KINYRAS AT PYLOS John C. Franklin University of Vermont Kinyras ...

‘are themselves said to have ruled the seas once upon a time’. 40 Add to this the tale of Kinyras’
unfulfilled promise to send Menelaus fifty ships for the expedition against Troy. 41 One should
also note the roles of Aphrodite and Astarte as patronesses of sailors—one of several areas in
which Kinyras mirrors the interests of his Island Girl, and shows some overlap with the Ugaritic
craftsman-god Kothar-wa-Hasis and his Phoenician descendant Chusor. 42
‘Kinyras’ also appears as a typical Cilician fisherman’s name in two entries of the Greek
Anthology. 43 These poems, despite their relatively late date, provide a valuable parallel for
‘Kinyras’ as a possible personal name at Pylos. There are also occasional epigraphic attestations
from various parts of the later Greek world. 44 Yet for the anthologized poet (and no doubt
parents choosing names) Kinyras’ is clearly a type, and there are audible echoes of ‘the’
Kinyras. 45 A weary old man, who in his retirement hangs his humble nets up for the nymphs,
inverts the Cypriote king’s proverbial wealth, and recalls the 160-year lifespan mentioned by
Anacreon in a lost poem. This longevity might also suggest the great antiquity of Kinyras’ family
aÈto€.
40 Eust. in Dionys. Per. 508–9.18 f. [ofl KÊprioi] l°gontai d° pote yalattokrat∞sai kairÒn tina ka‹
41 Fifty is the number found in Apollod. Epit. 3.9 and both Eustathius and scholia ad Il. 11.20; it seems
alluded to by Lucian Ver hist. 2.25–6. Cf. Baurain 1980, 294.
42 See e.g. Pl. Com fr. 3 K-A (‘oar-driven goddess’ [if this is the right reading: see ap. crit. in K-A]); cf.
Nonnus Dion. 2.103. Cf. Burkert 1985, 153. Kinyras and Kothar/Chusor: Brown 1965.
43 Anth. Pal. 6.25, 26 [Jul. Aegypt.], cf. Brown 1965, 206. Cilicia is an important extension of Kinyras’ mythology,
as discussed below in connection with the lyre-player seals. A fish appears on one of these (no. 113quater in
Boardman/Buchner 1966); perhaps this detail serves to bind the lyre-player to the Syrian Goddess, to whom fish were
sacred (for which see generally Lightfoot 2003, 65–72).
44 Fraser/Matthews 1987–, svv.
45 Compare Kinyras as the proverbial Good Man of Cilicia in Anth. Pal. 11.236 [Demodocus] (Ovid calls
Kinyras ‘pious and mindful of propriety’ (pius ille memorque ets / moris), Met. 10.354 f. (Myrrha speaking).