Online Encyclopedia

Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.

NIOBE

Online Encyclopedia
Originally appearing in Volume V19, Page 706 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
» Make a correction to this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Spread the word: del.icio.us del.icio.us it!

NIOBE , in See also:

Greek See also:mythology, daughter of See also:Tantalus and See also:Dione, wife of See also:Amphion, See also:king of See also:Thebes. Proud of her numerous See also:family, six daughters and six sons, she boasted of her superiority to her friend Leto, the See also:mother of only two See also:children, See also:Apollo and See also:Artemis. As a See also:punishment, Apollo slew her sons and Artemis her daughters. Their bodies See also:lay for nine days unburied, for See also:Zeus had changed the See also:people to See also:stone; on the tenth See also:day they were buried by the gods. Out of pity for her grief, the gods changed Niobe herself into a See also:rock on See also:Mount Sipylus in See also:Phrygia, in which See also:form she continued to weep (See also:Homer, Iliad, See also:xxiv. 6o2-617 ; See also:Apollodorus iii. 5; See also:Ovid, Metam. vi. 146-312). The names and number of her children, and the See also:time and See also:place of their See also:death, are variously given. This " Niobe," described by See also:Pausanias (i. 21) and See also:Quintus Smyrnaeus' (i. 293-306), both natives of the See also:district, was the See also:appearance assumed by a cliff on Sipylus when seen from a distance and from the proper point of view (see See also:Jebb on See also:Sophocles, See also:Antigone, 831).

It is to be distinguished from an archaic figure still visible, carved in the See also:

northern See also:side of the See also:mountain near See also:Magnesia, to•which tradition has given the name of Niobe, but which is really intended for See also:Cybele. According to some, Niobe is the goddess of See also:snow and See also:winter, whose children, slain by Apollo and Artemis, symbolize the See also:ice and snow melted by the See also:sun in See also:spring; according to others, she is an See also:earth-goddess, whose progeny—vegetation and the fruits of the See also:soil—is dried up and slain every summer by the shafts of the sun-See also:god. Burmeister regards the See also:legend as an incident in the struggle between the followers of See also:Dionysus and Apollo in Thebes, in which the former were defeated and driven back to See also:Lydia. Heffter builds up the See also:story See also:round the dripping rock in Lydia, really representing an See also:Asiatic goddess, but taken by the Greeks for an See also:ordinary woman. Enmann, who interprets the name as " she who prevents increase " (in contrast to Leto, who made See also:women prolific), considers the See also:main point of the myth to be Niobe's loss of her children. He compares her story withthat of See also:Lamia, who, after her children had been slain by Zeus, retired to a lonely See also:cave and carried off and killed the children of others. The appearance of the rock on Sipylus gave rise to the story of Niobe having been turned to stone. The tragedians used her story to point the moral of the instability of human happiness; Niobe became the representative of human nature, liable to See also:pride in prosperity and forgetfulness of the respect and submission due to the gods. The tragic story of Niobe was a favourite subject in literature and See also:art. See also:Aeschylus and Sophocles wrote tragedies upon it; Ovid has described it at length in his Metamorphoses. In art, the most famous See also:representation was a 'See also:marble See also:group of Niobe and her children, taken by Sosius to See also:Rome and set up in the See also:temple of Apollo Sosianus (See also:Pliny, Nat. Hist. See also:xxxvi.

4). What is probably a See also:

Roman See also:imitation of this See also:work was found in 1583 near the Lateran, and is now in the Uflizi See also:gallery at See also:Florence. In See also:ancient times it was disputed whether the See also:original was the work of See also:Praxiteles or See also:Scopas, and See also:modern authorities are not agreed as to its identity with the group mentioned by Pliny. On the whole subject see C.E. Burmeister, De fabula glaze de Niobe ejusque liberis agit (See also:Wismar, 1836); L. Curtze, Fabula Niobes Thebanae (Corbach, 1836); W. Heffter in Zeitschrift fiir Gymnasialwesen, ix. (1855) ; C. B. See also:Stark, Niobe and See also:die Niobiden (1863), the See also:standard work; E. Thramer, Pergamos (1888); C. Friederichs, Praxiteles and die Niobegruppe (1865); A.

Mayerhofer and H. Ohlrich, Die Florentiner Niobegruppe (1881 and 1888) ; for the Niobe on Mount Sipylus, see C. B. Stark, Nach dem griechischen Orient (1874); G. See also:

Weber, Le Sipylos et ses monuments (188o) ; W. See also:Ramsay, " Sipylos and Cybele," in See also:Journal of Hellenic Studies, iii. (1882); Frazer's Pausanias, iii. 555; for See also:vase-paintings, see H. Heydemann, Niobe and Niobiden auf griechischen Vasenbildern (1875). For further literature on the subject, see A. Preuner's mythological bibliography in C. See also:Bursian's Jahresbericht fiber die Fortschritte der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, vol. See also:xxv.

(1891) ; the various derivations of the name and interpretations of the legend are given in Enmann's See also:

article in See also:Roscher's Lexikon der Mythologie. In GREEK ART, fig. 29 (from an See also:Orvieto vase) represents the slaying of the children of Niobe by Apollo and Artemis; fig. 78 (Pl. VI.), Niobe shielding her youngest daughter.

End of Article: NIOBE

Additional information and Comments

There are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML.
Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide.
Do not copy, download, transfer, or otherwise replicate the site content in whole or in part.

Links to articles and home page are always encouraged.

[back]
NINUS 		[next]
NIORT

Site © 2006 - Net Industries