. Apollodorus, 1.2.6.
  9. ^ Nonnus, Dionysiaca 47.340
  10. ^ Alcaeus frag 149
  11. ^ Nonnus, Dionysiaca 26.355–365
  12. ^ The Iliad, Book II, "And now Iris, fleet as the wind, was sent by Jove to tell the bad news among the Trojans."
  13. Ptolemy Hephaestion, New History Book 6; epitomized in Photius' Bibliotheca 190
  14. S2CID 162661766
    . Retrieved 27 October 2022.
  15. ^ Homeric Hymns 2.314–325
  16. ^ Valerius Flaccus, Argonautica 4.60-78 ff
  17. ^ Ovid, Metamorphoses 11.585
  18. ^ Welsh 2014, p. 29.
  19. ^ Virgil, Aeneid 4.696
  20. ^ Virgil, Aeneid 5.606
  21. ^ Ovid, Metamorphoses 14.829–851
  22. ^ McLeish, Kenneth. "Bloomsbury Dictionary of Myth". Credo Reference.
  23. ^ Proclus' summary of Stasinus' Cypria.
  24. ^ Mackie, Christopher John (2011). "The Homer Encyclopedia". Credo Reference.
  25. ^ Homer, Iliad 24.144–189
  26. ^ Grant, Michael (2002). "Who's Who in Classical Mythology, Routledge". Credo Reference.
  27. ^ Callimachus, Hymn to Delos 67–69
  28. ^ Callimachus, Hymn to Delos 110–228
  29. ^ Statius, Thebaid 12.138 ff
  30. ^ Sells 2019, p. 112.
  31. ^ a b Antonopoulos, Christopoulos & Harrison 2021, pp. 627–628.
  32. ^ Euripides, Heracles 822
  33. ^ Theocritus, Idylls 15.135
  34. ^ British museum [1] Marble statue from the West pediment of the Parthenon.
  35. ^ Athenaeus, Scholars at Dinner 14.53; comp. Müller, Aegin. p. 170.
  36. ^ Homer uses the alternative form aellopos (ἀελλόπος): Iliad viii. 409.
  37. ^ Seton-Williams, M.V. (2000). Greek Legends and Stories. Rubicon Press. pp. 75–76.
  38. ^ Bulfinch, Thomas (1913). Bulfinch's Mythology: the Age of Fable, the Age of Chivalry, Legends of Charlemagne: Complete in One Volume. Thomas Y. Crowell Co.
  39. ^ Seton-Williams, M.V. (2000). Greek Legends and Stories. Rubicon Press. p. 9.
  40. ^ Theogony 233–297, 333–335 (Ladon) (Most, pp. 22, 23, 28, 29); Caldwell, p. 7, tables 6–9; Hard, p. 696.
  41. Oceanid daughters of Oceanus and Tethys, at 350
    .
  42. Oceanid daughters of Oceanus and Tethys, at 349
    .
  43. Galatea ( 250), and Psamathe ( 260
    ).
  44. ^ Who Echidna's mother is supposed to be, is unclear, she is probably Ceto, but possibly Callirhoe. The "she" at 295 is ambiguous. While some have read this "she" as referring to Callirhoe, according to Clay, p. 159 n. 32, "the modern scholarly consensus" reads Ceto, see for example Gantz, p. 22; Caldwell, pp. 7, 46 295–303.
  45. ^ Unnamed by Hesiod, but described at 334–335 as a terrible serpent who guards the golden apples.
  46. ^ Son of Cronus and Rhea at 456, where he is called "Earth-Shaker".
  47. Oceanid daughters of Oceanus and Tethys, at 351
    .
  48. ^ "Irris, 신비로운 아우라 로고 모션 첫 공개…4세대 프리즘 걸그룹 출격 예고".

Bibliography

Ancient sources

Modern sources

External links

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