Ans. Juno and Jove were playfully arguing about whether love was better for men or women. Jove believed that it had to be better for women, and Juno disagreed, so they called on Tiresias. The old man was the expert on the subject because he’d been born a man, but when he had one day hit mating snakes with a stick, he was transformed into a woman. Years later he came across the snakes again and hit them so that he would be transformed back into a man. Tiresias sided with Jove in the argument, and Juno wrathfully blinded him. To make up for Juno’s cruelty, and since he could not break her spell, Jove gave him the gift of prophecy.

Besides longevity, another of Tiresias’s features involves his having lived as a man, then as a woman, and then as a man again. Reportedly, he had been turned into a woman as the result of having struck and wounded mating snakes. When Tiresias returned to the site of the transformation seven years later to see if the “spell” could be reversed, Tiresias did indeed see the same snakes coupling and was changed back into a man.

That experience of life as both sexes may have inadvertently caused his blindness. One story holds that Hera and Zeus disagreed about which of the sexes experienced more pleasure during sex, with Hera arguing that the answer was men, by far. When they consulted Tiresias, he asserted that women had greater pleasure than men, and Hera thereupon struck him blind. Zeus, in thanks for his support, gave him the gifts of prophecy and longevity. Another version has it that Tiresias was blinded by Athena after he saw her bathing. Chariclo begged her to help him, so Athena, instead of restoring his ability to see the physical world, gave him the ability to see the future.

Tiresias also had a role in Homer’s Odyssey. In that work, Tiresias retained his prophetic gifts even in the underworld, where the hero Odysseus was sent to consult him.

The figure of Tiresias recurs in later European literature, both as prophet and as man-woman, in such works as T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land (1922).

Ans. The traditional epic is usually unified by a single hero, whose fortune is the central theme of the epic. The hero is usually a grand figure who does larger than life good deeds and who usually sets off on a journey. Has an extremely high position in society and when he falls, he tends to fall hard. Virgil had given Roman poets a new example for the formal narrative. His 15 books of the Metamorphoses were not unified by a single hero who has cross reference and climactic closure. Ovid has stated publicly new critical standards by which a poem should be judged, and the standards being that poems should be hig) y refined, evoking more than it said, and he rejected the long narrative form as being te dious. Callimachus has expressly praised the fine-spun verse and denounced the continuous unbroken poem. Here was Ovid declaring that he would

Or write a long and totally comprehensive poem that was also fine-spun and refined. And the title implied that the poem would be a composite of many transformation tales. The result is the Metamorphoses, a continuous poem (carmen perpetuum as he calls it in Metamorphoses 1.4) in 15 books, containing roughly 250 tales of ‘transformations’ ‘shape-shifting’. Not for Ovid the concentrated narrative of the Iliad, dealing with a short period of time in the final year of the Trojan War, or the Aeneid with its constant movement in the direction of the foundation of Rome and its glorious future. Ovid’s poem jumps from time to time and place to place, links between the stories being at times tenuous and keeping his readers on their toes by sometimes putting stories within other stories – as in this text where the tale of the sailors is embedded in the tale of Pentheus.

Actaeon is turned into a stag.

Narcissus is turned into a flower.

Echo is turned into a disembodied voice.

Sailors are turned into dolphins.

Teeth are turned into soldiers.

Jupiter is turned into mortal form to seduce Semele and then back to divine to kill her. Tiresias is turned into woman and then man again.

Pentheus is not changed in fact – but his nearest and dearest are made not to recognise him as they kill him. The dogs see straight but Actaeon changes shape – Pentheus keeps his shape but the killers are deluded.

Juno and Jove were playfully arguing about whether love was better for men or women. Jove believed that it had to be better for women, and Juno disagreed, so they called on Tiresias. The old man was the expert on the subject because he’d been born a man, but when he had one day hit mating snakes with a stick, he was transformed into a woman. Years later he came across the snakes again and hit them so that he would be transformed back into a man. Tiresias sided with Jove in the argument, and Juno wrathfully blinded him. To make up for Juno’s cruelty, and since he couldnot break her spell, Jove gave him the gift of prophecy.

Ans. In Greek and Roman mythology, the role of gods and goddesses were very influential to the people. Praising and sacrificing for the gods was an important part of everyday life in this culture, and any opposition of the gods were returned with punishment. The power of the gods is shown in Charles Martin’s translation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. In Book VI of Metamorphoses, which is rightly subtitled “Of Praise and Punishment”, three specific instances of the gods’ smite are shown through the conflict between Minerva and Arachne, Niobe and Latona, and the ill-fated marriage of Tereus and Procne.

What was Ovid’s view of the gods’ ethical performance: Ovid’s metamorphoses give us a fair image into the Roman as well as Greek gods in actions. In every lesson about these gods, it constantly proves that the gods are childish, jealous of any worship

is us at is not specific to them, and overall, not very god like. In his first story Ovid gives that Cupid was able to shoot Apollo with an arrow that made him fall in love with a nymph, it shows us that these gods do not have a chain of command all the gods un around trying to help certain nations while other gods try and foil their plans. In other story he tells us about a woman named Niobe and how she proclaimed that e should be worshiped instead of the gods because she had fourteen children. Several nuously connected short stories follow, including the stories of how Medusa’s progeny, the winged horse Pegasus, created a fountain with a stomp of his foot, how King Pyreneus tried to capture the Muses, how nine sisters who challenged the Muses singing contest were turned to birds when they lost, and how Arachne was ransformed into a spider after beating Minerva in a contest of spinning.

When Niobe of Thebes openly declares she is more fit to be worshipped as a goddess than Latona (mother of Apollo and Diana) on the grounds that she has borne fourteen children to Latona’s two, she is punished by having all her children killed and is herself turned to stone. Stories are then told of how Latona punished men who were rude to her by turning them into frogs, and how Apollo flayed a satyr for daring to challenge his superiority as a musician.

Ans. Acoetes is a shipmaster and a convert to Bacchus. Acoetes tries to convince Pentheus to worship Bacchus. Acoetes is not in Euripides’ Bacchae where the stranger before the king is the god himself in disguise. It is tempting to at least wonder whether Acoetes is the god himself (who is a master of disguise), as Pentheus had ordered his men to bring the ducem in chains (562-3) and this would give more point to his remark (658-9):

Acoetessaid: ‘My name is Acoetes, I was born in Lydia, and my parents were of humble stock. My father did not leave me any fields for sturdy bullocks to till, or any woolly flocks, or herds. He was a poor man, as I am, and used to catch fish with hook and line: with his rod he drew them, leaping, from the stream. His fisherman’s skill was all his wealth. This he passed on to me, saying: Take such riches as I have, be my successor and heir to my craft”.

Acoetes is brought in arrested with his arms tied behind his back, reminiscent in this of Sinon in Virgil’s Aeneid 2 who is also brought in to tell a tale which will have disastrous effects on its hearers. He seems oddly unconcerned and takes his time telling a long tale (Pentheus later describes his speech as ‘rambling’; 692) to show the king what this stranger can do. Here again we have direct speech quoted inside the direct speech of Acoetes’ tale, we have some very strong action such as Acoetes getting punched in the throat by Lycabas (626-7) – and we have some wonderful narrative art shown in the transformation first of the ship, then of the men, with the side-show of the tigers, lynxes and panthers thrown in for extra effect. Ovid writes a speech for each character which seems to come straight from the speaker’s heart; but he also manages to convey dialogue in reported speech (572-3):

Q. 5. Ovid’ Metamorphoses, offers a critique of the epic-heroic tradition of Homer and Virgil. Discuss with reference to the story of Bacchus.

Ans. Metamorphoses means Transformations is a narrative poem in fifteen books by the Roman poet Ovid, completed in 8 CE. It is an epic, rather a’mock-epical’ poem describing the creation and history of the world, incorporating many of the best known and loved stories from Greek mythology, although centring more on mortal characters than on heroes or the gods. Thetraditional epic is usually unified by a single hero, whose fortune is the central theme of the epic. The hero is usually a grand figure who does larger than life good deeds and who usually sets off on a journey. Has an extremely high position in society and when he falls, he tends to fall hard. Virgil had given Roman poets a new example for the formal narrative. His 15 books of the Metamorphoses were not unified by a single hero who has cross reference and climactic closure. Ovid has stated publicly new critical standards by which a poem should be judged, and the standards being that poems should be highly refined, evoking more than it said, and he rejected the long narrative form as being tedious. Callimachus has expressly praised the fine-spun verse and denounced the continuous unbroken poem. Here was Ovid declaring that he would write a long and totally comprehensive poèm that was also fine-spun and refined. And the title implied that the poem would be a composite of many transformation tales. The result is the Metamorphoses, a continuous poem (carmen perpetuum as he calls it in Metamorphoses 1.4) in 15 books, containing roughly 250 tales of ‘transformations’ or ‘shape-shifting’. Not for Ovid the concentrated narrative of the Iliad, dealing with a short period of time in the final year of the Trojan War, or the Aeneid with its constant movement in the direction of the foundation of Rome and its glorious future. Ovid’s poem jumps from time to time and place to place, links between the stories being at times tenuous and keeping his readers on their toes by sometimes putting stories within other stories – as in this text where the tale of the sailors is embedded in the tale of Pentheus. Homer’s Iliad is dominated by a theme – anger – and a small group of characters, whereas the Metamorphoses has a huge dramatis personae and defies easy analysis in thematic terms.

