User:Paul August/Achelous

Achelous

To Do

• Isler 1981
• Isler 2006
• Oxford Classical Dictionary
• Tripp
• Grimal
• Parada
• Smith
• Gantz
• Hard
• Fowler
• Loeb search
• LIMC
• Section on Iconography
• Expand Ovid section
• Wilkins, p. 120
• Molinari and Sisci

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According to Hesiod, Achelous, along with all the other river gods, was the son of the Titans Oceanus and Tethys. According to the sixth-century mythographer Acusilaus, Achelous was the "oldest and most honoured" of the river-god offspring of Oceanus. Servius relating a tradition of unknown origin, reports that Achelous was said to have been the son of Earth (i.e. Gaia).

Iconography

Philostratus

Philostratus the Younger, Imagines 4

Fairbanks, p. 303 n. 1

The contest between Heracles and Acheloüs was a favourite subject in art from early times (cf. Paus 6 19, 22 for the description of a group at Olympia, which included Ares, Athena, Zeus and Deianeira as well as Heracles and Acheloüs). In early drawings Acheloüs is given the form of a centaur, but by the fifth century he is regularly represented as a bull with a human face. As pointed out by Jahn (Eph. Arch. 1682, p. 317f.), Acheloüs here has the form of a man, but with the horns of a bull springing from his forehead. While the presence of the serpent and the bull with Acheloüs is not explained in the description, apparently the painter intended to depict two of the forms that the river assumed during the struggle. The failure of Philostratus to understand what he described may be regarded as direct evidence that he was dealing with an actual picture. Evi- dently the picture gave two scenes (if not three): first the situation before the conflict, and secondly the outcome of the conflict; for the latter can hardly be treated as mere rhetoric on the part of Philostratus. The subject is depicted on a tripod base in the Constantinople Museum (Mitth. d. deutsch. Palaestrina-vereins VII, PI. III), where Acheloüs appears as a bearded man with horns of a bull; one horn lies at the feet of Heracles, and blood spouts from the head where it had been broken off. (Benndorf.)

Coins

The river-god is depicted on several Acarnanian coins (after 300 BC) as a bull with the head of a man. The most common depiction of Achelous in Archaic and Classical times was this man-faced bull. Often a city would feature a man-faced bull on its coinage to represent a local variant of Achelous, such as Achelous Gelas of Gela, Sicily, or Achelous Sebethos of Neapolis, Campania.

Jebb, note on line 11

Coins of Acarnania (after 300 B.C.) show Acheloüs as a bull with human head; and Soph. may have had this type in mind, for it appears on coins of Magna Graecia as early as 500 B.C.

(3) ἀνδρείῳ κύτει βούπρῳρος κ.τ.λ. A human figure, with human face, and a shaggy beard, but with the forehead, horns, and ears of an ox. The Acheloüs appears thus on an archaic coin of Meta pontum in Lucania (Millingen, Anc. Coins of Greek Cities and Kings, pl. 1, no. 21). The words “ἐκ δὲ δασκίου γενειάδος, κ.τ.λ.”, coupled with such evidence, make it clear that βούπρῳρος means, ‘with front’ (not, ‘head’) of ox. In this sense, it is fitter than βούκρανος: and Strabo 's reading (cr. n.) is thus confirmed.

other

Stafford, pp. 75–76

In the visual arts Acheloos is most commonly represented as having the body of a bull and a man's head with bull's horns, though there are variations on the theme. ... In the late sixth century the episode is one of many on the Throne of Bathykles at Amyklai, and Pausanias (6.19.12-14) ... In Attic art the scene appears more than twenty times, ...

Jebb, note on line 11

(1) ταῦρος ["bull"]. This regular embodiment of a river-god symbolised both the roar of the torrent, and, as Strabo adds, the twistings of the stream (“καμπαί”), “ἃς καλοῦσι κέρατα” (10. 458).

Jebb, note on line 507

An engraved gem in the British Museum (King, Antique Gems II. pl. 34, fig. 3) shows Acheloüs as a bull, preparing to butt at Heracles. The gem is older than the time of Sophocles, and may, as Mr. Murray S. thinks, have followed the rendering of this subject on the still more archaic throne of Apollo at Amyclae ( Paus.3. 18. 5). Cp. n. on 520. This fight was a favourite theme in art: for the literature, see Roscher, Lex.p. 9.

D'Alessio, p. 26

The Greek god [Acheloios] was represented as a bull with human face, head or torso, but with bull's horns and ears, and a bison-like beard. ... That Acheloios' iconography is derived from Mesopotamian models, ... has been evident since the very first moment when Western archaeologists caught sight of the monumental figures of human-headed bulls protecting the gates of Neo-Assyrian royal palaces.

References

• Isler, Hand Peter (2006) s.v. Achelous 2, in Brill’s New Pauly Online, Antiquity volumes edited by: Hubert Cancik and, Helmuth Schneider, English Edition by: Christine F. Salazar, Classical Tradition volumes edited by: Manfred Landfester, English Edition by: Francis G. Gentry, published online: 2006.

• Molinari, Nicholas, and Nicola Sisci. Potamikon: Sinews of Acheloios. A Comprehensive Catalog of the Bronze Coinage of the Man-Faced Bull, with Essays on Origin and Identity. Oxford: Archaeopress Archaeology, 2016. ISBN 9781784914011. JSTOR j.ctvxrq0bd.

Sources

Ancient

Acusilaus

fr. 1 Fowler [= FGrHist 2 1 = Vorsokr. 9 B 21 = Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.9–10]

• Fowler 2000, p. 4

**1

Ὠκεανὸς δὲ γαμεῖ Τηθὺν ἑαυτοῦ ἀδελφήν· τῶν δὲ γίνονται τρισχίλιοι ποταμοί· Ἀχελῶιος δὲ αὐτῶν πρεσβύτατος καὶ τετίμηται μάλιστα.

Macrob. Sat. 5.18.9 (322.3 Willis). Didymus enim (p. 85 Schmidt), grammaticorum omnium facile eruditissimus, posita causa quam superius Ephorus (FGrHist 70 F 20) dixit, alteram quoque adiecit his verbis: ἄμεινον δὲ ἐκεῖνο λέγειν ὅτι διὰ τὸ πάντων τῶν ποταμῶν πρεσβύτατον εἶναι Ἀχελῷον τιμὴν ἀπονέμοντας αὐτῷ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους πάντα ἁπλῶς τὰ νάματα τῷ ἐκείνου ὀνόματι προσαγορεύειν. ὁ γοῦν Ἀκουσίλαος διὰ τῆς πρώτης ἱστορίας δεδήλωκεν ὅτι Ἀχελῷος πάντων τῶν ποταμῶν πρεσβύτατος. ἔφη γάρ: "Ὠκεανὸς—μάλιστα."

• Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.9–10

9. ... Didymus enim grammaticorum omnium facile eruditissimus, posita causa quam superius Ephorus dixit, alteram quoque adiecit his verbis:

10. ἄμεινον δὲ ἐκεῖνο λέγειν ὅτι διὰ τὸ πάντων τῶν ποταμῶν πρεσβύτατον εἶναι Ἀχελῷον τιμὴν ἀπονέμοντας αὐτῷ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους πάντα ἁπλῶς τὰ νάματα τῷ ἐκείνου ὀνόματι προσαγορεύειν. ὁ γοῦν Ἀγησίλαος²³⁴ διὰ τῆς πρώτης ἱστορίας δεδήλωκεν ὅτι Ἀχελῷος πάντων τῶν ποταμῶν πρεσβύτατος. ἔφη γαρ· Ὠκεανὸς δὲ γαμεῖ Τηθὺν ἑαυτοῦ ἀδελφήν, τῶν δὲ γίνονται τρισχίλιοι ποταμοί, Ἀχελῷος δὲ αὐτῶν πρεσβύτατος καὶ τετίμηται μάλιστα.

²³⁴ Ἀγησίλαος] Ἀκουσίλαος ed. Lugd. Bat. 1670

9. ... For Didymus—easily the most learned of all grammarians—cited the explanation given by Ephorus above and added a second, as follows (Tragic Diction fr. 2):

10. "Better to say that humankind honors Akheloös for being the oldest of all rivers by addressing simply all rivers with his name; Agêsilaos,74 at any rate, in Book 1 of his History, makes it plain that the Akheloös is the oldest river, saying, “Ôkean wed his own sister, Têthys, and from them were born 3,000 rivers, with Akheloös oldest among them and much the most honored."

• Andolfi, Book 1 fr. *1, pp. 34–38

Book 1

fr. *1

Ὠκεανὸς δὲ γαμεῖ Τηθὺν ἑαυτοῦ ἀδελφήν· τῶν δὲ γίνονται τρισχίλιοι ποταμοί ·

Ἀχελῶιος δὲ αὐτῶν πρεσβύτατος καὶ τετίμηται μάλιστα.

Macr. Sat. 5.18.9 (322.3 Willis). Didymus enim (p. 85 Schmidt), grammaticorum omnium facile eruditissimus, posita causa quam superius Ephorus (FGrHist 70 F 20a) adiecit his verbis: ἄμεινον δὲ ἐκεῖνο ... ἔφη γάρ^. «Ὠκεανὸς—μάλιστα».

• Freeman, p. 16

21 (Achelôo is the oldest of rivers): Ocean marries Tethys his own sister; from them spring three thousand rivers, but Achelôos is the oldest and most honoured.

• Fowler 2013, p. 12

Akousilaos fr. 1 reports the marriage of Okeanos to his own sister Tethys; unfortunately nothing indicates to which generation the couple might have belonged. As he follows Hesiod (Th. 367) in giving 3,000 as the number of rivers, it is probable that he follows him also for the genealogy. In the same fragment Akousilaos says that Acheloos is eldest, and most honoured; he is perhaps expanding a hint from Homer (Il. 21.194), ...

Alcaeus

fr. 450 Campbell [= BNJ 1 F35b]

• Campbell

p. 436

450 (Voigt) Comes Natalis Myth. 7. 2 (p. 714 ed. Francof. 1581)

Alcaeus Oceani et Terrae filium esse (Acheloum) sensit.

p. 436

450 Comes Natalis, Mythology

Alcaeus saw that Achelous¹ was the son of Ocean and Earth.

¹ River, boundary between Acarnania and Aetolia; cf. Sa. 212.

• Tor, p. 30

Hecataeus ... ascribing to Achelous, for example, a different divine parentage (Sun and Earth) than the one he is accorded in Alcaeus (fr. 450 Campbell = BNJ I F35b) or in Hesiod (Th. 337-40; Hecataeus: BNJ I F35b, with Pwnall (BNJ) ad loc.).⁵⁴

Apollodorus

1.3.4

and Melpomene had by Achelous the Sirens,

1.7.3

Perimede had Hippodamas and Orestes by Achelous;

1.7.10

Porthaon and Euryte, daughter of Hippodamas, had sons, Oeneus, Agrius, Alcathous, Melas, Leucopeus, and a daughter Sterope, who is said to have been the mother of the Sirens by Achelous.

1.8.1

This Deianira drove a chariot and practised the art of war, and Hercules wrestled for her hand with Achelous.

2.7.5 [= Pherecydes of Athens fr. 42 Fowler]

And having come to Calydon, Hercules wooed Deianira, daughter of Oeneus. He wrestled for her hand with Achelous, who assumed the likeness of a bull; but Hercules broke off one of his horns.² So Hercules married Deianira, but Achelous recovered the horn by giving the horn of Amalthea in its stead. Now Amalthea was a daughter of Haemonius, and she had a bull's horn, which, according to Pherecydes, had the power of supplying meat or drink in abundance, whatever one might wish.

² On the struggle of Herakles with the river Achelous, see Soph. Trach. 9-21; Diod. 4.35.3ff.; Dio Chrysostom lx.; Scholiast on Hom. Il. xxi.194; Ov. Met. 9.1-88; Hyginus, Fab. 31; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini, ed. Bode, i. pp. 20, 131 (First Vatican Mythographer 58; Second Vatican Mythographer 165). According to Ovid, the river-god turned himself first into a serpent and then into a bull. The story was told by Archilochus, who represented the river Achelous in the form of a bull, as we learn from the Scholiast on Hom. Il.xxi.194. Diodorus rationalized the legend in his dull manner by supposing that it referred to a canal which the eminent philanthropist Herakles dug for the benefit of the people of Calydon.

3.7.5

After the capture of Thebes, when Alcmaeon learned that his mother Eriphyle had been bribed to his undoing also,1 he was more incensed than ever, and in accordance with an oracle given to him by Apollo he killed his mother.2 Some say that he killed her in conjunction with his brother Amphilochus, others that he did it alone. But Alcmaeon was visited by the Fury of his mother's murder, and going mad he first repaired to Oicles3 in Arcadia, and thence to Phegeus at Psophis. And having been purified by him he married Arsinoe, daughter of Phegeus,4 and gave her the necklace and the robe. But afterwards the ground became barren on his account,5 and the god bade him in an oracle to depart to Achelous and to stand another trial on the river bank.6 At first he repaired to Oeneus at Calydon and was entertained by him; then he went to the Thesprotians, but was driven away from the country; and finally he went to the springs of Achelous, and was purified by him,7 and received Callirrhoe, his daughter, to wife. Moreover he colonized the land which the Achelous had formed by its silt, and he took up his abode there.8 But afterwards Callirrhoe coveted the necklace and robe, and said she would not live with him if she did not get them. So away Alcmaeon hied to Psophis and told Phegeus how it had been predicted that he should be rid of his madness when he had brought the necklace and the robe to Delphi and dedicated them.9 Phegeus believed him and gave them to him. But a servant having let out that he was taking the things to Callirrhoe, Phegeus commanded his sons, and they lay in wait and killed him.10 When Arsinoe upbraided them, the sons of Phegeus clapped her into a chest and carried her to Tegea and gave her as a slave to Agapenor, falsely accusing her of Alcmaeon's murder.

3.7.7

Having acquainted their mother with these things, they went to Delphi and dedicated the necklace and robe²⁴ according to the injunction of Achelous.

E 7.18

And having come to Circe he was sent on his way by her, and put to sea, and sailed past the isle of the Sirens.¹ Now the Sirens were Pisinoe, Aglaope, and Thelxiepia, daughters of Achelous and Melpomene, one of the Muses.

¹ Homer does not name the Sirens individually nor mention their parentage, but by using the dual in reference to them （Hom. Od. 12.52; Hom. Od. 12.167） he indicates that they were two in number. Sophocles, in his play Ulysses, called the Sirens daughters of Phorcus, and agreed with Homer in recognizing only two of them. See Plut. Quaest. Conviv. ix.14.6; The Fragments of Sophocles, ed. A. C. Pearson, iii.66, frag. 861. Apollonius Rhodius says that the Muse Terpsichore bore the Sirens to Achelous （Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.895ff.）. Hyginus names four of them, Teles, Raidne, Molpe, and Thelxiope （Hyginus, Fab. praefat. p. 30, ed. Bunte）, and, in agreement with Apollodorus, says that they were the offspring of Achelous by the Muse Melpomene. Tzetzes calls them Parthenope, Leucosia, and Ligia, but adds that other people named them Pisinoe, Aglaope, and Thelxiepia, and that they were the children of Achelous and Terpsichore. With regard to the parts which they took in the bewitching concert, he agrees with Apollodorus. See Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 712. According to a Scholiast on Ap. Rhod., Argon.iv.892, their names were Thelxiope, or Thelxione, Molpe, and Aglaophonus. As to their names and parents see also Eustathius on Hom. Od. 12. p. 1709, Scholiast on Hom. Od. xii.39, who mention the view that the father of the Sirens was Achelous, and that their mother was either the Muse Terpsichore, or Sterope, daughter of Porthaon.

Apollonius of Rhodes

Argonautica

4.893

[Race's Loeb translation: The brisk wind propelled the ship, and soon they spotted the beautiful island of Anthemoessa, where the clear-voiced Sirens, the daughters of Achelous, enchanted anyone who moored there with their sweet songs and destroyed him. Beautiful Terpsichore, one of the Muses, had slept with Achelous and bore them.

Archilochus

fr. 286 West [= Dio Chrysostom, 60.1]

286 Dio Chrys. 60.1

286 Dio Chrysostom, Orations

Can you solve this problem for me, whether or not some are right to find fault with Archilochus and others with Sophocles for their treatment of Nessus and Deianeira? For some say that Archilochus is talking nonsense when he makes Deianeira speak at length to Heracles while she is being sexually assaulted by the centaur, as she reminds him of the wooing of Achelous and of the events that took place then, with the result that Nessus had ample time to do what he wanted. And others say that Sophocles introduced the shooting of the arrow too early, while they were still crossing the river.

• Gantz, p. 432

Perhaps even earlier [than the Ehoiai] is a lost poem by Archilochos in which, as Nessos attempts to ravish Deianeira, she reminds Herakles of her wooing by Acheloos, and of his combat with that god in the latter's form as a bull (286 W). Our source Dion of Prusa, ...

fr. 287 West [= Scholiast on Homer, Iliad 21.237]

287 Schol. Hom. Il. 21.237, “μεμυκὼς ἠΰτε ταῦρος”

287 Scholiast on Homer, Iliad (“bellowing like a bull”)

From this starting point they represented Achelous as a bull in his fight with Heracles. Archilochus did not dare to pit Achelous as a river against Heracles, but as a bull, whereas Homer was the first to make river and hero contend in battle. Each therefore adapted the same topic to his own talent.

