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Cadmo
Kadmos dragon Louvre E707.jpg
Cadmo y el dragón, ánfora de figuras negras de Eubea , 560–50 a. C., Louvre
MoradaTebas
Informacion personal
Nació
Fenicia, Tiro, Sidón o Tebas en Egipto
PadresAgenor y Telephassa o Phoenix y Perimede
HermanosEuropa , Cilix , Phoenix
ConsorteHarmonia
NiñosPolydorus , Autonoë , Ino , Agave , Semele
mitología griega
Euboean amphora, c. 550 BCE, depicting the fight between Cadmus and a dragon
Deidades
Héroes y heroísmo
Relacionados
  • Sátiros
  • Centauros
  • Dragones
  • Demogorgon
  • La religión en la antigua Grecia
  • Dioses micénicos
 Portal de la antigua Grecia portal de mitos
 
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  • mi
Hendrick Goltzius , Cadmus luchando contra el Dragón
Sembrando los dientes del Dragón. Taller de Rubens

En la mitología griega , Cadmus ( / k æ d m ə s / ; Griego : Κάδμος Kadmos ), fue el fundador y primer rey de Tebas . [1] Cadmo fue el primer héroe griego y, junto con Perseo y Belerofonte , el héroe más grande y asesino de monstruos antes de los días de Heracles . [2] Se dice comúnmente que es un príncipe fenicio, hijo del rey Agenor y la reina Telephassa de Tiro.y el hermano de Phoenix , Cílix y Europa , fue enviado originalmente por sus padres reales para buscar y acompañar a su hermana de vuelta a Europa de neumáticos después de que fue secuestrado en las costas de Fenicia por Zeus . [3] En los primeros relatos, Cadmus y Europa eran en cambio los hijos de Phoenix. [4] Cadmo fundó la ciudad griega de Tebas , cuya acrópolis se llamó originalmente Cadmeia en su honor.

La tierra natal de Cadmo fue objeto de importantes desacuerdos entre los autores antiguos. Apolodoro lo identifica como Fenicia , pero se hace referencia a Tiro , Sidón e incluso Tebas en Egipto en diferentes relatos. Su ascendencia a veces se modifica para adaptarse, por ejemplo, las afirmaciones de origen tebano nombran a su madre como una de las hijas de Nilus , uno de los Potamoi y deidad del río Nilo. [5]

Resumen [ editar ]

Cadmo fue acreditado por los antiguos griegos (como Herodoto [6] c. 484 - c. 425 aC, uno de los primeros historiadores griegos, pero uno que también tejió mitos y leyendas estándar a través de su trabajo) con la introducción del alfabeto fenicio original a los griegos, que lo adaptaron para formar su alfabeto griego . Herodoto estima que Cadmo vivió mil seiscientos años antes de su tiempo, que sería alrededor del 2000 a. C. [7] Herodoto había visto y descrito la escritura cadmea en el templo de Apolo en Tebas grabada en ciertos trípodes. Calculó que esos trípodes se remontan a la época de Layo , bisnieto de Cadmo. [8]En uno de los trípodes no había esta inscripción por escrito Cadmean, que, como se atestigua, se parecía a las letras Jónicas : Ἀμφιτρύων μ ἀνέθηκ ἐνάρων ἀπὸ Τηλεβοάων (" Anfitrión me dedica [no se olvide] el botín de [la batalla de] Teleboae. ").