Q. 6. Comment on the character of Bacchus with references to Ovid’ Metamorphoses, Book III.

Ans. Ovid chose to write The Metamorphoses as a poem that meets the criteria for an epic; it is sufficiently long nearly 12000 lines, it has nearly 250 narratives joined together in fifteen books; it is composed in the dactylic hexameter, the meter of both the ancient Iliad and the Odyssey, and the more contemporary Latin epic Aeneid; and it treats the high literary subject of myth. But at the same time, he employs themes and tones of various genres that extend from the grand epic to the elegy, the tragedy and the pastoral. The most striking image that Ovid creates of the god is one of a cruel exactor of divine justice. His transformation of the sailors into dolphins is one of many examples where mortals are stripped of their humanity as a punishment for their hubris. This image is particularly important in the wider context of Met. 3, with this anecdote being used as a precautionary tale and a foreshadowing of the ‘transformation’ that Pentheus will undergo. However, we do also see that Ovid has created an image of the god that is

or more three dimensional than it may first appear. Bacchus can be seen as playful, en childish, taking on the role of a trickster god, as well as a divine avenger. He ends to be unaware of the sailors’ deceit and seems to take some kind of pleasure the spectacle he is creating. The phantom creatures he summons up are, in a an example of the god’s impish sense of humour, as all they add to the scene is more enjoyment for him, and for the reader. With this being said, it is worth noting that Bacchus takes pity on the innocent Acoetes, and thus, the image of Bacchus as ruel and manipulative is somewhat softened. However, the image that Ovid creates is most definitely not one of a benevolent god.

Ans. Metamorphoses is a Latin narrative poem written in 8 A.D. by Roman poetOvidius Naso (43 B.C.-18 A.D.), better known as simply Ovid. Divided in fifteen books, Metamorphoses contains 250 myths, and it is our main source of classical Greek mythology Ovid returns to the story of Cadmus’s family. Pentheus tries to persuade his family and others not to worship Bacchus. No one is convinced, but Pentheus stands firm. Not even Acoetes, a convert to the worship of Bacchus, can change his mind. Pentheus threatens to make Acoetes into an example by killing him. Penthous sets out for Mount Cithaeron to spy on the rites of Bacchus. When he arrives, his own aunt and mother mistake him for an animal and hunt him. His aunt, Autonoe, rips off his arms, and his mother tears off his head and lets out a shout of victory.

Pentheus regards any pretension to efficacious magic on the part of Bacchus as fraudulent – hardly surprising given his conviction that the latter is an impostor The charge recalls a passage in Euripides’ Bacchac, where Pentheus comments scornfully on reports that a ‘wizard conjurer’ has arrived from Lydia. The Greek formulation is slightly more ambiguous since it leaves open the possibility that the alleged wizardry is genuine – an ambiguity reinforced by the equivocal focalization (the people whose report Pentheus is reporting most likely believe in the supernatural powers of the stranger, whereas Pentheus clearly does not). The sense of secrecy and, of course, mystery with which these cults shrouded their rites naturally suggested the idea of magic to outside observers.

In the middle of the lo ng rhetorical question we get, buried in a relative clause, an evocation of the martial spirit of the Thebans, the overpowering of which by Bacchus is the immediate cause of Pentheus dismay This device is in the tradition of Ennius’ Aunals, where it was used to more extravagant effect at tuba terribilisomtutaratantaradır (and the trumpet in terrible tones blared “taratantara 140 Sk); Africa terribilitremithorrida terra tumultu (Africa, a rough land, trembled with a terrible tumult, Ann. 310 Sk).Pentheus witnesses and unwillingly takes part in the secret the rites of Bacchus. The result of each of these boundary crossings justifies Ovid’s dictum, “do not call someone happy until he dies and his funeral is over (III 136 137). When people cross boundaries, the result is blindness, death by sex, death by dogs, or an equally horrible fate. While Thebes is founded happily its subsequent history quickly grows grim.

enemy any event Pentheus here seems to refer to an occasion in which the Thebans faced an army in regular battle without fear. It is difficult to match this occasion with in Thebes’ very young history: ancient myth records no such encounter, and Cadmus battle with the dragon or the civil war among the Spartoi (the military scenarios that defined the foundation of the city) do not fit the bill.

Despite the fact that Pentheus blames Bacchus for upsetting the strict separation of male and female, the dominant group participating in Bacchic rites are women. As he makes clear later in his speech (esp. 553–56), Pentheus regards Bacchus as deficient in masculinity.

Bacchus, the god of the vine, was of course well known for inducing states of inebriation and ecstasy in his worshippers; Pentheus acknowledges the phenomenon, but deprives it of any religious significance by characterizing it as what we might now term ‘substance abuse’. In his view, Bacchus’ followers are intoxicated miscreants who conceal their sozzled antics under a veneer of ritual piety.

Pentheus’ contempt is clearly expressed in obsceni… greges: the word grex, like English ‘herd’ is often disparaging when used of human beings. The original sense of obscenus seems to have been ‘ill omened’ (so Ovid has obscenapuppis at Her. 5.119, of the ship that conveyed Helen to Troy), whence it came to mean ‘detestable, repulsive’, and eventually something like ‘obscene’ in the modern sense. Sexual license and like transgressions were widely attributed to Bacchic cult practice (see e.g. Eur. Bacch. 21523; Liv. 39.8.7 stuprapromiscua, ‘widespread adultery’ with Intro. §6).

The mention of this instrumen is clearly an appropriate epithet (but perhaps a double entendre), completes the list of musical instruments associated with the cult (532-33 n.). As McNamara (2010, 179) observes, Pentheus ‘begins and ends his list with the actual musical paraphernalia of Bacchic worship while he places the more abstract Bacchic associations (fraudes… fémineaevoces… insania… obsceniquegreges) between these. He thus “buries” his less tangible concerns within the brackets of these “real” items. For these concerns (magic, insanity, obscenity, femininity) are the standard accusations levelled at Bacchic rites by those who often represent more traditional authoritative religion’. The reference in context must be to religious conversion but here and elsewhere the use of military language and martial imagery exemplifies Pentheus’ martial obsession. Rather more subtly, it could also involve mythographic play with an older version of the tale, predating Euripides’ Bacchae, in which Pentheus responds to the arrival of Dionysus by leading an army into the mountains, only to be defeated in battle by a troop of Maenads.

Ans. Metamorphoses is a Latin narrative poem written in 8 A.D. by Roman poet Publius Ovidius Naso (43 B.C.-18 A.D.), better known as simply Ovid. Divided in fifteen ooks, Metamorphoses contains 250 myths, and it is our main source of classical Greek mythology. Starting from the story of creation and the flood to the deification of Julius Caesar and reign of Augustus, the poem contains many famous mythical stories such that of Daedalus and Icarus. Even with its complex narrative structure, modern scholars see four major divisions to Metamorphoses: “Divine Comedy” or “Gods in Love,” books 1-2; “Avenging Gods,” books 3-6 (to line 400); “Pathos of Love” the rest of book 6-11; and “History of Rome and the Deified Caesar,” books 12-15. Metamorphoses, Ovid’s magnum opus, is considered by current scholars as a masterpiece of Latin literature. With translations into just about every European language, it became the most-read of all classical works during the Middle Ages. The myths contained in this poem have inspired works in every medium for centuries. Ovid’s work has inspired Writers such as Dante, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Marlow, and Milton; painters such as Brueghel; and composers such as Händel among many others. Ovid’s Metamorphoses has exerted a profound influence on Western culture

Ans. The most well-known version of the myth in Ovid’s Metamorphoses tells of a young Theban nobleman, 1 grandson of Cadmus, who is hunting with his companions. Nearby, the goddess Diana is bathing with her nymphs. Resting in the midday heat, Actaeon stumbles unintentionally into her grotto, she reacts by changing him into a stag, and there follows a long description of the pursuit of this stag and his eventual death, torn apart by his own hunting dogs, with the encouragement of his former companions.

When we first encounter Actaeon he is a hunter, a young man leading to his companions, who delights in his prowess. It is because of him that the mountain side was stained with the slaughter of different wild animals, he is therefore a skilled speaker whose rhetoric evokes the literary ideals of the mythic-epic world. The reversal from hunter to the hunted turns on Actaeon’s encounter with Diana. This encounter is described by Ovid as a ‘fault of fortune’ (fortune crimen, 141) in which the fates guide the hunter’s wandering steps. In Ovid’s account, Actaeon certainly does not intend to spy on the naked goddess, yet nor is he punished simply for his glimpse of her. Diana’s wrath focuses on his potential role as an informant.

Q. 3.Write about the episode of Narcissus in Ovid’s Metamorphoses.

Ans. Narcissus’s is an interesting episode in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. He is a beautiful boy. Echo fell in love with Narcissus. Everyone had attraction with him. Narcissus was fond of hunting. He became mad in love with Echo. One day, he was returning from hunting. He felt thirsty. He seeing a pond, he stood there. He wanted to quench his thirst. He went there to drink water. He saw there his own reflection. He felt enchanted after seeing the reflection. His delusion made him plunge into the water. He expressed everything to the woods. He died of drowning in the water of the pool. His dead body was turned into a flower then.

Q. 4. How is the world depicted in Metamorphoses? Are the setting of the myths safe and peaceful places or dangerous and chaotic in Ovid’s Metamorphoses?

Ans. The most well-known version of the myth in Ovid’s Metamorphoses tells of a young Theban nobleman, a grandson of Cadmus, who is hunting with his companions. Nearby, the goddess Diana is bathing with her nymphs. Resting in the midday heat, Actaeon stumbles unintentionally into her grotto, she reacts by changing him into a stag, and there follows a long description of the pursuit of this stag and his eventual death, torn apart by his own hunting dogs, with the encouragement of his former companions.

When we first encounter Actaeon he is a hunter, a young man leading to his companions, who delights in his prowess. It is because of him that the mountain side was stained with the slaughter of different wild animals, he is therefore a skilled speaker, whose rhetoric evokes the literary ideals of the mythic-epic world. The reversal from hunter to the hunted turns on Actaeon’s encounter with Diana. This encounter is described by Ovid as a ‘fault of fortune’ (fortune crimen, 141) in which the fates guide the hunter’s wandering steps. In Ovid’s account, Actaeon certainly does not intend to spy on the naked goddess, yet nor is he punished simply for his glimpse of her. Diana’s wrath focuses on his potential role as an informant.

Ans. In Book III of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Acoetes was a fisherman of Lydia. His father was also a fisherman. His father was very poorand used to catch fish with hook and line.

