{"id":863,"date":"2018-03-26T02:46:26","date_gmt":"2018-03-26T02:46:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/?page_id=863"},"modified":"2018-06-14T17:59:56","modified_gmt":"2018-06-14T17:59:56","slug":"medea-crosser-of-boundaries-draft","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/?page_id=863","title":{"rendered":"Medea, Crosser of Boundaries (old version)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Medea\u2019s Mythic Biography<\/h3>\n<\/header>\n
\n
\"Medea<\/a>
Vase of the Talos Painter: drawing of side A (left), showing the Argo, Kallias and Zetes, and Medea. From Furtw\u00e4ngler-Reichhold, Griechische Vasenmalerei: Auswahl hervorragender Vasenbilder, Tafeln 31-40. M\u00fcnchen: Bruckmann, 1902. pls. 38-39, 1902 (print); 1993 (rescan)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

No woman in Greek mythology is more renown than Medea.\u00a0 And perhaps no woman in Greek mythology has a more complete life cycle.\u00a0 Her story begins as an adolescent girl in Colchis at the eastern edge of the Black Sea, passes through two marriages, and continues to maturity as an independent woman with children.\u00a0 Her roles include helper-maiden, a woman who leaves her father for love, wife, mother, and woman who chooses not to remarry.\u00a0 Despite her foreign status, she holds power as queen in Iolcus and Athens and as primary ruler of Corinth.\u00a0 Her descent from Helios provides her with divine lineage, her association with Hecate and Hera tie her to magic, rejuvenation, and reproduction.\u00a0 Indeed, it is likely that her appeal is rooted in how she crosses boundaries.<\/p>\n

Medea\u2019s mythic biography moves across the known Greek world in a circle, tracing different stages in a woman\u2019s life.\u00a0 Each author who writes of Medea focuses on one part of the story, but often alludes to other phases of her life.\u00a0 When Jason and the Argonauts first come to Colchis at the edge of the known world, \u00a0\u00a0Medea is a\u00a0parthenos<\/em>, a young unmarried woman, the daughter of King Aeetes.\u00a0 Jason is traveling to fulfill a task given to him by his uncle Pelias to obtain the golden fleece, now hanging in the grove of Ares guarded by a fierce dragon.\u00a0 Medea first falls in love (Pindar,\u00a0Pythian<\/em>\u00a04; Apollonius,\u00a0Argonautica\u00a0<\/em>3.275-98), taking the initiative by offering Jason a salve to protect him as he yokes fire-breathing bulls and sows a field with dragon\u2019s teeth (Apollonius 3.1013-62).\u00a0 When Jason must then snatch the golden fleece from the dragon who never sleeps, she drugs the dragon (Apollonius 4.123-66) or offers Jason a sleeping potion to render the dragon innocuous. \u00a0Now that she has betrayed her father twice, she demands that Jason take her to Greece and marry him.\u00a0 As they escape, they must slow down Aeetes\u2019s ships.\u00a0 And so Medea chops her half-brother Apsyrtus into pieces, forcing Aeetes\u2019 men to stop and pick up the pieces.<\/p>\n

\"Medea<\/a>
Medea and daughters of Pelias with the ram. A red-figure stamnos. Medea rejuvenated ram to make the daughters think she would do the same for their father. Greek, c. 470 BCE
Berlin, Pergamon Museum. Photo by Barbara McManus, 1992<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The second phase of her story takes place in Thessaly (central Greece) in the city of Iolcus, where Jason\u2019s uncle Pelias has usurped the throne from Jason\u2019s father, Aeson.\u00a0 \u00a0There Medea helps Jason take vengeance on his uncle.\u00a0 Approaching Pelias\u2019 daughters, Medea informs them that she has the power to rejuvenate an old ram.\u00a0 After cutting up the ram and adding some herbs, the ram emerges from the cauldron a young, supple animal.\u00a0 The daughters of Pelias are so impressed that they ask Medea to perform the same ritual to make their father young again.\u00a0 Medea gets as far as cutting up Pelias and putting him the boiling cauldron, but does not complete the rest of the ritual.\u00a0 Enraged, Pelias\u2019 daughters chase Medea and Jason out of Iolcus.<\/p>\n

