Listed 6 sub titles with search on: Mythology for destination: "KELENES Ancient city TURKEY".
Son of Possidon and Danaida Kelenous.
A Silenus of Phrygian legend (really god of the river of the same name near the old Phrygian town Celaenae), son of Hyagnis or of Olympus. He was the typical player on the flute. Among the Phrygians the flute entered into the worship of Cybele and Dionysus, and Marsyas is said to have instructed Olympus in playing upon that instrument. According to a Greek legend, Athene had invented the flute, and then cast it aside because it distorted the features of the player. Marsyas took it up, and became so skilful as to challenge Apollo, the patron god of the lyre. The Muses having declared him vanquished, the god flayed him; his skin was hung up in the cave from which the river Marsyas issued, and was said to move about joyfully when a flute was played. King Midas, who had decided in his favour, received as punishment from Apollo a pair of ass's ears. The contest was a favourite subject in art.
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Nov 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Marsyas (Marsuas), a mythological personage, connected with the earliest period
of Greek music. He is variously called the son of Hyagnis, or of Oeagrus, or of
Olympus. Some make him a satyr, others a peasant. All agree in placing him in
Phrygia. The following is the outline of his story, according to the mythographers.
Athena having, while playing the flute, seen the reflection of herself in water,
and observed the distortion of her features, threw away the instrument in disgust.
It was picked up by Marsyas, who no sooner began to blow through it than the flute,
having once been inspired by the breath of a goddess, emitted of its own accord
the most beautiful strains. Elated by his success, Marsyas was rash enough to
challenge Apollo to a musical contest, the conditions of which were that the victor
should do what he pleased with the vanquished. The Muses, or, according to others,
the Nysaeans, were the umpires. Apollo played upon the cithara, and Marsyas upon
the flute; and it was not till the former added his voice to the music of his
lyre that the contest was decided in his favour. As a just punishment for the
presumption of Marsyas, Apollo bound him to a tree, and flayed him alive. His
blood was the source of the river Marsyas, and Apollo hung up his skin in the
cave out of which that river flows. His flutes (for, according to some, the instrument
on which he played was the double flute) were carried by the river Marsyas into
the Maeander, and again emerging in the Asopus, were thrown on land by it in the
Sicyonian territory, and were dedicated to Apollo in his temple at Sicyon. (Apollod.
Bibl. i. 4. 2; Palaeph. de Incredib. 48; Liban. Narrat. 14, p. 1104; Nonn. Narrat.
ad Greg. Invect. ii. 10, p. 164; Diod. iii. 58, 59; Paus. ii. 7. 9; Herod. vii.
26; Xen. Anab. i. 2. 8; Plut. de Fluv. 10; Hygin. Fab. 165; Ovid, Metam. vi. 382,
400.) The fable evidently refers to the struggle between the citharoedic and auloedic
styles of music, of which the former was connected with the worship of Apollo
among the Dorians, and the latter with the orgiastic rites of Cybele in Phrygia.
It is easy to apply this explanation to the different parts of the legend; and
it may be further illustrated by other traditions respecting Marsyas. He is made
by some the inventor of the flute, by others of the double flute. ( Plut. de Mus.
p. 1132, a.; Suid. s. v. ; Athen. iv. p. 184, a., xiv. p. 616, 617; Plin. H. N.
vii. 56.) By a confusion between the mythical and the historical, the flute-player
Olympus is made his son, or by some his father. He is spoken of as a follower
of Cybele (Diod. l. c.), and he occupies, in fact, the same place in the orgiastic
worship of Cybele that Seilenus does in the worship of Dionysus: Pausanias (l.
c.) actually calls him Seilenus, and other writers connect him with Dionysus.
The story of Marsyas was often referred to by the lyric and epigrammatic
poets (Bode, Gesch. d. Lyr. Dichtk. vol. ii. pp. 296, 297; Brunck, Anal. vol.
i. p. 488, vol. ii. p. 97), and formed a favourite subject for works of art. (Muller,
Archaeol. d. Kunst, 362. n. 4.) In the fora of ancient cities there was frequently
placed a statue of Marsyas, with one hand erect, in token, according to Servius,
of the freedom of the state, since Marsyas was a minister of Bacchus, the god
of liberty. (Serv. in Aen. iv. 528.) It seems more likely that the statue, standing
in the place where justice was administered, was intended to hold forth an example
of the severe punishment of arrogant presumption. (Bottiger, Kleine Schriften,
vol. i. p. 28.) The statue of Marsyas in the forum of Rome is well known by the
allusions of Horace (Sat. i. 6. 120), Juvenal (Sat. ix. 1,2),and Martial (ii.