• Gantz, p. 28

The story of this offspring's transformation into a bull and his combat with Herakles for Deianeira was apparently recounted by Archilochos (287 W)

Aristophanes

fr. 365 Henderson [= fr. 365 PCG = Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.5]

365 Macrobius, Sat. 5.18.4

ἤμουν ἄγροιν

βάρος, ἤγειρεν γάρ τοι μ᾿ οἴνος

∗∗∗

οὐ μείξας πῶμ᾿ Ἀχελῴῳ

365 (on calling water “Achelous” the river god)

I had a savage fit

of vomiting, for the wine stirred me up,

having no admixture of Achelous

Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.5

Aristophanes, a poet of the Old Comedy, says in his Rooster (fr. 365 PCG 3,2:205),

I was puking up a nasty

burden—for the wine was weighing me down—

. . .

I had not mixed the drink with Akheloös.

I was being weighed down (he says) by the wine that had not been mixed with water, that is, by pure wine.

Aristotle

Metaphysics 1.983b

For they⁴ represented Oceanus and Tethys to be the parents of creation, and the oath of the gods to be by water— Styx,⁵ as they call it. Now what is most ancient is most revered, and what is most revered is what we swear by.

McKeon, p. 694

... for they made Ocean and Tethys the parents of creation,⁵ and described the oath of the gods as being by water,⁶ to which they gave the name of Styx; for what is oldest is most honorable, and the most honourable thing is that by which one swears.

⁵ Hom. Il. xiv, 201, 246.

Fowler 2103, p. 12–13

in Aristotle, as in Hesiod (Th. 777) it is Styx not Acheloos who is eldest and most honoured,

Derveni papyrus

• West 1983

p. 92

In columns xx-xxii of the [Derveni] papyrus the commentator is concerned with Zeus' creation of Oceanus and the rivers ('sinews of Achelous'), and of the sun, moon, and stars. The verb used in the verse about the creation of Oceanus was μήσατο, 'contrived'. Again the deliberate intelligence of the creation is conveyed. Achelous apparently stands for the world's fresh-water streams; they form a network like the sinews of the body.³⁹

³⁹ ... Achelous was the greatest of rivers (cf. Il. 21.194-5, Acusil. 2 F 1). For use of the name to stand for water see LSJ, and Dodds on E. Bacch. 635-6; Servius ascribes it to Orpheus (= fr. 344 K.).

p. 115

36 μήσατο δ' Ὠκεανοῖο ...

37 ἶνας δ' ἐγκα[tέλα]σσ' Ἀχελωίον ἀργυ[ρ]οδίνο[υ.

• D'Alessio

p. 20

2. ACHELOIOS IN THE DERVENI 'THEOGONY'

... The first two fragmentary verses, which in the London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] are to be read as

]νασ[.ἐ]γκατέλεξα / Ἀχελωίου ἀργυροδίνεω ['silver-eddying'. LSJ s.v. ἀργυροδίνης]

,ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα θάλασσα

p. 21

...is, as has been seen by K. Tsantsanoglou, practically identical to one of the the lines from the Orphic 'Theogony' interpreted in col. 23 of the Derveni papyrus. Previous reconstructions of the relevant portions of this papyrus, too, did not prove entirely reliable,⁹ and prevented its identification with with the first verse quoted in the London papyrus. Only very recently has a revised transcript of the relevant portion been published. The line [in the Derveni P.] now reads:

ἶνας δ' ἐγκατ[έλε]ξ' Ἀχελωίου ἀργυ[ρ]οδίνε[ω.

... There can be no doubt that the two lines were in fact identical. On the other hand, to establish whether the two papyri are referring to the same verse of the same poem is a quite different issue.

p. 22

I would argue that the quotation from the Orphic ίερὸς λόγος did not come from some Hellenistic scholar, but that it went back to an erlier discussion of the Homeric passage, which may well even be roughly contemporary with the Derveni text, if not dating back to the fifth century. ... if this is correct, the verse would belong, if not exactly to the poem discussed in the Derveni papyrus, to some roughly contemporary or not much later version. ...

The verse has been reconstructed by West (1983) 115, ... as μήσατο δ' Ὠκεανοῖο μέγα σθένος εὺρὺ ῥέοντος, 'and he (sc. Zeus) contrived the great strength of wide-flowing Ocean', a verse ...

Diodorus Siculus

4.35.3–4

But Heracles, desiring to do a service to the Calydonians, diverted the river Acheloüs, and making another bed for it he recovered a large amount of fruitful land which was now irrigated by this stream. [4] Consequently certain poets, as we are told, have made this deed into a myth; for they have introduced Heracles as joining battle with Acheloüs, the river assuming the form of a bull, and as breaking off in the struggle one of his horns, which he gave to the Aetolians. This they call the "Horn of Amaltheia," and represent it as filled with a great quantity of every kind of autumn fruit, such as grapes and apples and the like, the poets signifying in this obscure manner by the horn of Acheloüs the stream which ran through the canal, and by the apples and pomegranates and grapes the fruitful land which was watered by the river and the multitude [p. 459] of its fruit-bearing plants. Moreover, they say that the phrase "Amaltheia's Horn" is used as of a quality incapable of being softened (a-malakistia), whereby is indicated the tense vigour of the man who built the work.

Ephorus

FGrHist 70 20a = Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.6–8

6. Furthermore, Ephorus, the well known author, shows in Book 2 of his Histories why they adopted this usage (no. 70 fr. 20 FGrH): "Now, only the inhabitants nearby sacrifice to other rivers; the Akheloös alone happens to be honored by all humankind, who refer to other rivers by their proper names, not by one or another common term, whereas they adopt the Akheloös’ proper name as the common term."

7. "For we generally call "water" (as the common term has it) "Akheloös," from the river’s proper name, whereas in the case of other names we often use the common terms in place of the proper, for example calling Athenians "Hellenes" or Spartans "Peloponnesians." As the best explanation of this puzzle I can offer only the oracles from Dodona."

8. "For in nearly all his pronouncements the god was accustomed to enjoin sacrifice to Akheloös, with the result that many people came to believe that by "Akheloös" the oracle meant, not the river that flows through Akarnania,⁷³ but "water" tout court, and so they imitate the terms of address used by the god. As a token of this, there’s the fact that we usually speak that way in referring to the divine: for we call water "Akheloös" above all in oaths and in prayers and in sacrifices, all the things that concern the gods."

A'lessio, p. 32

The equation between the god's name and 'water' in general is well attested since the fifth century. It is fairly common in Attic texts and continues into Hellenistic epigrams. Ephoros (FGrHist 70 F 20b), quoted by both te London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] and Macrob. Sat. 5.18.6 (via Didymos), traces it back to Dodonean ritual usage, where oaths were sworn in Acheloios' name.

Andolfi, fr. 1

... Macrobius, via Didymus, quotes a passage from Ephorus (FGrHist 70 F 20a) explaining why men usually call streams by Achelous' name:⁷⁵ the historian saw the influence of a ritual occuring in Dodona in this usage, where people used to sear oaths in Achelous' name.⁷⁶ He states that three thousand rivers were born from Oceanus' union with Thethys, but the most anceint and honorable one was the Achelous.

Euripides

Andromache

165–168

[165] and cower in humility, fall at my feet, and sweep my house, scattering Achelous' water by hand from my gold-wrought vessels, and know where in the world it is you live.

Bacchae

519–520

Daughter of Achelöus,

Lady Dirce, fair maiden

625

ᾖσσ᾿ ἐκεῖσε κᾆτ᾿ ἐκεῖσε, δμωσὶν Ἀχελῷον φέρειν

ordering his servants to bring water [Ἀχελῷον]

Hypsipyle

fr. 753 [= Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.12]

753

<Hypsipyle>

Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.2 (= Didymus, Tragic Words fr. 2, p. 85 Schmidt)

I’ll show the Argives Achelous’ stream.¹

¹ The great river Achelous could be regarded as the source or parent of minor rivers and springs throughout Greece.

• Macrobius, Saturnalia 5.18.12

"Euripides, in his Hypsipylê, uses ‘Akheloös’ to mean water of every sort: for in speaking about water located quite far from Akarnania, home of the river Akheloös, he says (fr. 753 TGrF 5,1:758):

I shall show the Argives Akheloös’ stream.⁷⁵

Hecataeus

fr. 35b Brill's New Jacoby =? Natalis Comes Myth. 7.2 =? fr. 35 bis Jacoby and/or fr. 35 ter Jacoby

• Natalis Comes, [1]

Alcaeus thinks that Achelous was the son of Ocean and of Earth, Hecateus suggests the Sun and Earth, and Nymphis (in the first book of his Heraclea) claims that they were Thetis or Earth [sic]⁷²

• Tor, p. 30

Hecataeus ... ascribing to Achelous, for example, a different divine parentage (Sun and Earth) than the one he is accorded in Alcaeus (fr. 450 Campbell = BNJ I F35b) or in Hesiod (Th. 337-40; Hecataeus: BNJ I F35b, with Pownall (BNJ) ad loc.).⁵⁴

• Not in Fowler 2000

p. 141

p. 384

Hesiod

Catalogue of Women

Hes. fr. 10.34–45 Most

Most, pp. 54–55

fair-formed Perimede.

Perimede's Children

With her, fair-flowing Achelous] mingled with love [35]

...

[Hippodamas] ... [45]

Theogony

337–370.

And Tethys bore to Ocean eddying rivers, Nilus, and Alpheus, and deep-swirling Eridanus, Strymon, and Meander, and the fair stream of Ister, [340] and Phasis, and Rhesus, and the silver eddies of Achelous, Nessus, and Rhodius, Haliacmon, and Heptaporus, Granicus, and Aesepus, and holy Simois, and Peneus, and Hermus, and Caicus' fair stream, and great Sangarius, Ladon, Parthenius, [345] Euenus, Ardescus, and divine Scamander. Also she brought forth a holy company of daughters who with the lord Apollo and the Rivers have youths in their keeping—to this charge Zeus appointed them—Peitho, and ... and Styx who is the chiefest of them all. These are the eldest daughters that sprang from Ocean and Tethys; but there are many besides. For there are three thousand neat-ankled daughters of Ocean who are dispersed far and wide, [365] and in every place alike serve the earth and the deep waters, children who are glorious among goddesses. And as many other rivers are there, babbling as they flow, sons of Ocean, whom queenly Tethys bare, but their names it is hard for a mortal man to tell, [370] but people know those by which they severally dwell.

777

terrible Styx, eldest daughter of backflowing Ocean.

Homer

Iliad

21.194–199

With [Zeus] doth not even king Achelous vie, [195] nor the great might of deep-flowing Ocean, from whom all rivers flow and every sea, and all the springs and deep wells; howbeit even he hath fear of the lightning of great Zeus, and his dread thunder, whenso it crasheth from heaven.”

24.614–617

And now somewhere amid the rocks, on the lonely mountains, [615] on Sipylus, where, men say, are the couching-places of goddesses, even of the nymphs that range swiftly in the dance about Achelous, there, albeit a stone, she broodeth over her woes sent by the gods.

Hyginus

Fabulae

Theogony

[6] From Ocean and Tethys came ... also the Rivers: Strymon, Nilus, ... Achelous, ...

[30] From Achelous and Melpomene came the Sirens, ...

31

[7] The river Achelous could change himself into any form he wanted, and when he and Heracles were fighting over the right to marry deianira, he turned himself into a bull. Hercules broke off one of his horns and gave it to the Hesperides (or Nymphs); these goddesses filled the horn with fruit and called it Cornucopia {"Horn of Plenty"}.

125

[13] Then Ulysses came to the Sirens, the daughters of the Muse Melomene and the river Achelous.

Libanius

Progymnasmata

Narration 1: "On Deianira"]

Gibson, p. 11

Narration 1: On Deianira¹

Heracles wanted to marry Deianira, the daughter of Oeneus, but the river Achelous was in love with the girl, too. Fearing both of them, Oeneus freely offered her to neither. And so, setting his daughter as the prize he ordered them to compete for her. And Heracles won at wrestling by pulling off the river's horn. And the blood flowed and Earth received it; from this the Sirens were born.²

¹ C.f. Narrations 31. For the myth, see Sophocles, Trach. 9-21; Ovid, Metam. 9.1-88; Apollodorus, Bibl. 1.8.1; 2.7.5.

² Elsewhere the Sirens are said to be the offspring of Achelous by Melpomene (Apollodorus, Bibl. 1.3.4) or Sterope (Bibl. 1.7.10), or to be the offspring of Earth (Euripides, Hel. 167-169) or Phorcys (Sophocles frg. 861 Radt).

Narration 31: "On Deianira"]

Gibson, p. 33

Narration 1: On Deianira⁵⁹

Heracles longed for Deinira, daughter of Oeneus, but the river Achelous longed for her, as well. Coming into conflict because of their desire, they decided the issue with a contest and set marriage to the girl as the prize. And [p. 35] having attacked him Heracles pulled off Achelous's horn, and the blood of the wound running down sowed the birth of the Sirens.

⁵⁹ C.f. Narration 1 with notes.

Lycophron

Alexandra

712–716

And he shall slay the triple daughters,^o of Tethys’ son, who imitated the strains of their melodious mother^p: self-hurled^q from the cliff’s top they dive with their wings into the Tyrrhenian sea, where the bitter thread spun by the Fates shall draw them.

^o Sirens, daughter of Acheloüs, son of Tethys. Here three, while Hom. Od. xii. 52 and 167 uses the dual.

^p Melpomene.

^q The Sirens were doomed to die when anyone passed their shores safely (Hygin. Fab. 125 and 141). When Odysseus did so, they threw themselves from the Sirenes rocks (Strabo 247) into the sea.

Macrobius

Saturnalia

5.18.3

...But no one asks why Virgil named the Acheloüs, among all other rivers, when he intended "water" to be understood, and no one suspects that some more profound bit of learning might be present.

5.18.4

4. But after examining the matter more deeply I have found that the learned poet has spoken (as my evidence will show) in the manner of the most ancient Greeks, who used "Akheloös" as the proper term for "water"—nor did they do that to no purpose: rather, the reason has been carefully recorded. But before I explain the reason, I shall use the testimony of an ancient poet to show that this manner of speaking—using "Akheloös" to mean "water" in general—was pervasive.⁷²

⁷² Cf. (D)Serv. on G. 1.8 (citing but not quoting Aristophanes and Ephorus).

5.18.5

5. Aristophanes, a poet of the Old Comedy, says in his Rooster (fr. 365 PCG 3,2:205), "I was puking up a nasty burden—for the wine was weighing me down— . . . I had not mixed the drink with Akheloös." I was being weighed down (he says) by the wine that had not been mixed with water, that is, by pure wine.

5.18.6

6. Furthermore, Ephorus, the well known author, shows in Book 2 of his Histories why they adopted this usage (no. 70 fr. 20 FGrH): "Now, only the inhabitants nearby sacrifice to other rivers; the Akheloös alone happens to be honored by all humankind, who refer to other rivers by their proper names, not by one or another common term, whereas they adopt the Akheloös’ proper name as the common term."

5.18.7

7. "For we generally call "water" (as the common term has it) "Akheloös," from the river’s proper name, whereas in the case of other names we often use the common terms in place of the proper, for example calling Athenians "Hellenes" or Spartans "Peloponnesians." As the best explanation of this puzzle I can offer only the oracles from Dodona."

5.18.8

8. "For in nearly all his pronouncements the god was accustomed to enjoin sacrifice to Akheloös, with the result that many people came to believe that by "Akheloös" the oracle meant, not the river that flows through Akarnania,⁷³ but "water" tout court, and so they imitate the terms of address used by the god. As a token of this, there’s the fact that we usually speak that way in referring to the divine: for we call water "Akheloös" above all in oaths and in prayers and in sacrifices, all the things that concern the gods."

⁷³ Acarnania lay on the Ionian Sea in NW Greece: the Acheloüs marked the boundary with Aetolia to the east, the Ambracian Gulf the boundary with Epirus on the north.

5.18.9

9. Can there be any clearer demonstration that the ancient Greeks were in the habit of using "Acheloüs” to refer to water of any sort? That’s how Virgil came to make the very learned statement that father Liber mixed wine with Acheloüs. And though I think that in quoting the comic poet Aristophanes and the historian Ephorus I’ve given enough testimony on this point, we will nonetheless go a step further. For Didymus—easily the most learned of all grammarians—cited the explanation given by Ephorus above and added a second, as follows (Tragic Diction fr. 2):

5.18.10

10. Better to say that humankind honors Akheloös for being the oldest of all rivers by addressing simply all rivers with his name; Agêsilaos,⁷⁴ at any rate, in Book 1 of his History, makes it plain that the Akheloös is the oldest river, saying, "Ôkean wed his own sister, Têthys, and from them were born 3,000 rivers, with Akheloös oldest among them and much the most honored."

5.18.11

11. Though all that is more than enough to establish the customary ancient turn of phrase whereby “Acheloüs” was treated as a common term for “water” in general, let the following verse of Euripides, the most noble tragic poet, add still further authority, as the same Didymus cites it, in his books on Tragic Diction, in these words (ibid.):

5.18.12

12. "Euripides, in his Hypsipylê, uses 'Akheloös' to mean water of every sort: for in speaking about water located quite far from Akarnania, home of the river Akheloös, he says (fr. 753 TGrF 5,1:758):

I shall show the Argives Akheloös’ stream.⁷⁵

Natalis Comes

[2]

Alcaeus thinks that Achelous was the son of Ocean and of Earth, Hecateus suggests the Sun and Earth, and Nymphis (in the first book of his Heraclea) claims that they were Thetis or Earth [sic]⁷²

• Campbell

p. 436

450 (Voigt) Comes Natalis Myth. 7. 2 (p. 714 ed. Francof. 1581)

Alcaeus Oceani et Terrae filium esse (Acheloum) sensit.

p. 436

450 Comes Natalis, Mythology

Alcaeus saw that Achelous¹ was the son of Ocean and Earth.