\"Fresco<\/a>
Fresco of Medea, from peristyle of the Casa di Dioscuri in Pompeii, first century CE. Naples, National Archaeological Museum. Photo by Barbara McManus, 2010<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Medea and Jason escape to Corinth, home of the third phase of Medea\u2019s mythic biography.\u00a0 Here competing accounts differ in details.\u00a0 Early accounts by the poets Eumelus (cited in Pausanias\u00a02.3.10<\/a>) and Simonides (fr. 545) affirm that Medea was queen in Corinth while Euripides\u2019 famous tragedy indicates that both Jason and Medea are essentially refugees, dependent upon the grace and hospitality of the king Creon.\u00a0 When Jason resolves to marry the king\u2019s daughter in order to legitimize their place in Corinth, Euripides\u2019 tragedy depicts Medea responding to his betrayal with vengeance.\u00a0 She sends her children to the bride with a wedding gift, a poison robe.\u00a0 The fatal gift causes the bride\u2019s demise when she puts it on, and her father Creon dies attempting to embrace her. \u00a0After destroying Jason\u2019s new bride and father-in-law, Medea, according to Euripides, although torn whether to murder her children, ultimately decides to do so to keep Jason\u2019s family line from continuing.<\/p>\n

\"Medea<\/a>
Medea rides a chariot pulled by dragons.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In phase four, Medea accepts Aegeus\u2019 offer of hospitality and flees to Athens.\u00a0 Medea marries Aegeus since he believes he is childless.\u00a0 When Aegeus\u2019 son from his union with Aethra, Theseus, arrives from Troezen, Medea persuades Aegeus to poison the stranger, but Aegeus recognizes his son and knocks the lethal cup from Theseus\u2019 hands at the last second (Bacchylides fr. 18 (Campbell); Callimachus\u00a0Hecale<\/em>; Plutarch,\u00a0Life of Theseus<\/em>\u00a012.2-3<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Finally, Medea takes flight to the east to a land called Aria.\u00a0 Her son, named either Medeus or Medus, becomes the eponymous founder of the Medes.\u00a0 Some sources indicate that Jason is the father (Hesiod,\u00a0Theogony<\/em>\u00a0992-1002<\/a>) while others claim Aegeus is the father (Herodotus 7.62<\/a>;\u00a0Strabo 11.13.10<\/a>; Pausanias\u00a02.3.8<\/a>). Typically, when a hero is born who will found a new nation, one parent is divine, such as Zeus and Antiope giving birth to Zethus and Amphion, the founders of Thebes, the union of Poseidon and Melanippe producing Boeotus and Aeolus, the eponymous heroes of Boeotia and Aeolia, or Zeus and Callisto the parents of Arcas, the founder of Arcadia.\u00a0 In this story, Medeus\/Medus is the equivalent of these eponymous founders, yet the fact that neither Jason nor Aegeus is divine suggests that she, in fact, is the divine parent. Indeed, the version in Herodotus and Pausanias makes Medea, not her son, the eponymous founder (Krevans 74-76).<\/p>\n

At every stage of her life journey, Medea represents another phase in the life of a woman and another aspect of a Greek woman.\u00a0 In Colchis, she is the young unmarried girl (\u03c0\u03b1\u03c1\u03b8\u1f73\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2)\u00a0who falls in love, abandons her natal family, and marries a stranger.\u00a0 In Iolcus, she is the new bride (\u03bd\u1f7b\u03bc\u03c6\u03b7) who brings new customs to Jason\u2019s family and fails to be integrated into the new household and community.\u00a0 In Corinth, she is the wife (\u03b3\u03c5\u03bd\u1f75) and mother (\u03bc\u1f75\u03c4\u03b7\u03c1) who is cut off from her husband Jason.\u00a0 In Athens, she is the new wife, the stepmother (\u03bc\u03b7\u03c4\u03c1\u03c5\u03b9\u1f71) who wants to protect and promote her child Medeus.\u00a0 Finally, she is a woman who no longer needs a husband, traveling to a new land.\u00a0 Here she names a nation after her own child and acts as an autonomous, independent woman.<\/p>\n

