Page:History of the Literature of Ancient Greece (Müller) 2ed.djvu/196

174 174 HISTORY OF THE § 7. It is certain that Sappho, in her odes, made frequent mention of a youth, to whom she gave her whole heart, while he requited her passion with cold indifference. But there is no trace whatever of her having named the object of her passion, or sought to win his favour by her beautiful verses. The pretended name of this youth, Phaon, although frequently mentioned in the Attic comedies *, appears not to have occurred in the poetry of Sappho. If Phaon had been named in her poetry, the opinion could not have arisen that it was the courtesan Sappho, and not the poetess, who was in love with Phaon f. Moreover, the marvellous stories of the beauty of Phaon and the love of the goddess Aphrodite for him, have manifestly been borrowed from the mythus of Adonis. Hesiod mentions Phaethon, a son of Eos and Cephalus, who when a child was carried off by Aphrodite, and brought up as the guardian of the sanctuary in her temples §. This is evidently founded on the Cyprian legend of Adonis ; the Greeks, adopting this legend, appear to have given the name of Phaethon or Phaon to the favourite of Aphrodite ; and this Phaon, by various mistakes and misinterpretations, at length became the beloved of Sappho. Perhaps also the poetess may, in an ode to Adonis, have celebrated the beautiful Phaon in such a manner that the verses may have been supposed to refer to a lover of her own. According to the ordinary account, Sappho, despised by Phaon, took the leap from the Leucadiali rock, in the hope of finrling a cure for the pains of unrequited love. But even this is rather a poetical image, than a real event in the life of Sappho. The Leucadian leap was a re- ligious rite, belonging to the expiatory festivals of Apollo, which was celebrated in this as in other parts of Greece. At appointed times, criminals, selected as expiatory victims, were thrown from the high overhanging rock into the sea ; they were however sometimes caught at. the bottom, and, if saved, they were sent away from Leucadia ||. This custom was applied in various ways by the poets of the time to the description of lovers. Stesichorus, in his poetical novel named rov vmgx.oivxov irt^utu, ton' uvro r7itipu.])oZ;. f In Athen. XIII. p. 596 E, and several ancient lexicographers. % Cratinus, the comic poet, in an unknown play in Athen. II. p. 69. D. relates that Aphrodite had concealed Phaon h foihuximif, among the lettuce. The same legend is also related of Adonis by others, in Athengeus ; and it refers to the use of the horti Adonidis. Concerning Phaon- Adonis, see also jElian ,V. H. xii. 18. Lu- cian Dial. Mort. 9. Plin. N. H. xxii. 8. Servius ad Virg. JEn. III. 279. not to mention inferior authorities for this legend. § Hesiod. Theog. 986. so, wotoXm f*v%iev, according to the reading of Aris- tarchus. Dorians. B. 11. ch. 11. § 10.
 * As in the verses of Menander in Strabo x. p. 452.
 * Concerningthe connexion of this custom with the worship of Apollo, see M'uller's