¹ River, boundary between Acarnania and Aetolia; cf. Sa. 212.

Smith s.v. Achelous

He with 3000 brother-rivers is described as a son of Oceanus and Thetys (Hes. Th. 340), or of Oceanus and Gaea, or lastly of Helios and Gaea. (Natal. Com. 7.2.)

Nonnus

Dionysiaca

13.313–315

Lake Catana near the Sirens, whom rosy Terpsichore brought forth by the stormy embraces of her bull-horned husband Akheloos;^c

^c A river rising in Mount Pindos and falling into the Ionion sea. Rivers were represented as with heads or horns of bulls.

17.238–239

as they sing of horned Akheloos,^d when Heracles cut off his horn and took it to adorn his wedding.

^d Acheloos the river-god and Hracles both wooed Deianeira daughter of Oineus; they fought for her, and Heracles, wrestling with the god in his bull-shape, broke off one of his horns, whereat Acheloos yielded, and Heracles married Deianeria.

43.12–15

Deianeira, who once in that noisy strife for a bride preferred Herakles, and stood there fearing the wedding with a fickle bullhorn River.^b

^b An allusion to Sophocles, Trach. 9-27, cf. ibid. 503-530.

Ovid

Amores

3.6.35–36

Ask Achelous who his horns did drub,

Straight he complains of Hercules's club.

Fasti

2.43–46

The son of Amphiaraus^f said to Naupactian^g Achelous, “O rid me of my sin,” and the other did rid him of his sin. Fond fools alack! to fancy murder’s gruesome stain by river water could be washed away!

^f Alcmaeon, who had slain his mother Eriphyle, for accepting the bribe of a necklace to persuade him to attack Thebes. He was purified by water from the Achelous.

^g A mistake: Naupactus was far from the Achelous.

Heroides

9.137–140

Me, too, you have possessed among your many loves—but me with no reproach. Regret it not—twice you have fought for the sake of me. In tears Achelous gathered up his horns on the wet banks of his stream, and bathed in its clayey tide his mutilated brow;

16.263–268

Ah, might the gods make you the prize in a mighty contest, and let the victor have you for his couch!—as Hippomenes bore off, the prize of his running, Schoeneus’ daughter, as Hippodamia came to Phrygian embrace, as fierce Hercules broke the horns of the Achelous while aspiring to thy embraces, Deianira.

Metamorphoses

5.552–555

But, daughters of Acheloüs, why have you the feathers and feet of birds, though you still have maidens’ features? is it because, when Proserpina was gathering the spring flowers, you were among the number of her companions, ye Sirens, skilled in song?

8.547–564

Meanwhile Theseus, having done his part in the confederate task, was on his way back to Tritonia’s city where Erechtheus ruled. But Acheloüs, swollen with rain, blocked his way and delayed his journey. “Enter my house, illustrious hero of Athens,” said the river-god, “and do not entrust yourself to my greedy waters. The current is wont to sweep down solid trunks of trees and huge boulders in zigzag course with crash and roar. I have seen great stables that stood near by the bank swept away, cattle and all, and in that current neither strength availed the ox nor speed the horse. Many a strong man also has been overwhelmed in its whirling pools when swollen by melting snows from the mountain-sides. It is safer for you to rest until the waters shall run within their accustomed bounds, until its own bed shall hold the slender stream.” The son of Aegeus replied: “I will use both your house, Acheloüs, and your advice.” And he did use them both. He entered the river-god’s dark dwelling, built of porous pumice and rough tufa; the floor was damp with soft [cont.] moss, conchs and purple-shells panelled the ceiling.

8.574–591

What place is that? Tell me the name which that island bears. And yet it seems not to be one island.” The river-god replied: “No, what you see is not one island. There are five islands lying there together; but the distance hides their divisions. And, that you may wonder the less at what Diana did when she was slighted, those islands once were nymphs, who, when they had slaughtered ten bullocks and had invited all the other rural gods to their sacred feast, forgot me as they led the festal dance. I swelled with rage, as full as when my flood flows at the fullest; and so, terrible in wrath, terrible in flood, I tore forests from forests, fields from fields; and with the place they stood on, I swept the nymphs away, who at last remembered me then, into the sea. There my flood and the sea, united, cleft the undivided ground into as many parts as now you see the Echinades yonder amid the waves. But, as you yourself see, away, look, far away beyond the others is one island that I love: the sailors call it Perimele.

8.592–610

She was beloved by me, and from her I took the name of maiden. Her father, Hippodamas, was enraged with this, and he hurled his daughter to her death down from a high cliff into the deep. I caught her, and supporting her as she swam, I cried: ‘O thou god of the trident, to whom the lot gave the kingdom next to the world, even the wandering waves, bring aid, and to one drowned by a father’s cruelty, I pray, give a place, O Neptune, or else let her become a place herself.’ While I prayed a new land embraced her floating form and a solid island grew from her transformed shape.”

9.1–100

The Neptunian hero¹ asked the god why he groaned and what was the cause of his mutilated forehead; to whom the Calydonian river, binding, up his rough locks with a band of reeds, thus replied: “’Tis an unpleasant task you set; for who would care to chronicle his defeats? Still I will tell the story as it happened: nor was it so much a disgrace to be defeated as it was an honour to have striven at all, and the thought that my conqueror was so mighty is a great comfort to me. Deianira (if you have ever heard of her) was once a most beautiful maiden and the envied hope of many suitors. When along with them I entered the house of the father² of the maid I sought, I said: ‘Take me for son-in-law, O son of Parthaon.’ Hercules said the same, and the others yielded their claims to us two. He pleaded the fact that Jove was his father, pleaded his famous labours and all that he had overcome at the command of his stepmother. In reply I said: ‘It is a shame for a god to give place to a mortal’ (Hercules had not yet been made a god); ‘you behold in me the lord of the [cont.]

¹ Theseus was the reputed son of Aegeus; but there was a current tradition that he was really the son of Neptune.

² Oeneus.

9.1–100 [Brooks:]

To him the hero, who proclaimed himself

a favored son of Neptune, answered now;

"Declare the reason of your heavy sighs,

and how your horn was broken?" And at once

the Calydonian River-God replied,

binding with reeds his unadorned rough locks:

"It is a mournful task you have required,

for who can wish to tell his own disgrace?

But truly I shall speak without disguise,

for my defeat, if rightly understood,

should be my glory.—Even to have fought

in battle with a hero of such might,

affords me consolation.

... So, worsted in my strength,

I sought diversion by an artifice,

and changed me to a serpent.

“Twice was I vanquished, there remained to me

a third form so again I changed to seem

a savage bull, and with my limbs renewed

in that form fought once more. ...

Not yet content he laid his fierce right hand

on my tough horn, and broke and tore it from

my mutilated head.—This horn, now heaped

with fruits delicious and sweet-smelling flowers,

the Naiads have held sacred from that hour,

devoted to the bounteous goddess Plenty.’

14.87–88

the Sirens, daughters of Acheloüs.

P.Oxy. 221

D'Alessio, p. 18

... P.Oxy. 221 ... attributed ... to one Ammonios. ... The discussion on line 195 started in the last portion of Column 8, and occupies most of Column 9, ...

[1] σανταί[...] ( )κα[..] [Column 9?] πασ[..(.)] ^νκατέλεξα

[2] Ἀχελω[ΐου] ἀργυροδ[ί]νεω, / ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα

[3] θάλασ[σα". ...

[4] ...

[8] εἶναι [Σέλ]ευκος δ' †ἐν ε΄ [Ἡρ]ακλείας· “πῶ[ς]

[9] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ης ῥεῦμα Ἀ[χ]ελ[ω]ΐου ἀργυ[ρο-]

[10] δίνα, / Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμοῖο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ

[11] κέλευθα;”

[12] ...

[18] πολλούς πρό Δήμητρο[ς] θύειν ... Ἀ-

[19] χελώιωι, ὅτι πάντων πο[τα]μῶν ὄνο-

[20] μα ὁ Ἀχελῶιος κα[ὶ] ἐξ ὕδα[τος] ὁ καρπός.

...

Col. 9, line 1

• West 2003, fr. 12, pp. 292, 293

12 "Ammonius" in Il. 21.195 (P.Oxy.221 ix 1; v.93 Erbse)

κ]ύμασ[ιν] ἐνκατέλεξα Ἀχελω[ΐου] ἀργυροδ[ί]νεω, ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα θάλασσα.

12 "Ammonius," commentary on Iliad 21

"I laid (him?) in the [wat]ers of silver-eddying Achelous, from which is the whole sea."

• Davies and White, p. 106

P.Oxy 221 (1st century. CE), attributed to the scholar Ammonius, comments on Iliad XXI:

• D'Alessio

p. 18

The preserved portion first quotes at least two fragmentary hexameters to the effect that Acheloios was the origin of the whole sea.

p. 20

... The first two fragmentary verses, which in the London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] are to be read as

]νασ[.ἐ]γκατέλεξα / Ἀχελωίου ἀργυροδίνεω

,ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα θάλασσα

Col. 9, lines 8–11

• Panyassis fr. 13 West

13 "Ammonius" in Il. 21.195 (P. Oxy. 221 ix 8; v.93 Erbse)

[Σέλ]ευκος δὲ <τὸν αὐτὸν Ὠκεανῶι τὸν Ἀχελῶιον εἶναι

Πανύασσιν ἀποφαίνει λέγοντα> ἐν ε΄ [Ἡρ]ακλείας·

“π[ς] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ς ῥεῦμ᾿ Ἀ[χ][ω]ΐου

ἀργυ[ρο]δίνα,

Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ κέλευα;”

<τὸν αὐτὸν - λέγοντα> suppl. West.

13 "Ammonius," commentary on Iliad 21

Seleucus <points out that Panyassis identified Achelous with Oceanus> in Book 5 of the Heraclea:

"And how did you travel the stream of silver-eddying Achelous, over the watery ways of the broad river Oceanus?"¹⁵

¹⁵ The addressee is Heracles, the speaker perhaps Geryon.

• Fowler, p. 12

Particularly relevant are archaic verses quoted by Seleukos in P.Oxy. 221 ix 8-11 (from a commentary on this passage of the Iliad; Erbse 5.93-4), in which Acheloos and Okeanos are simply equated. Wilamowitz, who attributed the lines to Panyassls (fr. 13), could well be right that Acheloos was the original, Hellenic god, Okeanos the parvenu.³⁷.

³⁷ Wilamowitz, GGA 162 (1900) 42; ... See further D'Alessio, 'Textual fluctuations'.

• Schironi, p. 319

Seleucus, a grammarian of the first century CE, on the other hand, quoted Pindar and Panyassis to show that Achelous was identical with Oceanus; see P.Oxy. 221, ix, 8-20, and also Sch. Il. 21.195c (ex. [Did.]); this probably suggests that Seleucus too was in favor of omitting line 195 as unecessay. Cf. Schmidt 1976, 113-114; D'Alessio 2004, 30-33.

• D'Alessio, p. 30

[the identification of Achelous with Ocean] is exactly what we see in the next poetic passage quoted by the London papyrus, two hexameters introduced by the word[s] 'Seleukos in the fifth book of the Herakleia':

πῶ[ς] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ης ῥεῦμ' Ἀ[χ]ελ[ω]ΐου ἀργυ[ρο]δίνα,

Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμοῖο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ κέλευθα;

Somebody seems to be asking somebody else (probably Herakles) 'how did you cross the stream of silver-eddying Acheloios / through River Ocean's wet paths?'

Col. 9, lines 18–20

• D'Alessio, p. 31

The clue, once again, is offered by the London papyrus: Seleukos [says] that 'many people sacrifice to Achelois before sacrificing to Demeter, since Acheloios is the name of all rivers and the crop comes from water'.

Panyassis

fr. 2 West [= Pausanias, 10.8.9 = fr. 2.2 Bernabé]

2 Paus. 10.8.9

Πανύασσις δὲ ὁ Πολυάρχου πεποιηκὼς ἐς Ἡρακλέα ἔπη θυγατέρα Ἀχελώιου τὴν Κασταλίαν φησὶν εἶναι. λέγει γὰρ δὴ περὶ τοῦ Ἡρακλέους·

Παρνησσὸν νιφόεντα θοοῖς διὰ ποσσὶ περήσας

ἵκετο Κασταλίης Ἀχελωΐδος ἄμβροτον ὕδωρ.

2 Pausanias, Description of Greece

Panyassis the son of Polyarchus, the author of a Heracles epic, makes Castalia a daughter of Achelous. For he says of Heracles:

Crossing snowy Parnassus with swift feet, he came to Acheloian Castalia’s immortal water.

• D'Alessio, p. 30

Panyassis deals with Acheloios' problems in at least two other fragments: in fr. 2.2 Bernabé he mentions Κασταλίης Ἀχελωΐδος ἄμβροτον ὕδωρ, sharing with many other fifth-century authors the idea that all springs derive from Achelois;

fr. 13 West

13 "Ammonius" in Il. 21.195 (P. Oxy. 221 ix 8; v.93 Erbse)

[Σέλ]ευκος δὲ <τὸν αὐτὸν Ὠκεανῶι τὸν Ἀχελῶιον εἶναι

Πανύασσιν ἀποφαίνει λέγοντα> ἐν ε΄ [Ἡρ]ακλείας·

“π[ς] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ς ῥεῦμ᾿ Ἀ[χ][ω]ΐου

ἀργυ[ρο]δίνα,

Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ κέλευα;”

<τὸν αὐτὸν - λέγοντα> suppl. West.

13 "Ammonius," commentary on Iliad 21

Seleucus <points out that Panyassis identified Achelous with Oceanus> in Book 5 of the Heraclea:

"And how did you travel the stream of silver-eddying Achelous, over the watery ways of the broad river Oceanus?"¹⁵

¹⁵ The addressee is Heracles, the speaker perhaps Geryon.

• Fowler, p. 12

Particularly relevant are archaic verses quoted by Seleukos in P.Oxy. 221 ix 8-11 (from a commentary on this passage of the Iliad; Erbse 5.93-4), in which Acheloos and Okeanos are simply equated. Wilamowitz, who attributed the lines to Panyassls (fr. 13),

• Andolfi, fr. 1 (p. 36?)

Centuries later, the Homeric scholar Seleucus (1st cent. AD) followed Zenodtus' instincts in athetizing the line, as reported by P.Oxy. 221 (col. IX, ll. 8-11)

• Schironi, p. 319

Seleucus, a grammarian of the first century CE, on the other hand, quoted Pindar and Panyassis to show that Achelous was identical with Oceanus; see P.Oxy. 221, ix, 8-20, and also Sch. Il. 21.195c (ex. [Did.]); this probably suggests that Seleucus too was in favor of omitting line 195 as unecessay. Cf. Schmidt 1976, 113-114; D'Alessio 2004, 30-33.

• D'Alessio, p. 30

[the identification of Achelous with Ocean] is exactly what we see in the next poetic passage quoted by the London papyrus, two hexameters introduced by the word[s] 'Seleukos in the fifth book of the Herakleia':

πῶ[ς] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ης ῥεῦμ' Ἀ[χ]ελ[ω]ΐου ἀργυ[ρο]δίνα,

Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμοῖο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ κέλευθα;

Somebody seems to be asking somebody else (probably Herakles) 'how did you cross the stream of silver-eddying Acheloios / through River Ocean's wet paths?' Wilamowitz ((1900) 42) argued that the two hexameters do, in fact, belong to a quotation of Panyassis, an opinion shared by Matthews in his edition in 1974, and, with some doubts, by Bernabé (fr. dub. 31). M. West, reviewing Matthews' edition has argued that the lines may rather belong to some unknown poet called Seleukos.⁴⁶ This is very unlikely. ... There are several reasons for thinking that the lines do belong to Panyassis: ... Panyassis deals with Acheloios' problems in at least two other fragments: in fr. 2.2 Bernabé he mentions Κασταλίης Ἀχελωΐδος ἄμβροτον ὕδωρ, sharing with many other fifth-century authors the idea that all springs derive from Achelois; from fr. 20 Bernabé it appears that he spoke of ...

⁴⁶ West (1976) 172-3, I notice that West (2003) 200 has abandoned this hypothesis.

• D'Alessio, pp. 31-33?

fr. 23 West

23 Schol. (T) Il. 24.616b, “αἵ τ᾿ ἀμφ᾿ Ἀχελώϊον”

τινὲς “αἵ τ᾿ ἀμφ᾿ Ἀχελήσιον”· ποταμὸς δὲ Λυδίας, ἐξ οὗ πληροῦται ὁ Ὕλλος· καὶ Ἡρακλέα νοσήσαντα ἐπὶ τῶν τόπων, ἀναδόντων αὐτῶι θερμὰ λουτρὰ τῶν ποταμῶν, τοὺς παῖδας Ὕλλον καλέσαι καὶ τὸν ἐξ Ὀμφάλης Ἀχέλητα, ὃς Λυδῶν ἐβασίλευσεν. εἰσὶ δὲ καὶ νύμφαι Ἀχελήτιδες, ὥς φησι Πανύασσις.

23 23 Scholiast on the Iliad, “the nymphs who dance about the Achelous”

Some read “about the Achelesius”; this is a river in Lydia, a tributary of the Hyllus, and (they say) that after Heracles fell sick in these parts, and the rivers provided him with warm bathing, he named his sons Hyllus, and the one born to Omphale Acheles—he became king of Lydia. There are also Achelesian nymphs, as Panyassis says.