One day a gang of a sailor kidnapped a sweet boy from the shore of Chios and they said that they will leave him in Nexos. In the middle of the sea leaving Nexos behind a sailor follows a different way. No one could understand who the real boy was but Acoetes understood that the boy was actually Bacchus, the god of wine. The boy said to the sailors that this was not the shores that they promised. Acoetes said that what the will get to cheat a boy to the other sailors of the ship.

At last King Pandion agreed. Then they got ready for their journey. The motives of king Tereus was not so good. In the way Tereus kidnapped his sister-in-law and took her in a place where non could find her out. There he behaved too bad with her and cut down her tongue with cruel sword. Then he went back to Procue and declared that

lomela was dead. Somehow Philomela met with her sister and speaks all the story. Shen Procue became very angry and killed her own son Itys and cooked him. Procue called her husband and served her own son. King called for his son. Then Philomela me out from kitchen and served the head of Itys. Then in fury he took his sword and wanted to hit them but on this time Philomela was changed to a nightingale. Procue came swallow and Tereus was transformed to a hoopoe.

6 .In the story of Bacchus and the sailors, featured in Metamorphoses III, what image do we get of the god Bacchus?

Ans. The most striking image that Ovid creates of the god is one of a cruel exactor of divine justice. His transformation of the sailors into dolphins is one of many examples where mortals are stripped of their humanity as a punishment for their hubris. This image is particularly important in the wider context of Met. 3, with this anecdote being used as a precautionary tale and a foreshadowing of the ‘transformation’ that Pentheus will undergo. However, we do also see that Ovid has created an image of the god that is far more three dimensional than it may first appear. Bacchus can be seen as playful, even childish, taking on the role of a trickster god, as well as a divine avenger. He pretends to be unaware of the sailors’ deceit and seems to take some kind of pleasure from the spectacle he is creating. The phantom creatures he summons up are, in a sense, an example of the god’s impish sense of humour, as all they add to the scene is more enjoyment for him, and for the reader. With this being said, it is worth noting that Bacchus takes pity on the innocent Acoetes, and thus, the image of Bacchus as cruel and manipulative is somewhat softened. However, the image that Ovid creates is most definitely not one of a benevolent god.

Q.7. Who was Actaeon? What happened to him as he saw Diana bathing and incurred her wrath?

Ans. The story of Diana and Actaeon in Ovid’s Metamorphoses tells of a man who happened by chance upon a goddess bathing. The outraged goddess ensures that Actaeon can never tell what he has seen by changing him into a deer to be killed by his own hounds. There was a representation of the story of Actaeon and Diana in Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale.

The most striking image that Ovid creates of the god is one of a cruel exactor of divine justice. His transformation of the sailors into dolphins is one of many examples where mortals are stripped of their humanity as a punishment for their hubris. This image is particularly important in the wider context of.

Q. 8. Who was Acoetes?

Ans. In Book III of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Acoetes was a fisherman of Lydia. His father was also a fisherman. His father was very poor and used to catch fish with hook and line.In Book III of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Acoetes was a fisherman of Lydia. His father was also a fisherman. His father was very poor and used to catch fish with hook and line.

V was but One day a gang of a sailor kidnapped a sweet boy from the shore of Chios and they said that they will leave him in Nexos. In the middle of the sea leaving Nexos behind a sailor follows a different way. No one could understand who the real boy Acoetes understood that the boy was actually Bacchus, the god of wine. The boy said to the sailors that this was not the shores that they promised. Acoetes said that what the will get to cheat a boy to the other sailors of the ship.

At last King Pandion agreed. Then they got ready for their journey. The motives of king Tereus was not so good. In the way Tereus kidnapped his sister-in-law and took her in a place where none could find her out. There he behaved too bad with her and cur down her tongue with cruel sword. Then he went back to Procue and declared that Philomela was dead. Somehow Philomela met with her sister and speaks all the story Then Procue became very angry and killed her own son Itys and cooked him. Procue called her husband and served her own son. King called for his son. Then Philomela came out from kitchen and served the head of Itys. Then in fury he took his sword and wanted to hit them but on this time Philomela was changed to a nightingale. Procue became swallow and Tereus was transformed to a hoopoe.

Q. 9. Give the significance of the episode of Pyramus and Thisbe in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Book IV

Ans. Metamorphoses is one of the most famous creations of Ovid. The Latin epic, Metamorphoses is divided into fifteen books.

“Pyramus and Thisbe” is an episode from Book IV of the Metamorphoses, an epic poem published by the Roman poet Ovid in 8 AD. In contrast to the epics of Ovid’s contemporaries (like Virgil’s Aeneid), the Metamorphoses does not focus on a single, cohesive narrative. Rather, Ovid takes as his theme “bodies changed to other forms” (Book 1, Line 1) and fittingly, his Metamorphoses is a work in constant state of change. Its 15 books assemble a series of over 250 independent stories, linked loosely together in a continuous flow of words. Thus, the text of Ovid’s poem meta-poetically reenacts its theme: transformative metamorphosis.

While Ovid treats a wide variety of topics in his epic, “Pyramus and Thisbe” is representative of his special fondness for love stories. The Ur literary portrait of starcrossed lovers, “Pyramus and Thisbe” has enjoyed a reliable degree of popularity from antiquity to the present day. Preserved images of Pyramus and Thisbe can be found on the walls of Pompeii, and the story remains a popular choice for modern anthologies of Roman myth.

The importance of “Pyramus and Thisbe” as a literary model for tragic love stories cannot be overstated. Some of the most influential authors of the western traditionincluding Geoffrey Chaucer, Dante Alighieri, and William Shakespeare- either adapted the myth directly or were strongly influenced by it. Chaucer, the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages, faithfully treated the tale as The Legend of Thisbe in his 14th century work The Legend of Good Women. Dante Alighieri references, reworks, and inverts “Pyramus and Thisbe” constantly in his Italian narrative poem The Divine Comedy And the Elizabethan playwright William Shakespeare rocketed the myth to new levels of success, referencing it heavily in two of his most beloved plays: A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo and Juliet.

Ans. Metamorphoses is one of the most famous creations of Ovid. The Latin epic, Metamorphoses is divided into fifteen books. The story of Tereus, Procne and Philomela is one of these books which ends with a pathetic tragedy. As Procne had not seen her younger sister, Philomela for five years after she got married with Tereus, king of Thrace, Procne expressed her will of seeing her to Tereus. To fulfill her desire, Tereus marched towards Athens. Seeing his son-in-law, king Pandion became very happy and both exchanged their greetings. But sudden appearance of Philomela, richly attired in gorgeous robs forced him not to blink an eye. His heart could not contain the fires that burned him with ardent passion and determined to have her as his own at any cost. Convincing his father-in-law with pretence, Tereus became successful in his intention.

While sea-voyage, Tereus revealed before Philomela about his actual intention. He dragged her to a high walled steading, hidden in the dark of an ancient forest and there he shut her up. Instead of telling her where her sister was, he would take the opportunity of having a young girl alone and take pleasure or quenched his thrust using her body. Being hapless and defenseless, Philomela could none but crying addressing/calling her father, her sister and gods overhead to get rid of such situation. “She was quivering with fear, like some timid lamb which has been moulded and cast aside by a grey wolf and cannot yet believe in its safety”. But in the next she uttered some speech by addressing him ‘a horrible barbarian’. She said that how could he be so cruel, a betrayer son-in-law, a fraud husband and a tyrant of an innocent girl. She added that he would have to pay penalty for this. She also threatened him by saying of proclamation his misdeeds before the entire world. To prevent all these, Tereus cut her tongue with his cruel sword and destroyed the last hope could be said as well though it was his temporary victory. It is found that the story comes to an end with his pathetic tragedy.

Thus the episode of Tereus and Philomela has been one of the most significant of the story. parts

Q. 11. How does Ovid represent the gods and goddesses inhis Metamorphoses? Answer with special reference to Book III, IV and VI.

Ans. Book VI begins with acute rivalry between Arachne and Minerva. Minerva as we know is the Goddess associated with beaut ful weaving and her position is being threatened by a human called Arachne who is arrogant and insolent and does not respect the Goddess and thinks herself to be a better weaver than Minerva.L

Minerva tries to warn Arachne not to disrespect the Gods but Arachne in her arrogance does not pay heed. So Minerva goes to meet Arachne, disguised as an old woman, and advises Arachne to seek Minerva’s forgiveness for her impunity. But Arachne being proud of her workmanship does not pay heed to the old woman’s sound advice and Minerva is forced to reveal herself to the latter. But Arachne will not bow down and finally it amounts to a weaving competition between the two of them – the

Goddess of Weaving Minerva and the mortal Arachne. Minerva weaves a beautiful picture glorifying the Gods and herself. The description of Minerva’s weaving is beautifully depicted by Ovid.

Gods and mortals often have a parent/child relationship, with the gods acting as disciplinarians over the unruly behaviour of humans. The events that transpire in the story of Ceres, Proserpine, and Pluto show how power struggles erupt among the gods themselves. The gods do form a large family, with marital problems, sibling rivalries, and turf wars. Venus, for example, sets Apollo up to fall disastrously in love with Leucothoe in order to take revenge on him. Now Hades is her victim as she sets him up to fall for Proserpine so Venus can extend her territory into the underworld. In addition, Ceres and Pluto are siblings, and each has the ear of their brother Jupiter, who has the final say in such disputes. The three of them are engaged in a delicate balance of power.

Q. 12. How are women depicted inOvid’s Metamorphoses? Discuss with reference to Book III, IV and VI.

Ans. Ovid’s poem depicts the thoughts and actions of a wide range of female characters. Some of these characters are essentially victims, while others are more like what we would today consider “strong women.” Indeed, Ovid’s view of women is positive, negative, or somewhere in between.

The three daughters of Minyas are depicted as literally weaving, and as they weave and spin yarn they are also figuratively weave stories of unfulfilled love/spinning tales of unfulfilled love. The love stories they narrate have different characters in them but the recurrent theme is that of a sense of frustrated longing. The two young lovers, Pyramus and Thisbe, are separated in their mortal life because of their warring parents. They are able to be united only in death.

