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The Erinnyes (also spelled Erinyes) were "the
Angry Ones",
known as the Furies in Roman. They were the feared avenging
goddesses in Greek and Roman mythology who were born from the
falling drops of blood of Uranus (Sky) when he was mutilated by
his son, the Titan Cronus. The drops fell on Mother Earth (Gaea)
and impregnated her.
"...and Cronus cut off his father's genitals and threw them into
the sea; and from the drops of the flowing blood were born Furies,
to wit, Alecto, Tisiphone, and Megaera."
Apollodorus, Library and Epitome (ed. Sir James
George Frazer)
Other versions of their birth claim that they were the daughters
of Mother Earth and Darkness, or of Nyx (Night), or the Titans
Cronus and Eurynome (and thus sisters to the Moerae, the Fates).
One of their famous victims, Orestes, gave them the name 'Eumenides',
the 'Solemn Ones', or 'Kindly Ones'. More on Orestes below.
Their home was at the entrance to Tartarus, that infernal place
deep in the Underworld where the souls of the condemned were
exiled, a gloomy place in Hades as far distant from earth as earth
is distant from the sky. Others call their home Erebus, the
darkest pit of the Underworld. There, the Erinnyes would screen
out those unfortunate doomed who had yet to atone for their sins,
relentlessly tormenting them.
No prayer, no sacrifice, and no tears could move them, or protect
the hapless object of their persecution; and if ever they felt
that the criminal would escape them, they called in the assistance
of the goddess Dike (Justice). The Erinnyes were closely connected
to Dike, for the merciless maintenance of strict justice was their
utmost concern.
What did they look like? Often they were depicted as repulsive
winged female creatures wearing black robes. Other descriptions
adorned them with snakes twined in their hair, piercing red eyes
dripping blood, pitch-black bodies with bat wings, and even
sporting the heads of dogs.
Definitely not a posse you'd want on your case...
In works of art and on the stage, however, their fearful
appearance was greatly softened down, and they were represented as
solemn and purposeful maidens, wearing the richly adorned attire
of huntresses, with a band of serpents around their heads, and
serpents or torches in their hands.
Because nobody really wanted anything to do with these avenging
creatures, mortals rarely referred to the Erinnyes by name, in
case they invoked their wrath. Instead they were often
euphemistically called the aforementioned Eumenides, the 'Kindly
Ones' or 'Solemn Ones', the term coined by their hapless victim
called Orestes.
There were usually said to be three
Furies (note: At Athens there were statues of only two), called
Alecto, Tisiphone and Megaera, but quite often they were depicted
as a large flock of flying creatures, with the three named members
leading the avenging pack. The Harpies, who were filthy,
monstrous, vulture-like female beasts loathed by humans, often
served the Erinnyes in capturing or tormenting those unfortunate
people who had displeased them.
Portrayed with and without wings, the Erinnyes in time became
better known as those responsible for avenging offenses by
children against their mothers, and eventually came to be the
divine punishers - along with Zeus - of anyone who committed
perjury or patricide (killing of one's father).
As their influence spread, the Erinnyes became the personification
of the concepts of vindictiveness and retribution (also see Nemesis),
and represented the psychological torments associated with a
guilty conscience. Eventually their influence extended to the
hearing of complaints of insolence by the young toward the old;
punishing disrespect of parents by their children; as well as lack
of hospitality to guests by their hosts, a terrific breach of
ancient etiquette.
In short, if you messed up, the
wicked fury of the Erinnyes was not far...There were many who
incurred the wrath of the Furies, with catastrophic results. Some
of their more famous victims included Orestes, Oedipus, Alcmaeon,
and even the Amazon Queen called Penthesileia.
What did these perpetrators do to arouse the anger of the Erinnyes?
Orestes murdered his mother and was relentlessly hounded by the
Furies. Eventually Orestes begged Athena for redemption, going to
her temple on the Acropolis of Athens and embracing her image.
After a trial, Orestes was declared not guilty by the Olympian
gods, but the Erinnyes threatened to let fall a drop of their own
blood on earth, which would kill the plants and crops and destroy
the people of Athens if the ruling stood.
Athena convinced the Erinnyes to take up residence in a grotto at
Athens, where they would be worshipped by the citizens. Bribing
them with offers of great honor, Athena was able to placate their
vengeance, and the three named Furies finally agreed to stop
tormenting Orestes. However, some say that the rest of the winged
pack of Furies continued to harass and pursue Orestes, until he
finally managed to appease them by offering a sacrificial black
sheep at a place called Carneia.
A grateful Orestes then named them the Eumenides ('Solemn Ones',
'Kindly Ones') and dedicated a new sanctuary to them.
What about some of their other victims?
-
Oedipus was
tortured by the Erinnyes for killing his own father, even
though it was in self defense and Oedipus didn't know that
the man he slew on the road to Cadmus was his dad.
-
Alcmaeon was punished
and chastised by them for the murder of his mother, Eriphyle,
until finally he was driven mad by the Erinnyes.
-
Penthesileia, queen of
the Amazons, was haunted for the accidental shooting of her
sister, Hippolyte, killed while out hunting or during the
fight following the wedding of Theseus and Phaedra.
These were but a few of the targets of their terrible vengeance.
People were justifiably terrified of these timeless crones.
Tisiphone, Alecto and Megaera were older than Zeus or any of the
other Olympians, and were therefore not quite under the rule of
Zeus, though they honored and esteemed him. They acted on
complaints and punished the transgressors, relentlessly hounding
the culprits. Nobody could escape from their wrath -- they
pursued their victims from city to city and country to country,
without rest or pause.
They carried brass-studded scourges in their hands, inflicting a
terrible torment on their victims. Feared and revered by the
ancients, the Furies were mythology's personified avenging
spirits. The sacrifices which were offered to them consisted of
black sheep
and nêphalia -- a drink of honey mixed
with water. The objects sacred to them included white
turtledoves and the narcissus flower.
A festival called the 'Eumenidia' was celebrated in their honor
at Athens, where they had a sanctuary and a grotto near the
Areopagus. Another sanctuary, with a grove which no one was
allowed to enter lest the Furies' wrath was aroused, existed at
the city of Colonus. They were also worshipped at Megalopolis,
where they were known under the name of Maniai (Mania).
Here's some interesting material from Harry Thurston
Peck: The
name Erinys, which is the more ancient one, was derived by the
Greeks from the verb erinô or ereunaô, “I hunt down,” or
“persecute,” or from the Arcadian word erinuô, “I am angry”; so
that the Erinyes were either the angry goddesses, or the
goddesses who hunt or search for the criminal.
The name Eumenides, which signifies “the well-meaning,” or
“soothed goddesses,” is a mere euphemism, because people dreaded
to call these fearful goddesses by their real name; and it was
said to have been first given them after the acquittal of
Orestes by the court of the Areopagus, when the anger of the
Erinyes had become soothed. It was by a similar euphemism that
at Athens the Erinyes were called semnai theai, or the Revered
Goddesses.
From Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of
Classical Antiquities (1898)
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