Second, at each stage, Medea signifies \u201cforeignness.\u201d\u00a0 As Fritz Graf notes, Medea \u201cis a foreigner, who lives outside of the known world or comes to a city from outside; each time she enters a city where she dwells, she comes from a distant place, and when she leaves that city, she again goes to a distant place\u201d (38).\u00a0 Medea\u2019s combination of autonomy and foreignness poses a threat to the patriarchal hierarchy in Greek society. Can this strong, assertive outsider be trusted?\u00a0 It is no surprise that her autonomy and foreignness is interpreted as having magical or even divine powers, such as when she offers the salve as protection against the fire-breathing bulls or rejuvenates the ram.\u00a0 Interestingly, one author argues that Medea is never punished for her deeds.\u00a0 Is banishment and exile her punishment?\u00a0\u00a0 Why does she seem to escape every situation with impunity?<\/p>\n

\"Marble<\/a>
The story on this sarcophagus is based on the tragedy by Euripides. On the left, Medea’s children, accompanied by the Nurse and Jason, bring gifts to Creon’s daughter; note that Jason holds poppies in his hand. Next, Creon’s daughter writhes in pain from the poisoned garment while Creon helplessly grieves and Jason looks on. Third, Medea debates whether to kill her two sons. Finally, Medea escapes in a chariot pulled by serpents. The two side panels, carved in low relief, depict Jason harnessing the bulls on Colchis, and Jason standing beside a bearded man. Roman, mid-second century CE, found before the Porta San Lorenzo in Rome. Berlin, Pergamon Museum. Photo by Barbara McManus, 2005<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Pausanias\u2019 take on Medea<\/h3>\n

As different authors write for different audiences and utilize different sources, it is little surprise that Medea\u2019s mythic biography contains variations. \u00a0Given that Pausanias is writing about Corinth, it is only natural that he focuses on the Corinthian portion of Medea\u2019s life story. Yet interestingly enough, he preserves details that are not always recounted in other versions of the tale: 1) Creon\u2019s daughter is given a name, Glauce, and 2) rather than die in the palace in the arms of her father, she leaps into the fountain in order to relieve the poison from the robe. \u00a03) Medea is not a child-killer. Instead, it is the Corinthians who murder Medea\u2019s children, not Medea herself.\u00a0 4) In fact, Medea conceals the children in the sanctuary of Hera Acraea in order to make them immortal. \u00a0Furthermore, 5) Medea was the hereditary ruler at Corinth, summoned when Corinthus turned out to be childless.<\/p>\n

\"Creon's<\/a>
Creon’s daughter writhes in pain from the poisoned garment while Creon helplessly grieves and Jason looks on. Marble Sarcophagus of Medea Story. Roman, mid-second century CE, found before the Porta San Lorenzo in Rome. Berlin, Pergamon Museum. Photo by Barbara McManus,<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There may be several reasons why Pausanias preserves these details about the Medea myth.\u00a0 For one, Susan Alcock and others note that Greeks in the Hellenistic world were active not only in restoring old monuments, but also connecting them to local myths and legends.\u00a0 Betsy Robinson posits that the Corinthians of the new Roman colony at Corinth themselves might have participated in this process of \u201chistoriating\u201d older monuments such as the Fountain of Glauce, attaching a well-known story to the newly refurbished fountain.\u00a0 As Robinson explains, \u201con inheriting this monument, Corinth\u2019s rebuilders selected it to become another place where fragments of Corinthian history could be localized in the new urban landscape, and thereby be incorporated within the collective imagination of the new city\u201d (133-34).<\/p>\n

