(no subject)
I wrote this late last night/earlier this morning for perusal on a webcomics forum I hang out in, since Adonis was mentioned in the comic for the day. Bear in mind here that there are multiple versions of quite a few events in Greek myth, so what's here may be a little different from what you've heard.
~
Smyrnian (Syrian) princess named Myrrha gets the hots for Daddy. With the help of her nurse and/or some encouragement from Aphrodite, Myrrha sleeps with her father with the aid of a dark room. King Theias figures out the ruse and is pissed, chasing after his creepy daughter with a knife.
Aphrodite intervenes in the same way that the Greek gods usually helped out followers who have landed in some kind of trouble, which is by turning Creepy Daughter into a tree. A myrrh tree, to be exact. (YOU SEE WHAT THEY DID THERE.) This seems to be of limited helpfulness to me, but nobody asked. Either Theias - not to be deterred - shoots an arrow into the tree and goes back home to take eleventybillion showers or a boar comes on over and uses his tusks on the tree's bark, but whichever version you go with, Adonis popped out of a tree.
Aphrodite's all, "Damn, that is going to be one pretty man," and sticks him in a closed chest (?!) to deliver to Persephone (who is spending most of her time in the Underworld by this point and is also known as "Kore," "maiden") for safekeeping, except there's one eensy little flaw in her plan when it comes time to collect: Persephone's like, "GET YOUR OWN MAN." (No word on what Hades thought of all of this.) So they're squabbling and pulling each other's hair and generally creating an unholy racket and Zeus is all, "BOTH OF YOU GET HIM FOR SIX MONTHS APIECE, NOW SHUT UP." (Alternatively, he got a third of the year with Persephone, a third with Aphrodite, and a third to do as he pleased, because a boy's gotta rest. He usually spent it with Aphrodite, who seduced him at some point to the surprise of exactly no one.)
So Aphrodite and Adonis are in luuuuuv and as an expression of her luuuuv she accompanies him on his hunting trips decked out in a stunning Safety Orange chiton. Except one day she has to go caulk her basement windows or something and can't go shoot at Bambis.
Enter Ares.
Ares: I am Ares, jilted lover of Aphrodite! Now is my chance!
Except Ares really isn't that bright, so his commentary on the subject was probably more like:
Ares: *burp*
So he turned himself into a boar (theme!) and pranced off to go gore Adonis. (Alternatively, Artemis sent the boar to do the goring to get back at Aphrodite for her part in the death of a favorite of Artemis. Greek gods were great for vengeance.) Adonis is lying on the floor of the forest and groaning and bleeding and getting guts all over the place and Aphrodite pauses in home renovation to go to his side, at which point he's all "Rosebud!" and dies.
So everybody's boohooing like crazy, because when Aphrodite ain't happy, ain't nobody happy - except Persephone, because now Adonis is HERS ALL HERS MWAHAHAH. More squabbling results and this time they're using nails, so Zeus turns to Calliope, the muse of heroic poetry, and is all, "I am not even dealing with it, I have a wife to cheat on. You go deal with it." So Calliope is all, "I totally did not go to college for this, but let's see here. You get him for yay long, and you get him for yay long, now shut up so I can go back to watching Emeril. BAM!"
And everybody lived (or... not) happily ever after.
Greek mythology: making most of us look normal since God was a... never mind.
~
Smyrnian (Syrian) princess named Myrrha gets the hots for Daddy. With the help of her nurse and/or some encouragement from Aphrodite, Myrrha sleeps with her father with the aid of a dark room. King Theias figures out the ruse and is pissed, chasing after his creepy daughter with a knife.
Aphrodite intervenes in the same way that the Greek gods usually helped out followers who have landed in some kind of trouble, which is by turning Creepy Daughter into a tree. A myrrh tree, to be exact. (YOU SEE WHAT THEY DID THERE.) This seems to be of limited helpfulness to me, but nobody asked. Either Theias - not to be deterred - shoots an arrow into the tree and goes back home to take eleventybillion showers or a boar comes on over and uses his tusks on the tree's bark, but whichever version you go with, Adonis popped out of a tree.
Aphrodite's all, "Damn, that is going to be one pretty man," and sticks him in a closed chest (?!) to deliver to Persephone (who is spending most of her time in the Underworld by this point and is also known as "Kore," "maiden") for safekeeping, except there's one eensy little flaw in her plan when it comes time to collect: Persephone's like, "GET YOUR OWN MAN." (No word on what Hades thought of all of this.) So they're squabbling and pulling each other's hair and generally creating an unholy racket and Zeus is all, "BOTH OF YOU GET HIM FOR SIX MONTHS APIECE, NOW SHUT UP." (Alternatively, he got a third of the year with Persephone, a third with Aphrodite, and a third to do as he pleased, because a boy's gotta rest. He usually spent it with Aphrodite, who seduced him at some point to the surprise of exactly no one.)
So Aphrodite and Adonis are in luuuuuv and as an expression of her luuuuv she accompanies him on his hunting trips decked out in a stunning Safety Orange chiton. Except one day she has to go caulk her basement windows or something and can't go shoot at Bambis.
Enter Ares.
Ares: I am Ares, jilted lover of Aphrodite! Now is my chance!
Except Ares really isn't that bright, so his commentary on the subject was probably more like:
Ares: *burp*
So he turned himself into a boar (theme!) and pranced off to go gore Adonis. (Alternatively, Artemis sent the boar to do the goring to get back at Aphrodite for her part in the death of a favorite of Artemis. Greek gods were great for vengeance.) Adonis is lying on the floor of the forest and groaning and bleeding and getting guts all over the place and Aphrodite pauses in home renovation to go to his side, at which point he's all "Rosebud!" and dies.
So everybody's boohooing like crazy, because when Aphrodite ain't happy, ain't nobody happy - except Persephone, because now Adonis is HERS ALL HERS MWAHAHAH. More squabbling results and this time they're using nails, so Zeus turns to Calliope, the muse of heroic poetry, and is all, "I am not even dealing with it, I have a wife to cheat on. You go deal with it." So Calliope is all, "I totally did not go to college for this, but let's see here. You get him for yay long, and you get him for yay long, now shut up so I can go back to watching Emeril. BAM!"
And everybody lived (or... not) happily ever after.
Greek mythology: making most of us look normal since God was a... never mind.