THE METAMORPHOSES OF PUBLIUS OVIDIUS NASO

TABULA I.
IMPIETAS MINYEIDUM: DERCETIS: SEMIRAMIS: NA1AS.
The Thoban dames receive Bacchus at his festival, except Alcithoo and her
sistere, the daughters of Minyas, who remain at homo, carding and spinning.
To divert the time, one of them proposes to tell each a Btory in her turn. She
hesitates whether she will tell the story of Dercetis changed into a fish, or
the story of Semiramis changed into a dove, or that of Naias, or of the Tree
whose fruit, formerly white, was changed into the color of blood. This last
was preferred, as the story was not common.
EXPLICATIO.
IN the account of the daughters of Minyas, some reference appears to
be had to the Flood, for Minyas is described as a son of Neptune; and
Nicolaus Damascenus says, that Baris (Ararat), where the Ark rested,
ig above the country of the Minyse. Two of their names, as given by
Antoninus, were compounded in part of hippa, which is regarded as a
priestess of the hippos, or Ark. They probably adhered to the formei
rites of Bacchus, and resisted the corruptions that were introduced. In
the first part of this Fable, the names and titles of Bacchus are given,
and a brief, but lively description of the pageant of the procession. There
is also a lengthy apostrophe to Bacchus, which may be regarded in the
light of a hymn to that deity. Dercetis, to whose story reference is
briefly made by one of the sisters, is doubtless an hieroglyphic or emblem
intended to represent the Ark. It will be shown by the notes, that it
was the receptacle of the gods, in other words, Noah and his family, who
were regarded by their remote descendants with a reverence that after
wards became worship ; just as the Baris of Osiris contained the Ogdoad,
or eight gods of the Egyptians. Semiramis too, it will be seen, was a
mythological, and not an historical personage, and was no other than an
emblem of the Dove which signified to Noah the end of the Delugt.
The Ark, the Dove, and the Rainbow, were commemorated in many of
the rites of the heathens, and traces of the Arkite story are to be found
among every people of the earth, showing the universality of the tradi
tion. The Naiad referred to in the Fable, according to Arrian, lived in
Nosala, an island of the Erythrean sea, and after corrupting all the men
that came to the island, changed them into fishes. The Ichthyophagi
descended from them, after they were restored to the human form.
The story of Pyramus and Thisbe, of Babylon, which forms the
second Fable, is a continuation of the account of the Minyei'des, who
are changed into bats, after the relation of the sad fate of the Babylonian
Lovers.
258
x T non Alcithoe Minyeias Orgia censet
Accipienda dei: sed adhuc temeraria, Bacchum
Progeniem negat esse Jovis: sociasque sorores
Impictatis habet. Festum celebrare sacerdos,
Immuncsque operum dominas famulasque suorum, {
Pectora pelle tegi, crinales solvere vittas,
Serta Comis, manibus frondentes sumere thyrsos,
Jusserat: et sffivam kesi fore numinis iram,
NOT-flE.
1. A t. By the use of this particle, the poet artfully connects this
fable with the last one of the preceding book. Although Pentheua
had been punished for his impiety, Alcithoe is unwilling to own the
deiiy.
1. Or^ia. Regarding Bacchus as a blending of the Scriptural Noah
and Adam, and the rites of Bacchus as a commemoration of the Fall
of Man, and of the Flood, it is possible that Spyia is derived from opyii,
wrath, inasmuch as the anger of God was manifested at the expulsion
from Paradise, when man was forced to till the earth, and at the Flood,
when a guilty world was submerged for its impiety.
3. Sororfs. Antoninus names the sis
ters Alcithoe, Arsippa, and Leusippa.
4. Sarcnloi The priest was most pro
bably Tiresias, or Arrctes.
fi. Ptlle tffi. To be clothed with
skins. This was in commemoration of
God s clothing our first parents, when man
was ordered to till the ground. The skins
of fawns and foxes were employed. The
latter was probably an addition of later
times. Foxes were slain because they hurt
the vines.
6. Crinales solvere. In these sacrifices,
women were accustomed to let the ha'r
flow dishevelled, in token of the distress
of our general mother when rushing wildly
forth from Eden, a wanderer over the earth
8. -Eirst mtminis: of the insulted deity.
If they should refuse to attend his rites.
10. Calathot. Baskets in which they
259