The two young lovers long to be together, long to be able to hold hands or even steal gentle kisses, but the wall in the middle forbids that. Thisbe is on one side of the wall and Pyramus on the other, and they can only catch the sound of each other’s breath, they say, “… You spiteful wall! They would cry. “Why stand in the way of poor lovers? If you would only allow us to lie in each other’s arms! Philomela’s tragedy, at first sight, might look like a family drama, but the impact of the story goes much further as Philomela is not just any girl, but a princess of Athens. Philomela’s fate is not just sealed by her father and Tereus, but by a nation that permits patriarchy and places nationalism above personal happiness. Philomela is thus oppressed by nationalism and patriarchy. A great part of this epic will elaborate on the mechanisms behind these methods of oppression, as only a full understanding of this matters will permit us to link them to the consequences they have caused. The story delineates the consequences of oppression, namely muteness and trauma. Philomela reacts in two wholly different ways to this trauma, as she has lost her voice, she chooses violence and art to express and avenge herself.

Q.13. What is Ovid’s view of love? Or, Narrate in your own word, the love story of Echo and Narcissus.

Ans. Echo and Narcissus is a story from Ovid’s book of poetry, Metamorphoses, about a young man named Narcissus and Echo, the mountain nymph who fell in love with him. Zeus had given Echo the task of entertaining his wife Hera with stories, in order that he might have time to slip away and philander around with nymphs. Hera was known for her jealous and vengeful nature. Always suspicious of Zeus, she mistook Echo to be the object of his uncouth affections. She cast a spell on the unfortunate nymph – from this day forward Echo would only be able to repeat the last words addressed to her and never speak her own again.

Narcissus, a.hunter from Boeotia, got separated from his hunting companions one day in the woods. Echo, being a nymph and also feeling pitiful because of her curse, had been wandering those same woods. The moment she saw Narcissus walking through the forest, she fell in love with him and his breath-taking beauty. But because of Hera’s curse, she was unable to tell him, so she followed the boy and waited for him to speak. Eventually, Narcissus began to call for his companions. Echo eagerly stepped out of the trees and repeated the words. A confusing and repetitive exchange ensued, ending with Narcissus shouting to his companions that they should come together. Mistaking this for an invitation, Echo repeated his words and leapt towards Narcissus. However, at that moment, Narcissus decided he’d rather die before letting a wood nymph have him, and pushed her away. Echo, heartbroken, ran away and hid in a cave, not eatin or sleeping, just pining for Narcissus.

Nemesis, the goddess of revenge, punished Narcissus for not accepting the unrequited love of Echo. Nemesis caused him to fall in love with his own reflection he saw in a pool near the cave where Echo had died. Narcissus refused to leave the reflection of himself and, like Echo, starvation was going to claim him. But not before he cried out to his reflection: “Farewell, dear boy. Beloved in vain.”. Echo’s voice repeated “farewell” from the cave and Narcissus died by the bank of the pool.

After some time, Echo began to grow thin from starvation until her body withered away entirely into dust, leaving nothing but her voice. To this day Echo’s voice still calls back from caves and labyrinths, repeating the last spoken words forever. And thus ends the story of echo and Narcissus.

Ans. In each case, the dragon’s teeth, once planted, would grow into fully armed warriors. Cadmus was the bringer of literacy and civilization, killed the sacred dragon that guarded the spring of Ares. The goddess Athena told him to sow the teeth, from which sprang a group of ferocious warriors called the spartoi.

Cadmus’s household is plagued. While hunting, his grandson, Actaeon, stumbles upon Diana bathing in her sacred grove. Diana is so offended that she transforms Actaeon into a deer, and Actaeon’s own hunting dogs kill him. Semele, Cadmus’s daughter, is pregnant with Jupiter’s child. Juno, filled with rage at yet another dalliance of Jupiter’s, disguises herself as an old woman and convinces Semele to ask Jupiter to

make love to her with all his power as a god, just as he makes love to Juno. Semele gets Jupiter to promise her an unspecified gift. When she makes her request, Jupiter cannot go back on his word. He makes love to her with all his power. She cannot withstand it and she dies. Jupiter brings their son, Bacchus, to full term in his thigh.

Q. 15. Locate and annotate: “one of them flew off to the woods, the other flew under the eaves of the roof.”

Ans. While Procne is mulling over these incidents Itys the son of Procne and Tereus comes to his mother. Seeing him she starts forming a plan in her mind. She is ready to sacrifice all her motherly instincts to punish her husband. She chops her son and cooks him and then invites Tereus to eat. The wife invites the unsuspecting Tereus to the feast. Tereus eats by himself, seated in his tall ancestral chair, and fills his belly with his

own child.

Procne chalks out an equally horrendous plan. She kills her only child Itys, cooks the flesh of the child and serves it to Tereus the father as a meal. It is only after he has finished his meal that Procne reveals to Tereus that he has eaten his own son, and Tereus goes mad as he comprehends his actions and that of his wife Procne. When her husband asks for his son she cries, “Itys is with you already – inside.” He looks around and questions where the boy is. And then while he is calling out and seeking him, Philomela comes out with the head of the child. Then he weeps, and calls himself the sepulcher of his unhappy son, and now pursues, with naked sword, the daughters of Pandion. And we see him running after the two sisters but then these two women turn into birds. One of them turns into a nightingale/Philomela and makes for the woods. The other, a swallow/Procne, flies to the eaves of the palace. You may know that even today the swallow’s throat has not lost the stain of that murder, and the soft down bears witness to the blood. Tereus swift in his grief and desire for revenge, changes into a bird himself, with a feathered crest on his head. An immoderate, elongated, beak juts out, like a long spear. The name of the bird is the hoopoe, and it looks as though it is armed.

Q. 16. Briefly narrate the story of Tereus, Procne and Philomela with reference to Ovid’s Metamorphoses Book VI.

Ans. Ovid’s The Metamorphoses are all about transformation, change and creativity. It is thus no wonder that “displays of creative activity of one sort or another, in which material is transformed or translated into another medium” (Johnson 22) play a predominant role in the myth of Philomela. It is this prominence of human creativity that sets Ovid’s Philomela apart from the earlier versions and that makes it a tale well worth exploring. The tale opens on Attic ground at the moment when Athens is threatened by barbarian forces. In order to protect his kingdom Pandion decides to make an alliance with Tereus, the king of Thrace. “Pandion gave his child, Procne, in marriage” to validate the alliance with the Thracians, but the marriage never got the blessing from the gods (Ovid 134). Procne moves to Thrace and gives birth to an heir for Tereus, a son called Itys and for five years all is well. Procne, however starts longing for her country of birth and pleads Tereus to reunite her with her sister Philomela. Tereus

answers Philomela back to Thrace for a reunion. Once Tereus arrives on Attic grounds, “the AS a ht” of Philomela “sets [his] heart ablaze” (Ovid 135); fully conscious of the sinful nature of his thoughts he proceeds to convince Pandion to trust his second daughter to his hands. Pandion agrees and Tereus and Philomela start their journey towards Thrace. Once they have crossed the sea and set foot on the mainland, Tereus “locked her, and revealed his own black heart and ravished her, a virgin, all alone” (Ovid Book 137) As this cruel deed was not gruesome enough in its own right, Tereus cuts off her tongue as well to ensuresecrecy and keeps her locked up in the woods. Upon his return to his wife, he tells Procne that her sister has died; Procne does not question Tereus honesty he has “tears to prove it true” and starts mourning in the sincerest way (Ovid 138). Philomela, mutilated and violated, is left completely powerless, or so it seems, as “there’s tund of talent in distress, and misery learns cunning” (Ovid 139). She constructs herself a loom to weave a “clever fabric” that depicts her unfortunate fate (Ovid 139). After completing her story, she gives the tapestry to an old woman who delivers it to Procne. Procne, upon seeing the canvas, was “filled with visions of revenge” and decides to free her sister right away. Fortunately, “it was the time of Bacchus festival”, a time which disguises are appropriate, during which she could thus liberate her sister without raising any suspicion (Ovid 139). When they are finally reunited, the two sisters start plotting their revenge. Ultimately it is Itys who brings illumination. As Procne regards her son, she is infuriated by his resemblance to his father. At that moment, she decides to murder her own son, cook him and feed him to his unsuspecting father. Procne sends away all the servants and serves the meal herself, and after the supper was consummated, Tereus asked for his son to join him. At that moment Philomela rushes in, holding high the head of Itys, revealing to Tereus the cruelty that had been done to him. As expected, Tereus goes mad with rage and starts to chase the two sisters, who transform at that very moment into birds and fly away. Tereus himself is transformed as well into a bird “that bears a crest, with, for a sword, a long fantastic bill- a hoopoe, every inch a fighter still” (Ovid 142). As mentioned before, Ovid’s version places more emphasis on Philomela’s creative act of weaving as a form of resistance. This peaceful rebellion forms a sharp contrast with the more gruesome events, such as: rape, incest and cannibalistic murder. The violent acts in the myth are so incomprehensibly cruel that a social reading force itself upon the reader. In order to understand the mechanisms behind the cruelty, we will link the crimes to the value system of the Ancient Greeks. Philomela’s tragedy, at first sight, might look like a family drama, but the impact of the story goes much further as Philomela is not just any girl, but a princess of Athens. Philomela’s fate is not just sealed by her father and Tereus, but by a nation that permits patriarchy and places nationalism above personal happiness. Philomela is thus oppressed by nationalism and patriarchy. The first part of this study will elaborate on the mechanisms behind these methods of oppression, as only a full understanding of this matters will permit us to link them to the consequences they have caused. The story delineates the consequences of oppression, namely muteness and trauma.Philomela reacts in two wholly different ways to this trauma, as she has lost her voice, she chooses violence and art to express and avenge herself.

