Mnemosyne
Mnemosyne | |
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Goddess of memory and remembrance | |
Member of the Titans | |
Greek | Μνημοσύνη |
Abode | Mount Olympus |
Personal information | |
Parents | Uranus and Gaia |
Siblings |
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Consorts | Zeus |
Offspring | The Muses |
In
Family
A
- Calliope (epic poetry)
- Clio (history)
- Euterpe (music and lyric poetry)
- Erato (love poetry)
- Melpomene (tragedy)
- Polyhymnia (hymns)
- Terpsichore (dance)
- Thalia (comedy)
- Urania (astronomy)
Mythology
In Hesiod's Theogony, kings and poets receive their powers of authoritative speech from their possession of Mnemosyne and their special relationship with the Muses.
Appearance in oral literature
Although she was categorized as one of the
Later, once
Cult
Part of a series on |
Ancient Greek religion |
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While not one of the most popular divinities, Mnemosyne was the subject of some minor worship in Ancient Greece. Statues of her are mentioned in the sanctuaries of other gods, and she was often depicted alongside her daughters the Muses. She was also worshipped in Lebadeia in Boeotia, at Mount Helicon in Boeotia, and in the cult of Asclepius.
There was a statue of Mnemosyne in the shrine of Dionysos at Athens, alongside the statues of the Muses, Zeus and Apollo,
[Part of the rituals at the oracle of Trophonios (Trophonius) at Lebadeia, Boiotia (Boeotia):] He [the supplicant] is taken by the priests, not at once to the oracle, but to fountains of water very near to each other. Here he must drink water called the water of Lethe (Forgetfulness), that he may forget all that he has been thinking of hitherto, and afterwards he drinks of another water, the water of Mnemosyne (Memory), which causes him to remember what he sees after his descent ... After his ascent from [the oracle of] Trophonios the inquirer is again taken in hand by the priests, who set him upon a chair called the chair of Mnemosyne (Memory), which stands not far from the shrine, and they ask of him, when seated there, all he has seen or learned. After gaining this information they then entrust him to his relatives. These lift him, paralysed with terror and unconscious both of himself and of his surroundings, and carry him to the building where he lodged before with Tykhe (Tyche, Fortune) and the Daimon Agathon (Good Spirit). Afterwards, however, he will recover all his faculties, and the power to laugh will return to him.[13]
Mnemosyne was also sometime regarded as being not the mother of the Muses but as one of them, and as such she was worshiped in the sanctuary of the Muses at Mount Helicon in Boeotia:
The first to sacrifice on Helikon (Helicon) to the Mousai (Muses) and to call the mountain sacred to the Mousai were, they say, Ephialtes and Otos (Otus), who also founded Askra ... The sons of Aloeus held that the Mousai were three in number, and gave them the names Melete (Practice), Mneme (Memory), and Aoide (Aeode, Song). But they say that afterwards Pieros (Pierus), a Makedonian (Macedonian) ... came to Thespiae [in Boiotia] and established nine Mousai, changing their names to the present ones ... Mimnermos [epic poet C7th B.C.] ... says in the preface that the elder Mousai (Muses) are the daughters of Ouranos (Uranus), and that there are other and younger Mousai, children of Zeus.[14]
Cult of Asclepius
Mnemosyne was one of the
Genealogy
Mnemosyne's family tree [17] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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See also
References
- ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert (1940). Jones, Sir Henry Stuart; McKenzie, Roderick (eds.). "μνήμη". A Greek-English Lexicon. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Retrieved 2018-01-10.
- ^ Memory and the name Memnon, as in "Memnon of Rhodes" are etymologically related. Mnemosyne is sometimes confused with Mneme or compared with Memoria.
- ^ Hesiod, Theogony 135; Diodorus Siculus, 5.66.3; Clement of Alexandria, Recognitions 31.
- Fabulae Preface
- ^ Richard Janko, "Forgetfulness in the Golden Tablets of Memory", Classical Quarterly 34 (1984) 89–100; see article "Totenpass" for the reconstructed devotional which instructs the initiated soul through the landscape of Hades, including the pool of Memory.
- ^ "Lethe | Greek mythology". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2017-03-30.
- ^ ISBN 9780415046015.
- ^ JSTOR 283194.
- ^ Plato 1924, p. 393.
- ^ "Aristophanes, Lysistrata, line 1247". www.perseus.tufts.edu.
- ^ Pausanias, 1.2.5 (trans. Jones) (Greek travelogue C2nd A.D.)
- ^ Pausanias, 8.46.3
- ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece 9. 39. 3
- ^ Pausanias, Description of Greece 9. 29. 1
- ^ S2CID 162319084.
- ^ ISBN 978-91-7447-335-3.
- ^ Hesiod, Theogony 132–138, 337–411, 453–520, 901–906, 915–920; Caldwell, pp. 8–11, tables 11–14.
- ^ Although usually the daughter of Hyperion and Theia, as in Hesiod, Theogony 371–374, in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes (4), 99–100, Selene is instead made the daughter of Pallas the son of Megamedes.
- , another Oceanid, Asia was their mother by Iapetus.
- Cleito.
- ^ In Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound 18, 211, 873 (Sommerstein, pp. 444–445 n. 2, 446–447 n. 24, 538–539 n. 113) Prometheus is made to be the son of Themis.
Sources
- .
- Anonymous, The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White. Homeric Hymns. Cambridge, MA.,Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
- Antoninus Liberalis, The Metamorphoses of Antoninus Liberalis translated by Francis Celoria (Routledge 1992). Online version at the Topos Text Project.
- Apollodorus, Apollodorus, The Library, with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
- Caldwell, Richard, Hesiod's Theogony, Focus Publishing/R. Pullins Company (June 1, 1987). ISBN 978-0-941051-00-2.
- Ante-Nicene Library Volume 8, translated by Smith, Rev. Thomas. T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh. 1867. Online version at theio.com
- Diodorus Siculus, Diodorus Siculus: The Library of History. Translated by Charles Henry Oldfather. Twelve volumes. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. 1989.Online version at the Lacus Curtius: Into the Roman World.
- Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, Cambridge, MA.,Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
- Hyginus, Fabulae from The Myths of Hyginus translated and edited by Mary Grant. University of Kansas Publications in Humanistic Studies. Online version at the Topos Text Project.
- Ovid, Metamorphoses translated by Brookes More (1859-1942). Boston, Cornhill Publishing Co. 1922. Online version at the Topos Text Project.
- 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
- )
Further reading
- OCLC 303807.
External links
- Media related to Mnemosyne at Wikimedia Commons
- MNEMOSYNE from The Theoi Project
- MNEMOSYNE from Greek Mythology Link