64. 7). This statue was the place of assembly for the courtezans of Rome, who
used to crown it with chaplets of flowers. (Plin. H. N. xxi. 3; Senec. de Benef.
vi. 32; Lipsins, Antiq. Lect. 3.)
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2006 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Marsyas the Silenus : Picks up flutes of Athena, plays on flute, composes Mother's Air, defends Celaenae against Gauls, defeated in a musical contest with Apollo, flayed and hung on a pinetree, the "Silenus" according to legend worsted in a musical competition and flayed by Apollo, his flutes dedicated to Apollo at Sicyon, represented in art.
Atys, Attys, Attes, Attis, or Attin (Atus). A son of Nana, and a beautiful shepherd
of the Phrygian town, Celaenae (Theocr. xx. 40; Philostr. Epist. 39; Tertul. de
Nat. 1). His story is related in different ways.
According to Ovid (Fast. iv. 221), Cybele loved the beautiful shepherd,
and made him her own priest on condition that he should preserve his chastity
inviolate. Atys broke the covenant with a nymph, the daughter of the river-god
Sangarius, and was thrown by the goddess into a state of madness, in which he
unmanned himself. When in consequence he wanted to put an end to his life, Cybele
changed him into a firtree, which henceforth became sacred to her, and she commanded
that, in future, her priests should be eunuchs.
Another story relates, that Atys, the priest of Cybele, fled into
a forest to escape the voluptuous embraces of a Phrygian king, but that he was
overtaken, and in the ensuing struggle unmanned his pursuer. The dying king avenged
himself by inflicting the same calamity upon Atys. Atys was found by the priests
of Cybele under a fir-tree, at the moment he was expiring. They carried him into
the temple of the goddess, and endeavoured to restore him to life, but in vain.
Cybele ordained that the death of Atys should be bewailed every year in solemn
lamentations, and that henceforth her priests should be eunuchs.
A third account says, that Cybele, when exposed by her father, the
Phrygian king Maeon, was fed by panthers and brought up by shepherdesses, and
that she afterwards secretly married Atys, who was subsequently called Papas.
At this moment, Cybele was recognised and kindly received by her parents; but
when her connexion with Atys became known to them, Maeon ordered Attis, and the
shepherdesses among whom she had lived, to be put to death. Cybele, maddened with
grief at this act of her father, traversed the country amid loud lamentations
and the sound of cymbals. Phrygia was now visited by an epidemic and scarcity.
The oracle commanded that Attis should be buried, and divine honours paid to Cybele;
but as the body of the youth was already in a state of decomposition, the funeral
honours were paid to an image of him, which was made as a substitute (Diod. iii.
58, &c.).
According to a fourth story related by Pausanias (vii. 17.5), Atys
was a son of the Phrygian king Calaus, and by nature incapable of propagating
his race. When he had grown up, he went to Lydia, where he introduced the worship
of Cybele. The grateful goddess conceived such an attachment for him, that Zeus
in his anger at it, sent a wild boar into Lydia, which killed many of the inhabitants,
and among them Atys also.
Atys was believed to be buried in Pessinus under mount Agdistis (Paus.
i. 4.5). He was worshipped in the temples of Cybele in common with this goddess
(vii. 20.; Hesych. s. v. Attes) In works of art he is represented as a shepherd
with flute and staff. His worship appears to have been introduced into Greece
at a comparatively late period. It is an ingenious opinion of Boettiger (Amalthea,
i), that the mythus of Atys represents the twofold character of nature, the male
and female, concentrated in one.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Lityerses (Lituerses), a natural son of Midas, lived at Celaenae in Phrygia, engaged in rural pursuits, and hospitably received all strangers that passed his house, but he then compelled them to assist him in the harvest, and whenever they allowed themselves to be surpassed by him in their work, he cut off their heads in the evening, and concealed their bodies in the sheaves, accompanying his deed with songs. Heracles, however, slew him, and threw his body into the Maeander. The Phrygian reapers used to celebrate his memory in a harvestsong which bore the name of Lityerses (Schol. ad Theocrit. x. 41; Athen. x. p. 615, xiv. p. 619; Eustath. ad Hom. p. 1164; Hesych., Phot., Suid. s. v.; Pollux, iv. 54).
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