Melus (mythology)

Melus (Ancient Greek: Μήλος, romanized: Mḗlos, lit. 'apple, sheep') in Greek mythology is the name of two minor figures; one is a childhood friend of Adonis, Aphrodite's beloved, who is connected to apples via his metamorphosis into one, and the other a son of the river-god Scamander. Although unrelated to each other, both feature in myths connecting Aphrodite to the apple.

Cyprus

Melus was born on Delos, but moved to Cyprus. When the ruler of Cyprus, Cinyras, saw that Melus was of sound character, he made Melus a companion to his son Adonis. Melus eventually married a woman named Pelia, who was kin to Cinyras and Adonis, and had a son by her, also named Melus. The child was raised inside the sanctuary of Aphrodite. When Adonis was slain by a boar during hunting, Melus was so distraught over his loss that he ended his life by hanging himself from an apple tree, which took his name thereafter. Pelia, not standing the loss of her kin and her husband, took her life in the same way. After Aphrodite's own period of mourning was over, she turned Melus into an apple fruit, and Pelia into a dove. Their son, Melus, was sent back to Delos, where he founded the city Melon. The sheep there also took his name, for he first taught the Delians to shear them and make clothing out of their wool; the Greek μῆλον means 'apple' and 'sheep' both. The apple was seen as the most important fruit symbol of Aphrodite, as the emblem of her victory in the beauty contest; in the ancient Greek society, the apple fruit became "the love token par excellence".

Asia Minor

Melus, the son of the river-god Scamander, is mentioned by the Alexandrine grammarian Ptolemaeus Chennus, who recorded an alternative narrative of the myth of Aphrodite, Hera and Athena vying over the Apple of Discord. Melus was a handsome young man so all three goddesses fought over who would have him as her priest; Alexander (Paris) was tasked with solving the issue, and he decreed that Melus would serve Aphrodite. Ptolemaeus Chennus wrote that the story concerning the golden apple was inspired by this incident, in a example of rationalizing Greek myth also seen in the works of Palaephatus and Heraclitus.

See also

• Side (mythology)
• Peristera (mythology)
• Cycnus of Liguria

Bibliography

• Cyrino, Monica S (2010). Aphrodite. Gods and Heroes of the Ancient World. New York and London: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-77523-6.
• Forbes Irving, Paul M. C. (1990). Metamorphosis in Greek Myths. Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-814730-9.
• Grimal, Pierre (1987). The Dictionary of Classical Mythology. Translated by A. R. Maxwell-Hyslop. New York, USA: Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 0-631-13209-0.
• Maurus Servius Honoratus, In Vergilii carmina comentarii. Servii Grammatici qui feruntur in Vergilii carmina commentarii; recensuerunt Georgius Thilo et Hermannus Hagen. Georgius Thilo. Leipzig. B. G. Teubner. 1881. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
• Photius, Bibliotheca excerpts, sections 1-166 translated by John Henry Freese, from the SPCK edition of 1920, now in the public domain, and other brief excerpts from subsequent sections translated by Roger Pearse (from the French translation by René Henry, ed. Les Belles Lettres).
• Smith, William, A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. London. John Murray: printed by Spottiswoode and Co., New-Street Square and Parliament Street, 1873.