Although it is not explicitly attested in Proclus’ summary or elsewhere, it can be reasonably assumed that in reporting that the accidental killing accounted for Penthesileia’s presence at Troy (5. 1), Apollodorus was following the Aethiopisin the epic cycle. It is surely probable that the incident would have taken place in her native land within Asia Minor to the east of Troy, as indicated in the surviving accounts in Diodorus 2. 46. 5 and Quintus of Smyrna 1. 21 ff. Diodorus is vague, merely stating that she killed her (unnamed) sister and had to leave her native land, but according to Quintus, she killed Hippolyte when throwing her spear at a stag (which may well be the early tradition).
EXPLANATORY NOTES
References:these are included either to suggest passages for comparison and further reading in ancient works which are readily accessible in translation, or to state the source of specific information given within the note. In the latter case, the references are selective, and refer if necessary to untranslated works.
The following abbreviationsare used:
Aesch.
Aeschylus (tragic poet, 525/4–456 BC).
[Aesch.] PV
Prometheus Enchained, a play transmitted under Aeschylus’ name but of uncertain authorship.
AL
Antoninus Liberalis, Metamorphoses(compendium of transformation myths, circasecond century AD; for translation see Select Bibliography).
Ap.
Apollodorus, the author of the Library.
AR
Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica(epic, third century BC).
Bacch.
Bacchylides (lyric poet, flourished fifth century BC; the numbering follows Snell’s Teubner edition).
Catast.
Pseudo-Eratosthenes, Catasterisms(compendium of constellation myths; in Mythographi Graeci, Leipsig, vol. 3).
DS
Diodorus of Sicily, Library(a world history, first century BC, translated in the Loeb series).
Eur.
Euripides (tragic poet, fifth century BC).
fr.
fragment.
Hdt.
Herodotus, History(fifth century BC).
Hes.
Hesiod. (For translations of the Hesiodic works, and of some of the testimonies and fragments, see the Hesiod volume in the Loeb series; the references for the fragments are to the standard edition by Merkelbach and West, Oxford, 1967.)
Hes. Cat.
Catalogue of Women(a sixth-century genealogical epic, not by the author of the Theogony;see Introduction and Select Bibliography).
Hes. WD
Hesiod, Works and Days.
HH
Homeric Hymns(post-Homeric, of varying date up to sixth century BC or later, translated in Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns, Loeb series).
Hyg.
Hyginus, Fabulae(mythological compendium; for translation see Select Bibliography).
Hyg. PA
Hyginus, Poetic Astronomy(Book II of the Astronomy;see Select Bibliography).
Il.
Homer’s Iliad.
Od.
Homer’s Odyssey.
Ov. Met.
Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
P.
Pausanias, Description of Greece(second century AD, translated in the Loeb series and Penguin).
Parthen.
Parthenius of Nicaea, Love Stories(first century BC; in Mythographi Graeci, Leipsig, vol. 2).
Pind.
Pindar (lyric poet, 518–438 BC). Isth.: Isthmian Odes; Nem.: Nemean Odes; 01.: Olympian Odes; Pyth.: Pythian Odes.
Plut. Thes.
Plutarch (first-second century AD), Life of Theseus.
Procl.
Proclus (of uncertain date, author of summaries of the early epics in the Trojan cycle; translated in Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns, Loeb series).
QS
Quintus of Smyrna, Posthomerica(epic poem on the fall of Troy, fourth century AD; translated in the Loeb series).
sc.
scholion. (The scholia were marginal notes by ancient and medieval scholars, which often preserve material from lost mythographical works. French translations of some of the scholia relevant to the text of the Librarycan be found in the notes to Carriere’s edition; see Select Bibliography.)
NB. In references to scholia conventional abbreviations have been used.
Theog.
Hesiod’s Theogony.
Thuc.
Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War(fifth century BC).
Tzetz.
Johannes Tzetzes (Byzantine scholar, twelfth-century AD).
VM
The Vatican Mythographers (ed. G. H. Bode, Scriptores Rerum Mythicarum Latini Tres, Celle, 1834; late Latin compendia).
Dates: all are BC unless otherwise indicated.
Cross-references: these are selective, and the Index should also be consulted.
Textual matters: notes on these, and on points of language, have been kept to a bare minimum, except with regard to dubious passages and interpolations (marked by square brackets in the text) and to etymologies, which depend on wordplay in the original Greek (indicated by italics in the text).
Homer and Hesiod: it is convenient to refer to ‘Homer’, but this implies no judgement as to whether the Iliadand the Odysseywere composed by the same author, or on the extent to which each poem can be regarded as the work of a single poet. There is disagreement on whether the Hesiodic Theogonyand Works and Dayswere written by the same author; and other works attributed to Hesiod by the ancients, notably the Catalogue of Womenand the Shield, were certainly written at a later period.
Modern authors: all references are to editors or translators of the Library(see Select Bibliography).
Pherecydes, Acousilaos, and Hellanicos: for these early mythographer-historians, who are important sources for Apollodorus, see the Introduction.
Ouranos. . . Ge: respectively the Sky and the Earth (who was also referred to as Gaia, the form preferred by Hesiod). For the early history of the universe, cf. Theog. 116 ff., but the present account sometimes diverges significantly (perhaps following a theogony from the epic cycle, summarized by Proclus in Photius 319A). In Theog., Chaos—representing a yawning gap rather than disorder— comes into being first, followed by Gaia, Tartaros, and Eros (116 ff.), and Gaia gives birth to Ouranos from herself (126 f.).
the Cyclopes: cf. Theog. 139 ff.; named the ‘Round-Eyed’ because of their single round eye. Their individual names were suggested by their prime function, as the beings who armed Zeus with his thunder (see p. 28): (a)steropemeans lightning, bronte, thunder, and argesrefers to the brightness associated with the thunderbolt. For other kinds of Cyclops, see p. 63 and note and pp. 164 f.