Scholiast on Apollonius of Rhodes

Panyassis says that Heracles fell sick in Lydia and obtained therapy from the river Hyllus, which is in Lydia; and this is why his two sons were both named Hyllus.

• D'Alessio, pp. 30–31

Panyassis deals with Acheloios' problems in at least two other fragments: ... from fr. 20 Bernabé it appears that he spoke of Ἀχελήτιδες nymphs when talking of the same Lydian river known as Ἀχελώιος in most versions od Iliad 24.616 (a variant Ἀχελήσιον was known in antiquity, perhaps also connected with the Panyassis passage).⁴⁷ Within a Herakleia, the lines preserved by [p. 31] the London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] would fit very well when speaking of Herakles' ... The attribution to Panyssis leads ...

Pausanias

1.34.3

[3] The altar [at the Amphiareion of Oropos] shows parts. One part is to Heracles... The fifth is dedicated to the nymphs and to Pan, and to the rivers Achelous and Cephisus.

1.41.2

[2] From this place [near Megara] the local guide took us to a place which he said was named Rhus （Stream）, for that water once flowed here from the mountains above the city. But Theagenes, who was tyrant at that time, turned the water into another direction and made here an altar to Achelous.

2.2.3

The names of the Corinthian harbors were given them by Leches and Cenchrias, said to be the children of Poseidon and Peirene the daughter of Achelous, though in the poem called The Great Eoeae Peirene is said to be a daughter of Oebalus.

3.18.16

There is represented the fight between Heracles and Oreius the Centaur, and also that between Theseus and the Bull of Minos. There are also represented the wrestling of Heracles with Achelous,

6.19.12

The Megarians who are neighbors of Attica built a treasury and dedicated in it offerings, small cedar-wood figures inlaid with gold, representing the fight of Heracles with Achelous. The figures include Zeus, Deianeira, Achelous, Heracles, and Ares helping Achelous.

8.24.8

Alcmaeon, after killing his mother, fled from Argos and came to Psophis, which was still called Phegia after Phegeus, and married Alphesiboea, the daughter of Phegeus. Among the presents that he naturally gave her was the necklace. While he lived among the Arcadians his disease did not grow any better, so he had recourse to the oracle at Delphi. The Pythian priestess informed him that the only land into which the avenging spirit of Eriphyle would not follow him was the newest land, one brought up to light by the sea after the pollution of his mother's death.

8.24.9

On discovering the alluvial deposit of the Achelous he settled there, and took to wife Callirhoe, said by the Acarnanians to have been the daughter of Achelous.

8.38.9

This it is their custom to do. To the north of Mount Lycaeus is the Theisoan territory. The inhabitants of it worship most the nymph Theisoa. There flow through the land of Theisoa the following tributaries of the Alpheius, the Mylaon, Nus, Achelous, Celadus, and Naliphus. There are two other rivers of the same name as the Achelous in Arcadia, and more famous than it.

8.38.10

One, falling into the sea by the Echinadian islands, flows through Acarnania and Aetolia, and is said by Homer in the Iliad¹ to be the prince of all rivers. Another Achelous, flowing from Mount Sipylus, along with the mountain also, he takes occasion to mention in connection with his account of Niobe.² The third river called the Achelous is the one by Mount Lycaeus.

¹ See Hom. Il. 21.194.

² Hom. Il. 24.615.

10.8.9 [= Panyassis fr. 2 West]

Ascending from the gymnasium along the way to the sanctuary you reach, on the right of the way, the water of Castalia, which is sweet to drink and pleasant to bathe in. Some say that the spring was named after a native woman, others after a man called Castalius. But Panyassis, son of Polyarchus, who composed an epic poem on Heracles, says that Castalia was a daughter of Achelous. For about Heracles he says:—“Crossing with swift feet snowy Parnassus He reached the immortal water of Castalia, daughter of Achelous."

Philostratus the Younger

Imagines 4

• Fairbanks

p. 303

4. Heracles or Acheloüs¹

Probably you are asking what these three figures have to do with each other—a serpent “ruddy of back”² which rises there lifting its long form, a beard hanging beneath an erect serrated crest, its glare terrible and its glance one that cannot but work consternation; a bull that curves its neck beneath those mighty horns and, pawing the earth at its feet, rushes as for a charge;³ and here a man that is half animal, for he has the forehead of a bull and a spreading beard, while streams of water run in floods from his chin.⁴ The multitude that has gathered as for a spectacle; the girl in their midst, a bride, I suppose (for this must be inferred from the ornaments she wears); an old man yonder of sad countenance; a youth who is divesting himself of a lion’s skin and holding in his hands a club; and here a heroine of sturdy form who has been crowned [cont.]

¹ The contest between Heracles and Acheloüs was a favourite subject in art from early times (cf. Paus 6 19, 22 for the description of a group at Olympia, which included Ares, Athena, Zeus and Deianeira as well as Heracles and Acheloüs). In early drawings Acheloüs is given the form of a centaur, but by the fifth century he is regularly represented as a bull with a human face. As pointed out by Jahn (Eph. Arch. 1682, p. 317f.), Acheloüs here has the form of a man, but with the horns of a bull springing from his forehead. While the presence of the serpent and the bull with Acheloüs is not explained in the description, apparently the painter intended to depict two of the forms that the river assumed during the struggle. The failure of Philostratus to understand what he described may be regarded as direct evidence that he was dealing with an actual picture. Evi- dently the picture gave two scenes (if not three): first the situation before the conflict, and secondly the outcome of the conflict; for the latter can hardly be treated as mere rhetoric on the part of Philostratus. The subject is depicted on a tripod base in the Constantinople Museum (Mitth. d. deutsch. Palaestrina-vereins VII, PI. III), where Acheloüs appears as a bearded man with horns of a bull; one horn lies at the feet of Heracles, and blood spouts from the head where it had been broken off. (Benndorf.)

² Quoted from Homer, Il. 2. 308.

³ Cf. Eur. Her. Fur. 869: “Like a bull in act to charge.”

⁴ Cf. Soph. Trach. 8f.: “For my wooer was a river-god, Acheloüs, who in three shapes was ever asking me from my sire—coming now as a bull in bodily form, now as a serpent with sheeny coils, now with trunk of man and front of ox, while from a shaggy beard the streams of fountain-water flowed abroad.” Trans. Jebb.

p. 305

with beech leaves in harmony with the story of her Arcadian nurture—all this, I think, is Calydon.

What is the meaning of the painting? The river Acheloüs, my boy, in love with Deianeira the daughter of Oeneus, presses for the marriage;¹ and Persuasion has no part in what he does, but by assuming now one and now another of the shapes we see here, he thinks to frighten Oeneus. For you are to recognize the figure in the painting as Oeneus, despondent on account of his daughter Deianeira, who looks so dolefully at her suitor. For she is painted, not with cheek reddening through modesty, but as greatly terrified at the thought of what she will suffer in union with that unnatural husband. But the noble Heracles willingly assumes the task as an “incident of his journey,” to use a popular phrase.

So much by way of prelude; but now see how the contestants have already joined battle, and you must imagine for yourself all that has transpired in the first bouts of the struggle between god and irresistible hero. Finally, however, the river, assuming the form of a horned bull, rushes at Heracles, but he, grasping the right horn with his left hand, uproots the other horn from its forehead with the aid of his club; thereupon the river-god, now emitting streams of blood instead of water, gives up the struggle, while Heracles, full of joy at his deed, looks at Deianeira, and throwing his club on the ground holds out to her the horn of Acheloüs as his nuptial gift.

¹ It must be remembered that Deianeira had been promised to Acheloüs by Oeneus.

Pherecydes of Athens

fr. 42 Fowler (p. 303) [= Apollodorus, 2.7.5]

• Fowler 2013, p. 323

According to Apollodorus (Bibl. 2.148), he wrestled Acheloos in the form of a bull, and broke off one of his horns; Acheloos then gave him the horn of Amaltheia in its place. Here Apollodorus cites Pher. fr. 42, which says that the horn provided any quantity of food or drink one might wish for.

fr. 76 Fowler (p. 315)

Pindar

fr. 249a

• Gantz, p. 28

and Pindar (fr. 249a SM); our summary of the latter also says that Herakles broke off one of his horns. and that the river god ransomed it back by offering a horn acquired from Amaltheia, daughter of Okeanos

• Jebb, Introduction 5

Pindar, in a lost poem,—of what class, is unknown,—told the story somewhat as follows⁴. Heracles, having gone down to Hades for Cerberus, there met the departed Meleager, who recommended his sister Deianeira as a wife for the hero. On returning to the upper world, Heracles went at once to Aetolia, where he found that Deianeira was being wooed by the river-god Acheloüs. He fought with this formidable rival,—who wore the shape of a bull,—and broke off one of his horns. In order to recover it, Acheloüs gave his conqueror the wondrous ‘cornucopia’ which he himself had received from Amaltheia, daughter of Oceanus. ...

⁴ Schol. on Iliad 21. 194. The schol. on Il.8. 368 probably has the same passage in view when he quotes Pindar as saying that Cerberus had a hundred heads.

Plato

Phaedrus

230b

Socrates

By Hera, it is a charming resting place. For this plane tree is very spreading and lofty, and the tall and shady willow is very beautiful, and it is in full bloom, so as to make the place most fragrant; then, too, the spring is very pretty as it flows under the plane tree, and its water is very cool, to judge by my foot. And it seems to be a sacred place of some nymphs and of Achelous, judging by [230c] the figurines and statues.

263d

Socrates

Oh, how much more versed the nymphs, daughters of Achelous,

Propertius

Elegies 2.34.33–34

For though you should tell of the course of Aetolian Achelous, how its waters flowed broken by the power of love ...

Pseudo-Plutarch

De fluviis

22

ACHELOUS is a river of Aetolia, formerly called Thestius. This Thestius was the son of Mars and Pisidice, who upon some domestic discontent travelled as far as Sicyon, where [p. 505] after he had resided for some time, he returned to his native home. But finding there his son Calydon and his mother both upon the bed together, believing him to be an adulterer, he slew his own child by a mistake. But when he beheld the unfortunate and unexpected fact he had committed, he threw himself into the river Axenos, which from thence was afterwards called Thestius. And after that, it was called Achelous upon this occasion.

Achelous, the son of Oceanus and the Nymph Nais, having deflowered his daughter Cletoria by mistake, flung himself for grief into the river Thestius, which then by his own name was called Achelous.

Sappho

fr. 212 Campbell

• Campbell

p. 194

212 Comes Natalis Myth. 7. 2 (p. 716 ed. Francof. 1581)

memoriae prodit Sappho primum Acheloum vini mistionem . . . invenisse.

p. 195

212 Comes Natalis, Mythology

Sappho records that Achelous¹ invented the mixing of wine.

¹ See Alc. 450 (Voigt).

Servius

On Virgil's Georgics 1.8

[Georgics 1.8–9: Chaoniam pingui glandem mutavit arista, | poculaque inventis Acheloia miscuit uvis; "Chaonia’s acorn for the rich corn ear, and blended draughts of Achelous with the new-found grapes"]

[8] CHAONIAM P. G. M. A. Epiroticam, ... , aut de solo Acheloo homines potare consueverant. sane 'Acheloia' non praeter rationem dixit: nam, sicut Orpheus docet, generaliter aquam veteres Acheloum vocabant. ... Achelous Terrae fuisse filius dicitur, ut solet de his dici, quorum per antiquitatem latent parentes. ... sed Hercules cum propter uxorem Deianiram cum Acheloo contenderet, cornu eius unum fregit, quod graece κέρας dicitur, unde miscere poculum apud Graecos κεράσαι dicitur. sed hic Acheloum non praeter rationem dixit: nam, sicut Orpheus docet, et Aristophanes comicus et Ephorus historicus tradunt, Ἀχελῷον generaliter propter antiquitatem fluminis omnem aquam veteres vocabant. ergo quia specialiter Achelous Graeciae fluvius dicitur, aut species est pro genere, aut secundum antiquitatem est locutus.

[8] CHAONIAM P. G. M. A. Epirotica, ... , or men were wont to drink from the Achelous. Of course he said 'Acheloia' for a reason: because, as Orpheus teaches, the ancients generally called water Achelous. ... Achelous is said to have been the son of Earth, as is usually said of those whose parents are hidden through antiquity. ...But Hercules, when he contended with Achelous for his wife Deianira, broke one of his horns, which in Greek is called κέρας, whence it is called κεράσαι among the Greeks to mix a cup. But this Achelous did not say beyond reason: for, as Orpheus teaches, and Aristophanes the comic and Ephorus the historian report, the ancients generally called all water Ἀχελῷον because of the antiquity of the river. therefore, because the Achelous river of Greece is specially called, either it is a species for a genus, or it is spoken of according to antiquity.

Fowler 2013, p. 12

Sophocles

Women of Trachis

9–26

Deianeira

For my suitor was a river-god, Achelous, [10] who in three shapes was always asking me from my father—coming now as a bull in visible form, now as a serpent, sheeny and coiled, now ox-faced with human trunk, while from his thick-shaded beard wellheads of fountain-water sprayed. [15] In the expectation that such a suitor would get me, I was always praying in my misery that I might die, before I should ever approach that marriage-bed.

But at last, to my joy, the glorious son of Zeus and Alcmena came and [20] closed with him in combat and delivered me. The manner of their fighting I cannot clearly recount. I know it not, but if there be anyone who watched that sight without trembling, he might give an account of it. But I, as I sat there, was struck with terror, [25] lest my beauty should win me sorrow in the end. But Zeus, Arbiter of Contests, accomplished a good ending—

497–506

Chorus

Great and mighty is the victory which the Cyprian queen always bears away. I bypass the tales of the gods, [500] and do not narrate how she beguiled the son of Cronus, and Hades, the lord of darkness, or Poseidon, shaker of the earth. But, when this bride was to be won, [505] who were the massive rivals that entered the contest for her nuptials? Who stepped forward to the ordeal of battle full of blows and raising dust?

507–516

Chorus

One was a mighty river-god, the form of a bull, high-horned and four-legged, [510] Achelous, from Oeniadae. The other came from Thebes, home of Bacchus, brandishing his resilient bow, his spears and club; he was the son of Zeus. These two then met in a mass, lusting to win a bride, [515] and the Cyprian goddess of nuptial joy was there with them, acting as sole umpire.

517–525

Chorus

There was clatter of fists and clang of bow and crash of a bull's horns mixed together; [520] then there were close-locked grapplings and deadly blows from foreheads and loud deep cries from both. Meanwhile the delicate beauty sat on the side of a hill that could be seen from afar, [525] awaiting the husband that would be hers.

fr. 5 Lloyd-Jones

Lloyd-Jones, p. 13

So Achelous^a runs with wine in our place.

^a The name of the Achelous, which is by far the greatest river of Greece, is sometimes used to mean "water" in general.

Statius

Thebaid

4.106

The river^d whose face the athlete Hercules did mar: even yet scarce dares he raise his stricken visage from the water's depth, but mourns with head sunk far below in his green cave, while the river-banks pant and sicken with dust

^d The Achelous.

Strabo

8.2.3

The Corinthian Gulf begins, on the one side, at the outlets of the Evenus (though some say at the outlets of the Acheloüs, the river that separates the Acarnanians and the Aetolians),

8.3.11

The Teutheas empties into the Acheloüs which flows by Dyme² and has the same name as the Acarnanian river. It is also called the "Peirus"; by Hesiod, for instance, when he says: “"he dwelt on the Olenian Rock along the banks of a river, wide Peirus."

2 CP. 10. 2. 1]

9.5.10

for here too, near Lamia, is a river Acheloüs, on whose banks live the Paracheloïtae.

10.2.1

Now the Aetolians and the Acarnanians border on one another, having between them the Acheloüs River, which flows from the north and from Pindus on the south through the country of the Agraeans, an Aetolian tribe, and through that of the Amphilochians, the Acarnanians holding the western side of the river as far as that part of the Ambracian Gulf which is near Amphilochi and the temple of the Actian Apollo, but the Aetolians the eastern side as far as the Ozalian Locrians and Parnassus and the Oetaeans. Above the Acarnanians, in the interior and the parts towards the north, are situated the Amphilochians, and above these the Dolopians and Pindus, and above the Aetolians are the Perrhaebians and Athamanians and a part of the Aenianians who hold Oeta. The southern side, of Acarnania and Aetolia alike, is washed by the sea which forms the Corinthian Gulf, into which empties the Acheloüs River, which forms the boundary between the coast of the Aetolians and that of Acarnania. In earlier times the Acheloüs was called Thoas. The river which flows past Dyme bears the same name as this, as I have already said,¹ and also the river near Lamia.,² I have already stated, also, that the Corinthian Gulf is said to begin at the mouth of this river.,³

¹ 8. 3. 11.

² 9. 5. 10.

³ 8. 2. 3.

