Hyacinth (ˈhaɪəsɪnθ) or Hyacinthus (in Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...

, Ὑάκινθος, Hyakinthos) is a divine hero from Greek mythology

Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

. His cult at Amyclae, southwest of Sparta, where his tumulus

Tumulus

A tumulus is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds, Hügelgrab or kurgans, and can be found throughout much of the world. A tumulus composed largely or entirely of stones is usually referred to as a cairn...

 was located— in classical times at the feet of Apollo

Apollo

Apollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in Greek and Roman mythology...

's statue in the sanctuary

Temenos

Temenos is a piece of land cut off and assigned as an official domain, especially to kings and chiefs, or a piece of land marked off from common uses and dedicated to a god, a sanctuary, holy grove or holy precinct: The Pythian race-course is called a temenos, the sacred valley of the Nile is the ...

 that had been built round the burial mound— dates from the Mycenaean era

Mycenaean Greece

Mycenaean Greece was a cultural period of Bronze Age Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece. Athens, Pylos, Thebes, and Tiryns are also important Mycenaean sites...

. The literary myths serve to link him to local cults, and to identify him with Apollo.

Mythology

In Greek mythology

Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

, Hyacinth was given various parentage, providing local links, as the son of Clio

Clio

thumb|Clio—detail from [[The Art of Painting|The Allegory of Painting]] by [[Johannes Vermeer]]In Greek mythology, Clio or Kleio, is the muse of history. Like all the muses, she is a daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyne...

 and Pierus

Pierus

Pierus , in Greek mythology, is a name attributed to two individuals.*Pierus, the eponym of Pieria, son of Makednos and father by Antiope or Euippe of the of Pierides, nine maidens who wanted to outshine the Muses...

, King of Macedon

Macedon

Macedonia or Macedon was an ancient kingdom, centered in the northeastern part of the Greek peninsula, bordered by Epirus to the west, Paeonia to the north, the region of Thrace to the east and Thessaly to the south....

, or of king Oebalus

Oebalus

In Greek mythology, King Oebalus or Oibalos of Sparta, son of Cynortas, was the second husband of Gorgophone. With her, he fathered Tyndareus, Icarius and Hippocoon , as well as a daughter, Arene, who married her half-brother Aphareus...

 of Sparta

Sparta

Sparta or Lacedaemon, was a prominent city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the banks of the River Eurotas in Laconia, in south-eastern Peloponnese. It emerged as a political entity around the 10th century BC, when the invading Dorians subjugated the local, non-Dorian population. From c...

, or of king Amyclas

Amyclas

In Greek mythology, Amyclas refers to three individuals:*Amyclas was the son of Lacedemon and Sparta, and he was the brother of Eurydice . According to Pseudo-Apollodorus, he was the father of Hyacinth and Cynortas; according to Pausanias, he was also the father of Laodamia or Leaneira, wife of...

, progenitor of the people of Amyclae, dwellers about Sparta. His cult at Amyclae, where his tomb was located, at the feet of Apollo

Apollo

Apollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in Greek and Roman mythology...

's statue, dates from the Mycenaean era

Mycenaean Greece

Mycenaean Greece was a cultural period of Bronze Age Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece. Athens, Pylos, Thebes, and Tiryns are also important Mycenaean sites...

.

In the literary myth, Hyacinth was a beautiful boy and lover of the god Apollo

Apollo

Apollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in Greek and Roman mythology...

 , though he was also admired by West Wind, Zephyr. Apollo and Hyacinth took turns throwing the discus

Discus

Discus, "disk" in Latin, may refer to:* Discus , a progressive rock band from Indonesia* Discus , a fictional character from the Marvel Comics Universe and enemy of Luke Cage* Discus , a freshwater fish popular with aquarium keepers...

. Hyacinth ran to catch it to impress Apollo, was struck by the discus as it fell to the ground, and died. A twist in the tale makes the wind god Zephyrus responsible for the death of Hyacinth. His beauty caused a feud between Zephyrus and Apollo. Jealous that Hyacinth preferred the radiant archery god Apollo, Zephyrus blew Apollo's discus off course, so as to injure and kill Hyacinth. When he died, Apollo didn't allow Hades

Hades

Hades , Hadēs, originally , Haidēs or , Aidēs , meaning "the unseen") was the ancient Greek god of the underworld. The genitive , Haidou, was an elision to denote locality: "[the house/dominion] of Hades". Eventually, the nominative came to designate the abode of the dead.In Greek mythology, Hades...

 to claim the boy; rather, he made a flower, the hyacinth, from his spilled blood. According to Ovid's account, the tears of Apollo stained the newly formed flower's petals with ai, ai, the sign of his grief. The flower of the mythological Hyacinth has been identified with a number of plants other than the true hyacinth, such as the iris

Iris (plant)

Iris is a genus of 260-300species of flowering plants with showy flowers. It takes its name from the Greek word for a rainbow, referring to the wide variety of flower colors found among the many species...

. According to a local Spartan version of the myth, Hyacinth and his sister Polyboea

Polyboea

In Greek mythology, Polyboea is a name that refers to:*A sister of Hyacinthus who died a virgin and was believed to have been taken to heaven by Aphrodite, Athena and Artemis, together with her brother.*The first wife of Actor....

 were taken to heaven by Aphrodite

Aphrodite

Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation.Her Roman equivalent is the goddess .Historically, her cult in Greece was imported from, or influenced by, the cult of Astarte in Phoenicia....

