Muse
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2008-07-09T23:17:22Z
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{{two other uses||the band|Muse (band)}}
{{Greek myth (personified)}}
In [[Greek mythology]], the '''Muses''' ([[Ancient Greek]] {{Polytonic|αἱ μοῦσαι}}, ''hai moũsai'' <ref>[[Greek language|Modern Greek]] οι μούσες, ''i moúses''.</ref>: perhaps from the [[Proto-Indo-European language|Proto-Indo-European]] root *''men-'' "think"<ref>from which ''mind'' and ''mental'' are also derived; so ''OED'' </ref>) are a sisterhood of goddesses or spirits, their number set at nine by Classical times, who embody the arts and inspire the creation process with their graces through remembered and [[improvised]] song and stage, writing, traditional music, and dance. They were water [[nymph]]s, associated with the springs of [[Mount Helicon|Helicon]] and with [[Pieris]], from which they are sometimes called the ''Pierides''. The Olympian system set [[Apollo]] as their leader, ''Apollon Mousagetēs''. Not only are the Muses explicitly used in modern English to refer to an [[inspiration]], as when one cites his/her own artistic muse, but they are also implicit in the words "amuse" or "musing upon".<ref>''[[OED]]'' derives "''amuse"'' from French ''a'' ("from") + ''muser'', "to stare stupidly" or distractedly.</ref>
According to [[Hesiod]]'s ''[[Theogony]]'' (seventh century BC), they are the daughters of [[Zeus]], king of the gods, and [[Mnemosyne]], goddess of memory. For [[Alcman]] and [[Mimnermus]], they were even more primordial, springing from [[Uranus (mythology)|Uranus]] and [[Gaia (mythology)|Gaia]]. [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] records a tradition of two generations of Muses; the first being daughters of [[Uranus (mythology)|Uranus]] and [[Gaia (mythology)|Gaia]], the second of [[Zeus]] and [[Mnemosyne]]. Another, rarer genealogy is that they are daughters of [[Harmonia (Greek goddess)|Harmonia]] (the daughter of [[Aphrodite]] and [[Ares]]) which contradicts the myth in which they were dancing at the wedding of [[Harmonia (Greek goddess)|Harmonia]] and [[Cadmus]].
Compare the Roman inspiring nymphs of springs, the [[Camenae]], the [[Völva]] of [[Norse Mythology]] and also the [[apsaras]]a in the culture of classical [[India]].
== Muses in myth ==
[[Image:Eustache Le Sueur 002.jpg|thumb|right|The Muses Clio, Euterpe and Thalia, by [[Eustache Le Sueur]]]]
According to [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] in the later second century AD,<ref>Pausanias, ''Description of Greece'' 9.29.1.</ref> there were three original Muses: [[Aoidē]] ("song" or "voice"), [[Meletē]] ("practice" or "occasion"), and [[Mnēmē]] ("memory"). Together, these three form the complete picture of the preconditions of poetic art in [[cult (religion)|cult practice]]. In [[Delphi]] three Muses were worshipped as well, but with other names: [[Nētē]], [[Mesē]], and [[Hypatē]], which are the names of the three chords of the ancient musical instrument, the [[lyre]]. Alternatively they were called [[Cēphisso]], [[Apollonis]], and [[Borysthenis]], whose names characterise them as daughters of [[Apollo]]. In later tradition, four Muses were recognized: Thelxinoē, [[Aoedē]], [[Arche]], and [[Meletē]], said to be daughters of Zeus and Plusia (or of [[Uranus (mythology)|Uranus)]]. One of the persons associated with the Muses was [[Pierus]]. By some he was called the father (by a Pimpleian nymph: called [[Antiope]] by Cicero) of a total of seven Muses, called Neilo, [[Tritone]], Asopo, Heptapora, [[Achelois]], Tipoplo, and [[Rhodia]]. <ref>[http://www.theoi.com/Ouranios/Mousai.html TheoiProject: Muses]</ref>
The Muses judged the contest between [[Apollo (god)|Apollo]] and [[Marsyas]]. They also gathered the pieces of the dead body of [[Orpheus]], son of [[Calliope]], and buried them. They blinded [[Thamyris]] for his [[hubris]] in challenging them to a contest.