10.2.19

To the east of Zacynthos and Cephallenia are situated the Echinades Islands, ... lie off the outlet of the Acheloüs, the farthermost being fifteen stadia distant and the nearest five. In earlier times they lay out in the high sea, but the silt brought down by the Acheloüs has already joined some of them to the mainland and will do the same to others. It was this silt which in early times caused the country called Paracheloïtis, which the river overflows, to be a subject of dispute, since it was always confusing the designated boundaries between the Acarnanians and the Aetolians; for they would decide the dispute by arms, since they had no arbitrators, and the more powerful of the two would win the victory; and this is the cause of the fabrication of a certain myth, telling how Heracles defeated Acheloüs and, as the prize of his victory, won the hand of Deïaneira, the daughter of Oeneus, whom Sophocles represents as speaking as follows: "For my suitor was a river-god, I mean Acheloüs, who would demand me of my father in three shapes, coming now as a bull in bodily form, now as a gleaming serpent in coils, now with trunk of man and front of ox."^{3 4} Some writers add to the myth, saying that this was the horn of Amaltheia,⁵ which Heracles broke off from Acheloüs and gave to Oeneus as a wedding gift. Others, conjecturing the truth from the myths, say that the Acheloüs, like the other rivers, was called "like a bull" from the roaring of its waters, and also from the the bendings of its streams, which were called Horns, and "like a serpent" because of its length and windings, and "with front of ox"⁶ for the same reason that he was called "bull-faced"; and that Heracles, who in general was inclined to deeds of kindness, but especially for Oeneus, since he was to ally himself with him by marriage, regulated the irregular flow of the river by means of embankments and channels, and thus rendered a considerable part of Paracheloïtis dry, all to please Oeneus; and that this was the horn of Amaltheia.⁷

³ Soph. Trach. 7-11

⁴ One vase-painting shows Acheloüs fighting with Achilles as a serpent with the head and arms of a man, and with ox horns, and another as a human figure, except that he had the forehead, horns, and ears of an ox (Jebb, note ad loc.).

⁵ Cf. 3. 2. 14 and footnote.

⁶ Literally, "ox-prowed" (see Jebb, loc. cit.).

⁷ Cp. 3. 2. 14.

Thucydides

2.102.2–6

[2] For the town⁴ is in the midst of a marsh formed by the river Achelous, which, rising in Mount Pindus and passing first through the territory of the Dolopians, Agraeans, and Amphilochians, and then through the Acarnanian plain, at some distance from its mouth flows by the city of Stratus and finds an exit into the sea near Oeniadae: an expedition in winter is thus rendered impossible by the water. [3] Most of the islands called Echinades are situated opposite to Oeniadae and close to the mouth of the Achelous. The consequence is that the river, which is large, is always silting up: some of the islands have been already joined to the mainland, and very likely, at no distant period, they may all be joined to it. The stream is wide and strong and full of mud; [4] and the islands are close together and serve to connect the deposits made by the river, not allowing them to dissolve in the water. For, lying irregularly and not one behind the other, they prevent the river from finding a straight channel into the sea. These islands are small and uninhabited. [5] The story is that when Alcmaeon the son of Amphiaraus was wandering over the earth after the murder of his mother, he was told by Apollo that here he should find a home, the oracle intimating that he would never obtain deliverance from his terrors until he discovered some country which was not yet in existence and not seen by the sun at the time when he slew his mother; there he might settle, but the rest of the earth was accursed to him. [6] He knew not what to do, until at last, according to the story, he spied the deposit of earth made by the Achelous, and he thought that a place sufficient to support life must have accumulated in the long time during which he had been wandering since his mother's death. There, near Oeniadae, he settled, and, becoming ruler, left to the country the name of his son Acarnan. Such is the tradition which has come down to us concerning Alcmaeon.

⁴ Oeniadae was inaccessible, owing to the flooding of the Achelous. Opposite to the town lie the Echinades, islands formed by the deposits of the river. Here Alcmaeon, after the murder of his mother is said to have found a home which was indicated to him by the oracle of Apollo.

Virgil

Georgics

1.8–9

Chaoniam pingui glandem mutavit arista,

poculaque inventis Acheloia miscuit uvis;

Chaonian acorn for the plump wheat-ear,

And mingled with the grape, your new-found gift,

The draughts of Achelous;

Modern

Andolfi

[in folder]

• Andolfi, Ilaria, Acusilaus of Argos’ Rhapsody in Prose: Introduction, Text, and Commentary, Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, 2019. ISBN 978-3-11-061695-8.

ISBN 9783110617030 (EPUB)

ISBN 978-3-11-061860-0 (PDF)

fr. 1 (= pp. 34–38?)

p. 34?

2 Commentary

Book 1

fr. *1

Ὠκεανὸς δὲ γαμεῖ Τηθὺν ἑαυτοῦ ἀδελφήν· τῶν δὲ γίνονται τρισχίλιοι ποταμοί ·

Ἀχελῶιος δὲ αὐτῶν πρεσβύτατος καὶ τετίμηται μάλιστα.

Macr. Sat. 5.18.9 (322.3 Willis). Didymus enim (p. 85 Schmidt), grammaticorum omnium facile eruditissimus, posita causa quam superius Ephorus (FGrHist 70 F 20a) adiecit his verbis: ἄμεινον δὲ ἐκεῖνο ... ἔφη γάρ^. «Ὠκεανὸς—μάλιστα».

... Macrobius, via Didymus, quotes a passage from Ephorus (FGrHist 70 F 20a) explaining why men usually call streams by Achelous' name:⁷⁵ the historian saw the influence of a ritual occuring in Dodona in this usage, where people used to sear oaths in Achelous' name.⁷⁶ He states that three thousand rivers were born from Oceanus' union with Thethys, but the most anceint and honorable one was the Achelous.

The Achelous The achelous, one of the biggest rivers in Greece, began from [cont.]

p. 35?

springs at Mount Pindus (between Epirus and Thesaly): it divided Aetolia and Acarnania and empried into the Ionian Sea near the Echinadian islands (cf. Hdt. 2.10.3 and Thuc. 2.102.2-4). However, ancient Greeks knew at least six rivers called this way (Molinari/Sisci 2016, 61): probably because its name was generally equated with water, as is well attested in the lexical of 5th century poetry (e.g. Eur. Andr. 167, Bacch. 519, 625; Ar. Lys 381).⁷⁷

...

... Furthermore, as it has increasingly come to be recognized, this text displays connection with Homer as well:⁸⁰ Achelous' supremacy above all its siblings is implicitly claimed by Achilles in his speech in Il. 21.193-7, where he states that not even the powerful Achelous could resist Zeus' attack. This can be justifiably [cont.]

p. 36?

read as referring to its prominence among all other rivers (the second half of Acuslaus: it is the most ancient one (the first half of the fragment). ...

...

... The abovementioned passage from book twenty-one of the Iliad arouses suspicion, since antiquity and ancient scholastic material testifies that: according to scholia A and to the text of Genavensis 44, Zenodotus athetizied line 195, ... Also Megacleides (end 4th cent./beginning 3rd cent. BC), who authored a work On Homer, did not read this line,⁸¹ as scholia A demontrate. Centuries later, the Homeric scholar Seleucus (1st cent. AD) followed Zenodtus' instincts in athetizing the line, as reported by P.Oxy. 221 (col. IX, ll. 8-11), while Aristarchus and Crates of Mallus (fr. Broggiato) kept it as genuine.⁸² Interestingly, the prominence of Achelous is also attested in P.Derv. (col. XXIII, esp. 1.10), where Zeus conceived Oceanus and immediately thereafter Achelous, who was to [cont.]

p. 37?

become the origin of the sea and all waters (cf. M.L. West 1983, 92, 115 D'Alessio 2004, 20-23). Despite the evident disagreement with Acusilaus in the overall picture (Achelous' supremacy is over other rivers and not over Oceanus himself), the agreement on some sort of leadership bt Achelous over other rivers is significant. Full discussion of this material is included in D'Aleesio 2004, 16-23, who concludes that

The ancient discussion on this passage provide us with ample evidence that the text read by Megakleides and Zenodotos was probably already in circulation in the Archaic period. and that there are good reasons to think that it may represent an earlier textual stage than the longer version, which replaced it in the vulgata (19-20).

The omission of this line has serious consequences for the appreciation of the passage as a whole: if one does not read it, the text says that Achelous, and not Oceanus, was the origin of all streams. As Pasquali 1934, 227 already pointed out, the insertion of l. 195 was functional to restore consistency within Homeric mythology and to eliminate an unorthodox peculiarity that did not match the cosmogonic account in book fourteen of the Iliad, where Oceanus' predominance is unquestionable. The passage lacking 195 needed to be normalized by bringing Oceanus back to his usual function through insertion of a verse that, in Pasquali's opinion, blends Hom. Il. 18.607 and Hes. Th. 265 together (cf. D'Alessio 2004, 33-34, Fowler EGM II, 12-13).

Boardman

p. 2

In the figure frieze of a Corinthian cup of about 570-560 B.C. Theseus' dispatch of the Miotaur is divide from Herakles' fight with Acheloos only by the figure of an old man (Oineus, watching Herakles; with Deianeira and a chariot beyond).⁴

⁴ Brussels A 1374: Payne, NC pl. 34, 6.

D'Alessio

p. 16

Abstract: According to the ancient commentaries, Iliad 21.195 was omitted by some sources, thus making Acheloios, instead of Ocean, the origin of all waters, including the sea: ... In this paper I argue that the version without line 195 actually represents the earlier textual stage. ...

p. 18

... P.Oxy. 221 ... attributed ... to one Ammonios. ... The discussion on line 195 started in the last portion of Column 8, and occupies most of Column 9, ...

[1] σανταί[...] ( )κα[..] [Column 9?] πασ[..(.)] ^νκατέλεξα

[2] Ἀχελω[ΐου] ἀργυροδ[ί]νεω, / ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα

[3] θάλασ[σα". ...

[4] ...

[8] εἶναι [Σέλ]ευκος δ' †ἐν ε΄ [Ἡρ]ακλείας· “πῶ[ς]

[9] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ης ῥεῦμα Ἀ[χ]ελ[ω]ΐου ἀργυ[ρο-]

[10] δίνα, / Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμοῖο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ

[11] κέλευθα;”

[12] ...

[18] πολλούς πρό Δήμητρο[ς] θύειν ... Ἀ-

[19] χελώιωι, ...

The preserved portion [1-3] first quotes at least two fragmentary hexameters to the effect that Acheloios was the origin of the whole sea.

p. 20

... While the fact that his name might stand for fresh water in general is referred back to Dodonean rituals by Ephoros, and is well attested in fifth-century Athenian Drama and in Hellenistic epigrams, ...

2. ACHELOIOS IN THE DERVENI 'THEOGONY'

... The first two fragmentary verses, which in the London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] are to be read as

]νασ[.ἐ]γκατέλεξα / Ἀχελωίου ἀργυροδίνεω

,ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα θάλασσα

p. 21

... is, as has been seen by K. Tsantsanoglou, practically identical to one of the the lines from the Orphic 'Theogony' interpreted in col. 23 of the Derveni papyrus. Previous reconstructions of the relevant portions of this papyrus, too, did not prove entirely reliable,⁹ and prevented its identification with with the first verse quoted in the London papyrus. Only very recently has a revised transcript of the relevant portion been published. The line [in the Derveni P.] now reads:

ἶνας δ' ἐγκατ[έλε]ξ' Ἀχελωίου ἀργυ[ρ]οδίνε[ω.

... There can be no doubt that the two lines were in fact identical. On the other hand, to establish whether the two papyri are referring to the same verse of the same poem is a quite different issue.

p. 22

I would argue that the quotation from the Orphic ίερὸς λόγος did not come from some Hellenistic scholar, but that it went back to an erlier discussion of the Homeric passage, which may well even be roughly contemporary with the Derveni text, if not dating back to the fifth century. ... if this is correct, the verse would belong, if not exactly to the poem discussed in the Derveni papyrus, to some roughly contemporary or not much later version. ...

The verse has been reconstructed by West (1983) 115, ... as μήσατο δ' Ὠκεανοῖο μέγα σθένος εὺρὺ ῥέοντος, 'and he (sc. Zeus) contrived the great strength of wide-flowing Ocean', a verse ...

p. 23

The first problem is to investigate the traces of Archaic Acheloios, seen as the origin of every stream and of the sea itself.

p. 25

The main subject of the Akkadian epic poem Enūma eliš is the struggle between the god Marduk, who thanks to this feat becomes the ruler of other gods, and the primeval divinity Tiāmat, the Sea (and, after her defeat, also the origin of the great Mesopotamian rivers).²⁵ ... A further feature shared by Achelois and Tiāmat ... It is from this text we learn that Marduk also broke Tiāmat's horns,²⁴ an episode comparable to the effect of Herakles' fight against Acheloios, where the Greek hero broke one of the god's horns.

p. 26

The Greek god [Acheloios] was represented as a bull with human face, head or torso, but with bull's horns and ears, and a bison-like beard. ... That Acheloios' iconography is derived from Mesopotamian models, ... has been evident since the very first moment when Western archaeologists caught sight of the monumental figures of human-headed bulls protecting the gates of Neo-Assyrian royal palaces.

p. 30

[the identification of Achelous with Ocean] is exactly what we see in the next poetic passage quoted by the London papyrus, two hexameters introduced by the word[s] 'Seleukos in the fifth book of the Herakleia':

πῶ[ς] δ᾿ ἐπορ[εύθ]ης ῥεῦμ' Ἀ[χ]ελ[ω]ΐου ἀργυ[ρο]δίνα,

Ὠκεανοῦ ποταμοῖο [δι᾿] εὐρέος ὑγ[ρ]ὰ κέλευθα;

Somebody seems to be asking somebody else (probably Herakles) 'how did you cross the stream of silver-eddying Acheloios / through River Ocean's wet paths?' Wilamowitz ((1900) 42) argued that the two hexameters do, in fact, belong to a quotation of Panyassis, an opinion shared by Matthews in his edition in 1974, and, with some doubts, by Bernabé (fr. dub. 31). M. West, reviewing Matthews' edition has argued that the lines may rather belong to some unknown poet called Seleukos.⁴⁶ This is very unlikely. ... There are several reasons for thinking that the lines do belong to Panyassis: ... Panyassis deals with Acheloios' problems in at least two other fragments: in fr. 2.2 Bernabé he mentions Κασταλίης Ἀχελωΐδος ἄμβροτον ὕδωρ, sharing with many other fifth-century authors the idea that all springs derive from Achelois; from fr. 20 Bernabé it appears that he spoke of Ἀχελήτιδες nymphs when talking of the same Lydian river known as Ἀχελώιος in most versions od Iliad 24.616 (a variant Ἀχελήσιον was known in antiquity, perhaps also connected with the Panyassis passage).⁴⁷ Within a Herakleia, the lines preserved by [cont.]

⁴⁶ West (1976) 172-3, I notice that West (2003) 200 has abandoned this hypothesis.

⁴⁷ There seems ...

p. 31

the London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] would fit very well when speaking of Herakles' ...

The attribution to Panyssis leads again to the early fifth century, and offers a further step towards the solution of the Acheloios problem. His idea [Achelous = Oceanus] is not incompatible with one possible reading of the derveni theogony, where, as we have seen, Achelois, being within Ocean, might easily have been identified with him.

In later times ... The clue, once again, is offered by the London papyrus: Seleukos [says] that 'many people sacrifice to Achelois before sacrificing to Demeter, since Acheloios is the name of all rivers and the crop comes from water'.

p. 32

The equation between the god's name and 'water' in general is well attested since the fifth century. It is fairly common in Attic texts and continues into Hellenistic epigrams. Ephoros (FGrHist 70 F 20b), quoted by both te London papyrus [P.Oxy. 221] and Macrob. Sat. 5.18.6 (via Didymos), traces it back to Dodonean ritual usage, where oaths were sworn in Acheloios' name.

Frazer

Note 2 to Apollodorus 2.7.5

² On the struggle of Herakles with the river Achelous, see Soph. Trach. 9-21; Diod. 4.35.3ff.; Dio Chrysostom lx.; Scholiast on Hom. Il. xxi.194; Ov. Met. 9.1-88; Hyginus, Fab. 31; Scriptores rerum mythicarum Latini, ed. Bode, i. pp. 20, 131 (First Vatican Mythographer 58; Second Vatican Mythographer 165). According to Ovid, the river-god turned himself first into a serpent and then into a bull. The story was told by Archilochus, who represented the river Achelous in the form of a bull, as we learn from the Scholiast on Hom. Il.xxi.194. Diodorus rationalized the legend in his dull manner by supposing that it referred to a canal which the eminent philanthropist Herakles dug for the benefit of the people of Calydon.

