Greek Mythology, page 15
In desperation, Heracles fled to Delphi, but the oracle refused him audience. Again the mist of anger engulfed the hero. He raged through the sanctuary causing terrible destruction before seizing the sacred tripod in Apollo’s temple. Now Apollo himself intervened, and for long hours the two wrestled for control of this most sacred object. At last Zeus interceded, hurling a thunderbolt that exploded in a blinding flash and restored Heracles’ sanity.
As punishment, Zeus caused Heracles to be enslaved for a further year, this time to the Lydian queen, Omphale. For the red-blooded hero this was an even more terrifying experience than his servitude to Eurystheus. The queen unmanned him: not only did she confiscate his club and lionskin, she made him dress in women’s clothes, wear jewelry and make-up, and help her and her maidservants at the spinning-wheel.
The Death of Heracles
Released at last, Heracles returned to Greece, where – after many wars against cities such as Elis, Pylos and Troy – he married Deineira, Meleager’s sister from Calydon, the woman who unwittingly would kill him. Leaving Calydon, they soon came to the roaring River Evenos, swollen with melted snow from the high Vardousia mountains. Here, a Centaur, Nessus, approached them, claiming to be a god-appointed ferryman and offering to convey Deineira across while Heracles swam. It was a ruse. Nessus was intent on rape.
Reaching the far bank, Nessus galloped off with Deineira, terrified, clinging to his back. But Heracles shot at the escaping Centaur and, despite the distance, felled him. As Nessus lay dying, he whispered to Deineira to save some of his blood, and, if she ever suspected Heracles of straying, to smear it on his tunic. It would give the garment magic properties: Heracles would never be unfaithful again.
Years later Heracles returned from battle to his adopted home in Trachis (north of Delphi), with a beautiful slave girl, Iole, to be his mistress. Now Deineira recalled Nessus’ words. She rubbed the Centaur’s blood on a new tunic, and gave it to Heracles to wear at his victory celebrations. But the blood was infected with the Hydra’s bile, in which Heracles had once dipped his arrows. Heracles’ flesh began to blister and bubble. He tried in vain to tear off the tunic, and when he dived into a nearby pool he merely made the poison work more quickly. (Ever afterwards the waters boiled with sulphur, which gave them their name: Thermopylae, ‘Hot Gates’.)
In agony Heracles crawled up Mount Oeta. Reaching the summit he ordered his son Hyllus – or, in some accounts, his friend Philoctetes – to burn him alive on a pyre of oak and olive branches. But before the flames caught fully, Zeus consumed the hero in a lightning flash and conveyed his soul to Mount Olympus, where, married to Hebe, the goddess of youth, Heracles lived forever, an immortal. Meanwhile in Trachis, Deineira hanged herself.
Eurystheus & the Children of Heracles
With Heracles dead, Eurystheus seized his chance to wreak vengeance on his hated cousin’s children. For some time Heracles’ mother Alcmene had been living in Tiryns with many of the sons whom Heracles had fathered on his travels. Now Eurystheus vowed to expel them – along with all Heracles’ other children – from Greece. When Athens’ king Theseus heard of this injustice, he offered them asylum in Attica and soon the sons of Heracles had formed an army.
Rousing himself to unaccustomed action, Eurystheus marched from Tiryns with his own troops, and on the coast just north of the Isthmus of Corinth the armies met head-on. In heavy fighting, the cowardly Eurystheus turned tail and fled, urging his chariot team back south along the road by the Scironian Rocks. But here the sons of Heracles caught up with him, dragged him to the ground and hacked off his head. When it was brought to Alcmene, she gouged out the lifeless eyes with brooch pins.
Now kingless, Tiryns was annexed by Atreus and Thyestes, who were ruling nearby Midea. When the brothers took control of Mycenae too, Tiryns became the main port of the Argolid.
Tiryns in History & Today
Tiryns was occupied from the mid-sixth millennium BC. Then the sea lapped close to the rocky outcrop, which rises abruptly from the plain to a height of just under 28 m (100 ft), but the shoreline gradually receded until by the second millennium BC it was 1 km (just over half a mile) away. (It is now almost twice that distance.)
