Classical Mythology, 7th Edition - obinfonet: dia logou

60
THE MYTHS OF CREATION: THE GODS
Aurora, artist unknown. Watercolor and gold paper collage on silk, ca. 1820; I4V2 x 14V4
in. The goddess in this painting, formerly called Venus Drawn by Doves, has been identified
as Aurora (Eos) by verses that accompany other copies, beginning: "Hail, bright Aurora,
fair goddess of the morn!/Around thy splendid Car the smiling Hours submissive
wait attendance." Her chariot is drawn by doves and winged cupids fly around it. Aurora
is dressed in early nineteenth-century clothing, appropriate for the American landscape
to which she brings the light of a new day. (Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Collection,
Williamsburg, Virginia. Reproduced by permission.)
and Apollo; and Selene and Artemis also are described by the adjective "bright,"
Phoebe (the feminine form of Phoebus). 15 Therefore the lover of Endymion becomes
Artemis (or Roman Diana).
Eos, Goddess of the Dawn, and Tithonus. Eos (the Roman Aurora), the third child
of Hyperion and Theia, is goddess of the dawn, and like her sister Selene drives
a two-horsed chariot. Her epithets in poetry are appropriate, for instance, rosyfingered
and saffron-robed. She is an amorous deity. Aphrodite, the goddess of
love, caused her to long perpetually for young mortals because she caught her
mate Ares in Eos' bed, 16 but her most important mate was Tithonus, a handsome
youth of the Trojan royal house. Eos carried off Tithonus; their story is