Aunque griegos como Herodoto fecharon el papel de Cadmo en el mito fundador de Tebas mucho antes de la Guerra de Troya (o, en términos modernos, durante la Edad del Bronce del Egeo ), esta cronología entra en conflicto con la mayor parte de lo que ahora se sabe o se cree que se conoce sobre el orígenes y difusión de los alfabetos fenicio y griego. Las primeras inscripciones griegas coinciden con las formas de las letras fenicias de finales del siglo IX o VIII a. C .; en cualquier caso, el alfabeto fenicio propiamente dicho no se desarrolló hasta alrededor del 1050 a. C. (o después del colapso de la Edad del Bronce ). El homéricoLa imagen de la época micénica delata muy poca conciencia de la escritura, posiblemente reflejando la pérdida durante la Edad Oscura de la escritura lineal B anterior . De hecho, la única referencia homérica a la escritura [9] estaba en la frase "γράμματα λυγρά", grámmata lygrá , literalmente "dibujos nefastos ", al referirse a la letra belerofóntica . Las tablillas lineales B se han encontrado en abundancia en Tebas , lo que podría llevar a especular que la leyenda de Cadmo como portador del alfabeto podría reflejar tradiciones anteriores sobre los orígenes de la escritura lineal B en Grecia (como especuló Frederick Ahl en 1967 [10]). Pero tal sugerencia, por atractiva que sea, no es de ninguna manera una conclusión segura a la luz de la evidencia actualmente disponible. La conexión entre el nombre de Cadmo y los orígenes históricos de la escritura Lineal B o del alfabeto fenicio posterior, si existe, sigue siendo difícil de alcanzar. Sin embargo, en el Líbano actual , Cadmo todavía es venerado y celebrado como el "portador de la carta" para el mundo.

Según el mito griego, los descendientes de Cadmo gobernaron en Tebas de forma intermitente durante varias generaciones, incluida la época de la Guerra de Troya .

Etimología [ editar ]

La etimología del nombre de Cadmus sigue siendo incierta. [11] Posibles palabras conectadas incluyen la raíz triliteral semítica qdm ( ugarítico : 𐎖𐎄𐎎 ) [12] significa "este", en árabe , las palabras derivadas de la raíz "qdm" incluyen el verbo "qdm" que significa "por venir" así como palabras que significan "primitivo" y "adelante" así como "pie" (en hebreo , qedem significa "este", "frente" y "antiguo" (primitivo); el verbo qadam ( siríaco : ܩܕܡ ) significa Al frente"),[13] [14] y el griego kekasmai (<*kekadmai ) "brillar". [nota 1] Por lo tanto, el significado completo del nombre podría ser: "El que sobresale" o "del este". [dieciséis]

Andanzas [ editar ]

Samotracia [ editar ]

Cadmo luchando contra el dragón. Pintura de una crátera en el Museo del Louvre .
Lee Lawrie , Cadmus (1939). Edificio John Adams de la Biblioteca del Congreso , Washington, DC

Después de que Zeus se llevara a su hermana Europa de las costas de Fenicia , su padre envió a Cadmo a buscarla y le ordenó que no regresara sin ella. Sin éxito en su búsqueda, o no dispuesto a ir contra Zeus, llegó a Samotracia , la isla sagrada para los "Grandes Dioses" [17] o los Kabeiroi , cuyos misterios se celebrarían también en Tebas .

Cadmo no viajó solo a Samotracia; apareció con su madre Telephassa [18] en compañía de su sobrino (o hermano) Taso , hijo de Cilix , quien dio su nombre a la cercana isla de Tasos . Un trío idénticamente compuesto tenía otros nombres en Samotracia, según Diodoro de Sicilia : [19] Electra y sus dos hijos, Dardanos y Eetión o Iasion . Había una cuarta figura, la hija de Electra, Harmonia , [20] a quien Cadmo se llevó como esposa, ya que Zeus había secuestrado a Europa. [21]

The wedding was the first celebrated on Earth to which the gods brought gifts, according to Diodorus[22] and dined with Cadmus and his bride.[23]

Founder of Thebes[edit]

Cadmus Asks the Delphic Oracle Where He Can Find his Sister, Europa, Hendrick Goltzius

Cadmus came in the course of his wanderings to Delphi, where he consulted the oracle. He was ordered to give up his quest and follow a special cow, with a half moon on her flank, which would meet him, and to build a town on the spot where she should lie down exhausted.[24]

The cow was given to Cadmus by Pelagon, King of Phocis, and it guided him to Boeotia, where he founded the city of Thebes.

Intending to sacrifice the cow to Athena, Cadmus sent some of his companions, Deioleon and Seriphus to the nearby Ismenian spring for water.[25][26] They were slain by the spring's guardian water-dragon (compare the Lernaean Hydra), which was in turn destroyed by Cadmus, the duty of a culture hero of the new order.

Cadmus Sowing the Dragon's teeth, by Maxfield Parrish, 1908.