Tiryns’ first period of prosperity came in the mid-third millennium BC, when both the acropolis and a relatively large area outside the walls show signs of well-built houses. The most remarkable structure, on the highest part of the acropolis (the Upper Citadel), was an impressive – if now somewhat unimaginatively named – Round Building, 28 m (90 ft) in diameter. Remains of bastions suggest it rose to a significant height, sufficient to be clearly seen from afar, not least from the sea. Its purpose remains unknown: was it a fortified stronghold, a temple, a palace or perhaps a granary? Later in the third millennium much of Tiryns (including the Round Building) was burned, and only around 1400 BC did it regain its previous prosperity. The Upper Citadel was encircled by a ‘Cyclopean’ wall and a splendid palace was constructed, with plastered and finely painted reception rooms.
As the chief port of the wealthy Argolid, Tiryns became a rich entrepôt. Evidence suggests that merchant ships laden with foodstuffs, fabrics and precious metals reached here from Egypt by way of Syria and Crete. Towards the end of the thirteenth century BC further ‘Cyclopean’ walls were built around the Lower Citadel. The palace was rebuilt, its floors decorated with leaping dolphins and its plastered walls painted with scenes of elaborately coiffed women walking in procession, young men with chariots, and hunting dogs attacking a boar. The town expanded considerably, and a dam was built to contain and divert the nearby stream, which had previously been prone to flood the area to the north. But around 1200 BC an earthquake appears to have destroyed most of the town and citadel.
Unusually for Mycenaean palace settlements, Tiryns experienced renewed building in the twelfth century BC. Earthquake-damaged buildings were cleared away, a new palatial hall constructed in the Upper Citadel, and the town expanded to cover some 24 ha (60 acres). However, this prosperity came to an abrupt halt and – for reasons still unknown – by around 1060 BC Tiryns was largely abandoned.
While the Upper Citadel remained partially inhabited, Tiryns never regained its former status. In 494 BC it offered asylum to slaves escaping in the aftermath of Argos’ defeat by Sparta at the Battle of Sepeia, and in 479 BC it sent four hundred hoplites to fight at the Battle of Plataea, five times the number sent by nearby Mycenae. Thanks partly to this heroic intervention, in his epic Thebaid (an extract from which begins this chapter), the Roman Statius imagined Tiryns’ army eagerly taking part in the expedition of the Seven Against Thebes.
In 468 BC, Argos annexed Tiryns. Some inhabitants settled in Argos itself, others moved a few miles east, founding the town of Halieis (modern Porto Heli). When Pausanias visited Tiryns he found it deserted but nonetheless he marvelled:
The wall, which is the work of Cyclopes and all that still remains, is made from undressed stones, each so large that a team of two mules could not move even the smallest by the slightest distance from where it is set.
He added:
Greeks tend to admire foreign sights more than homegrown ones. Eminent historians have provided exhaustive descriptions of the pyramids of Egypt, but none has made even the briefest mention of the Treasury of Minyas [in Orchomenos near Thebes] or the walls of Tiryns, even though both are just as remarkable.
Because of its walls, Tiryns’ location was never lost, and in 1876 Heinrich Schliemann began excavations at the site. They have been continued ever since by the German Archaeological Institute and Greek Archaeological Service.
Tiryns
SOME IMPORTANT DATES & REMAINS
c. 5500 BC
First settlements.
c. 2500 BC
First period of prosperity. Round Building constructed on Upper Citadel.
c. 2200 BC
Much of Tiryns consumed by fire.
c. 1400 BC
Walls constructed around new palace on Upper Citadel.
c. 1225 BC
Walls constructed around Lower Citadel; palace rebuilt on Upper Citadel; dam built.
c. 1200 BC
Major earthquake damage followed by rebuilding of much of town and parts of Upper Citadel.
c. 1060 BC
Tiryns largely abandoned.
494 BC
Argive slaves take refuge in Tiryns.
479 BC
Tiryns sends 400 hoplites to fight at Battle of Plataea.
468 BC
Tiryns defeated, annexed and depopulated by Argos.
AD 1876
Schliemann begins excavations.
