Chapter 1: The Early Gods
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♠ Hesiod, Theogony 453-62
But Rhea was subject in love to Cronos and bore splendid children, Hestia, Demeter, and gold-shod Hera and strong Hades, pitiless in heart, who dwells under the earth, and the loud-crashing Earth-Shaker, and wise Zeus, father of gods and men, by whose thunder the wide earth is shaken. These great Cronos swallowed as each came forth from the womb to his mother’s knees with this intent, that no other of the proud sons of Heaven should hold the kingly office amongst the deathless gods. Greek Text
♠ Hesiod, Theogony 491
himself to reign over the deathless gods. Greek Text
♠ Hesiod, Theogony 463-91
For he learned from Earth and starry Heaven that he was destined to be overcome by his own son, strong though he was, through the contriving of great Zeus. Therefore he kept no blind outlook, but watched and swallowed down his children: and unceasing grief seized Rhea. But when she was about to bear Zeus, the father of gods and men, then she besought her own dear parents, Earth and starry Heaven, to devise some plan with her that the birth of her dear child might be concealed, and that retribution might overtake great, crafty Cronos for his own father and also for the children whom he had swallowed down. And they readily heard and obeyed their dear daughter, and told her all that was destined to happen touching Cronos the king and his stout-hearted son. So they sent her to Lyctus, to the rich land of Crete, when she was ready to bear great Zeus, the youngest of her children. Him did vast Earth receive from Rhea in wide Crete to nourish and to bring up. To that place came Earth carrying him swiftly through the black night to Lyctus first, and took him in her arms and hid him in a remote cave beneath the secret places of the holy earth on thick-wooded Mount Aegeum; but to the mightily ruling son of Heaven, the earlier king of the gods, she gave a great stone wrapped in swaddling clothes. Then he took it in his hands and thrust it down into his belly: wretch! he knew not in his heart that in place of the stone his son was left behind, unconquered and untroubled, and that he was soon to overcome him by force and might and drive him from his honors, himself to reign over the deathless gods. Greek Text
♠ Mousaios 2B8 – Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker 1, pp. 23-24, ed. H. Diels and W. Kranz. 6th ed. Berlin 1951.
♠ Pseudo-Eratosthenes, Katasterismoi 13 – Mythographi Graeci vol. 3.1, p. 17, ed. A. Olivieri. Leipzig 1897.
♠ Hyginus, De Astronomia 2.13.4
On his left shoulder (the goat) Capra stands, and in his left hand the Kids seem to be placed. They tell this story about him. A certain Olenus, son of Vulcan, had two daughters, the nymphs Aex and Helice, who were nurses of Jove. Others have said that certain cities were named from them — Olenus in Aulis, Helice in the Peloponneus, and Aex in Haemonia — about which Homer writes in the second book of the Iliad. But Parmeniscus say that a certain Melisseus was king in Crete, and to his daughters Jove was brought to nurse. Since they did not have milk, they furnished him a she-goat, Amalthea by name, who is said to have reared him. She often bore twin kids, and at the very time that Jove was brought to her to nurse, had borne a pair. And so because of the kindness of the mother, the kids, too were placed among the constellations. Cleostratus of Tenedos is said to have first pointed out these kids among the stars.
But Musaeus says Jove was nursed by Themis and the nymph Amalthea, to whom he was given by Ops, his mother. Now Amalthea had as a pet a certain goat which is said to have nursed Jove.
Some have called Aex the daughter of Sol, who surpassed many in beauty of body, but in contrast to this beauty, had a most horrible face. Terrified by it, the Titans begged Terra to hide her body, and Terra is said to have hidden her in a cave in the island of Crete. Later she became nurse of Jove, as we have said before. But when Jupiter, confident in his youth, was preparing for war against the Titans, oracular reply was given to him that if he wished to win, he should carry on the war protected with the skin of a goat, aigos, and the head of the Gorgon. The Greeks call this the aegis. When this was done, as we have shown above, Jupiter, overcoming the Titans, gained possession of the kingdom. Covering the remaining bones of the goat with a skin, he gave life to them and memorialised them, picturing them with stars. Afterwards he gave to Minerva the aegis with which he had been protected when he won.
♠ Germanicus Scholia – Eratosthenis Catasterismorum Reliquiae, p. 102, ed. C. Robert Berlin 1878.
♠ Kallimachos Hymn 1.47-48 – Callimachus 2, p. 3, ed. R. Pfeiffer. Oxford 1953
♠ ∑b Iliad 15.229 – Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem 4, p. 86, ed. W. Dindorf and E. Maass. Oxford 1877.
♠ Ovid, Fasti 5.111-28
Begin the work with Jupiter. On the first night is visible the star that tended the cradle of Jupiter; the rainy sign of the Olenian She-goat rises. She has her place in the sky as a reward for the milk she gave the babe. The Naiad Amalthea, famous on the Cretan Mount Ida, is said to have hidden Jupiter in the woods. She owned a she-goat, conspicuous among the Dictaean flocks, the fair dam of two kids; her airy horns bent over on her back; her udder was such as the nurse of Jove might have. She suckled the god. But she broke a horn on a tree, and was short of half her charm. The nymph picked it up, wrapped it in fresh herds, and carried it, full of fruit, to the lips of Jove. He, when he had gained the kingdom of heaven and sat on his father’s throne, and there was nothing greater than unconquered Jove, made his nurse and her horn of plenty into stars: the horn still keeps its mistress’ name. Latin Text
♠ 361 PMG – Poetae Melici Graeci, p. 184. ed. D. L. Page. Oxford 1962.
♠ Phokylides fr 7 – Fragments of Greek lyric poetry cited according to E. Diehl, Anthologia Lyrica Graeca 1-3. Leipzig 1949-52
♠ Pherekydes 3F42 – Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker 1, p. 74, ed. F. Jacoby, 2d ed. Leiden 1957.
Amaltheia was the daugther of Haimonios, and she had the horn of a bull. This horn, as Pherekydes says, had such power that it furnished plentiful food or drink, whatever one might desire . (Transl. E. Bianchelli)
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Edited by Elena Bianchelli, Senior Lecturer of Classical Languages and Culture, Univ. of Georgia, July 2020
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