He was then instructed by Athena to sow the dragon's teeth in the ground, from which there sprang a race of fierce armed men, called the Spartoi ("sown"). By throwing a stone among them, Cadmus caused them to fall upon one another until only five survived, who assisted him to build the Cadmeia or citadel of Thebes, and became the founders of the noblest families of that city.

The dragon had been sacred to Ares, so the god made Cadmus do penance for eight years by serving him. According to Theban tellings, it was at the expiration of this period that the gods gave him Harmonia ("harmony", literally "putting or assembling together", "good assembly", or "good composition") as wife.[27] At Thebes, Cadmus and Harmonia began a dynasty with a son Polydorus, and four daughters, Agave, Autonoë, Ino and Semele.

At the wedding, whether celebrated at Samothrace or at Thebes, all the gods were present; Harmonia received as bridal gifts a peplos worked by Athena and a necklace made by Hephaestus. This necklace, commonly referred to as the Necklace of Harmonia, brought misfortune to all who possessed it. Notwithstanding the divinely ordained nature of his marriage and his kingdom, Cadmus lived to regret both: his family was overtaken by grievous misfortunes, and his city by civil unrest. Cadmus finally abdicated in favor of his grandson Pentheus, and went with Harmonia to Illyria, to fight on the side[28] of the Enchelii.[29] Later, as king, he founded the city of Lychnidos and Bouthoe.[30]

Nevertheless, Cadmus was deeply troubled by the ill-fortune which clung to him as a result of his having killed the sacred dragon, and one day he remarked that if the gods were so enamoured of the life of a serpent, he might as well wish that life for himself. Immediately he began to grow scales and change in form. Harmonia, seeing the transformation, thereupon begged the gods to share her husband's fate, which they granted (Hyginus).

In another telling of the story, the bodies of Cadmus and his wife were changed after their deaths; the serpents watched their tomb while their souls were translated to the fields. In Euripides' The Bacchae, Cadmus is given a prophecy by Dionysus whereby both he and his wife will be turned into snakes for a period before eventually being brought to live among the blest.

Samothracian connection[edit]

In Phoenician, as well as Hebrew, the Semitic root qdm signifies "the east", the Levantine origin of "Kdm" himself, according to the Greek mythographers; the equation of Kadmos with the Semitic qdm was traced to a publication of 1646 by R. B. Edwards.[31] The name Kadmos has been thoroughly Hellenised. The fact that Hermes was worshipped in Samothrace under the name of Cadmus or Cadmilus seems to show that the Theban Cadmus was interpreted as an ancestral Theban hero corresponding to the Samothracian. Another Samothracian connection for Cadmus is offered via his wife Harmonia, who is said by Diodorus Siculus to be daughter of Zeus and Electra and of Samothracian birth.[32]

The "Wedding of Cadmus and Harmonia" is considered as a conceptual symbolic coupling of Eastern (Phoenician) learning with Western (Greek) love of beauty. He died tragicallly by getting killed by Ares the God of war.

Genealogy[edit]

Cadmus was of ultimately divine ancestry, the grandson of the sea god Poseidon and Libya on his father's side, and of Nilus (the River Nile) on his mother's side; overall he was considered a member of the fifth generation of beings following the (mythological) creation of the world:

Argive genealogy in Greek mythology
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InachusMelia
ZeusIoPhoroneus
EpaphusMemphis
LibyaPoseidon
BelusAchiroëAgenorTelephassa
DanausElephantisAegyptusCadmusCilixEuropaPhoenix
MantineusHypermnestraLynceusHarmoniaZeus
Polydorus
SpartaLacedaemonOcaleaAbasAgaveSarpedonRhadamanthus
Autonoë
EurydiceAcrisiusInoMinos
ZeusDanaëSemeleZeus
PerseusDionysus
Colour key:

  Male
  Female
  Deity


Offspring[edit]

With Harmonia, he was the father of Semele, Polydorus, Autonoe, Agave and Ino. Their youngest son was Illyrius.[33] According to Greek mythology, Cadmus is the ancestor of Illyrians and Theban royalty.[34]

Hittite records controversy[edit]

It has been argued by various scholars, that in a letter from the King of Ahhiyawa to the Hittite King, written in the Hittite language in c. 1250 BC, a specific Cadmus was mentioned as a forefather of the Ahhijawa people. The latter term most probably referred to the Mycenaean world (Achaeans), or at least to a part of it.[35][36] Nevertheless, this reading about a supposed Cadmus as historical person is rejected by most scholars.[37]

