Herse (

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

: Ἕρση, "

dew Dew is water in the form of droplets that appears on thin, exposed objects in the morning or evening due to condensation. As the exposed surface cools by radiating its heat, atmospheric moisture condenses at a rate greater than that at wh ...

") was a figure in

Greek mythology A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the Cosmogony, origin and Cosmology#Metaphysical co ...

, the

Athenian Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...

princess as the daughter of King

Cecrops In Greek mythology, Cecrops ( /ˈsiːkrɒps/; Ancient Greek: Κέκροψ, ''Kékrops''; ''gen''.: Κέκροπος) may refer to two legendary kings of Athens: * Cecrops I, the first king of Athens. * Cecrops II, son of Pandion I, king of ...

of Athens and

Aglaurus Aglaurus (; grc, Ἄγλαυρος, , 'dewfall') or Agraulus (; grc, Ἄγραυλος, , 'rustic one') is a name attributed to three figures in Greek mythology. *Aglaurus, an Athenian princess as the daughter of King Actaeus. She married Cecr ...

, daughter of King

Actaeus In Greek mythology, Actaeus (; Ancient Greek: Ἀκταῖος ''Ἀktaῖos'' means "coast-man"), also called Actaeon, was the first king of Attica, according to Pausanias. Family Actaeus was the father of Aglaurus, and father-in-law to Cecr ...

Family

Herse was the sister to

Aglauros Aglaurus (; grc, Ἄγλαυρος, , 'dewfall') or Agraulus (; grc, Ἄγραυλος, , 'rustic one') is a name attributed to three figures in Greek mythology. *Aglaurus, an Athenian princess as the daughter of King Actaeus. She married Cecro ...

and

Pandrosos Pandrosos or Pandrosus (Ancient Greek: Πάνδροσος) was known in Greek myth as one of the three daughters of Cecrops I, Kekrops, the first king of Athens, and Aglaurus, daughter of King Actaeus. Family Pandrosus' two sisters were Aglaur ...

Cephalus of Athens In Greek mythology, Cephalus (; Ancient Greek: Κέφαλος ''Kephalos'') was a member of the Athens, Athenian royal family as the son of Princess Herse and Hermes. Family In some accounts, Cephalus was said to be the son of Hermes by Creusa ...

is the son of

Hermes Hermes (; grc-gre, Ἑρμῆς) is an Olympian deity in ancient Greek religion and mythology. Hermes is considered the herald of the gods. He is also considered the protector of human heralds, travellers, thieves, merchants, and orato ...

and Herse, who married

Eos In ancient Greek mythology and religion, Eos (; Ionic and Homeric Greek ''Ēṓs'', Attic ''Héōs'', "dawn", or ; Aeolic ''Aúōs'', Doric ''Āṓs'') is the goddess and personification of the dawn, who rose each morning from her home ...

, and gave birth to

Tithonus In Greek mythology, Tithonus ( or ; grc, Τιθωνός, Tithonos) was the lover of Eos, Goddess of the Dawn. He was a prince of Troy, the son of King Laomedon by the Naiad Strymo (Στρυμώ). The mythology reflected by the fifth-century vas ...

(not to be confused with Tithonus of

Troy Troy ( el, Τροία and Latin: Troia, Hittite language, Hittite: 𒋫𒊒𒄿𒊭 ''Truwiša'') or Ilion ( el, Ίλιον and Latin: Ilium, Hittite language, Hittite: 𒃾𒇻𒊭 ''Wiluša'') was an ancient city located at Hisarlik in prese ...

Mythology

Erichthonius

According to the '' Bibliotheca'', when

Hephaestus Hephaestus (; eight spellings; grc-gre, Ἥφαιστος, Hḗphaistos) is the Greek god of blacksmiths, metalworking, carpenters, craftsmen, artisans, sculptors, metallurgy, fire (compare, however, with Hestia), and volcanoes.Walter Burk ...

unsuccessfully attempted to rape

Athena Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is an ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva. Athena was regarded as the patron and protectress of ...

, she wiped his semen off her leg with wool and threw it on the ground, impregnating

Gaia In Greek mythology, Gaia (; from Ancient Greek , a poetical form of , 'land' or 'earth'),, , . also spelled Gaea , is the personification of the Earth and one of the Greek primordial deities. Gaia is the ancestral mother—sometimes parthenog ...

. Athena wished to make the resulting infant Erichthonius immortal and to raise it, so she gave it to three sisters, Herse,

and

, in a willow basket and warned them to never open it. Aglauros and Herse disobeyed her and opened the basket which contained the infant and future king, Erichthonius, who was somehow mixed or intertwined with a snake. The sight caused Herse and Aglauros to go insane and they jumped to their deaths off the

Acropolis An acropolis was the settlement of an upper part of an ancient Greek city, especially a citadel, and frequently a hill with precipitous sides, mainly chosen for purposes of defense. The term is typically used to refer to the Acropolis of Athens, ...

. Shrines were constructed for Herse and Aglauros on the Acropolis. An alternative version of the story is that, while

was gone bringing a limestone mountain from the Pallene peninsula to use in the Acropolis, the sisters, minus Pandrosos again, opened the box with Erichthonius inside. A crow witnessed the opening and flew away to tell Athena, who fell into a rage and dropped the mountain (now

Mt. Lykabettos Mount Lycabettus (), also known as Lycabettos, Lykabettos or Lykavittos ( el, Λυκαβηττός, ), is a Cretaceous limestone hill in the Greek capital Athens. At 277 meters (908 feet) above sea level, its summit is the highest point in Cen ...

