Siren

Siren
	;
Real Name	Mermaid
First Appearance	Greek Myth
Created by	Greek Myth

Origin[]

Funerary siren Louvre Myr148 — Moaning siren statuette from Myrina, first century BC

In Greek mythology, sirens are humanlike beings with alluring voices; they appear in a scene in the Odyssey in which Odysseus saves his crew's lives. Roman poets place them on some small islands called Sirenum scopuli. In some later, rationalized traditions, the literal geography of the "flowery" island of Anthemoessa, or Anthemusa, is fixed: sometimes on Cape Pelorum and at others in the islands known as the Sirenuse, near Paestum, or in Capreae. All such locations were surrounded by cliffs and rocks.

he sirens of Greek mythology first appeared in Homer's Odyssey, where Homer did not provide any physical descriptions, and their visual appearance was left to the readers' imagination. It was Apollonius of Rhodes in Argonautica (3rd century BC) who described the sirens in writing as part woman and part bird similar to a harpy.

By the 7th century BC, sirens were regularly depicted in art as human-headed birds. They may have been influenced by the ba-bird of Egyptian religion. In early Greek art, the sirens were generally represented as large birds with women's heads, bird feathers and scaly feet. Later depictions shifted to show sirens with human upper bodies and bird legs, with or without wings. They were often shown playing a variety of musical instruments, especially the lyre, kithara, and aulos.

Sirens were later often used as a synonym for mermaids, and portrayed with upper human bodies and fish tails. The sirens are depicted as mermaids or "tritonesses" in examples dating to the 3rd century BC, including an earthenware bowl found in Athens and a terracotta oil lamp possibly from the Roman period. The first known literary attestation of siren as a "mermaid" appeared in the Anglo-Latin catalogue Liber Monstrorum (early 8th century AD), where it says that sirens were "sea-girls... with the body of a maiden, but have scaly fishes' tails".

In the Odyssey, Homer says nothing of their origin or names, but gives the number of the sirens as two. Later writers mention both their names and number: some state that there were three, Peisinoe, Aglaope and Thelxiepeia or Aglaonoe, Aglaopheme and Thelxiepeia; Parthenope, Ligeia, and Leucosia; Apollonius followed Hesiod gives their names as Thelxinoe, Molpe, and Aglaophonos; Suidas gives their names as Thelxiepeia, Peisinoe, and Ligeia; Hyginus gives the number of the sirens as four: Teles, Raidne, Molpe, and Thelxiope; Eustathius states that they were two, Aglaopheme and Thelxiepeia; an ancient vase painting attests the two names as Himerope and Thelxiepeia.

Although a Sophocles fragment makes Phorcys their father, when sirens are named, they are usually as daughters of the river god Achelous, either by the Muse Terpsichore, Melpomene or Calliope or lastly by Sterope, daughter of King Porthaon of Calydon.

In Euripides's play Helen (167), Helen in her anguish calls upon "Winged maidens, daughters of the Earth (Chthon)." Although they lured mariners, the Greeks portrayed the sirens in their "meadow starred with flowers" and not as sea deities. Epimenides claimed that the sirens were children of Oceanus and Ge.

According to Ovid (43 BC–17 AD), the sirens were the companions of young Persephone. Demeter gave them wings to search for Persephone when she was abducted by Hades. However, the Fabulae of Hyginus (64 BC–17 AD) has Demeter cursing the sirens for failing to intervene in the abduction of Persephone. According to Hyginus, sirens were fated to live only until the mortals who heard their songs were able to pass by them.

One legend says that Hera, queen of the gods, persuaded the sirens to enter a singing contest with the Muses. The Muses won the competition and then plucked out all of the sirens' feathers and made crowns out of them. Out of their anguish from losing the competition, writes Stephanus of Byzantium, the sirens turned white and fell into the sea at Aptera ("featherless"), where they formed the islands in the bay that were called Leukai ("the white ones", modern Souda).

In the Argonautica (third century BC), Jason had been warned by Chiron that Orpheus would be necessary in his journey. When Orpheus heard their voices, he drew out his lyre and played his music more beautifully than they, drowning out their voices. One of the crew, however, the sharp-eared hero Butes, heard the song and leapt into the sea, but he was caught up and carried safely away by the goddess Aphrodite.