Trivia[edit]

The Syrian city of Al-Qadmus is named after Cadmus.[38]

See also[edit]

  • Cadmium
  • Cadmus of Miletus
  • Cadmean victory
  • Cadmean vixen
  • Theban kings in Greek mythology

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ Robert Beekes rejects these derivations and considers it Pre-Greek.[15]

Citations[edit]

  1. ^ Alden, John B. (1883) The Greek Anthology, pp. 160–162.
  2. ^ Kerenyi, Karl, 1959. The Heroes of the Greeks (London: Thames and Hudson) p. 75.
  3. ^ A modern application of genealogy would make him the paternal grandfather of Dionysus, through his daughter by Harmonia, Semele. Plutarch once admitted that he would rather be assisted by Lamprias, his own grandfather, than by Dionysus' grandfather, i.e. Cadmus. (Symposiacs, Book IX, question II Archived 13 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine)
  4. ^ Scholia on Homer, Iliad B, 494, p. 80, 43 ed. Bekk. as cited in Hellanicus' Boeotica
  5. ^ Smith, William, Sir, ed. (1870). Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Boston: Little Brown and Company. p. 524. ark:/13960/t9s17xn41.
  6. ^ Herodotus' Histories, Book V, 58.
  7. ^ Herodotus. Histories, Book II, 2.145.4.
  8. ^ Herodotus. Histories, Book V.59.1
  9. ^ There are several examples of written letters, such as in Nestor's narrative concerning Bellerophon and the "Bellerophontic letter", another description of a letter presumably sent to Palamedes from Priam but in fact written by Odysseus (Hyginus. Fabulae, 105), as well as the letters described by Plutarch in Parallel Lives, Theseus, which were presented to Ariadne, presumably sent from Theseus. Plutarch goes on to describe how Theseus erected a pillar on the Isthmus of Corinth, which bears an inscription of two lines.
  10. ^ F. M. Ahl. "Cadmus and the Palm-Leaf Tablets". American Journal of Philology 88.2, Apr. 1967, pp. 188–194.
  11. ^ LSJ s.v. Κάδμος.
  12. ^ Gregorio del Olmo Lete; Joaquín Sanmartín (2003). A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition - Part One (PDF). Brill. p. 694. ISBN 90-04-12891 3. Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 December 2017. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  13. ^ Compare: Graves, Robert (1955). "58: Europe and Cadmus". The Greek Myths. 1. London: Penguin (published 1990). ISBN 9781101554982. Retrieved 11 November 2016. [...] a small tribe, speaking a Semitic language, seems to have moved up from the Syrian plains to Cadmeia in Caria – Cadmus is a Semitic word meaning 'eastern' [...].
  14. ^ Ruprecht, Louis A., Jr. (2008). God Gardened East: A Gardener's Meditation on the Dynamics of Genesis. Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 31. ISBN 9781556354342.
  15. ^ R. S. P. Beekes, Etymological Dictionary of Greek, Brill, 2009, p. 614.
  16. ^ "Cadmus". Baby Names. SheKnows. Retrieved 14 January 2017. The name Cadmus is a Greek baby name. In Greek the meaning of the name Cadmus is: He who excels; from the east.
  17. ^ The Megaloi theoi of the Mysteries of Samothrace.
  18. ^ Or known by another lunar name, Argiope, "she of the white face" (Kerenyi 1959:27).
  19. ^ Diodorus Siculus, 5.48; Clement of Alexandria, to wit Proreptikos 2.13.3.
  20. ^ Harmonia at Thebes was accounted the daughter of Ares and Aphrodite; all these figures appeared in sculptures on the pediment of the Hellenistic main temple in the Sanctuary of the Great Gods at Samothrace, the Hieron; the ancient sources on this family grouping were assembled by N. Lewis, Samothrace. I: The Ancient Literary Sources (New York) 1958:24-36.
  21. ^ Kerenyi (1959) notes that Cadmus in some sense found another Europa at Samothrace, according to an obscure scholium on Euripides' Rhesus 29.
  22. ^ Diodorus, 5.49.1; when the gods attended the later wedding of Peleus and Thetis, the harmony was shattered by the Apple of Discord.
  23. ^ The full range of references in Antiquity to this wedding is presented by Matia Rocchi, Kadmos e Harmonia: un matrimonio problemmatico (Rome: Bretschneider) 1989.
  24. ^ http://mythology.stackexchange.com/a/2495/2892/
  25. ^ John Tzetzes. Chiliades, 10.32 line 4
  26. ^ Atsma, Aaron J. "Drakon Ismenia". Theoi Greek Mythology. Retrieved 5 September 2014.
  27. ^ Scholia on Homer, Iliad B, 494, p. 80, 43 ed. Bekk. as cited in Hellanicus' Boeotica
  28. ^ Apollodorus. Library and Epitome, 3.5.4.
  29. ^ Pierre Grimal, Pierre, Maxwell-Hyslop, A. R. The Dictionary of Classical Mythology. Blackwell, 1996, ISBN 0-631-20102-5, p. 83.
  30. ^ Wilkes, J. J. The Illyrians. Blackwell Publishing, 1992, ISBN 0-631-19807-5, p. 99.
  31. ^ Edwards, Kadmos the Phoenician: A Study in Greek Legends and the Mycenaean Age (Amsterdam 1979), noted by Walter Burkert, The Orientalizing Revolution: Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture in the Early Bronze Age (Harvard University Press) 1992:2, and note), who remarks that the complementary connection of Europa with rb, "West" was an ancient one, made by Hesychius.
  32. ^ Diodorus Siculus 5.48.2
  33. ^ Pierre Grimal, Pierre, Maxwell-Hyslop, A. R. The Dictionary of Classical Mythology. Blackwell, 1996, ISBN 0-631-20102-5, pp. 83, 230.
  34. ^ Parsons, P.J. (2011). Culture In Pieces: Essays on Ancient Texts in Honour of Peter Parsons. p. 204. ISBN 9780199292011.
  35. ^ Windle, Joachim Latacz. Transl. from the German by Kevin; Ireland, Rosh (2004). Troy and Homer towards a solution of an old mystery. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press. p. 244. ISBN 9780199263080.
  36. ^ Rava, R D'Amato & A Salimbeti ; illustrated by Giuseppe (22 March 2011). Bronze age Greek warrior 1600-1100 BC. Oxford, UK: Osprey Pub Co. p. 58. ISBN 9781849081955.
  37. ^ Strauss, Barry (2007). The Trojan War : a new history (1st trade paperback ed.). New York: Simon & Schuster. p. 19. ISBN 9780743264426.
  38. ^ ""أهلا بكم في مدينة الفينيقين القديمة "القدموس". esyria (in Arabic). 20 April 2009.