At first sight unprepossessing, Tiryns lies on the main road 8 km (5 miles) from Argos and 4 km (2½ miles) from Nafplio. From the large car park a path leads south along the east wall to a steep ramp. At the top is the (now ruined) monumental gateway with postholes for folding doors. Beyond is the Upper Citadel. A courtyard leads (left) to a series of impressive galleries – six vaulted chambers built into the outer wall – and (left) to the foundations of a pillared propylaion. This gives on to a courtyard. A further gallery (left) set into the wall is accessed by a covered stairway; through a colonnaded courtyard (right) a series of antechambers lead to the megaron, the site of the earlier Round Building (no longer visible). Right is a smaller megaron, perhaps part of the women’s quarters. Left is a fine postern gate and a secret staircase leading to a small gateway. The Lower Citadel contains fewer identifiable buildings. A further two staircases tunnel down into underground cisterns outside the walls.
Many finds from Tiryns, the nearby hilltop citadel of Midea and its related Mycenaean cemetery at Dendra (both well worth a visit) are housed in the Archaeological Museum at Nafplio. These include a stunning suit of Mycenaean armour, complete with boar’s-tusk helmet and fragments of frescoes and flooring. Other artifacts (including frescoes) are in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens. The first capital of independent Greece from 1829 to 1834, Nafplio is a charming, curiously Italianate seaside town with a hilltop castle, a delightful waterfront, an island fortress, fine Venetian architecture, tempting shops and arguably the best ice cream parlour in Greece (the Antica Gelateria di Roma).
12
Iolcus & Mount Pelion: Centaurs, Weddings & the Voyage for the Golden Fleece
You would never grow bored of Pelion or of its way of life. You would never weary of its ash trees, grown strong in the breeze, which make straight spear shafts, never snapping at the spearhead. Nor would you tire of its caves – they are so beautiful! – or its springs or the female centaurs gathered round them. Overlook their equine element and they look like water nymphs; dwell on it and they seem like Amazons, for their womanly good looks are but enhanced by seeing them joined to their equine bodies.… They are so beautiful!
Philostratus the Elder, Imagines, 2.3
The morning is already hot and hazy. Below the low hill at Dimini, the modern port of Volos stretches its urban sprawl across the plain, its suburbs chequered with dark pine trees and lush citrus orchards. From distant highways the grind of gears and the occasional insistent blare of an alarm provide a muffled bass for the cackling concerto of cockerels squawking with increasing fervour from farmsteads closer by.
The sea once washed much nearer to our vantage point. Three and a half millennia ago the rising sun would glitter on splintering waves down there on the great inlet of the Gulf of Pagasae; though beyond, the pale folds of Mount Pelion are stippled still with shadows of tall trees and fragrant aromatic shrubs. Once Greeks believed that Centaurs lived in caves high on this wooded promontory. Intelligent and shy, half-horse, half-man, they galloped along stony tracks, as confident as any mountain goat. It was believed, too, that a white-sailed ship once cast off from the quay below, when the Argo slipped her moorings to sail east across the misty ocean to the very limits of the world. Even now, with the Centaurs and the Argo gone and a busy city booming in their stead, Volos, or Iolcus as it was known to mythology, can still be magical, a place of rare jewels and unexpected discovery.
The Centaurs
The Centaurs of Mount Pelion were the hybrid children of Centaurus, the son of Ixion. Wishing to marry princess Dia, Ixion invited her father to bring her to his palace, and then tricked him into walking over a pitfall trap into which he fell to be roasted alive. Curiously, Zeus forgave Ixion and invited him to a feast on Mount Olympus.
There Ixion plotted to seduce Hera. But Zeus found out and, to expose him, fashioned a false Hera from a cloud, with which willing substitute Ixion made love. Caught in flagrante, Ixion was arrested by Hermes, flogged and strapped to a burning wheel, on which he was rotated for eternity. Meanwhile Zeus took the opportunity to father a son by Dia: Peirithous, who later ruled the Lapiths.
The cloudy simulacrum, whose name was Nephele, also bore a son, Centaurus. Centaurus was unconventional. Conceiving a passion for a herd of mares which grazed near Iolcus, he mated with each one. Their offspring were the Centaurs, creatures with the torso of a human joined to the body of a horse, who, when provoked or drunk, could become barbarically wild.