, Athena

Athena

In Greek mythology, Athena, Athenê, or Athene , also referred to as Pallas Athena/Athene , is the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, warfare, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, justice, and skill. Minerva, Athena's Roman incarnation, embodies similar attributes. Athena is...

 and Artemis

Artemis

Artemis was one of the most widely venerated of the Ancient Greek deities. Her Roman equivalent is Diana. Some scholars believe that the name and indeed the goddess herself was originally pre-Greek. Homer refers to her as Artemis Agrotera, Potnia Theron: "Artemis of the wildland, Mistress of Animals"...

.

Hyacinth was the tutelary deity of one of the principal Spartan festivals, the Hyacinthia

Hyacinthia

The death of Hyacinthus was celebrated at Amyclae by the second most important of Spartan festivals, the Hyacinthia in the Spartan month Hyacinthius in early summer.-Proceedings:...

, held every summer. The festival lasted three days, one day of mourning for the death of the divine hero Hyacinth, and the last two celebrating his rebirth as Apollo Hayakinthios, though the division of honours is a subject for scholarly controversy.

Interpretation

The name of Hyacinth is of pre-Hellenic origin, as indicated by the suffix

Suffix

In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs...

 -nth. According to classical interpretations, his myth, where Apollo is a Dorian god, is a classical metaphor of the death and rebirth of nature, much as in the myth of Adonis. It has likewise been suggested that Hyacinthus was a pre-Hellenic divinity supplanted by Apollo through the "accident" of his death, to whom he remains associated in the epithet

Epithet

An epithet or byname is a descriptive term accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, divinities, objects, and binomial nomenclature. It is also a descriptive title...

 of Apollon Hyakinthios.

Apollo teaches Hyacinthus to become an accomplished adult. Indeed, according to Philostratus

Philostratus

Philostratus or Lucius Flavius Philostratus , , called "the Athenian", was a Greek sophist of the Roman imperial period. His father was a minor sophist of the same name. He was born probably around 172, and is said by the Suda to have been living in the reign of emperor Philip the Arab . His death...

, Hyacinthus learns not only to throw the discus, but all the other exercises of the Palaestra

Palaestra

The palaestra was the ancient Greek wrestling school. The events that did not require a lot of space, such as boxing and wrestling, were practised there...

 as well, to shoot with a bow, music, the art of divination, and also to play the lyre

Lyre

The lyre is a stringed musical instrument known for its use in Greek classical antiquity and later. The word comes from the Greek "λύρα" and the earliest reference to the word is the Mycenaean Greek ru-ra-ta-e, meaning "lyrists", written in Linear B syllabic script...

. Pausanias also mentions his apotheosis

Apotheosis

Apotheosis is the glorification of a subject to divine level. The term has meanings in theology, where it refers to a belief, and in art, where it refers to a genre.In theology, the term apotheosis refers to the idea that an individual has been raised to godlike stature...

, represented on the pedestal of the ritual statue of the boy at Amyclae, his place of worship. The poet Nonnus of Panopolis mentions the resurrection of the boy by Apollo. Sergent finds that the death and resurrection as well as the apotheosis, represent the transition to adult life.

Spoken-word myths - audio files

The Hyacinth myth as told by story tellers
Bibliography of reconstruction: Homer Homer In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is... , Iliad Iliad The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles... ii.595-600 (c. 700 BC); Various 5th century BC vase paintings; Palaephatus Palaephatus Palaephatus was the original author of a rationalizing text on Greek mythology, the work of paradoxography On Incredible Tales , which survives in a Byzantine edition.... , On Unbelievable Tales 46. Hyacinthus (330 BC); Apollodorus Apollodorus Apollodorus of Athens son of Asclepiades, was a Greek scholar and grammarian. He was a pupil of Diogenes of Babylon, Panaetius the Stoic, and the grammarian Aristarchus of Samothrace... , Library 1.3.3 (140 BC); Ovid Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria... , Metamorphoses 10. 162-219 (1 AD – 8 AD); Pausanias Pausanias (geographer) Pausanias was a Greek traveler and geographer of the 2nd century AD, who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. He is famous for his Description of Greece , a lengthy work that describes ancient Greece from firsthand observations, and is a crucial link between classical... , Description of Greece 3.1.3, 3.19.4 (160 – 176 AD); Philostratus the Elder, Images i.24 Hyacinthus (170 – 245 AD); Philostratus the Younger Philostratus the Younger Philostratus the Younger , also known as Philostratus of Lemnos, was a Greek sophist of the Roman imperial period. He was author of the second series of Imagines, which does not survive completely; in the preface, he praises his mother's father, who wrote the first series of Imagines; this is... , Images 14. Hyacinthus (170 – 245 AD); Lucian Lucian Lucian of Samosata was a rhetorician and satirist who wrote in the Greek language. He is noted for his witty and scoffing nature.His ethnicity is disputed and is attributed as Assyrian according to Frye and Parpola, and Syrian according to Joseph.... , Dialogues of the Gods 14 (170 AD); First Vatican Mythographer, 197. Thamyris et Musae

External link

• Collected classical references to Hyacinthus