[[Image:Musas.jpg|thumb|right|The Muses dancing with Apollo, by [[Baldassare Peruzzi]]]]
Though the Muses, when taken together, form a complete picture of the subjects proper to poetic art, the association of specific muses with specific art forms is a later innovation. The Muses were not assigned standardized divisions of poetry with which they are now identified until late [[Hellenistic]] times. The canonical nine Muses, with their fields of patronage, as established since the [[Renaissance]], are:
* [[Calliope]] (the 'beautiful of speech'): chief of the muses and muse of [[epic poetry|epic or heroic poetry]]
* [[Clio]] (the 'glorious one'): muse of history
* [[Erato]] (the 'amorous one'): muse of [[love poetry|love or erotic poetry]], lyrics, and marriage songs
* [[Euterpe]] (the 'well-pleasing'): muse of music and [[lyric poetry]]
* [[Melpomene]] (the 'chanting one'): muse of [[tragedy]]
* [[Polyhymnia]] or Polymnia (the '[singer] of many [[hymn]]s'): muse of [[sacred art|sacred]] song, oratory, lyric, singing and rhetoric
* [[Terpsichore]] (the '[one who] delights in dance'): muse of [[choral]] song and dance
* [[Thalia]] (the 'blossoming one'): muse of [[comedy]] and [[bucolic poetry]]
* [[Urania]] (the 'celestial one'): muse of [[astronomy]]
<gallery perrow=3>
Image:Calliope.jpg|[[Calliope]]
Image:clio.jpg|[[Clio]]
Image:erato.jpg|[[Erato]]
<!--Image does not exist:Image:BattoniEuterpe.jpg -->|[[Euterpe]], left, with Urania
Image:Melpomene-Simmons-Highsmith-detail-1.jpeg|[[Melpomene]]
Image:Francesco del Cossa 001.jpg|[[Polyhymnia]]
Image:Satue_of_Terpsichore_-_detail.JPG|[[Terpsichore]]
Image:Thalia.jpg|[[Thalia]]
Image:Urania (M.A.N. Madrid) 01.jpg|[[Urania]]
</gallery>
==Emblems of the Muses==
In [[Renaissance]] and [[Neoclassicism|Neoclassical]] art, the dissemination of [[emblem book]]s such as [[Cesare Ripa]]'s ''Iconologia'' (1593 and many further editions) helped standardise the depiction of muses in sculptures or paintings, who could be distinguished by certain props, together with which they became [[emblem]]s readily identifiable by the viewer, who would immediately recognize the art with which they had become bound.
Calliope (epic poetry) carries a writing tablet;
Clio (history) carries a scroll and books;
Erato (love poetry) is often seen with a lyre and a crown of roses;
Euterpe (music) carries a flute;
Melpomene (tragedy) is often seen with a tragic mask;
Polyhymnia (sacred poetry) is often seen with a pensive expression;
Terpsichore (dance) is often seen dancing and carrying a lyre;
Thalia (comedy) is often seen with a comic mask; and
Urania (astronomy) carries a pair of compasses and celestial globe.
===Function in society===
[[Image:Musas01.jpg|thumb|right|''Melpomene and Polyhymnia'', [[Palacio de Bellas Artes]], Mexico.]]
Greek ''mousa'' is a common noun as well as a type of goddess: it literally means "song" or "poem". In [[Pindar]], to "carry a ''mousa''" is "to sing a song". The word is probably derived from the Indo-European root ''men-'', which is also the source of Greek ''[[Mnemosyne]]'', and English "mind", "mental" and "memory" (or alternatively from ''mont-'', "mountain", due to their residence on Mount Helicon, which is less likely in meaning, but somewhat more likely linguistically).
The Muses were therefore both the embodiments and sponsors of performed metrical speech: ''mousike'', whence "music", was "the art of the Muses". In the archaic period, before the wide-spread availability of books, this included nearly all of learning: the first Greek book on astronomy, by [[Thales]], was set in [[dactylic hexameter]], as were many works of [[pre-Socratic]] philosophy; both [[Plato]] and the [[Pythagoras|Pythagoreans]] explicitly included philosophy as a sub-species of ''mousike''<ref>[[Strabo]] 10.3.10.</ref> [[Herodotus]], whose primary medium of delivery was public recitation, named each one of the nine books of his ''Histories'' after a different Muse, [[Invocation|invoked]] at the outset.
For poet and "law-giver" [[Solon]]<ref>Solon, fragment 13.</ref> the Muses were "the key to the good life"; since they brought both prosperity and friendship. Solon sought to perpetuate his political reforms by establishing recitations of his poetry—complete with invocations to his practical-minded Muses—by Athenian boys at festivals each year. It was believed that they would help inspire people to do their best.