Fontenrose

p. 232

Not only is Ocean closely related to river-gods, but he is himself the first and greatest of river-gods. Next to him in majesty was Acheloos, largest of the Greek rivers, the Hellenic Father of Waters. In Iliad 21.193-199, as the text stands, Ocean and Acheloss appear to be identified. There it is said that Lord Acheloos is no match for Zeus, nor is mighty Oean, from whom all rivers, seas, springs, and wells flow: even he fears Zeus' thunderbolt. Now the verse which introduces Ocean was rejected by the Alexandrian scholar Zenodotos, and it was unknown to Pausanias, [8.38.10, but see D'Alessio, p. 18 n. 4] who, citing Homer's [cont.]

p. 233

Iliad speaks of Achelous as ruler of all rivers—that is if Ocean is omitted, the whole passage refers to Acheloos. Acheloos fought Zeus' son Herakles, who is also Zeus's double (p. 357), and a myth of comabat between Zeus and Acheloos (or Ocean) may be implied by the verses cited in their allusion to the river-god's fear of Zeus' thunderbolt and dread lightening as the god thunders on high. One is reminded of Zeus's bolts that lash the couches of Typhoeus (pp. 70f.) Conversely, an echo of conflict between Ocean and Heracles can be heard in the story that Ocean rocked Helios' boat when it was carrying the hero to the Hesperides, but ceased in terror when Herakles pointed his arrows at him.²¹

²¹ Schol. T on Il. 21.195 cites anonymous authorities for the identity of Ocean and Acheloos. ...

p. 234

In a red figure vase painting of the combat between Herakles and Acheloos (fig. 22) the river god looks like a human-headed eel (i.e., a snake with a fish's tail); only the horns upon his head suggest his usual bull shape. In Sophocles' Trachiniae it is said that Acheloos took three forms: bull, dragon, and bull-browed man. He had, of course, the water-deities' power of changing shape (Th. 3E); but the three forms that he took are significant. There are indications that Ocean too was sometimes conceived in serpent form. In a so-called Orphic cosmogony that may be ultimately derived from Pherekydes of Syros, Ocean was the watery chaos, the first being, who was followed by Erth; then from Ocean was born an hermaphroditic dragon that had three heads (a god's head between heads of bull and lion) and wings.

p. 350

ACHELOOS, NESSOS, AND AMALTHEIA

A like doubling of the prize of victory can be seen in the combat with Acheloos. Deianeira was destined to marry Acheloos, much against her will (at least in later sources): for though a bride contest had been set by her father Oineus, all suitors retired before Acheloos—save Herakles, who arrived just in time to challenge the river god and defeat him, thus winning Deianeira for himself. But he also won the horn of Amaltheia, which was identified with Acheloos' horn that Herakles had broken from his head (fig. 22); or , if the two horns are not identified, it is said that Acheloos recovered his own horn by trading Amaltheia's horn for it. This was the cornucopia, the wonder horn from which every kind of fruit, or anything that one wanted to eat or drink, could be magically drawn in abundance. Amaltheia was the goat that nursed the infant Zeus in the Dictaean Cave; her two horns it is sometimes said, yielded nectar and ambrosia.

p. 351

It has already been pointed out (p. 232) that Acheloos was once identified with Ocean and, in fact, with all waters, which it was said were formerly called by his name; as a specific river god he was said to be born from Ocean and Tethys; and it was also said that his mother was Ge. Amaltheia was Ocean's daughter; and the name Amaltheeia's horn was given to the fertile land of the Acheloos delta. It was said that Herakles recovered that land for men's use by diverting the river's course of the Acheloos. We need not see Euhemerism here any more than in the Vedas: the breaking of the horn and the turning of the rivers course are one and the same to the mythical eye, just as the death of Vritra was the end of drought. Or if it is Euhemerism, it is like that of Chinese myth (p, 492), in which the outlines of the original myth remain. ...

According to Hyginus, Heracles gave the horn to the Hesperides; while Hesychios says that Hermes gave it to Heracles when the hero was about to drive off Geryon's cows.

p. 352

(2) Acheloos is coupled with Antaios as Herakles' opponent in the wrestling bout that gave the hero the name Palaimon (wrestler). (3) The coupling with Antaios is made more significant by the tradition that the Acheloos River was once called Thoas: for Thoas was the name of that Tauric king who sacrificed foreigners in the manner of Busiris. (4) Another earlier name of the river was Thestios, so called from a son of Ares. Now Ares helped Acheloo against Herakles, eactly as he helped Kyknos against him, or sttod against him at Pylos. ...⁴⁸

⁴⁸ ... (2) Pherek. 76, 1.80 f. J. (3) Strabo 10.2.1, p. 450; Tauric Thoas: Eur. IT 30-41. (4) Testios: ps.-Plut. Fluv. 22.1 Ares' help: Paus. 6.19.12. ...

Fowler

p. 12

Akousilaos' fr. 1 reports the marriage of Okeanos to his own sister Tethys; unfortunately nothing indicates to what generation the couple might have belonged. As he follows Hesiod (Th. 367) in giving 3,000 as the number of rivers, it is probable that he follows him also for the genealogy. In the same fragment Akousilaos says that Acheloos is eldest, and most honoured; he is perhaps expanding a hint from Homer (Il. 21.194), where Acheloos is singled out from all rivers for his might. Indeed, it is possible that Akousilaos knew a text lacking l. 195, thus:

...

The scholia on these lines (5.165-70 Erbse) reveal that Zenodotos athetized l. 195, and that the pre-Alexandrian critic Megakleides³⁵ did not have it in his text. The effect of the omission is to promote Acheloos to the standing of Okeanos. The greatest of the Greek rivers, he was much honoured in cult at the persistent behest of Dodona, that ancient oracle, and his name is often used in poetry as an equivalent of 'water'.³⁶ Particularly relevant are archaic verses quoted by Seleukos in P.Oxy. 221 ix 8-11 (from a commentary on this passage of the Iliad; Erbse 5.93-4), in which Acheloos and Okeanos are simply equated. Wilamowitz, who attributed the lines to Panyassls (fr. 13), could well be right that Acheloos was the original, Hellenic god, Okeanos the parvenu.³⁷. Servius on Verg. Georg. 1.8 reports a tradition that Acheloos was actually son of Ge, not Okeanos; one would like to know how old the tradition was.

³⁶ See the passages collected by Erbse 4.166 and Mathews on his fr. 28 of Panyassis; for the oracle see Ephoros FGrHist 70 F 20a. For the very numerous representations in art see H. P. Isler in LIMC 1.1 s.v., who also lists the epigraphical attestations of cult (p. 12)....

³⁷ Wilamowitz, GGA 162 (1900) 42; ... See further D'Alessio, 'Textual fluctuations'.

p. 13

In Aristotle, as in Hesiod (Th 777) it is Styx not Aceloos who is eldest and most honoured, ...

p. 323

§8.8.7 THE HORN OF AMALTHEIA (Pher. frr. 42, 76)

While in Hades Herakles met Meleagros in a scene memorably dramatized by Bacchylides (5.160-9), and formed the desire to wed his sister Deianeira (cf. Pind. fr. 249a). Ne returned to Kalydon, where the river Acheloos was already attempting the same objective. According to Apollodorus (Bibl. 2.148), he wrestled Acheloos in the form of a bull, and broke off one of his horns; Acheloos then gave him the horn of Amaltheia in its place. Here Apollodorus cites Pher. fr. 42, which says that the horn provided any quantity of food or drink one might wish for. ... We are dealing here with different traditions, one a folktale about a magical cornucopia, the [cont.]

p. 324

other a story about the goat that nursed the infant Zeus. By the time of Pherekydes these have become entagled with each other. ... Acheloos as a river of the Underworld [??] makes him part of Plutos' realm, so it is fitting that he too should be associated with the horn.²¹⁴

At this point we recall the figure of Palaimon, the son/epithet of Herakles we met above in connection with Antaios; the scholion quoting Pher. fr. 76 suggests that the epithet could also derive from his wrestling match with Acheloos.

²¹⁴ Wilamowitz, Glaube der Hellenen 1.131-2 [1.127-8]. Herakles' bout with Acheloos occurs in early lierature also in Archil. fr. 287, Pind. fr. 249a, Soph. Trach. 9-26; see also Diod. Zic. 4.35.3-4, Strabo 10.2.19, Ov. Met. 9.1-88, Hyg, Fab. 31.7, in all of whom the horn is Acheloos' own. For representations in art from the 6th c. on see Gantz 433; LIMC Acheloos nos 213-59; Bemman, ...

Freeman

p. 15

9. ACUSILÂUS OF ARGOS

p. 16

21. (Achelôos is the oldest of the rivers): Ocean marries Tethys his own sister; from them spring three thousand rivers, but Achelôos is the oldest and most honoured.

Gantz

p. 28

Akousilaos calls Acheloos the eldest of the group (2F1); Homer mentions him together with Oceanus as a mighty river (though weaker than Zeus: Il 21.193-195). The story of this offspring's transformation into a bull and his combat with Herakles for Deianeira was apparently recounted by Archilochos (287 W) and Pindar (fr. 249a SM); our summary of the latter also says that Herakles broke off one of his horns. and that the river god ransomed it back by offering a horn acquired from Amaltheia, daughter of Okeanos (the latter not mentioned in Hesiod; for other notions about this horn, see below on Zeus' infancy). But a full account is not preserved until the prologue to Sophokles' Trachiniai, where Deianeira herself tells the story. Vase-painting [cont.]

p. 29

portrays Acheloos for this occasion as a Kentauros or human-headed bull or fish, horn prominent (see chapter 13).

p. 41

Ovid ... adds, however, that the goat broke off one of her horns against a tree, and that Amaltheia [the owner of the goat] carried the horn, filled with fruits, to the child Zeus (Fasti 5.111-28). This seems the earliest preserved source we have to relate this origin of the horn of plenty, but already in the Archaic period Anakreon has referred to "the horn of Amaltheeia" as something highly desirable (361 PMG; likewise Phokylides [fr 7 Diehl]), and Pherekydes says that it had the power to furnish whatever food and drink one might desire (3F42). We saw, too, earlier in this chapter that Pindar has Acheloos trade a [cont.]

p. 42

horn obtained from Amaltheia in order to get back the one he lost to Herakles (fr. 249a SM). By contrast, in Ovid's Metamorphoses the horn of plenty is Acheloos' own broken-off horn, which the Naiades fill with fruits (Met 9.85-88), and we encounter something of the sort in Apollodoros, who says that Amaltheia's horn was the horn of the bull (this just before citing Pherekydes, who may be his source: ApB 2.7.5).

...

p. 431

Deianeira, Acheloos, and Nessos

p. 432

Perhaps even earlier [than the Ehoiai] is a lost poem by Archilochos in which, as Nessos attempts to ravish Deianeira, she reminds Herakles of her wooing by Acheloos, and of his combat with that god in the latter's form as a bull (286 W). Our source Dion of Prusa, ...

... Pindar also seems to have recounted the combat between Herakles and a bull-Acheloos for deianeira's hand in a lost work (fr. 249a SM: Acheloos loses a horn), but the above is the sum of our archaic knowledge. Still, the artistic tradition supports the main events, and Sophokles in his Trachiniai very likely drew on a fairly uniform tradition. Deianeira opens the play by relating how Acheloos wooed her in three forms—as a bull, a snake, and a half-man/half-bull—until Herakles arrived and defeated him in combat.

p. 433

And from Ovid we have a sympathetic narrative of the Acheloos combat from the loser's point of view (Met 9.1-100). Here and in Apollodoros (ApB 2.7.5) he again sufferes the breaking-off of a horn; its recovery for or conversion into a horn of plenty we have already considered in chapter 1.

In art this wooing combat surfaces on vase-painting as early as the second quarter of the sixth century. A middle Corinthian cup shows Heracles wrestling a creature with horns and a human torso, but a bull's (or horse's) body joined to the waist in the manner of a Kentauros (Brussels A1374). The earliest Attic versions (from about 570 B.C.) alter this to a complete bull with only a human face and beard (NY 59.64; Boston 99.519), but the Kentauros form does reappear by the time of the Leagros Group (e.g. London B313). In virtually all cases, Herakles grasps Acheloos by his (usually single) horn. An Archaic scarab may show the horn broken-off, if this rather than a club is what Hsrakles holds in his hand (London 489).⁹¹ [In person it does look like a horn. See Boardman 1968.46 cat. no. 75, 48.] In any case, that idea is certain by the early fifth century, when a Red-Figure column krater displays the broken-off horn lying on the ground (Louvre G365; Acheloos still has a second horn). In these scenes figures presumably meant to be Deianeira and Oineus are sometimes included, as are Athena and Hermes. Pausanias saw the battle on the Amyklai Throne but gives no details (3.18.16); he also encountered it in a group of carved cedar figures set up in the Megarian Treasury at Olympia which he says depicted Zeus and Athena, Deianeira, Herakles and Acheloos, and Ares helping Acheloos (an idea not found elsewhere: 6.19.12).

Grimal

s.v. Achelous, pp. 3–4

Achelous (Ἀχελῷος) The name both of the largest river in Greece (in Boeotia) and of the river god. Achelous was said to be the son of Oceanus and Tethys, that is to say, one of the moast ancient couples known to Greek theogonies. He was regarded as the oldest of the three thousand river gods who were his brothers.

Different legends say that Achelous was the son of either Helios and Earth, or one the sons of Poseidon (in these versions the river is called Phorbas). One day Achelous was fatally wounded by an arrow while crossing the river. He fell in and the river was later called after him.

Achelous is said to have had various affairs, first with Melpomene, by whom he was believed to [p. 4] have been the father of the Sirens, and then with some of the other Muses. He was regarded as the father of several streams: of Pirene in Corinth, of Castalia at Delphi, and of Dirce in Thebes. Callirhoe ('the lovely spring') who married Alcmaeon was said to be his daughter, but no tradition records her mother's name (see ALCMAEON and ACARNAN).

Achelous was closely involved in the cycle of the Labours of Heracles. ...

The Echinades Islands, lying at the mouth of the river, were reputed to be the to have been miraculously created by Achelous. While four nymphs of the country were sacrificing to the divinities on the river banks of the Achelous they omitted to include the god of the river himself and in his anger he caused the waters to rise and sweep them down to the sea where they became islands. The fifth island of the group, Perimele, was a girl whom the gods loved and whose virginity he had taken by force. Her father Hippodamas cast his daughter into the river as she was about to give birth to a child. In answer to her lover's prayers the girl was changed by Poseidon into an island.

The modern name of the Achelous, which flows into the Ionian Sea at the entrance to the gulf of Patras, is the Asproptamo.

s.v. Sirens, p. 421

Libanius related that [the Sirens] were born of the blood of Achelous when the latter was wounded by Herakles.

p. 471

Achelous ... Macr. Sat. 5.18.10 Serv. on Virgil Georg. 1.8; Joann. Malala, Chron. 6.164; Prop. 2.25.33; Ovid. Met. 8.550ff; ... Apold. 1.3.4, 1.7.10, 3.7.5; Apoll. Rhod. Arg 4.896; Paus 2.2.3; 10.8.5; Eur. Bach 519; Apold. 1.8.1; Soph. Trach. 9ff.; Diod. Sic 4.35.3 ff. Dio Chrysostom 60; Hyg. Fab 31; Ovid Met 8.577ff; 9.1ff.

p. 510

Sirens ... Libanius, Narrationes 1.31

Hard

p. 41

The ACHELOOS, which rose in Epirus in north-western Greece and flowed to the sea near the northern entrance to the Corinthian Gulf, was the largest river in Greece. The river and its god play a significant role in the legend of the Archive hero Alkmaion (see p. 327); and Herakles wrestled with him for the hand of Deianera, who came from Calydon not far from his streams (see p. 280).

p. 42

Acheloos also appears in two transformation myths recounted by Ovid. According to one, some naiad nymphs forgot to invite him to a local sacrifice and festival along with other deities of the area, causing him to swell with rage until his waters flooded over and washed them out to sea to become the Echinades, a group of islands just outside the Corinthian Gulf, not far from the mouth of the Acheloos.^{110 [Ov. Met. 8.576-89]} The other tale tells how he once seduced a maiden called Perimele, whose father Hippodamas was so angry to learn of it that he hurled her over a cliff into the sea. Acheloos held her up in the water, however, and appealed for the help of Poseidon, who turned her into an island that was known by her name.^{111 [Ibid. 8.590-610]}

p. 279

It was no easy matter for Herakles to win Deianeira as his bride since she was also being courted by Acheloos, the god of the great river of that name that flowed along the western borders of Arcadia. Sophocles tells how he had been visiting her [cont.]

p. 280

father's palace to seek her hand, causing her great alarm, for he was a fearsome being who would manifest himself now as a bull, now as a man, and now as a man with the head of a bull. Herakles visited Acheloos by his own waters to wrestle with him for Deianeira, who watched anxiously from the bank. Although the river-god transformed hiself into a bull and perhaps other forms too, Herakles kept a firm grip on him and finally forced him to submit by breaking off one of his horns.^{203 [Soph. Trach. 6-26, Apollod. 2.7.5, Ov. Met. 9.1-88; see also Archil. 286 (lost poem that told how Herakles courted Deianeira and fought the tauriform Acheloos).]}

Acheloos recovered his horn from Heracles by offering to exchange it for the horn of Amaltheia, a magical horn that had the power to provide as much food and drink as anyone could desire.^{204 [Apollod. 2.7.5, Pi. fr. 249a SM.]} This horn had originally been a gift from Zeus to the nymph (or nymphs) who reared him as an infant. In one account ... Apollodorus states [that] the Amaltheia's horn of plenty was a bull's horn (evidently a misapprehension that arose because it was exchanged for the taurine horn of Acheloos). In the Roman world, the magical horn was known as the cornu copias (i.e. horn of plenty), or in later Latin cornucopia; ... Ovid combines Greek and Roman motifs by suggesting that the naiad nymphs filled the broken horn of Acheloos with fruits and flowers,

p. 304

The name Dirke was attached to a well-known spring at Thebes and also to a stream that issued from it; a chorus in Euripides' Bacchae addresses Dirke, the nymph of these waters, in most flattering terms as a revered daughter of Acheloos.^{65 [Eur. Bacch. 519ff.]}

p. 327

The later history of Alkmaion

... He was still polluted, ... An oracle advised him to search for a land on which the sun had not yet shone at the time when he had killed his mother;^{193 [The best source for the oracle is Thuc. 2.102, cf. Paus. 8.24.8; the text of our main narraative, Apollod. l.c., is imperfectly preserved at the relevant point.]} ... he ... visited the springs of the great river Acheloos, where he received purification from the god of the river. He finally discovered the land that the oracle had spoken of when he arrived at the mouth of the Acheloos at the entrance of the Corinthian Gulf; for new land had been laid down there by silt from the river since the time of his mother's death. He made this his new home, marrying Kallirhoe, a daughter of the river-god.

p. 410

(iv) PERIMELE bore two children to the Aetolian river-god Acheloos, a certain Orestes (not the famous one) and Hippodams, whose daughter Euryte became the mother of Oineus (see p. 413).^{50 [Ap. 1.7.3, cf. Hes. fr. 10a.34-5.]}

Isler 1970

• Isler, Hans Peter (1970), Acheloos: Eine Monographie. Bern: Francke, 1970.