Odysseus was curious as to what the sirens sang to him, and so, on the advice of Circe, he had all of his sailors plug their ears with beeswax and tie him to the mast. He ordered his men to leave him tied tightly to the mast, no matter how much he might beg. When he heard their beautiful song, he ordered the sailors to untie him but they bound him tighter. When they had passed out of earshot, Odysseus demonstrated with his frowns to be released. Some post-Homeric authors state that the sirens were fated to die if someone heard their singing and escaped them, and that after Odysseus passed by they therefore flung themselves into the water and perished.

According to the ancient Hebrew Book of Enoch, the women who were led astray by the fallen angels will be turned into sirens.

Saint Jerome, who produced the Latin Vulgate version of the bible, used the word sirens to translate Hebrew tannīm ("jackals") in the Book of Isaiah 13:22, and also to translate a word for "owls" in the Book of Jeremiah 50:39.

By the time of the Renaissance, female court musicians known as courtesans filled the role of an unmarried companion, and musical performances by unmarried women could be seen as immoral. Seen as a creature who could control a man's reason, female singers became associated with the mythological figure of the siren, who usually took a half-human, half-animal form somewhere on the cusp between nature and culture.

Leonardo da Vinci wrote of them in his notebooks, stating "The siren sings so sweetly that she lulls the mariners to sleep; then she climbs upon the ships and kills the sleeping mariners."

The famous siren of German folklore was Lorelei who was placed on a rock on the Rhine and with her song seduced the navigators.

Public Domain Appearances[]

Public Domain Literary Appearances[]

Any published appearances of sirens before January 1, 1929 are public domain in the US.

Notable appearances can be found below:

The Odyssey
Liber Monstrorum
Helen
Argonautica
Book of Enoch
Physiologus
The Bible
The Divine Comedy
Historia Regum Britanniae
A General History of Music
Classical Dictionary
Weird Tales v1 #4: The Siren by Tarleton Collier
Godwi oder Das steinerne Bild der Mutte (1801)
Die Lorelei (1824)

Public Domain Film Appearances[]

Siren of the Sea (1911)

Public Domain Film Appearances Inspired by Sirens[]

The Jungle Siren (1942)

Public Domain Comic Appearances Inspired by Sirens[]

Movie Love #21: An adaptation of the 1953 film Siren of Bagdad.
Pioneer West Romances #3-4: In the story titled Kiss of the Six-Gun Siren, Firehair encounters braves from the Mandan tribe that are set up by the villain Craig to disguise themselves as Dakotas and attack the stage. Then in Siren of the Silver Sage, A stage coach is stolen and one of Firehair's friends is killed.
Approved Comics #12 - Northwest Mounties: Features a 8 page story about the Northwest Mounties entitled Mountie Guns Break the Snow Siren's Secret.
Northwest Mounties #4:Same story as Approved Comics #12, A thief and killer is setting up a woman who is looking for stories from gold miners.
Heart Throbs #2: In the story Siren of the Tropics, Kent falls for a nightclub singer, and follows her to a tropical island, leaving his sweetheart Sue behind.
Whiz Comics #47: Spysmasher stars in a story titled The Siren's Song.
Buster Brown #28,30,32: The Interstellar Police fought a villain named Tanya the Space Siren.
Space Mouse #4: In a text story, Space Hound encounters Space Sirens who transform the men they enchanted with their music into horrid looking monsters.
Romantic Adventures #35:Included a 4 page story titled Selfish Siren.
Strange Worlds #5: These Space Sirens were the women warriors of Mimas, a moon of Jupiter, lure unsuspecting spaceships close by singing in clear bubbles in space, but when a ship is close enough their songs are amplified enough to disable those inside the ships.
Secret Loves #6: Featured a story titled Siren Song of the Bayou.
Intimate Love #28: Included a 1 page story titles Summertime Siren.
Cat-Man Comics #23: Text story titled the Siren's Wail
Freckles and His Friends #12: In A Blonde Siren, Lard Smith visits Pat Owen during women hating week.
Cookie #30:Two page text story title the Siren, Gwen Holly attempts to make her love interest jealous by seducing Cookie.
Jungle Comics #58:A jungle siren lures unwary travelers to a slaver, but Terry Thunder breaks up the ring.
Feature Comics #97: In the Band Break-up, Swing Sisson and his band-mates Bonnie Baxter and Toby Tucker are called the Three Musketeers of Jazz until a red-headed siren, named Torchy Lane, proves that even friends can fall out over a woman.