References[edit]

Classical sources[edit]

  • Hyginus. Fabulae, 178.
  • Pseudo-Apollodorus. Bibliotheke, III, i, 1-v, 4;
  • Ovid. Metamorphoses, III, 1-137; IV, 563-603.
  • Homer. The Odyssey, 5.333.

Secondary material[edit]

  • Theoi Project
  • Kerenyi, Karl. The Heroes of the Greeks, 1959.
  • Vian, F. Les origines de Thébes: Cadmos et les Spartes. Paris, 1963.
  • R. B. Edwards. Kadmos, the Phoenician: A Study in Greek Legends and the Mycenaean Age. Amsterdam, 1979.
  • T. Gantz. Early Greek Myth., Volume 2, 467–73.
  • Matia Rocchi. Kadmos e Harmonia: un matrimonio problemmatico. Rome, Bretschneider, 1989.
  • Svetlana Janakieva, "Lе Mythe de Cadmos et l'aire ethnolinguistique paleobalkanique," Thracia, 11, 1995 (= Studia in honorem Alexandri Fol. Sofia, 1995).
  • ‹See Tfd› This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: ‹See Tfd›Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Cadmus". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Further reading[edit]

  • Calasso, Roberto (1993). The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony. New York: Knopf. ISBN 0-394-58154-7.

External links[edit]

  • Images of Cadmus in the Warburg Institute Iconographic Database
Regnal titles
New creation Mythical King of ThebesSucceeded by
Pentheus