Isler 1981

s.v. Acheloos

p. 12

( Ἀχελῷος, poetisch auch Ἀχελώϊος; Achelous; etruskisch Αχλαε, cf. 230*) Nach Hesiod Sohn des Okeanos und der Tethys, nach anderer, wohl urspriinglicherer Überlieferung Sohn der Erde (Ge). Gott des fruchtbaren und lebensspendenden Wassers und Flußgott des gleichnamigen großen Gewässers in Nordwestgriechenland. Auch weitere kleinere Flüße trugen diesen Namen. Der Name A. ist möglicherweise vorgriechisch (Isler, 113). Er konnte synonym ftir Wasser gebraucht werden. A. galt als Vater der berühmten Quellen, der ->Kastalia in Delphi, der ->Peirene in Korinth, der ->Dirke in Theben und überhaupt als Vater aller Quellnymphen (->Nymphai); als solcher erscheint er auf den Nymphenreliefs (166*-196). Ferner war er der Vater der Sirenen (->Seirenes). Auch Bezüge zur Welt des ->Dionysos sind erkennbar, indem bei der erstmaligen Weinmischung Wasser des A. verwendet wurde. Mit Dionysos gemeinsam hat A. auch, daß eine seiner wichtigsten Erscheinungsformen das Maskenbild ist (Kultmasken: 80* und 198).

Im Zusammenhang des ->Herakles-Mythos erscheint A. als Mitbewerber um — Deianeira, Tochter des Königs Oineus; er wird von Herakles besiegt. ...

LITERARISCHE QUELLEN: Sohn des Okeanos: Hes. theog. 340. Sohn der Erde: Serv. georg. 1, 8. Ältester Fluß nach Akusilaos, FGrH 2 F 1.

( Ἀχελῷος, poetically also Ἀχελώϊος; Achelous; etruskisch Αχλαε, cf. 230*) According to Hesiod, son of Oceanus and Tethys, according to another, probably older tradition, son of the earth (Ge). God of fertile and life-giving water and river god of the large body of water of the same name in northwest Greece. Other smaller rivers also bore this name. The name A. is possibly pre-Greek (Isler, 113). It could be used synonymously with water. A. was considered the father of the famous springs, the ->Kastalia in Delphi, the ->Peirene in Corinth, the ->Dirke in Thebes and generally the father of all spring nymphs (->Nymphai); as such he appears on the nymph reliefs (166*-196). He was also the father of the sirens (->Seirenes). References to the world of ->Dionysus are also evident, as water from A. was used in the first wine blend. What A. also has in common with Dionysus is that one of his most important manifestations is the mask image (cult masks: 80* and 198).

In the context of the Heracles myth, A. appears as a competitor for — Deianeira, daughter of King Oeneus; he is defeated by Heracles. ...

LITERARY SOURCES: Son of Oceanus: Hes. theog. 340. Son of the earth: Serv. georg. 1, 8. Oldest river according to Akusilaos, FGrH 2 F 1.

Isler 2006

s.v. Achelous 2

[2] Greek water-god

(Ἀχελῷος [Achelôios], Etruscan Αχλαε [Achlae]). Water-god, with jurisdiction over fresh water and the land's fertility. His name could be used synonymously for water. His cult is attested in many inscriptions, and was disseminated by the oracle at Dodona. Some rivers, among them Greece's greatest river, also bore the name A. A. figures in the myth of Heracles as a rival for the favours of Deïanira. He appears at the fight as a bull, as a snake and in human likeness. Heracles defeats him by breaking off his horn. This is then equated with the Horn of Plenty. From the end of the 4th cent. BC the cult of A. declined in significance. However, in the literature of the Imperial period he remained popular as the stereotypical unlucky lover. From the 1st cent. BC the breaking off of the horn was also rationalized in terms of the diversion of the Acarnanian river by Heracles.

Portrayals of A. are very common in Archaic and Classical Greek art. He is characteristically portrayed as the man-bull, i.e. the bull with a human face. Far more frequent than the battle scenes with Heracles are individual representations; besides full-figure portrayals often protomes, busts and particularly masks. As father of the nymphs, A. appears in their company on the Attic nymph reliefs. A. appears on the coins of numerous cities, especially in Magna Graecia and Sicily. Portrayals of A. are also common in Etruscan art.

Deïanira; River gods; Heracles

Isler, Hans-Peter (Zürich)

Bibliography

H. P. Isler, A., 1970.

H. P. Isler, s. v. A., LIMC 1.1, 12-36

C. Weiss, Griechische Flußgottheiten in vorhellenischer Zeit, in: Beitr. zur Arch. 17, 1984.

H. P. Isler, in: Gnomon 62, 1990, 661-663.

Jebb

Introduction 5

Pindar, in a lost poem,—of what class, is unknown,—told the story somewhat as follows⁴. Heracles, having gone down to Hades for Cerberus, there met the departed Meleager, who recommended his sister Deianeira as a wife for the hero. On returning to the upper world, Heracles went at once to Aetolia, where he found that Deianeira was being wooed by the river-god Acheloüs. He fought with this formidable rival,—who wore the shape of a bull,—and broke off one of his horns. In order to recover it, Acheloüs gave his conqueror the wondrous ‘cornucopia’ which he himself had received from Amaltheia, daughter of Oceanus. ...

Long before Pindar, Archilochus had related how Heracles overcame the tauriform suitor⁶, and won the fair maiden;

⁴ Schol. on Iliad 21. 194. The schol. on Il.8. 368 probably has the same passage in view when he quotes Pindar as saying that Cerberus had a hundred heads.

⁶ Schol. Il. 21. 237.

9

μνηστὴρ: this legend had already been treated by Archilochus (c. 670 B.C.), and by Pindar: see Introd.

Ἀχελῷον. The Acheloüs rises at the centre of Pindus, in Mount Lacmon, the great watershed of northern Greece, and, after a course of some 130 miles from N. to S. , flows into the Ionian Sea. Its lower waters formed the boundary between Acarnania on the west and Aetolia on the east. The modern name, ‘White River’ (Aspropotamo), is due to the yellowish colour which the stream derives from a clayed bed.

To the Greeks, Acheloüs was the king of rivers ( Il.21. 194 "κρείων Ἀχελώϊος"). He was the ‘eldest son of Oceanus and Tethys’: Acusilaüs fr. 11 a (Müller Frag. Hist. I. 101) "Ὠκεανὸς δὲ γαμεῖ Τηθὺν ἑαυτοῦ ἀδελφήν: τῶν δὲ γίγνονται τρισχίλιοι ποταμοί: Ἀχελῷος<*> δὲ αὐτῶν πρεσβύτατος καὶ τετίμηται μάλιστα". The oracle at Dodona,—which was not far west of the river's sources,—‘enjoined sacrifice to Acheloüs in all its responses’ (schol. Il. 21.194). In Acarnania "ἀγῶνες" were held in his honour (schol. Il. 24.616). The cult of this river-god was, however, not merely local, but Panhellenic. Such pre-eminence is enough to explain how he became a type of "πηγαῖον ὕδωρ" generally, without assuming the more than doubtful kinship of "ἀχ" with aqua. For Greek, it should rather be "ἀπ", as in "Μεσσάπιοι".

11

Acheloüs occurs in works of art under each of the three forms which he takes here.

(1) ταῦρος ["bull"]. This regular embodiment of a river-god symbolised both the roar of the torrent, and, as Strabo adds, the twistings of the stream (“καμπαί”), “ἃς καλοῦσι κέρατα” (10. 458). Coins of Acarnania (after 300 B.C.) show Acheloüs as a bull with human head; and Soph. may have had this type in mind, for it appears on coins of Magna Graecia as early as 500 B.C.

(2) αἰόλος δράκων ["serpent"] ἑλικτός. The image is peculiarly appropriate, since the Acheloüs, in parts of its course, is so tortuous. For “αἰόλος”, ‘gleaming,’ cp. n. on Ph.1157.A vase-painting shows the Acheloüs, in combat with Heracles, as a serpent with the head and arms of a man, and an ox's horns (Gerhard, Auserl. Vasenbilder, vol. 2, no. 115).

(3) ἀνδρείῳ κύτει βούπρῳρος κ.τ.λ. A human figure, with human face, and a shaggy beard, but with the forehead, horns, and ears of an ox. The Acheloüs appears thus on an archaic coin of Meta pontum in Lucania (Millingen, Anc. Coins of Greek Cities and Kings, pl. 1, no. 21). The words “ἐκ δὲ δασκίου γενειάδος, κ.τ.λ.”, coupled with such evidence, make it clear that βούπρῳρος means, ‘with front’ (not, ‘head’) of ox. In this sense, it is fitter than βούκρανος: and Strabo 's reading (cr. n.) is thus confirmed.

κύτει. The word “κύτος” (rt “κυ”) means ‘a cavity,’ then ‘a vessel’: hence, fig., the human body as encasing the vital organs: Plat. Tim. 74 A “ἀπὸ τῆς κεφαλῆς διὰ παντὸς τοῦ κύτους”. See Appendix.

507

Acheloüs fights, then, as the “ἐναργὴς ταῦρος”,—not merely as the “ἀνδρείῳ κύτει βούπρῳρος” (12). Sophocles is here following the traditional version. The Homeric Scamander, in conflict with Achilles, roars ‘like a bull’ (“μεμυκὼς ἠΰτε ταῦρος”, Il.21. 237). “ἐντεῦθεν ὁρμηθέντες” (says the schol. there) “τὸν Ἀχελῷον ἐταύρωσαν Ἡρακλεῖ ἀγωνιζόμενον”. The taurine form was given to Acheloüs, in that combat, by Archilochus (schol. ib.), by Pindar (schol. Il.21. 194), and by the logographer Pherecydes ( Apollod.2. 6. 5): perhaps, too, by Panyasis, the author of an epic “Ἡράκλεια”. An engraved gem in the British Museum (King, Antique Gems II. pl. 34, fig. 3) shows Acheloüs as a bull, preparing to butt at Heracles. The gem is older than the time of Sophocles, and may, as Mr. Murray S. thinks, have followed the rendering of this subject on the still more archaic throne of Apollo at Amyclae ( Paus.3. 18. 5). Cp. n. on 520. This fight was a favourite theme in art: for the literature, see Roscher, Lex.p. 9.

518

κεράτων. A prominent mention is given to the horns, since the story was that Heracles broke off one of them. Cp. Ovid M. 9. 85 rigidum fera dextera cornu | Dum tenet, infregit, truncaque a fronte revellit. Acheloüs ransomed it by giving his conqueror the horn of Amaltheia, or cornucopia ( Apollod.2. 7. 5). This gift, which Heracles transferred as the bride-price to Oeneus, was explained as a symbol of the increased fertility gained by works which altered the course of the Acheloüs (Strabo 10, p. 458).

LSJ Middle

s.v. Ἀχελῷος

I. Achelous, name of several rivers; the best known ran through Aetolia and Acarnania, Il., Hes.

II. any stream, or, generally, water, Eur.

Luce

pp. 425–437

p. 426

p. 428

FIGURE 3. HERACLES AND ACHELOUS: CYLIX IN BOSTON

p. 429

p. 430

Of the vases, there is but one that can possibly antedate our specimen. This is a Corinthian cylix, ...

p. 431

FIGURE 5. HERACLES AND ACHELOUS: CORINTHIAN CYLIX: BRUSSELS.

p. 4xx

Molinari and Sisci

pp. 1-6 [in folder]

pp. 22-30 [in folder]

pp. 48-68 [in folder]

p. 55

The Greek Man-Faced Bull

... In contemporary mainland Greece, for the earliest examples, the man-faced bull is predominately represented as a supporting actor in the myth of Herakles in painted pottery and glyptic art.¹⁰⁸ In fact, only in the early to mid 5th century do we see [cont.]

¹⁰⁸ H.P. Isler, 'Acheloos,' in LIMC, no.213-228, and no.246-259.

p. 56

the first traces for a cult of the man-faced bull in Greece proper.¹⁰⁹ Shortly after this adoption of the iconography around the second half of the fifth century BC, it appears to have become the standard cultic image for Acheloios throughout the entire Greek world.

¹⁰⁹ According to Isler, the earliest archaelogical evidence for a cult of Acheloios in mainland Greece is a marble mask dated to 470 BC (H.P. Isler, Acheloos, no.51).

pp. 91-96 [in folder]

Murray

s.v. Achelous

Acheloüs Acheloüs, the longest of all Greek rivers, rising in central Epirus and debouching, after a course of 240 km. (150 mi.; mostly through mountainous gorges), into the NW corner of the Corinthian Gulf. Its lower reaches were affected by heavy alluviation (Hdt. 2. 10. 3; Thuc. 2. 102. 3) and constituted the frequently disputed frontier between Acarnania and Aetolia. Recent geological studies based on coring in the river's delta continue to refine our understanding of this process as it relates to historical periods. Acheloüs was personified early as a water- ...

Ogden

p. 165

Oxford Classical Dictionary

s.v. Acheloüs

the longest of Greek rivers, rising in central Epirus and debouching after a course of 150 miles ...

Parada

s.v. Achelous, p. 3

Ἀχελῷος

Perseus Encyclopedia

s.v. Acheloos

Schironi

p. 319

Seleucus, a grammarian of the first century CE, on the other hand, quoted Pindar and Panyassis to show that Achelous was identical with Oceanus; see P.Oxy. 221, ix, 8-20, and also Sch. Il. 21.195c (ex. [Did.]); this probably suggests that Seleucus too was in favor of omitting line 195 as unecessary. Cf. Schmidt 1976, 113-114; D'Alessio 2004, 30-33.

Smith 1854

s.v. Achelous 1. （Aspropotamo), the largest and most celebrated river in Greece, rose in Mount Pindus, and after flowing through the mountainous country of the Dolopians and Agraeans, entered the plain of Acarnania and Aetolia near Stratus, and discharged itself into the Ionian sea, near the Acarnanian town of Oeniadae. It subsequently formed the boundary between Acarnania and Aetolia, but in the time of Thucydides the territory of Oeniadae extended east of the river. It is usually called a river of Acarnania, but it is sometimes assigned to Aetolia. Its> general direction is from north to south. Its waters are of a whitish yellow or cream colour, whence it derives its modern name of Aspropotamo or the White river, and to which Dionysius (432) probably alludes in the epithet ἀργυροδίνης. It is said to have been called more anciently Thoas, Axenus and Thestius (Thuc. 2.102; Strab. pp. 449, 450, 458; Plut. de Fluv. 22; Steph. B. sub voce We learn from Leake that the reputed sources of the Achelous are at a village called Khaliki, which is probably a corruption of Chalcis, at which place Dionysius Periegetes (496) places the sources of the river. Its waters are swelled by numerous torrents, which it receives in its passage through the mountains, and when it emerges into the plain near Stratus its bed is not less than three-quarters of a mile in width. In winter the entire bed is often filled, but in the middle of summer the river is divided into five or six rapid streams, of which only two are of a considerable size. After leaving Stratus the river becomes narrower; and, in the lower part of its course, the plain through which it flows was called in antiquity Paracheloitis after the river. This plain was celebrated for its fertility, though covered in great part with marshes, several of which were formed by the overflowings of the Achelous. In this part of its course the river presents the most extraordinary series of wanderings; and these deflexions, observes a recent traveller, are not only so sudden, but so extensive, as to render it difficult to trace the exact line of its bed,--and sometimes, for several miles, having its direct course towards the sea, it appears to flow back into the mountains in which it rises. The Achelous brings down from the mountains an immense quantity of earthy particles, which have formed a number of small islands at its mouth, which belong to the group anciently called Echinades; and part of the mainland near its mouth is only alluvial deposition. [ECHINADES] (Leake, Northern Greece, vol. i. p. 136, seq., vol. iii. p. 513, vol. iv. p. 211; Mure, Journal of a Tour in Greece, vol. i. p. 102.) The chief tributaries of the Achelous were:--on its left, the CAMPYLUS (Καμπύλος, Diod. 19.67: Medghova), a river of considerable size, flowing from Dolopia through the territory of the Dryopes and Eurytanes, and the CYATHUS (Κύαθος, Pol. ap. Ath. p. 424c.) flowing out of the lake Hyrie into the main stream just above Conope:--on its right the PETITARUS (Liv. 43.22) in Aperantia, and the ANAPUS (Ἄναπος), which fell into the main stream in Acarnania 80 stadia S. of Stratus. (Thuc. 2.82.) [p. 1.19]

The Achelous was regarded as the ruler and representative of all fresh water in Hellas. Hence he is called by Homer (Hom. Il. 20.194) Κρείων Ἀχελώϊος, and was worshipped as a mighty god throughout Greece. He is celebrated in mythology on account of his combat with Heracles for the possession of Deïaneira. The river-god first attacked Heracles in the form of a serpent, and on being worsted assumed that of a bull. The hero wrenched off one of his horns, which forthwith became a cornucopia, or horn of plenty. (Soph. Trach. 9; Ov. Met. 9.8, seq.; Apollod. 2.7.5.) This legend alludes apparently to some efforts made at an early period to check the ravages, which the inundations of the river caused in this district; and if the river was confined within its bed by embankments, the region would be converted in modern times into a land of plenty. For further details respecting the mythological character of the Achelous, see Dict. of Biogr. and Myth. s. v.