Ans. Ovid’s 15-book epic, Metamorphoses, written in exquisite Latin hexameter, is a rollercoaster of a read. Metamorphoses is an epic poem published by the Roman poet Ovid in 8 AD. In contrast to the epics of Ovid’s contemporaries (like Virgil’s Aeneid), the Metamorphoses does not focus on a single, cohesive narrative. Rather, Ovid takes as his theme “bodies changed to other forms” (Book 1, Line 1) and fittingly, his Metamorphoses is a work in constant state of change. Its 15 books assemble a series of over 250 independent stories, linked loosely together in a continuous flow of words. Thus, the text of Ovid’s poem meta-poetically reenacts its theme: transformative metamorphosis.

Ans. We come across the story of Daphne and Apollo in Ovid’s The Metamorphoses Book I. is the daughter of Peneus in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. She is transformed into a laurel tree as Apollo seeks to rape her. As Apollo lustfully pursues Daphne, she is saved through her metamorphosis and confinement into the laurel tree which can be seen as an act of eternal chastity. Daphne is forced to sacrifice her body and become the laurel tree as her only form of escape from the pressures of Apollo’s constant sexual desires.

Q. 3. Name the Greek family that

 Ans. Metamorphoses deals with the story of the House of Cadmus. Juno hates Cadmus’ daughter, Ino, as Ino is devoted to Bacchus. Ino is the second daughter of Cadmus, younger than Sémele, whom Juno tricks into getting killed by her lover and Juno’s husband Jupiter. We should remember Bacchus is Ino’s nephew and she had actually concealed him in her cave and fed him milk once his own mother was killed by Juno’s trickery.

links all the stories of Metamorphoses, Book III.

Ans. Actaeon committed no crime. It was only an unfortunate coincidence that, one day while hunting, he happened to stumble across the goddess Diana as she and her retinue of nymphs were bathing in a forest pool.

Diana punished him by destroying his power of speech and turning him into a stag, with antlers and a shaggy coat. Actaeon longed to cry out “I am Actaeon! Don’t you know your own master?” but the words he wanted to utter would not come; the air echoed with barking. This was the plight of Actaeon.

Q.5. Locate and annotate: “only when he had been dispatched by hounds innumerable, so men say, was the anger of Diana, the quiver-bearing goddess, appeased.

Ans. Diana punished him by destroying his power of speech and turning him into a stag, with antlers and a shaggy coat. Diana is called the quiver bearing goddess here. She is not appeased until Actaeon’s punishment comes to an end. The voyeurism is treated as a crimein Ovid’s Metamorphoses.

Q.6. How did Juno disguise herself when she met Semele?

Ans. Juno disguised herself as an old woman when she met Semele. Semele, Cadmus’s daughter, is pregnant with Jupiter’s child. Juno, filled with rage at yet another dalliance of Jupiter’s, disguises herself as an old woman and convinces Semele to ask Jupiter to make love to her with all his power as a god, just as he makes love to Juno. Semele gets Jupiter to promise her an unspecified gift. When she makes her request, Jupiter cannot go back on his word. He makes love to her with all his power. She cannot withstand it, and she dies. Jupiter brings their son, Bacchus, to full term in his thigh.

Q. 7. How did Semele’s child survive?

Who secretly reared the child after its birth? Ans. Dionysus was the son of Zeus and Semele, a daughter of Cadmus. Zeus saved his son by sewing him up in his thigh and keeping him there until he reached maturity, so that he was twice born.

After Dionysus’s “second birth,” the birth from Zeus’s body, Hermes secretly took the child to Semele’s sister, Ino, who agreed to rear the child. Q.

Ans. Ovid’s 15-book epic, written in exquisite Latin hexameter, is a rollercoaster of a read.

Narcissus walked by a pool of water and decided to drink some. He saw his reflection, became entranced by it, and killed himself because he could not have his object of desire.

Despite the harshness of his rejection, Echo’s love for Narcissus only grew. When Narcissus died, wasting away before his own reflection, consumed by a love that could not be, Echo mourned over his body.

Q. 9. Who’rejected’ Tiresias? What was the prophesy of Tiresias about that person?

Ans. Pentheus, the son of Echion, in scorn of the gods, alone amongst all of them, rejected the seer Tiresias.

Jupiter and Juno discuss whether men or women receive more pleasure from sex. They ask Tiresias if he knows the answer, since he was once transformed from a male to a female, then back again after seven years. Tiresias takes Jupiter’s side in the matter and says that men enjoy sex more. Angered, Juno curses Tiresias with blindness, but to compensate Jupiter gives him the power to see into the future.

Q.10. “Now the city of Thebes was built”. What is the story of Cadmus’s building of the Theban city?

Ans. The poet demonstrates the continuing power struggle between gods and mortals. Cadmus’s story may act as a traditional mini-epic within the larger scope of Metamorphoses, with its focus on a hero, his extraordinary deeds, and the founding of a city. But while things turn out well for Cadmus, his descendants, such as Semele, Actaeon, and later Ino in IV, are not so lucky. In this way Ovid undercuts the conventions of epic poetry by not ending on a high note, where a central hero triumphs, but he makes Cadmus’s story the lead-in to a series of tragic metamorphoses in which humans upset the gods and pay the price. He founded the city of Thebes.

Q.11. Who killed the followers of Cadmus in the new land? What did Cadmus do with the teeth of the killer?

Ans. A water-dragon killed the followers of Cadmus eventually managed to kill the beast. Following Athena’s advice, he took the teeth of the dragon and placed them in the soil, out of which a legion of fierce men, the Spartoi, sprang out. Cadmus is the son of King Agenor and Queen Telephassa. He is also the founder of the city of Thebes.

Q.12. Which incident led to Tiresias’s transformation from a man into a woman?

 Ans. Tiresias’ tale of woe and transformation began when he separated two mating snakes for no apparent reason. Instead of poisoning Tiresias with indignant viper venom, the snakes magically transformed him into a woman.

Q.13. Who was Semele? Why did she become a victim of Juno’s wrath?

Ans. Semele, in Greek mythology, was the daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia, at Thebes.

Semele, Cadmus’s daughter, is pregnant with Jupiter’s child. So, she became a victim of Juno’s wrath. Juno, filled with rage at yet another dalliance of Jupiter’s, disguises herself as an old woman and convinces Semele to ask Jupiter to make love to her with all his power as a god, just as he makes love to Juno.

Q.14. Who was Pentheus? In whose hands did he die? 

Ans. Pentheus was a sceptical man who doubted Tiresias’ prophecies. Pentheus is killed by Agave, his own mother. She is in a trance and she and the other Maenads force Pentheus out of the tree where he is hiding and tear him apart with their bare hands.

Q.15. What did the angry Juno do to Tiresias?

Ans. In her anger, Juno strikes Tiresias blind. As Tiresias came upon a pair of copulating snakes, he hit the pair with his stick. Hera was displeased, and she punished Tiresias by transforming him into a woman.

Q.16. Name the mother of Narcissus. What did Tiresias say about the future of (B.U. 2019) Narcissus?

Ans. Narcissus, in Greek mythology, the son of the nymph Liriope. When Liriope gave birth to the handsome child Narcissus, she consulted the seer Tiresias, who predicted that the boy would live a long life only if he never discovered himself.

Ans. Diana, the goddess of animals and the hunt, often wanders the woods with her bow and arrows. Like her sister Minerva, she is a sworn virgin, as are her followers, who are devoted to maintaining their chastity. Protecting her privacy is especially important to the goddess, who swiftly punishes anyone who invades it. Like the other gods, Diana also steps in to protect mortals who ask for her help, such as the nymph Arethusa whom she surrounds with a protective cloud so she can escape from Alpheus, who pursues her against her will.

“That destiny was to blame for Actaeon’s misfortune”.

Actaeon once went to the forest for hunting. There he saw Diana bathing in a state of undress. Diana lost temper and turned him into a stag. His young grandson Actaeon, spies Diana when he is hunting and she is bathing in her sacred grove. Diana is so upset that she transforms Actaeon into a deer and his own hunting dogs kill Actaeon as Actaeon has been transformed into a stag and to the hunting dogs the stag is the prey.

The fields were ringing with the wild shrieks of the countrymen. The crowds streamed out of the city. Men women, old and young, the poor and the rich— all rushed to celebrate the new rites in honour of Bacchus. LAS.

Pyramus and Thisbe are the lover and the beloved in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. They lived next door to each other. They lived together in a neighbouring house in the towering city whose brick walls were built by Semiramis. Pyramus was the young man from Babylon who is the boyfriend of Thisbe whom he is not allowed to marry. Ans.

Ans. Pyramus and Thisbe are the lover and the beloved inOvid’s Metamorphoses. They lived next door to each other. They lived in a neighbouring house in the towering city whose brick walls were built by Semiramis. While standing on the opposite sides of the wall addressed the wall as the ‘jealous’ as it prevented the lovers’ meeting. At nightfall, they kissed their own side of the wall. Of course, they confessed that they owe to the wall as their voices were allowed to pass through it.

Ans. When her husband asks for his son she cries, “Itys is with you already – inside.” He looks around and questions where the boy is. And then while he is calling out and seeking him, Philomela comes out with the head of the child. Then he weeps, and calls himself the sepulchre of his unhappy son, and now pursues, with naked sword, the daughters of Pandion. And we see him running after the two sisters but then these two women turn into birds. One of them turns into a nightingale. Here Philomela becomes a nightingale and makes for the woods. The other turns into a swallow. Procne being turned into a swallow, flies to the eaves of the palace. We know that, even today the swallow’s throat has not lost the stain of that murder, and the soft down bears witness to the blood. Tereus swift in his grief and desire for revenge, changes into a bird himself, with a feathered crest on his head. An immoderate, elongated, beak juts out, like a long spear. The name of the bird is the hoopoe, and it looks as though it is armed.

Q.23. What is peculiar about the response everyone, including the victim, expresses with respect to the rape of Philomela? What distinguishes the metamorphoses of Tereus, Procne, and Philomela from the previous ones? as

Ans. It is peculiar that everyone, including Procne and Philomela herself, acted though the victim had been somehow to blame for what happened.

In the case of these three people, we are not told that a god caused the transformation; it just “happened.”