One Centaur, Cheiron, did not share this lineage. Both immortal and much older, he was born when Cronus in the guise of a black stallion ravished the nymph Philyra. Cheiron’s appearance was different, too – he possessed the full body of a man joined to a horse’s torso and rear legs. Skilled in medicine, this wisest of all Centaurs tutored many of the greatest heroes (including Theseus, Perseus, Achilles and Jason) in the idyllic glades of Pelion.
Holding a branch, from which hangs a hare, the centaur Cheiron addresses a young protégé. (Attic red figure vase, c. 520 BC).
Aeson, Pelias & the One-Sandalled Man
As the son of its founder Cretheus, Aeson was Iolcus’ rightful king. However, Pelias, Aeson’s step-brother by their mother, Tyro, enjoyed an even higher pedigree. As a young girl Tyro had left Thessaly when her father, Salmoneus, went south to rule Elis. But Salmoneus was overbearing, and thought himself Zeus’ equal. Hurling burning firebrands as if they were lightning bolts, he drove the streets in a chariot equipped with bronze drums, which boomed like thunder. So Zeus hurled a lightning bolt of his own and put an end to Salmoneus.
Abused by her stepmother, Tyro moped by the river’s edge, where Poseidon spied her, with inevitable consequences. He engulfed Tyro in a towering wave, and nine months later she was delivered of twins, Pelias and Neleus. In shame she exposed them on the mountainside to die, but a herdsman found them and reared them until they came of age. Discovering their parentage, they rescued Tyro and returned with her to Iolcus. Here Tyro married King Cretheus and bore Aeson – who subsequently fathered a son of his own and sent him to be schooled by Cheiron on Mount Pelion. While the boy was away, old Cretheus died, and it was now that Pelias showed his colours. Imprisoning Aeson and banishing Neleus (who fled in exile to the southwest Peloponnese to found Pylos), he seized the throne. Pelias could not relax, however. He lived in dread of a one-sandalled man, whom the Delphic oracle foretold would kill him.
Meanwhile, on Mount Pelion Aeson’s son became well-versed in medicine and took the name Jason (‘Healer’). Now twenty years old and eager to restore his father to the throne, he set off for Iolcus. In his path lay the River Anaurus, thundering in spate. As he prepared to ford it, an old woman begged him to carry her across. Without a second thought, Jason set her on his back and struggled through the swollen stream. Only when they were safely across did she reveal her true identity: she was Hera in disguise, and, because Jason had helped her so willingly, she promised to aid Jason in return.
Encouraged, Jason strode on to Iolcus. Pindar describes him as:
a man of magnificent appearance, with two spears and a double tunic, the costume of his native land, close-fitting his magnificent physique. Around him he had slung a leopard skin to keep out the icy rain, and his uncut hair cascaded down his back in waves. Swiftly he strode, still testing his unshakeable resolve, until he came into the market place and stood there in the middle of the jostling crowd.
People were speculating whether Jason was a god when Pelias drove up in his polished mule-cart and stared in horror at the young man’s feet. In the swirling currents of the river Jason had lost a sandal. Pelias’ nemesis had arrived.
Jason demanded that Pelias restore Aeson to the throne. Deceitfully Pelias agreed, but first he asked Jason to ‘appease the anger of the dead’. Iolcus, he said, was haunted by the ghost of Phrixus, a local prince who had fled far to the east, borne by a miraculous golden ram. The oracle had ordered Pelias to restore to Greece both the ram’s fleece and Phrixus’ hapless ghost, that it might rest forever in its homeland. If Jason accomplished this task, Pelias would concede the kingship.
Phrixus & Helle (a Brief Digression)
Phrixus had close ties with Iolcus’ royal family. He and his sister Helle were the children of King Athamas of Boeotia (brother of Salmoneus) and the cloud-goddess Nephele. But, spurning Nephele, Athamas instead married Ino (Cadmus’ daughter, a princess of Thebes) and had two further children, Learches and Melicertes.
Jealous of her step-children, Ino plotted to kill them. She commanded local women to roast the seed-corn before it was sown to prevent it from producing crops. Inevitably the harvest failed, and Athamas sent messengers to Delphi to discover why. But Ino bribed them, and on their return they announced that the gods were angry. The only way to soothe them was to sacrifice Helle and Phrixus (whom his aunt, the wife of Cretheus, king of Iolcus, had falsely accused of raping her).