). Once again, Herse and Aglauros went insane and threw themselves to their deaths off the cliffs of the Acropolis. This story supposedly inspired an ancient ritual in

Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...

: "The Festival of the Dew Carriers" or

Arrhephoria Arrhephoria was a feast among the Athenians, instituted in honor of Athena. The word is derived from the Greek term Ἀρρηφόρια, which is composed of ἀρρητον, "mystery", and φέρω, "I carry". This feast was also called Hersiph ...

Jealous sister

Some authors, such as

Ovid Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...

in his ''

Metamorphoses The ''Metamorphoses'' ( la, Metamorphōsēs, from grc, μεταμορφώσεις: "Transformations") is a Latin narrative poem from 8 CE by the Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his ''magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the wo ...

'' and ''

Ars Amatoria The ''Ars amatoria'' ( en, The Art of Love) is an instructional elegy series in three books by the ancient Roman poet Ovid. It was written in 2 AD. Background Book one of ''Ars amatoria'' was written to show a man how to find a woman. In book two ...

'', wrote a different end for Herse and Aglauros. Ovid tells in Book 2 of his ''Metamorphoses'' that Erichthonius was born without a mother. Pallas Athena (better known as Athena, Minerva is her Roman name) placed him in a willow basket and told the sisters not to look on the mysteries. Two daughters, Herse and Pandrosos obeyed, but Aglauros looked and saw the child lying next to a great snake.

Corone Corone ( grc, Κορώνη, Korṓnē, crow) may refer to: * Koroni, also spelled Corone, a town in Greece * Corone (crow) In Greek and Roman mythology, Corone ( grc, Κορώνη, Korṓnē, crow ) is a young woman who attracted the attenti ...

, the crow, told Athena, who turned her feathers from white to black for her pains. Later in Book 2,

(Mercury in Roman mythology) is in Athens and sees a festival to Athena. He falls in love with Herse and goes to her house to ask for her hand. Aglauros agrees to give Herse his message for the price of gold. Athena sees all of this and goes to the house of

Envy Envy is an emotion which occurs when a person lacks another's quality, skill, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it. Aristotle defined envy as pain at the sight of another's good fortune, stirred b ...

and orders the goddess to poison Aglauros. Aglauros, who begins to waste away with jealousy, blocks the passage to Herse's room and refuses to move. Hermes, angry at Aglauros for breaking her promise, changes her into a black marble statue.Ovid, ''Metamorphoses'' 2.708-832

Gallery

File:Erichthonius Released from His Basket LACMA 65.37.98.jpg, ''Erichthonius Released from His Basket'' by Antonio Tempesta (1606) File:Jakob Jordaens 015.jpg, ''Daughters of Kekrops Finding Erichthonios'' by Jacob Jordaens (1640) File:Peter Paul Rubens - The Discovery of the Child Erichthonius - WGA20295.jpg, ''The Discovery of the Child Erichthonius'' by Peter Paul Rubens (circa 1615) File:Pierre, Jean-Baptiste Marie - Mercury, Herse and Aglauros - 1763.jpg, ''Mercury, Herse and Aglauros'' by Jean-Baptiste Marie Pierre (1763) File:Rubens, Peter Paul - Finding of Erichthonius - 1632-1633.jpg, ''Finding of Erichthonius'' by Peter Paul Rubens (between 1632 and 1633) File:Willem van Herp Erichthonius.jpg, ''The finding of the infant Erichthonius by Cecrops's daughters'' by Willem van Herp (circa 1650)) File:Caraglio Voyeurism.jpg, Mercury and Herse from the series “Götterlieben” (Prinmaking), Hamburg.

Notes

References

Apollodorus Apollodorus (Ancient Greek, Greek: Ἀπολλόδωρος ''Apollodoros'') was a popular name in ancient Greece. It is the masculine gender of a noun compounded from Apollo, the deity, and doron, "gift"; that is, "Gift of Apollo." It may refer to: ...

, ''The Library'' with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921. ISBN 0-674-99135-4
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.Greek text available from the same website
*

Gaius Julius Hyginus Gaius Julius Hyginus (; 64 BC – AD 17) was a Latin author, a pupil of the scholar Alexander Polyhistor, and a freedman of Caesar Augustus. He was elected superintendent of the Palatine library by Augustus according to Suetonius' ''De Grammatic ...

, ''Fabulae from The Myths of Hyginus'' translated and edited by Mary Grant. University of Kansas Publications in Humanistic Studies
Online version at the Topos Text Project
* Morford, Mark P. O., Robert J. Lenardon, ''Classical Mythology'', Eighth Edition, Oxford University Press, 2007.
Internet Archive
*

Pausanias Pausanias ( el, Παυσανίας) may refer to: *Pausanias of Athens, lover of the poet Agathon and a character in Plato's ''Symposium'' *Pausanias the Regent, Spartan general and regent of the 5th century BC *Pausanias of Sicily, physician of th ...

, ''Description of Greece'' with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
* Pausanias, ''Graeciae Descriptio.'' ''3 vols''. Leipzig, Teubner. 1903.
Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library
*

Publius Ovidius Naso Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...

, ''Metamorphoses'' translated by Brookes More (1859-1942). Boston, Cornhill Publishing Co. 1922
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
* Publius Ovidius Naso, ''Metamorphoses.'' Hugo Magnus. Gotha (Germany). Friedr. Andr. Perthes. 1892
Latin text available at the Perseus Digital Library
{{Authority control Princesses in Greek mythology Women of Hermes Metamorphoses characters Attican characters in Greek mythology Deeds of Athena Attic mythology