Q.24. Which god is Cadmus attempting to honour when he sends his men offend?

forest? Which god does he unintentionally Ans. He wishes to honour Jove.He offends Mars, to whom the serpent (some call it a dragon) is sacred.

Q.25. “I am Actaeon! Don’t you know your own master?” Is it believable that the dogs would not have recognized their master, even if metamorphosed? Briefly give reasons for your answer.

Ans. It is difficult to believe that dogs would not recognize their master, no matter what; Ovid and his readers would have known that. This is an example which shows that these myths were intended to be symbolic and poetic, not realistic or factual.

Q. 1. Describe the story of Tiresias and recount its outcome. 

Ans. Juno and Jove were playfully arguing about whether love was better for men or women. Jove believed that it had to be better for women, and Juno disagreed, so they called on Tiresias. The old man was the expert on the subject because he’d been born a man, but when he had one day hit mating snakes with a stick, he was transformed into a woman. Years later he came across the snakes again and hit them so that he would be transformed back into a man. Tiresias sided with Jove in the argument, and Juno wrathfully blinded him. To make up for Juno’s cruelty, and since he couldnot break her spell, Jove gave him the gift of prophecy.

Besides longevity, another of Tiresias’s features involves his having lived as a man, then as a woman, and then as a man again. Reportedly, he had been turned into a woman as the result of having struck and wounded mating snakes. When Tiresias returned to the site of the transformation seven years later to see if the “spell” could be reversed, Tiresias did indeed see the same snakes coupling and was changed back into a man.

That experience of life as both sexes may have inadvertently caused his blindness. One story holds that Hera and Zeus disagreed about which of the sexes experienced more pleasure during sex, with Hera arguing that the answer was men, by far. When they consulted Tiresias, he asserted that women had greater pleasure than men, and Hera thereupon struck him blind. Zeus, in thanks for his support, gave him the gifts of prophecy and longevity. Another version has it that Tiresias was blinded by Athena after he saw her bathing. Chariclo begged her to help him, so Athena, instead of restoring his ability to see the physical world, gave him the ability to see the future.

Tiresias also had a role in Homer’s Odyssey. In that work, Tiresias retained his prophetic gifts even in the underworld, where the hero Odysseus was sent to consult him.

The figure of Tiresias recurs in later European literature, both as prophet and as man-woman, in such works as T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land .

Ans. The traditional epic is usually unified by a single hero, whose fortune is the central theme of the epic. The hero is usually a grand figure who does larger than life good deeds and who usually sets off on a journey. Has an extremely high position in society and when he falls, he tends to fall hard. Virgil had given Roman poets a new example for the formal narrative. His 15 books of the Metamorphoses were not unified by a single hero who has cross reference and climactic closure. Ovid has stated publicly new critical standards by which a poem should be judged, and the standards being that poems should be refined, evoking more than it said, and he rejected the long narrative form as being tedious. Callimachus has expressly praised the fine-spun verse and denounced the continuous unbroken poem. Here was Ovid declaring that he would

Or write a long and totally comprehensive poem that was also fine-spun and refined. And the title implied that the poem would be a composite of many transformation tales. The result is the Metamorphoses, a continuous poem (carmen perpetuum as he calls it in Metamorphoses 1.4) in 15 books, containing roughly 250 tales of ‘transformations’ ‘shape-shifting’. Not for Ovid the concentrated narrative of the Iliad, dealing with a short period of time in the final year of the Trojan War, or the Aeneid with its constant movement in the direction of the foundation of Rome and its glorious future. Ovid’s poem jumps from time to time and place to place, links between the stories being at times tenuous and keeping his readers on their toes by sometimes putting stories within other stories – as in this text where the tale of the sailors is embedded in the tale of Pentheus.

Actaeon is turned into a stag.

Narcissus is turned into a flower.

Echo is turned into a disembodied voice.

Sailors are turned into dolphins.

Teeth are turned into soldiers.

Jupiter is turned into mortal form to seduce Semele and then back to divine to kill her. Tiresias is turned into woman and then man again.

Pentheus is not changed in fact – but his nearest and dearest are made not to recognise him as they kill him. The dogs see straight but Actaeon changes shape – Pentheus keeps his shape but the killers are deluded.

Juno and Jove were playfully arguing about whether love was better for men or women. Jove believed that it had to be better for women, and Juno disagreed, so they called on Tiresias. The old man was the expert on the subject because he’d been born a man, but when he had one day hit mating snakes with a stick, he was transformed into a woman. Years later he came across the snakes again and hit them so that he would be transformed back into a man. Tiresias sided with Jove in the argument, and Juno wrathfully blinded him. To make up for Juno’s cruelty, and since he couldnot break her spell, Jove gave him the gift of prophecy.

Q. 3. Briefly analyse how Ovid has shown the power of gods upon men in (B.U 2019) Metamorphoses, Book III.

Ans. In Greek and Roman mythology, the role of gods and goddesses were very influential to the people. Praising and sacrificing for the gods was an important part of everyday life in this culture, and any opposition of the gods were returned with punishment. The power of the gods is shown in Charles Martin’s translation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. In Book VI of Metamorphoses, which is rightly subtitled “Of Praise and Punishment”, three specific instances of the gods’ smite are shown through the conflict between Minerva and Arachne, Niobe and Latona, and the ill-fated marriage of Tereus and Procne.

What was Ovid’s view of the gods’ ethical performance: Ovid’s metamorphoses give us a fair image into the Roman as well as Greek gods in actions. In every lesson about these gods, it constantly proves that the gods are childish, jealous of any worship

is us at is not specific to them, and overall, not very god like. In his first story Ovid gives that Cupid was able to shoot Apollo with an arrow that made him fall in love with a nymph, it shows us that these gods do not have a chain of command all the gods un around trying to help certain nations while other gods try and foil their plans. In other story he tells us about a woman named Niobe and how she proclaimed that e should be worshiped instead of the gods because she had fourteen children. Several nuously connected short stories follow, including the stories of how Medusa’s progeny, the winged horse Pegasus, created a fountain with a stomp of his foot, how King Pyreneus tried to capture the Muses, how nine sisters who challenged the Muses singing contest were turned to birds when they lost, and how Arachne was ransformed into a spider after beating Minerva in a contest of spinning.

When Niobe of Thebes openly declares she is more fit to be worshipped as a goddess than Latona (mother of Apollo and Diana) on the grounds that she has borne fourteen children to Latona’s two, she is punished by having all her children killed and is herself turned to stone. Stories are then told of how Latona punished men who were rude to her by turning them into frogs, and how Apollo flayed a satyr for daring to challenge his superiority as a musician.

Ans. Acoetes is a shipmaster and a convert to Bacchus. Acoetes tries to convince Pentheus to worship Bacchus. Acoetes is not in Euripides’ Bacchae where the stranger before the king is the god himself in disguise. It is tempting to at least wonder whether Acoetes is the god himself (who is a master of disguise), as Pentheus had ordered his men to bring the ducem in chains (562-3) and this would give more point to his remark (658-9):

Acoetessaid: ‘My name is Acoetes, I was born in Lydia, and my parents were of humble stock. My father did not leave me any fields for sturdy bullocks to till, or any woolly flocks, or herds. He was a poor man, as I am, and used to catch fish with hook and line: with his rod he drew them, leaping, from the stream. His fisherman’s skill was all his wealth. This he passed on to me, saying: Take such riches as I have, be my successor and heir to my craft”.

Acoetes is brought in arrested with his arms tied behind his back, reminiscent in this of Sinon in Virgil’s Aeneid 2 who is also brought in to tell a tale which will have disastrous effects on its hearers. He seems oddly unconcerned and takes his time telling a long tale (Pentheus later describes his speech as ‘rambling’; 692) to show the king what this stranger can do. Here again we have direct speech quoted inside the direct speech of Acoetes’ tale, we have some very strong action such as Acoetes getting punched in the throat by Lycabas (626-7) – and we have some wonderful narrative art shown in the transformation first of the ship, then of the men, with the side-show of the tigers, lynxes and panthers thrown in for extra effect. Ovid writes a speech for each character which seems to come straight from the speaker’s heart; but he also manages to convey dialogue in reported speech (572-3):

Ans. Metamorphoses means Transformations is a narrative poem in fifteen books by the Roman poet Ovid, completed in 8 CE. It is an epic, rather a’mock-epical’ poem describing the creation and history of the world, incorporating many of the best known and loved stories from Greek mythology, although centring more on mortal characters than on heroes or the gods. Thetraditional epic is usually unified by a single hero, whose fortune is the central theme of the epic. The hero is usually a grand figure who does larger than life good deeds and who usually sets off on a journey. Has an extremely high position in society and when he falls, he tends to fall hard. Virgil had given Roman poets a new example for the formal narrative. His 15 books of the Metamorphoses were not unified by a single hero who has cross reference and climactic closure. Ovid has stated publicly new critical standards by which a poem should be judged, and the standards being that poems should be highly refined, evoking more than it said, and he rejected the long narrative form as being tedious. Callimachus has expressly praised the fine-spun verse and denounced the continuous unbroken poem. Here was Ovid declaring that he would write a long and totally comprehensive poèm that was also fine-spun and refined. And the title implied that the poem would be a composite of many transformation tales. The result is the Metamorphoses, a continuous poem (carmen perpetuum as he calls it in Metamorphoses 1.4) in 15 books, containing roughly 250 tales of ‘transformations’ or ‘shape-shifting’. Not for Ovid the concentrated narrative of the Iliad, dealing with a short period of time in the final year of the Trojan War, or the Aeneid with its constant movement in the direction of the foundation of Rome and its glorious future. Ovid’s poem jumps from time to time and place to place, links between the stories being at times tenuous and keeping his readers on their toes by sometimes putting stories within other stories – as in this text where the tale of the sailors is embedded in the tale of Pentheus. Homer’s Iliad is dominated by a theme – anger – and a small group of characters, whereas the Metamorphoses has a huge dramatis personae and defies easy analysis in thematic terms.

