Chapter 2: The Olympians
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Diodorus Siculus 3.62.6
And though the writers of myths have handed down the account of a third birth as well, at which, as they say, the Sons of Gaia tore to pieces the god, who was a son of Zeus and Demeter, and boiled him, but his members were brought together again by Demeter and he experienced a new birth as if for the first time, such accounts as this they trace back to certain causes found in nature. Greek Text
Hyginus, Fabulae 167
LIBER: Liber, son of Jove and Proserpine, was dismembered by the Titans, and Jove gave his heart, torn to bits, to Semele in a drink. When she was made pregnant by this, Juno, changing herself to look like Semele’s nurse, Beroe, said to her: “Daughter, ask Jove to come to you as he comes to Juno, so you may know what pleasure it is to sleep with a god.” At her suggestion Semele made this request of Jove, and was smitten by a thunderbolt. He took Liber from her womb, and gave him to Nysus to be cared for. For this reason he is called Dionysus, and also “the one with two mothers.” Latin Text
Iliad 6.130-40
Nay, for even the son of Dryas, mighty Lycurgus, lived not long, seeing that he strove with heavenly gods—he that on a time drave down over the sacred mount of Nysa the nursing mothers of mad Dionysus; and they all let fall to the ground their wands, smitten with an ox-goad by man-slaying Lycurgus. But Dionysus fled, and plunged beneath the wave of the sea, and Thetis received him in her bosom, filled with dread, for mighty terror gat hold of him at the man’s threatenings. Then against Lycurgus did the gods that live at ease wax wroth, and the son of Cronos made him blind; and he lived not for long, seeing that he was hated of all the immortal gods. Greek Text
Homeric Hymn 26 to Dionysus
The rich-haired Nymphs received him in their bosoms from the lord his father and fostered and nurtured him carefully in the dells of Nysa, where by the will of his father he grew up in a sweet-smelling cave, being reckoned among the immortals. Greek Text
Hesiod, Theogony 942
a mortal woman an immortal son. And now they both are gods. Greek Text
Eumelos, Europeia fr 11 PEG – Poetae Epici Graeci 1, p. 112, ed. A. Bernabé. Leipzig, 1987.
Stesichoros 234 PMG – Poetae Melici Graeci, p. 123, ed. D. L. Page. Oxford 1962.
Pherekydes 3F90 – Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker 1, pp. 84-85, ed. F. Jacoby. 2d ed. Leiden 1957.
ApB 3.5.1 – Apollodoros, Bibliotheke (Library)
But Lycurgus, son of Dryas, was king of the Edonians, who dwell beside the river Strymon, and he was the first who insulted and expelled him. Dionysus took refuge in the sea with Thetis, daughter of Nereus, and the Bacchanals were taken prisoners together with the multitude of Satyrs that attended him. But afterwards the Bacchanals were suddenly released, and Dionysus drove Lycurgus mad. And in his madness he struck his son Dryas dead with an axe, imagining that he was lopping a branch of a vine, and when he had cut off his son’s extremities, he recovered his senses. But the land remaining barren, the god declared oracularly that it would bear fruit if Lycurgus were put to death. On hearing that, the Edonians led him to Mount Pangaeum and bound him, and there by the will of Dionysus he died, destroyed by horses. Greek Text
Hyginus, Fabulae 132
LYCURGUS: Lycurgus, son of Dryas, drove Liber from his kingdom. When he denied that Liber was a god, and had drunk wine, and in drunkenness tried to violate his mother, he then tried to cut down the vines, because he said wine was a bad medicine in that it affected the mind. Under madness sent by Liber he killed his wife and son. Liber threw Lycurgus himself to his panthers on Rhodope, a mountain of Thrace, over which he ruled. He is said to have cut off one foot thinking it was a vine. Latin Text
Hyginus, Fabulae 242
Lycurgus, son of Dryas, killed himself in madness sent by Liber. Latin Text
Sophocles, Antigone 955-65
And Dryas’s son, the Edonian king swift to rage, was tamed in recompense for his frenzied insults, when, by the will of Dionysus, he was shut in a rocky prison. There the fierce and swelling force of his madness trickled away. That man came to know the god whom in his frenzy he had provoked with mockeries. For he had sought to quell the god-inspired women and the Bacchanalian fire, and he angered the Muses who love the flute. Greek Text
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Edited by Elena Bianchelli, Senior Lecturer of Classical Languages and Culture, Univ. of Georgia, May 2020
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