| Ariadne | |
|---|---|
 | |
|
Real Name |
Ariadne |
|
First Appearance |
Greek Mythology |
|
Created by |
Unknown |
Origin[]
In Greek mythology, Ariadne was a Cretan princess, the daughter of King Minos of Crete. There are variations of Ariadne's myth, but she is known for helping Theseus escape from the Minotaur and being abandoned by him on the island of Naxos. There, Dionysus saw Ariadne sleeping, fell in love with her, and later married her. Many versions of the myth recount Dionysus throwing Ariadne's jeweled crown into the sky to create a constellation, the Corona Borealis. Ariadne was faithful to Dionysus and bore him famous children, including Oenopion, Staphylus, and Thoas.
In one version of her myth, Perseus killed her at Argos by turning her to stone with the head of Medusa during Perseus' war with Dionysus. The Odyssey relates that Theseus took Ariadne away from Crete only for Artemis to kill her in Dia (usually identified with Naxos) on Dionysus' witness. An ancient scholiast wrote that Ariadne and Theseus had sex on a sacred grove, and an angry Dionysus revealed that to Artemis, who proceeded to punish Ariadne with death.
According to Plutarch, one version of the myth tells that Ariadne hanged herself after being abandoned by Theseus. Dionysus then went to Hades, and brought her and his mother Semele to Mount Olympus, where they were deified.
Some scholars have posited, because of Ariadne's associations with thread-spinning and winding, that she was a weaving goddess, like Arachne.
Public Domain Appearances[]
All published appearances of Ariadne from before January 1, 1930 are public domain in the US.
Some notable appearances are listed below:
Public Domain Literary Appearances[]
- The Odyssey
- Theogony
- Of the Origin of Homer and Hesiod
- Greek Lyric II Anacreon, Fragments
- The Library
- The Argonautica
- Phaenomena
- The Library of History
- Description of Greece
- Lives
- Imagines
- New History
- To Autolycus
- Fall of Troy
- Dionysiaca
- Fabulae
- Astronomica
- Metamorphoses
- Fasti
- Heroides
- Elegies
- Hercules Furens
- Oedipus
- Phaedra
- Ideal Likenesses (1825)
- Ariadne watching the Sea after the Departure of Theseus (1838)
- Romola (1862-1863)
- Ariadne auf Naxos (1912)
- Ariadne (1924)