===Function in literature===
[[Image:GustaveMoreau03.jpg|thumb|left|[[Gustave Moreau]], ''Hesiod and the Muse'' (1891). [[Musée d'Orsay]], Paris]]
The muses are typically invoked at or near the beginning of an epic poem or classical Greek hymn. They have served as aids to an author of prose, too, sometimes represented as the true speaker, for whom an author is only a mouthpiece.<ref>This is an ancient convention: the Mesopotamian epic ''[[Atra-Hasis]]'' is represented as dictated by the Goddess in a dream-vision.</ref> Originally, the invocation of the Muse was an indication that the speaker was working inside the poetic tradition, according to the established formulas. Six classic examples :
:[[Homer]], in Book I of ''[[Odyssey|The Odyssey]]'':
::"Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns
::driven time and again off course, once he had plundered
::the hallowed heights of Troy." ([[Robert Fagles]] translation, 1996)
:[[Virgil]], in Book I of the ''[[Aeneid]]'':
::O Muse! the causes and the crimes relate;
::What goddess was provok'd, and whence her hate;
::For what offense the Queen of Heav'n began
::To persecute so brave, so just a man; [...]
::([[John Dryden]] translation, 1697)
:[[Catullus]], in Carmen I:
::"And so, have them for yourself, whatever kind of book it is,
::and whatever sort, oh patron Muse
::let it last for more than one generation, eternally."
::(Student translation, 2007)
:[[Dante Alighieri]], in Canto II of [[The Divine Comedy#Inferno|The Inferno]]:
::O Muses, O high genius, aid me now!
::O memory that engraved the things I saw,
::Here shall your worth be manifest to all! (Anthony Esolen translation, 2002)
:[[John Milton]], opening of Book 1 of ''[[Paradise Lost]]'':
::Of Man’s first disobedience, and the fruit
::Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste
::Brought death into the World, and all our woe,
::With loss of Eden, till one greater Man
::Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat,
::Sing, Heavenly Muse, [...]
:[[William Shakespeare]], Act 1, Prologue of ''[[Henry V (play)|Henry V]]'':
::Chorus: O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
::The brightest heaven of invention,
::A kingdom for a stage, princes to act
::And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!
:[[Geoffrey Chaucer]], in Book II of [[Troilus and Criseyde]]:
::O lady myn, that called art Cleo,
::Thow be my speed fro this forth, and my Muse,
::To ryme wel this book til I haue do;
::Me nedeth here noon othere art to vse.
::ffor-whi to euery louere I me excuse
::That of no sentement I this endite,
::But out of Latyn in my tonge it write.
Modern evocations of the muses have appeared in a variety of literary and media sources. The muses are [[travesty|travestied]] in the 1980 feature film ''[[Xanadu (film)|Xanadu]]'' and its 2007 [[Xanadu (musical)|Broadway musical adaptation]]), which place Terpsichore and Clio, respectively, in the leading role under the pseudonym 'Kira'.
===Cults of the Muses===
When [[Pythagoras]] arrived at [[Croton]], his first advice to the Crotoniates was to build a shrine of the Muses at the center of the city, to promote civic harmony and learning.
Local cults of the Muses were often associated with springs or fountains. They were sometimes called Aganippids because of their association with a fountain called [[Aganippe]]. Other fountains, [[Hippocrene]] and [[Pirene]], were also important haunts of the Muses. The Muses were also occasionally referred to as "Corycides", or "Corycian [[nymph]]s" after a cave on [[Parnassos|Mount Parnassos]], called the [[Corycian Cave]].
The Muses were especially venerated in [[Boeotia]], near [[Mount Helicon|Helicon]], and in [[Delphi]] and the [[Parnassus]], where Apollo became known as ''Mousagetes'' "Muse-leader".
Muse-worship was also often associated with the [[Greek hero cult|hero-cults]] of poets: the tombs of [[Archilochus]] on [[Thasos]] and [[Hesiod]] and [[Thamyris]] in [[Boeotia]], all played host to festivals, in which poetic recitations were accompanied by sacrifices to the Muses.
The [[Library of Alexandria]] and its circle of scholars were formed around a ''mousaion'' ("[[museum]]" or shrine of the Muses) close by the tomb of [[Alexander the Great]].