\"Sanctuary<\/a>
Lower Sanctuary of Hera Acraia, Perachora. L-shaped Stoa in foreground, altar (middle), and Temple of Hera against the hill. Photo by J. Matthew Harrington, personal digital image, November 16, 2006. Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As for Medea and her children, the cult of Hera Acraea, located at Perachora, the \u201cland across,\u201d i.e., the promontory jutting out into the Gulf of Corinth just north of the isthmus, helped protect mothers in pregnancy and the children who might die in the first years of life.\u00a0 According to the archaic poet Eumelus, Medea brings her children to the sanctuary in order to hide them and make them immortal (Paus.\u00a02.3.11<\/a>), much like Demeter attempts to immortalize Demophon at Eleusis.\u00a0 \u00a0Jason sees her performing this ritual and misinterprets it as deadly.\u00a0 Yet, the only reason Eumelus offers for the children\u2019s death is Hera\u2019s refusal to protect them.\u00a0 Pausanias (2.3.6-7<\/a>) reports that the Corinthians respond to the death of Medea\u2019s children in two complementary ways: they erected a \u03b4\u03b5\u1fd6\u03bc\u03b1 \u201cterror\u201d and sent a yearly offering of seven girls and seven boys (Schol. Eur.\u00a0Med<\/em>. 264) in an effort to ward off the same deadly end to their own children.\u00a0 As Sarah Iles Johnston explains, \u201cThe children\u2019s black clothing suggest that during their year of service, they were temporarily \u201cdead,\u201d having been \u201csacrificed\u201d to Hera to appease her and thus dissuade her from seizing the children of the Corinthians more widely and permanently.\u00a0 The two techniques\u2014averting\u00a0apotropaion<\/em>\u00a0and appeasing dedication of children\u2014worked toward the same end.\u201d\u00a0 Indeed, another story of Eumelus is recorded, saying that Medea averts a famine in Corinth by sacrificing to Demeter and the Lemnian Nymphs (Schol. Pindar\u00a0Ol<\/em>. 13.74).<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
\"Aeolus'<\/a>
Heroes with Corinthian Connections. Created by Phillip Gallagher \u00a92010<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Finally, why is Medea included in the list of Corinthian rulers and who is Pausanias\u2019 source for this list?\u00a0 In\u00a02.3.10<\/a>, Pausanias identifies his source as the archaic poet Eumelus, who is attempting to make sense of and provide a framework for the many stories of important mythological figures and stories connected with Corinth.\u00a0 The return of the sons of Heracles is traditionally associated with the arrival of the Dorians (1.44.10<\/a>), and other figures such as Helius, Sisyphus, and Medea are equally notable.\u00a0 Helius was assigned Acrocorinth by the Titan Briareos and had altars there (2.4.6<\/a>; cf.\u00a02.1.6<\/a>); Homer mentions Sisyphus as King of Ephyra in\u00a0Iliad<\/em>\u00a06.152<\/a>,\u00a0210<\/a>, and Pausanias reports that he rescued Melicertes, helped establish the Isthmian Games, and was buried on the isthmus (2.1.3<\/a>;\u00a02.2.2<\/a>); and Medea and her children were central to the cult of Hera Acraea (2.3.6<\/a>, 11).\u00a0 Second, Eumelus is trying to establish a royal pedigree for the Bacchiad kings, his patrons, that rivals the king lists of Argos and Sparta.\u00a0 By showing that Helius, Medea, Sisyphus, and the sons of Heracles are divine and heroic predecessors, Eumelus provides the Bacchiad kings with a long and venerable line of ancient rulers that validate their right to rule.\u00a0 Moreover, if the chest of the tyrant Cypselus dedicated at Olympia is an object of his patronage, then it suggests that Cypselus included \u00a0scene of Medea and Jason on the chest to reinforce his right to rule.\u00a0 Pausanias records that the chest depicts Medea sitting on a throne with Jason and Aphrodite standing on either side (5.18.3<\/a>).\u00a0 Medea\u2019s rule at Corinth is hereditary through her father Aeetes. \u00a0Medea, as the daughter of Aeetes, inherited the kingdom after Corinthus died childless.\u00a0 When Medea lost her children, she passed on the kingdom to Sisyphus and his sons.\u00a0 \u00a0In short, Medea becomes the linchpin that makes possible the orderly succession of rulers from Helius to Sisyphus.<\/p>\n