Ans. Ovid chose to write The Metamorphoses as a poem that meets the criteria for an epic; it is sufficiently long nearly 12000 lines, it has nearly 250 narratives joined together in fifteen books; it is composed in the dactylic hexameter, the meter of both the ancient Iliad and the Odyssey, and the more contemporary Latin epic Aeneid; and it treats the high literary subject of myth. But at the same time, he employs themes and tones of various genres that extend from the grand epic to the elegy, the tragedy and the pastoral. The most striking image that Ovid creates of the god is one of a cruel exactor of divine justice. His transformation of the sailors into dolphins is one of many examples where mortals are stripped of their humanity as a punishment for their hubris. This image is particularly important in the wider context of Met. 3, with this anecdote being used as a precautionary tale and a foreshadowing of the ‘transformation’ that Pentheus will undergo. However, we do also see that Ovid has created an image of the god that

or more three dimensional than it may first appear. Bacchus can be seen as playful, en childish, taking on the role of a trickster god, as well as a divine avenger. He ends to be unaware of the sailors’ deceit and seems to take some kind of pleasure the spectacle he is creating. The phantom creatures he summons up are, in a an example of the god’s impish sense of humour, as all they add to the scene is more enjoyment for him, and for the reader. With this being said, it is worth noting that Bacchus takes pity on the innocent Acoetes, and thus, the image of Bacchus as ruel and manipulative is somewhat softened. However, the image that Ovid creates is most definitely not one of a benevolent god.

Ans. Metamorphoses is a Latin narrative poem written in 8 A.D. by Roman poetOvidius Naso (43 B.C.-18 A.D.), better known as simply Ovid. Divided in fifteen books, Metamorphoses contains 250 myths, and it is our main source of classical Greek mythology Ovid returns to the story of Cadmus’s family. Pentheus tries to persuade his family and others not to worship Bacchus. No one is convinced, but Pentheus stands firm. Not even Acoetes, a convert to the worship of Bacchus, can change his mind. Pentheus threatens to make Acoetes into an example by killing him. Penthous sets out for Mount Cithaeron to spy on the rites of Bacchus. When he arrives, his own aunt and mother mistake him for an animal and hunt him. His aunt, Autonoe, rips off his arms, and his mother tears off his head and lets out a shout of victory.

Pentheus regards any pretension to efficacious magic on the part of Bacchus as fraudulent – hardly surprising given his conviction that the latter is an impostor The charge recalls a passage in Euripides’ Bacchac, where Pentheus comments scornfully on reports that a ‘wizard conjurer’ has arrived from Lydia. The Greek formulation is slightly more ambiguous since it leaves open the possibility that the alleged wizardry is genuine – an ambiguity reinforced by the equivocal focalization (the people whose report Pentheus is reporting most likely believe in the supernatural powers of the stranger, whereas Pentheus clearly does not). The sense of secrecy and, of course, mystery with which these cults shrouded their rites naturally suggested the idea of magic to outside observers.

In the middle of the lo ng rhetorical question we get, buried in a relative clause, an evocation of the martial spirit of the Thebans, the overpowering of which by Bacchus is the immediate cause of Pentheus dismay This device is in the tradition of Ennius’ Aunals, where it was used to more extravagant effect at tuba terribilisomtutaratantaradır (and the trumpet in terrible tones blared “taratantara 140 Sk); Africa terribilitremithorrida terra tumultu (Africa, a rough land, trembled with a terrible tumult, Ann. 310 Sk).Pentheus witnesses and unwillingly takes part in the secret the rites of Bacchus. The result of each of these boundary crossings justifies Ovid’s dictum, “do not call someone happy until he dies and his funeral is over (III 136 137). When people cross boundaries, the result is blindness, death by sex, death by dogs, or an equally horrible fate. While Thebes is founded happily its subsequent history quickly grows grim.

enemy any event Pentheus here seems to refer to an occasion in which the Thebans faced an army in regular battle without fear. It is difficult to match this occasion with in Thebes’ very young history: ancient myth records no such encounter, and Cadmus battle with the dragon or the civil war among the Spartoi (the military scenarios that defined the foundation of the city) do not fit the bill. terruerit is perfect subjunctive, an instance of ‘subjunctive by attraction’ arising from the fact that the relative clause containing terruerit is dependent on the subjunctive vincant in 537. Relative clauses that depend upon subjunctives and constitute an integral part of the thought will themselves take the subjunctive (AG §593).

Despite the fact that Pentheus blames Bacchus for upsetting the strict separation of male and female, the dominant group participating in Bacchic rites are women. As he makes clear later in his speech (esp. 553–56), Pentheus regards Bacchus as deficient in masculinity.

Bacchus, the god of the vine, was of course well known for inducing states of inebriation and ecstasy in his worshippers; Pentheus acknowledges the phenomenon, but deprives it of any religious significance by characterizing it as what we might now term ‘substance abuse’. In his view, Bacchus’ followers are intoxicated miscreants who conceal their sozzled antics under a veneer of ritual piety.

Pentheus’ contempt is clearly expressed in obsceni… greges: the word grex, like English ‘herd’ is often disparaging when used of human beings. The original sense of obscenus seems to have been ‘ill omened’ (so Ovid has obscenapuppis at Her. 5.119, of the ship that conveyed Helen to Troy), whence it came to mean ‘detestable, repulsive’, and eventually something like ‘obscene’ in the modern sense. Sexual license and like transgressions were widely attributed to Bacchic cult practice (see e.g. Eur. Bacch. 21523; Liv. 39.8.7 stuprapromiscua, ‘widespread adultery’ with Intro. §6).

The mention of this instrumen is clearly an appropriate epithet (but perhaps a double entendre), completes the list of musical instruments associated with the cult (532-33 n.). As McNamara (2010, 179) observes, Pentheus ‘begins and ends his list with the actual musical paraphernalia of Bacchic worship while he places the more abstract Bacchic associations (fraudes… fémineaevoces… insania… obsceniquegreges) between these. He thus “buries” his less tangible concerns within the brackets of these “real” items. For these concerns (magic, insanity, obscenity, femininity) are the standard accusations levelled at Bacchic rites by those who often represent more traditional authoritative religion’. The reference in context must be to religious conversion but here and elsewhere the use of military language and martial imagery exemplifies Pentheus’ martial obsession. Rather more subtly, it could also involve mythographic play with an older version of the tale, predating Euripides’ Bacchae, in which Pentheus responds to the arrival of Dionysus by leading an army into the mountains, only to be defeated in battle by a troop of Maenads.

Ans. Metamorphoses is a Latin narrative poem written in 8 A.D. by Roman poet Publius Ovidius Naso (43 B.C.-18 A.D.), better known as simply Ovid. Divided in fifteen ooks, Metamorphoses contains 250 myths, and it is our main source of classical Greek mythology. Starting from the story of creation and the flood to the deification of Julius Caesar and reign of Augustus, the poem contains many famous mythical stories such that of Daedalus and Icarus. Even with its complex narrative structure, modern scholars see four major divisions to Metamorphoses: “Divine Comedy” or “Gods in Love,” books 1-2; “Avenging Gods,” books 3-6 (to line 400); “Pathos of Love” the rest of book 6-11; and “History of Rome and the Deified Caesar,” books 12-15. Metamorphoses, Ovid’s magnum opus, is considered by current scholars as a masterpiece of Latin literature. With translations into just about every European language, it became the most-read of all classical works during the Middle Ages. The myths contained in this poem have inspired works in every medium for centuries. Ovid’s work has inspired Writers such as Dante, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Marlow, and Milton; painters such as Brueghel; and composers such as Händel among many others. Ovid’s Metamorphoses has exerted a profound influence on Western culture

Q. 2. Write a critical appreciation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Or, Who was Actaeon? What happened to him as he saw Diana bathing and incurred her wrath? 

Ans. The most well-known version of the myth in Ovid’s Metamorphoses tells of a young Theban nobleman, 1 grandson of Cadmus, who is hunting with his companions. Nearby, the goddess Diana is bathing with her nymphs. Resting in the midday heat, Actaeon stumbles unintentionally into her grotto, she reacts by changing him into a stag, and there follows a long description of the pursuit of this stag and his eventual death, torn apart by his own hunting dogs, with the encouragement of his former companions.

When we first encounter Actaeon he is a hunter, a young man leading to his companions, who delights in his prowess. It is because of him that the mountain side was stained with the slaughter of different wild animals, he is therefore a skilled speaker whose rhetoric evokes the literary ideals of the mythic-epic world. The reversal from hunter to the hunted turns on Actaeon’s encounter with Diana. This encounter is described by Ovid as a ‘fault of fortune’ (fortune crimen, 141) in which the fates guide the hunter’s wandering steps. In Ovid’s account, Actaeon certainly does not intend to spy on the naked goddess, yet nor is he punished simply for his glimpse of her. Diana’s wrath focuses on his potential role as an informant.

Q. 3.Write about the episode of Narcissus in Ovid’s Metamorphoses.

Ans. Narcissus’s is an interesting episode in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. He is a beautiful boy. Echo fell in love with Narcissus. Everyone had attraction with him. Narcissus was fond of hunting. He became mad in love with Echo. One day, he was returning from hunting. He felt thirsty. He seeing a pond, he stood there. He wanted to quench his thirst. He went there to drink water. He saw there his own reflection. He felt enchanted after seeing the reflection. His delusion made him plunge into the water. He expressed everything to the woods. He died of drowning in the water of the pool. His dead body was turned into a flower then.

Q. 4. How is the world depicted in Metamorphoses? Are the setting of the myths safe and peaceful places or dangerous and chaotic in Ovid’s Metamorphoses?

Ans. The most well-known version of the myth in Ovid’s Metamorphoses tells of a young Theban nobleman, a grandson of Cadmus, who is hunting with his companions. Nearby, the goddess Diana is bathing with her nymphs. Resting in the midday heat, Actaeon stumbles unintentionally into her grotto, she reacts by changing him into a stag, and there follows a long description of the pursuit of this stag and his eventual death, torn apart by his own hunting dogs, with the encouragement of his former companions.