In the Roman poets we find Acheloïdes, i. e. the Sirenes, the daughters of Achelous (Ov. Met. 5.552): Acheloïa Callirhoë, because Callirhoë was the daughter of Achelous (Ov. Met. 9.413): pocula Acheloïa, i. e. water in general (Virg. Geory. 1.9): Acheloïus heros, that is, Tydeus, son of Oeneus, king of Calydon, Acheloïus here being equivalent to Aetolian. (Stat. Theb. 2.142.)

2. A river of Thessaly, in the district of Malis, flowing near Lamia. (Strab. pp. 434, 450.)

3. A mountain torrent in Arcadia, flowing into the Alpheus, from the north of Mount Lycaeus. (Paus. 8.38.9.)

4. Also called PEIRUS a river in Achaia, flowing near Dyme. (Strab. pp. 342, 450.)

Smith 1873

s.v. Achelous

Achelo'us

（*)Axelw=|os), the god of the river Achelous which was the greatest, and according to tradition, the most ancient among the rivers of Greece. He with 3000 brother-rivers is described as a son of Oceanus and Thetys (Hes. Th. 340), or of Oceanus and Gaea, or lastly of Helios and Gaea. (Natal. Com. 7.2.) The origin of the river Achelous is thus described by Servius (ad Virg. Georg. 1.9; Acn. 8.300): When Achelous on one occasion had lost his daughters, the Sirens, and in his grief invoked his mother Gaea, she received him to her bosom, and on the spot where she received him, she caused the river bearing his name to gush forth. Other accounts about the origin of the river and its name are given by Stephanus of Byzantium, Strabo (x. p.450), and Plutarch. (De Flum. 22.) Achelous the god was a competitor with Heracles in the suit for Deianeira, and fought with him for the bride. Achelous was conquered in the contest, but as he possessed the power of assuming various forms, he metamorphosed himself first into a serpent and then into a bull. But in this form too he was conquered by Heracles, and deprived of one of his horns, which however he recovered by giving up the horn of Amalthea. (Ov. Met. 9.8, &c.; Apollod. 1.8.1, 2.7.5.) Sophocles (Trachin. 9, &c.) makes Deianeira relate these occurrences in a somewhat different manner. According to Ovid (Ov. Met. 9.87), the Naiads changed the horn which Heracles took from Achelous into the horn of plenty. When Theseus returned home from the Calydonian chase he was invited and hospitably received by Achelous, who related to him in what manner he had created the islands called Echinades. (Ov. Met. 8.547, &c.) The numerous wives and descendants of Achelous are spoken of in separate articles. Strabo (x. p.458) proposes a very ingenious interpretation of the legends about Achelous, all of which according to him arose from the nature of the river itself. It resembled a bull's voice in the noise of the water; its windings and its reaches gave rise to the story about his forming himself into a serpent and about his horns; the formation of islands at the mouth of the river requires no explanation. His conquest by Heracles lastly refers to the embankments by which Heracles confined the river to its bed and thus gained large tracts of land for cultivation, which are expressed by the horn of plenty. (Compare Voss, Mytholog. Briefe, lxxii.) Others derive the legends about Achelous from Egypt, and describe him as a second Nilus. But however this may be, he was from the earliest times considered to be a great divinity throughout Greece (Hom. Il. 21.194), and was invoked in prayers, sacrifices, on taking oaths, &c. (Ephorus apud Macrob. 5.18), and the Dodonean Zeus usually added to each oracle he gave, the command to offer sacrifices to Achelous. (Ephorus, l.c.) This wide extent of the worship of Achelous also accounts for his being regarded as the representative of sweet water in general, that is, as the source of all nourishment. (Verg. G. 1.9, with the note of Voss.) The contest of Achelous with Heracles was represented on the throne of Amyclae (Paus. 3.18.9), and in the treasury of the Megarians at Olympia there was a statue of him made by Dontas of cedar-wood and gold. (Paus. 6.19.9.) On several coins of Acarnania the god is represented as a bull with the head of an old man. (Comp. Philostr. Imag. n. 4.)

Stafford [in folder]

Amazon

p. 75 [cf. Ebook p. 74]

In the visual arts Acheloos is most commonly represented as having the body of a bull and a man's head with bull's horns, though there are variations on the theme. The scene's earliest appearance is on a Corithian cup, c.590-580 BC (Brussels A 1374), where Herakles wrestles with a centaur-like Acheloos, watched by figures who may be Deianeira and her father, and the fight is appropriately paired with that of Theseus against the Minotaur. In the late sixth century the episode is one of many on the Throne of Bathykles at Amyklai, and Pausanias (6.19.12-14) also reports seeing a dedication in the Megarian Treasury at Olypia consisting of little figures of cedar-wood decorated with gold' representing Herakles wrestling with [cont.]

p. 76

Acheloos, the group apparently by the Spartan sculptor Dontas. In Attic art the scene appears more than twenty times, but the most striking depiction is on a red-figure stamnos by Oltos, c.520 BC (London E437), where Acheloos has a human torso, a long, sinuous fish's tail, and his satyr-like human head has a large bull's horn, which Herakles is about to break off.

Tripp

s.v. Acheloüs, p. 5

The principal river of the southwestern mainlan are of Greece, and its god. The Acheloüs flows southward, dividing Acarnania from Aetolia, to empty into the Ionian Sea near ...

Acheloüs, god of one of the most turbulant of Greek rivers, played a role in several myths. When five local nymphs failed to honor him sufficiently, he swept them away, and they became the Echinadian Islands. He fell in love with Perimele and seduced her. Her father flung her off a cliff, but Acheloüs persuaded Poseidon to transform her into an island. The river-god himself had the power to change his shape, but it did not help him when he wrestled Heracles [M] for the hand of Deïanerira. After several changes he became a bull. Heracles not only vanquished him but broke off one of his horns. Acheloüs was the father of Alcmeon's second wife, Callirrhoë; of Peirene, nymph of the famous spring at Corinth; of Castalia a nymph of the even more famous spring at Delphi; and of the Sirens. Acheloüs was frequently represented in art, often in the form of a bull with the horned head of a man.

There were other rivers named Acheloüs, one in Lydia. the other a small stream in Arcadia.

s.v. Heracles (M), pp. 292–294

p. 293

Some say that Heracles presented the horn to the Hesperides or to some nymphs, and they filled it with fruits and called it the Cornucopia. Others claim, however, that Acheloüs begged his horn back and gave Heracles in its place the horn of Amaltheia, who, either a nymph or a goat, had been Zeus's nurse.

University of Oxford Classical Art Research Centre

Acheloos

God of the River Acheloos in west central Greece, who comes to typify all river gods. He is usually shown as a bull with a man's horned head or forepart. Herakles wrestles with him to win his bride Deianeira. Some thought his broken horn became the Cornucopia.

West 1983

p. 92

In columns xx-xxii of the [Derveni] papyrus the commentator is concerned with Zeus' creation of Oceanus and the rivers ('sinews of Achelous'), and of the sun, moon, and stars. The verb used in the verse about the creation of Oceanus was μήσατο, 'contrived'. Again the deliberate intelligence of the creation is conveyed. Achelous apparently stands for the world's fresh-water streams; they form a network like the sinews of the body.³⁹

³⁹ ... Achelous was the greatest of rivers (cf. Il. 21.194-5, Acusil. 2 F 1). For use of the name to stand for water see LSJ, and Dodds on E. Bacch. 635-6; Servius ascribes it to Orpheus (= fr. 344 K.).

p. 115

36 μήσατο δ' Ὠκεανοῖο μέγα σθένος εὺρὺ ῥέοντος˙

37 ἶνας δ' ἐγκα[tέλα]σσ' Ἀχελωίον ἀργυ[ρ]οδίνο[υ.

West 2003

fr. 12, pp. 292, 293

12 "Ammonius" in Il. 21.195 (P.Oxy.221 ix 1; v.93 Erbse)

κ]ύμασ[ιν] ἐνκατέλεξα Ἀχελω[ΐου] ἀργυροδ[ί]νεω, ἐξ οὗ πᾶσα θάλασσα.

12 "Ammonius," commentary on Iliad 21

"I laid (him?) in the [wat]ers of silver-eddying Achelous, from which is the whole sea."

• Davies and White, p. 106

P.Oxy 221 (1st century. CE), attributed to the scholar Ammonius, comments on Iliad XXI:

Wilkins

p. 120

Iconography

Vases

Boston 99.519

LIMC 15049 Acheloos 215

ID: 15049

Type: cup, kylix

Artist: Boston C. A.

Origin: Attica

Category: vase painting

Material: clay

Discovery: Thebes (Boeotia)

Dating: -560 – -550

Description

A: naked Kirke giving a Greek with an animal head to drink, behind the latter three of his friends with heads of dog, panther and goat, behind Kirke three with heads of a lion, chicken and horse; from the left comes Odysseus with a sword and another man (maybe Eurylochos).

Beazley Archive 300620

Vase Number: 300620

Fabric: ATHENIAN

Technique: BLACK-FIGURE

Shape Name: CUP SIANA

Provenance: GREECE, BOEOTIA, THEBES

Date: -575 to -525

Attributed To: BOSTON CA, P OF by BEAZLEY

Decoration: A: CIRCE (NAKED) WITH CUP, ODYSSEUS WITH SWORD, MEN WITH ANIMAL HEADS (DOG, GOAT, PANTHER, COCK, HORSE, LION), DOG

B: HERAKLES WITH ACHELOOS, BETWEEN DRAPED MEN, MOCK INSCRIPTION

I: SPHINX

Current Collection: Boston (MA), Museum of Fine Arts: 99.519

Gantz, p. 433

The earliest Attic versions (from about 570 B.C.) alter this to a complete bull with only a human face and beard (NY 59.64; Boston 99.519), but the Kentauros form does reappear by the time of the Leagros Group (e.g. London B313). In virtually all cases, Herakles grasps Acheloos by his (usually single) horn. ...

Luce

p. 426

p. 428

Figue 3. HERACLES AND ACHELOUS: CYLIX IN BOSTON

Brussels A1374

LIMC 4267 Acheloos 246

ID: 4267

Type: cup, kylix

Artist: Gorgoneion-Group

Origin: Corinth

Category: vase painting

Material: terracotta

Dating: -600 – -575

Description: Minotauros lies on the ground while Theseus stabs him in the neck. To the right a standing man. Further to the right Herakles attacking Acheloos. Oineus with long hair, beard and stuff gestures. At right Deianeira.

Beazley Archive 1011067

Vase Number: 1011067

Fabric: CORINTHIAN

Technique: BLACK-FIGURE

Shape Name: CUP

Current Collection: Brussels, Musees Royaux: A1374

Gantz, p. 433

In art this wooing combat surfaces on vase-painting as early as the second quarter of the sixth century. A middle Corinthian cup shows Heracles wrestling a creature with horns and a human torso, but a bull's (or horse's) body joined to the waist in the manner of a Kentauros (Brussels A1374). ... In virtually all cases, Herakles grasps Acheloos by his (usually single) horn.

Stafford, pp. 75–76

In the visual arts Acheloos is most commonly represented as having the body of a bull and a man's head with bull's horns, though there are variations on the theme. The scene's earliest appearance is on a Corithian cup, c.590-580 BC (Brussels A 1374), where Herakles wrestles with a centaur-like Acheloos, watched by figures who may be Deianeira and her father, and the fight is appropriately paired with that of Theseus against the Minotaur.

Boardman, p. 2

In the figure frieze of a Corinthian cup of about 570-560 B.C. Theseus' dispatch of the Miotaur is divide from Herakles' fight with Acheloos only by the figure of an old man (Oineus, watching Herakles; with Deianeira and a chariot beyond).⁴

⁴ Brussels A 1374: Payne, NC pl. 34, 6.

Luce

p. 430

Of the vases, there is but one that can possibly antedate our specimen. This is a Corinthian cylix, ...

p. 431

FIGURE 5. HERACLES AND ACHELOUS: CORINTHIAN CYLIX: BRUSSELS.

London E437

Heracles wrestling with Achelous. Illustration from a Stamnos attributed to Oltos, c. 525–475 BC, London, British Museum E437.

LIMC 9321 Acheloos 245

ID: 9321

Type: stamnos

Artist: Oltos

Origin: Attica

Category: vase painting

Material: terracotta

Discovery: Cerveteri, Caere

Dating: -520 – -510

Beazley Archive 200437

Vase Number: 200437

Fabric: ATHENIAN

Technique: RED-FIGURE

Shape Name: STAMNOS

Provenance: ITALY, ETRURIA, CERVETERI

Date: -525 to -475

Inscriptions: Named: HERAKLE[S], ACHELOIO[S]

Named: ORETHUA

Signature: PHANPH[AIOS] EPOIEI

Attributed To: OLTOS by BEAZLEY

PAMPHAIOS POTTER by SIGNATURE

Decoration: A: HERAKLES AND ACHELOOS B: SATYR AND MAENAD IN LEOPARD SKIN WITH KROTALA AND THYRSOS

Current Collection: London, British Museum: E437

AVI 4590

Schefold

p. 159

Herakles' victory over his meandering rival receives its finest pictorial illustration on Oltos' London Stamnos (fig. 195), .... Oltos represents the river-god as Triton, a favourite character of the period, ... He gives him a bull's horn, which Herakles is about to break off; before the classical period it was conventional to portray river-gods as bulls with either a human upper body or a horned male head.³⁵⁵ His fishy body suggests the wild water of the untamed torrent and his daimonic sinuosity, the horn his power. Here he gives the impression of being a real god, not (as in later pictures) a mere personification. He has the ears and the typical snub nose typical of satyrs, creatures often worshipped as gods of springs and streams.

195 Herakles wrestles with Acheloos. Stamnos by Oltos, 520-510. London E 437.

p. 337

355 See H. P. Isler, Acheloos (1970).

Stafford, p. 76

In Attic art the scene appears more than twenty times, but the most striking depiction is on a red-figure stamnos by Oltos, c.520 BC (London E437), where Acheloos has a human torso, a long, sinuous fish's tail, and his satyr-like human head has a large bull's horn, which Herakles is about to break off.

Fontenrose, pp. 233–234

FIGURE 22. HERAKLES AND ACHELOOS

In a red figure vase painting of the combat between Herakles and Acheloos (fig. 22) the river god looks like a human-headed eel (i.e., a snake with a fish's tail); only the horns upon his head suggest his usual bull shape.

Luce, p. 425

in one vas-painting, an Attic red-gigured samnus in the British Museum, bearing the signiture of Pamphaeus as maker (ΦΑΝΦ ... ΕΓΟΙΕΙ),² only the horn, and the retrograde inscription ... distingquish the river-god from the "Triton" of so many Attic black-figure vases.

Louvre G365

Heracles fighting Achelous, Attic column krater, Louvre G365 (c. 475–425).

LIMC 4275 Acheloos 218

ID: 4275

Type: column crater

Origin: Attica

Category: vase painting

Material: terracotta

Discovery: Agrigento

Dating: -460 – -450

Description: Herakles fighting against Acheloos, Deianeira and Oineus.

Beazley Archive 6911

Vase Number: 6911

Fabric: ATHENIAN

Technique: RED-FIGURE

Shape Name: KRATER, COLUMN

Provenance: SICILY, AGRIGENTO

Date: -475 to -425

Decoration: A: HERAKLES AND ACHELOOS, OLD MAN (?) WITH SCEPTRE, DRINKING HORN, DEIANEIRA

Current Collection: Paris, Musee du Louvre: G365

Gantz, p. 433

An Archaic scarab may show the horn broken-off, if this rather than a club is what Hsrakles holds in his hand (London 489).⁹¹ [In person it does look like a horn. See Boardman 1968.46 cat. no. 75, 48.] In any case, that idea is certain by the early fifth century, when a Red-Figure column krater displays the broken-off horn lying on the ground (Louvre G365; Acheloos still has a second horn).

New York 50.64

LIMC 4268 Acheloos 214

Type: neck amphora

Origin: Attica

Category: vase painting

Material: terracotta

Discovery: Sicily

Dating: -570 – -560

Description

Herakles fighting against Acheloos between Oineus and Deianeira.

Beazley Archive 350203

Fabric: ATHENIAN

Technique: BLACK-FIGURE

Shape Name: AMPHORA, NECK

Provenance: SICILY

Date: -600 to -550

Attributed To: Compare PTOON P by BEAZLEY

Decoration: A: SYMPOSIUM, MAN AND WOMAN RECLINING ON KLINE, YOUTHS AND MAN, ALL DRAPED, TABLE WITH PHIALE AND FOOD, STOOL

B: HERAKLES (WITHOUT LIONSKIN) AND ACHELOOS, ONLOOKERS (WOMAN, DRAPED YOUTHS)

Frieze below: ANIMAL FRIEZE, GOATS AND PANTHERS

Current Collection: New York (NY), Metropolitan Museum: 59.64

Metropolitan Museum of Art 59.64

Title: Terracotta neck-amphora (jar)

Attributed to the Ptoon Painter

Period: Archaic

Date: ca. 570–560 B.C.

Culture: Greek, Attic

Medium: Terracotta; black-figure

Accession Number: 59.64

Gantz, p. 433

The earliest Attic versions (from about 570 B.C.) alter this to a complete bull with only a human face and beard (NY 59.64; Boston 99.519), but the Kentauros form does reappear by the time of the Leagros Group (e.g. London B313). In virtually all cases, Herakles grasps Acheloos by his (usually single) horn. ...