Many [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] figures sought to re-establish a "Cult of the Muses" in the eighteenth century. A famous [[Freemasonry|Masonic]] lodge in pre-Revolutionary [[Paris, France|Paris]] was called [[Les Neuf Soeurs]] ("nine sisters", that is, the nine Muses), and was attended by [[Voltaire]], [[Benjamin Franklin]], [[Georges Danton|Danton]] and other influential Enlightenment figures. One side-effect of this movement was the use of the word "museum" (originally, "cult place of the Muses") to refer to a place for the public display of knowledge.
=== The Muse-poet ===
The British poet [[Robert Graves]] popularised the concept of the Muse-poet in modern times based on pre-twelfth century traditions of the Celtic poets, on the tradition of the medieval troubadours who celebrated the concept of [[courtly love]] and the [[romantic poets]].
''"No Muse-poet grows conscious of the Muse except by experience of a woman in whom the Goddess is to some degree resident; just as no Apollonian poet can perform his proper function unless he lives under a monarchy or a quasi-monarchy. A Muse-poet falls in love, absolutely, and his true love is for him the embodiment of the Muse...''
''But the real, perpetually obsessed Muse-poet distinguishes between the Goddess as manifest in the supreme power, glory, wisdom and love of woman, and the individual woman whom the Goddess may make her instrument...''
''The Goddess abides; and perhaps he will again have knowledge of her through his experience of another woman...''<ref>[[Robert Graves]], ''[[The White Goddess]]'', a historical grammar of poetic myth.</ref>
===The "Tenth Muse"===
The poet [[Sappho]] of [[Lesbos Island|Lesbos]] was given the compliment of being called "the tenth Muse" by [[Plato]]. The phrase has become a somewhat conventional compliment paid to female poets since.
In Callimachus' "Aetia", the poet refers to Queen Berenike, wife of Ptolemy II, as a "Tenth Muse", dedicating both the 'Coma Berenikes' and the 'Victoria Berenikes' in Books III-IV.
French critics have acclaimed a series of ''dixième Muses'' who were noted by [[William Rose Benet]] in ''The Reader's Encyclopedia'' (1948): Marie Lejars de Gournay (1566-1645), [[Antoinette Deshoulières]] (1633-1694), [[Madeleine de Scudéry]] (1607-1701) and [[Delphine Gay]] (1804-1855).
[[Anne Bradstreet]], a [[Puritan]] poet of [[New England]], was honored in with this title with the publishing of her poems in [[London]] in 1650, in a volume titled by the publisher ''The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America...''. This was also the first ever published volume of [[American poetry]].
[[Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz]], a Mexican poet, is well known in the Spanish literary world as the tenth muse.
[[Gabriele D'Annunzio]]'s 1920 Constitution for the [[Free State of Fiume]] was based around the nine muses, and invoked [[Energeia]] (energy) as "the tenth Muse".
In [[1924]] [[Karol Irzykowski]] published a monograph on cinematography entitled "The Tenth Muse" ("Dziesiąta muza"). Analyzing [[silent film]], he pronounced his definition of cinema: "It is the visibility of man's interaction with reality".
The [[comic book]] superhero Emma Sonnet (and later Lyxandra) from the Bluewater Productions series ''[[Tenth Muse]]'' is based on the idea of a fictional muse representing justice.
[[Mark Twain]] referred to a lie as the tenth muse in [http://www.online-literature.com/twain/1320/ his essay] ''[[On the Decay of the Art of Lying]].''
[[Gradiva]] 'the woman who walks through walls' is the muse of Surrealism. (Nadeau, Maurice, ''A History of Surrealism'', orig.1965, various publishers)
Shakespeare's Sonnet 38 invokes the Tenth Muse:<ref>[http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/38.html Shakespeare, Sonnet 38.]</ref>
<blockquote>"How can my Muse want subject to invent,<br>
While thou dost breathe, that pour'st into my verse <br>
Thine own sweet argument?"</blockquote>
the poet asks, and in the opening of the [[sestet]] calls upon his muse:
<blockquote>"Be thou the tenth Muse, ten times more in worth <br>
Than those old nine which rhymers invocate."</blockquote>
==References==
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==External links==
*[http://ancientrome.ru/art/artworken/result.htm?alt=Muses Muses in the ancient art]
{{Commonscat|Muses}}
[[Category:Greek mythology]]
[[Category:Arts goddesses]]
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[[Category:Offspring of Zeus]]
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