When we first encounter Actaeon he is a hunter, a young man leading to his companions, who delights in his prowess. It is because of him that the mountain side was stained with the slaughter of different wild animals, he is therefore a skilled speaker, whose rhetoric evokes the literary ideals of the mythic-epic world. The reversal from hunter to the hunted turns on Actaeon’s encounter with Diana. This encounter is described by Ovid as a ‘fault of fortune’ (fortune crimen, 141) in which the fates guide the hunter’s wandering steps. In Ovid’s account, Actaeon certainly does not intend to spy on the naked goddess, yet nor is he punished simply for his glimpse of her. Diana’s wrath focuses on his potential role as an informant.

Ans. In Book III of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Acoetes was a fisherman of Lydia. His father was also a fisherman. His father was very poorand used to catch fish with hook and line.

One day a gang of a sailor kidnapped a sweet boy from the shore of Chios and they said that they will leave him in Nexos. In the middle of the sea leaving Nexos behind a sailor follows a different way. No one could understand who the real boy was but Acoetes understood that the boy was actually Bacchus, the god of wine. The boy said to the sailors that this was not the shores that they promised. Acoetes said that what the will get to cheat a boy to the other sailors of the ship.

At last King Pandion agreed. Then they got ready for their journey. The motives of king Tereus was not so good. In the way Tereus kidnapped his sister-in-law and took her in a place where non could find her out. There he behaved too bad with her and cut down her tongue with cruel sword. Then he went back to Procue and declared that

lomela was dead. Somehow Philomela met with her sister and speaks all the story. Shen Procue became very angry and killed her own son Itys and cooked him. Procue called her husband and served her own son. King called for his son. Then Philomela me out from kitchen and served the head of Itys. Then in fury he took his sword and wanted to hit them but on this time Philomela was changed to a nightingale. Procue came swallow and Tereus was transformed to a hoopoe.

In the story of Bacchus and the sailors, featured in Metamorphoses III,

Ans. The most striking image that Ovid creates of the god is one of a cruel exactor of divine justice. His transformation of the sailors into dolphins is one of many examples where mortals are stripped of their humanity as a punishment for their hubris. This image is particularly important in the wider context of Met. 3, with this anecdote being used as a precautionary tale and a foreshadowing of the ‘transformation’ that Pentheus will undergo. However, we do also see that Ovid has created an image of the god that is far more three dimensional than it may first appear. Bacchus can be seen as playful, even childish, taking on the role of a trickster god, as well as a divine avenger. He pretends to be unaware of the sailors’ deceit and seems to take some kind of pleasure from the spectacle he is creating. The phantom creatures he summons up are, in a sense, an example of the god’s impish sense of humour, as all they add to the scene is more enjoyment for him, and for the reader. With this being said, it is worth noting that Bacchus takes pity on the innocent Acoetes, and thus, the image of Bacchus as cruel and manipulative is somewhat softened. However, the image that Ovid creates is most definitely not one of a benevolent god.

Q.7. Who was Actaeon? What happened to him as he saw Diana bathing and incurred her wrath?

Ans. The story of Diana and Actaeon in Ovid’s Metamorphoses tells of a man who happened by chance upon a goddess bathing. The outraged goddess ensures that Actaeon can never tell what he has seen by changing him into a deer to be killed by his own hounds. There was a representation of the story of Actaeon and Diana in Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale.

The most striking image that Ovid creates of the god is one of a cruel exactor of divine justice. His transformation of the sailors into dolphins is one of many examples where mortals are stripped of their humanity as a punishment for their hubris. This image is particularly important in the wider context of.

Q. 8. Who was Acoetes?

Ans. In Book III of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Acoetes was a fisherman of Lydia. His father was also a fisherman. His father was very poor and used to catch fish with hook and line.In Book III of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Acoetes was a fisherman of Lydia. His father was also a fisherman. His father was very poor and used to catch fish with hook and line.

V was but One day a gang of a sailor kidnapped a sweet boy from the shore of Chios and they said that they will leave him in Nexos. In the middle of the sea leaving Nexos behind a sailor follows a different way. No one could understand who the real boy Acoetes understood that the boy was actually Bacchus, the god of wine. The boy said to the sailors that this was not the shores that they promised. Acoetes said that what the will get to cheat a boy to the other sailors of the ship.

At last King Pandion agreed. Then they got ready for their journey. The motives of king Tereus was not so good. In the way Tereus kidnapped his sister-in-law and took her in a place where none could find her out. There he behaved too bad with her and cur down her tongue with cruel sword. Then he went back to Procue and declared that Philomela was dead. Somehow Philomela met with her sister and speaks all the story Then Procue became very angry and killed her own son Itys and cooked him. Procue called her husband and served her own son. King called for his son. Then Philomela came out from kitchen and served the head of Itys. Then in fury he took his sword and wanted to hit them but on this time Philomela was changed to a nightingale. Procue became swallow and Tereus was transformed to a hoopoe.

Q. 9. Give the significance of the episode of Pyramus and Thisbe in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Book IV

Ans. Metamorphoses is one of the most famous creations of Ovid. The Latin epic, Metamorphoses is divided into fifteen books.

“Pyramus and Thisbe” is an episode from Book IV of the Metamorphoses, an epic poem published by the Roman poet Ovid in 8 AD. In contrast to the epics of Ovid’s contemporaries (like Virgil’s Aeneid), the Metamorphoses does not focus on a single, cohesive narrative. Rather, Ovid takes as his theme “bodies changed to other forms” (Book 1, Line 1) and fittingly, his Metamorphoses is a work in constant state of change. Its 15 books assemble a series of over 250 independent stories, linked loosely together in a continuous flow of words. Thus, the text of Ovid’s poem meta-poetically reenacts its theme: transformative metamorphosis.

While Ovid treats a wide variety of topics in his epic, “Pyramus and Thisbe” is representative of his special fondness for love stories. The Ur literary portrait of starcrossed lovers, “Pyramus and Thisbe” has enjoyed a reliable degree of popularity from antiquity to the present day. Preserved images of Pyramus and Thisbe can be found on the walls of Pompeii, and the story remains a popular choice for modern anthologies of Roman myth.

The importance of “Pyramus and Thisbe” as a literary model for tragic love stories cannot be overstated. Some of the most influential authors of the western traditionincluding Geoffrey Chaucer, Dante Alighieri, and William Shakespeare- either adapted the myth directly or were strongly influenced by it. Chaucer, the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages, faithfully treated the tale as The Legend of Thisbe in his 14th century work The Legend of Good Women. Dante Alighieri references, reworks, and inverts “Pyramus and Thisbe” constantly in his Italian narrative poem The Divine Comedy And the Elizabethan playwright William Shakespeare rocketed the myth to new levels of success, referencing it heavily in two of his most beloved plays: A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo and Juliet.

Ans. Metamorphoses is one of the most famous creations of Ovid. The Latin epic, Metamorphoses is divided into fifteen books. The story of Tereus, Procne and Philomela is one of these books which ends with a pathetic tragedy. As Procne had not seen her younger sister, Philomela for five years after she got married with Tereus, king of Thrace, Procne expressed her will of seeing her to Tereus. To fulfill her desire, Tereus marched towards Athens. Seeing his son-in-law, king Pandion became very happy and both exchanged their greetings. But sudden appearance of Philomela, richly attired in gorgeous robs forced him not to blink an eye. His heart could not contain the fires that burned him with ardent passion and determined to have her as his own at any cost. Convincing his father-in-law with pretence, Tereus became successful in his intention.

While sea-voyage, Tereus revealed before Philomela about his actual intention. He dragged her to a high walled steading, hidden in the dark of an ancient forest and there he shut her up. Instead of telling her where her sister was, he would take the opportunity of having a young girl alone and take pleasure or quenched his thrust using her body. Being hapless and defenseless, Philomela could none but crying addressing/calling her father, her sister and gods overhead to get rid of such situation. “She was quivering with fear, like some timid lamb which has been moulded and cast aside by a grey wolf and cannot yet believe in its safety”. But in the next she uttered some speech by addressing him ‘a horrible barbarian’. She said that how could he be so cruel, a betrayer son-in-law, a fraud husband and a tyrant of an innocent girl. She added that he would have to pay penalty for this. She also threatened him by saying of proclamation his misdeeds before the entire world. To prevent all these, Tereus cut her tongue with his cruel sword and destroyed the last hope could be said as well though it was his temporary victory. It is found that the story comes to an end with his pathetic tragedy.

Thus the episode of Tereus and Philomela has been one of the most significant of the story. parts

Q. 11. How does Ovid represent the gods and goddesses inhis Metamorphoses? Answer with special reference to Book III, IV and VI.

Ans. Book VI begins with acute rivalry between Arachne and Minerva. Minerva as we know is the Goddess associated with beaut ful weaving and her position is being threatened by a human called Arachne who is arrogant and insolent and does not respect the Goddess and thinks herself to be a better weaver than Minerva.

Minerva tries to warn Arachne not to disrespect the Gods but Arachne in her arrogance does not pay heed. So Minerva goes to meet Arachne, disguised as an old woman, and advises Arachne to seek Minerva’s forgiveness for her impunity. But Arachne being proud of her workmanship does not pay heed to the old woman’s sound advice and Minerva is forced to reveal herself to the latter. But Arachne will not bow down and finally it amounts to a weaving competition between the two of them – the

Goddess of Weaving Minerva and the mortal Arachne. Minerva weaves a beautiful picture glorifying the Gods and herself. The description of Minerva’s weaving is beautifully depicted by Ovid.

Gods and mortals often have a parent/child relationship, with the gods acting as disciplinarians over the unruly behaviour of humans. The events that transpire in the story of Ceres, Proserpine, and Pluto show how power struggles erupt among the gods themselves. The gods do form a large family, with marital problems, sibling rivalries, and turf wars. Venus, for example, sets Apollo up to fall disastrously in love with Leucothoe in order to take revenge on him. Now Hades is her victim as she sets him up to fall for Proserpine so Venus can extend her territory into the underworld. In addition, Ceres and Pluto are siblings, and each has the ear of their brother Jupiter, who has the final say in such disputes.

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