In Pausanias\u2019 versions of Medea\u2019s life story, we can recognize\u00a0several elements in Pausanias\u2019 way of selecting and organizing his material.\u00a0 First, his tales (logoi<\/em>) are rooted in the monuments and sights (theoremata<\/em>) on the ground.\u00a0 The fountain Glauce is named for Creon\u2019s daughter and the memorial to Medea\u2019s children is still visible near the Odeum. \u00a0Second, Pausanias relies on his sources, both literary texts and local guides. \u00a0Thus, he relies on local guides (and perhaps local records) to explain the traditions behind these same sites and present the site as the Corinthians remembered it. \u00a0Finally, when confronted with a seemingly disconnected king list, Pausanias (or a predecessor) uses his intellect to stitch together a plausible chronological order to make the list of rulers more coherent.\u00a0In short, rather than follow the more canonical Euripidean tradition, Pausanias the\u00a0pepaideumenos<\/em>\u00a0reveals both his learning and his\u00a0respect for the local traditions of ancient Corinth.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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 <\/p>\n

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Works Cited<\/strong><\/p>\n

Alcock, Susan. \u201cThe Heroic Past in a Hellenistic Present.\u201d\u00a0Hellenistic Constructs<\/em>. Ed. P. Cartledge, P. Garnsey, and E. Gruen. Berkeley: California, 1997. 20-34.<\/p>\n

Graf, Fritz. \u201cMedea, the Enchantress from Afar: Remarks on a Well-Known Myth.\u201d\u00a0Medea: Essays on Medea in Myth, Literature, Philosophy, and Art<\/em>. Ed. James J. Clauss and Sarah Iles Johnston. Princeton: Princeton, 1997. 21-43.<\/p>\n

Griffiths, Emma.\u00a0Medea<\/em>. London and New York: Routledge, 2006.<\/p>\n

Johnston, Sarah Iles. \u201cCorinthian Medea and the Cult of Hera Akraia.\u201d\u00a0Medea: Essays on Medea in Myth, Literature, Philosophy, and Art<\/em>. Ed. James J. Clauss and Sarah Iles Johnston. Princeton: Princeton, 1997. 44-70.<\/p>\n

Krevans, Nita. \u201cMedea as Foundation-Heroine.\u201d\u00a0Medea: Essays on Medea in Myth, Literature, Philosophy, and Art<\/em>. Ed. James J. Clauss and Sarah Iles Johnston. Princeton: Princeton, 1997. 71-82.<\/p>\n

Robinson, Betsy. \u201cFountains and the Formation of Cultural Identity at Roman Corinth.\u201d\u00a0Urban Religion in Roman Corinth<\/em>. Ed. Daniel N. Schowalter and Steven J. Friesen. Cambridge: Harvard, 2005. 111-40.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Medea\u2019s Mythic Biography No woman in Greek mythology is more renown than Medea.\u00a0 And perhaps no woman in Greek mythology has a more complete life cycle.\u00a0 Her story begins as an adolescent girl in Colchis at the eastern edge of the Black Sea, passes through two marriages, and continues to maturity as an independent woman […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/863"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=863"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/863\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":993,"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/863\/revisions\/993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/imaginingancientcorinth.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}