InGreek mythology, theGolden Fleece (Ancient Greek:Χρυσόμαλλον δέρας,romanized: Khrysómallon déras,lit. 'Golden-haired pelt') is thefleece of thegolden-woolled,[a] wingedram,Chrysomallos, that rescuedPhrixus and brought him toColchis, where Phrixus then sacrificed it toZeus. Phrixus gave the fleece to KingAeëtes who kept it in a sacred grove, whenceJason and theArgonauts stole it with the help ofMedea, Aeëtes' daughter. The fleece is a symbol of authority and kingship.
In the historical account, the hero Jason and his crew of Argonauts set out on a quest for the fleece by order of KingPelias in order to place Jason rightfully on the throne ofIolcus inThessaly. Through the help ofMedea, they acquire the Golden Fleece. The story is of great antiquity and was current in the time ofHomer (eighth century BC). It survives in various forms, among which the details vary.
Nowadays, the heraldic variations of the Golden Fleece are featured frequently inGeorgia, especially for Coats of Arms and Flags associated with Western Georgian (Historical Colchis) municipalities and cities, including the Coats of Arms of City ofKutaisi, the ancient capital city of Colchis.
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Athamas the founder of Thessaly, but also king of the city ofOrchomenus inBoeotia (a region of southeasternGreece), took the goddessNephele as his first wife. They had two children, the boyPhrixus (whose name means "curly", as in the texture of the ram's fleece) and the girlHelle. Later Athamas became enamored of and marriedIno, the daughter ofCadmus. When Nephele left in anger, drought came upon the land.
Ino was jealous of her stepchildren and plotted their deaths; in some versions, she persuaded Athamas that sacrificing Phrixus was the only way to end the drought. Nephele, or her spirit, appeared to the children with a winged ram whose fleece was ofgold.[b] The ram had been sired byPoseidon in his primitive ram-form uponTheophane, anymph[c] and the granddaughter ofHelios, the sun-god. According toHyginus,[2] Poseidon carried Theophane to an island where he made her into a ewe so that he could have his way with her among the flocks. There Theophane's other suitors could not distinguish the ram-god and his consort.[3]
Nephele's children escaped on the yellow ram over the sea, but Helle fell off and drowned in the strait now named after her, theHellespont. The ram spoke to Phrixus, encouraging him,[d] and took the boy safely toColchis (modern-day south-east coastal region of the Black Sea), on the easternmost shore of theEuxine (Black) Sea.There the ram was sacrificed to gods.In essence, this act returned the ram to the god Poseidon, and the ram became theconstellationAries.
Phrixus settled in the house ofAeëtes, son of Helios the sun god. He hung the Golden Fleece preserved from the ram on anoak in a grove sacred toAres, the god of war and one of theTwelve Olympians. The fleece was guarded by a never-sleeping dragon with teeth that could become soldiers when planted in the ground. The dragon was at the foot of the tree on which the fleece was placed.[5]
In some versions of the story,Jason attempts to put the guard serpent to sleep.
Pindar employed the quest for the Golden Fleece in his Fourth Pythian Ode (written in 462 BC), though the fleece is not in the foreground. When Aeëtes challenges Jason to yoke the fire-breathing bulls, the fleece is the prize: "Let the King do this, the captain of the ship! Let him do this, I say, and have for his own the immortal coverlet, the fleece, glowing with matted skeins of gold".[6]
In later versions of the story, the ram is said to have been the offspring of the sea godPoseidon andThemisto (less often,Nephele orTheophane). The classic telling is theArgonautica ofApollonius of Rhodes, composed in the mid-third century BCAlexandria, recasting early sources that have not survived. Another, much less-known Argonautica, using the same body of myth, was composed in Latin byValerius Flaccus during the time ofVespasian.
Where the written sources fail, through accidents of history, sometimes the continuity of a mythic tradition can be found among the vase-painters. The story of the Golden Fleece appeared to have little resonance for Athenians of the Classic age, for only two representations of it on Attic-painted wares of the fifth century have been identified: akrater at theMetropolitan Museum of Art and akylix in the Vatican collections.[e][f][7] In thekylix painted by Douris,c. 480–470, Jason is being disgorged from the mouth of the dragon, a detail that does not fit easily into the literary sources; behind the dragon, the fleece hangs from an apple tree. Jason's helper in the Athenian vase-paintings is notMedea— who had a history in Athens as the opponent ofTheseus—butAthena.
Severaleuhemeristic attempts to interpret the Golden Fleece "realistically" as reflecting some physical cultural object or alleged historical practice have been made. For example, in the 20th century, some scholars suggested that the story of the Golden Fleece signified the bringing ofsheep husbandry to Greece from the east;[g] in other readings, scholars theorized it referred to golden grain,[h] or to the Sun.[i]
A more widespread interpretation relates the myth of the fleece to a method of washing gold from streams, which was well attested (but only fromc. 5th century BC) in the region ofGeorgia to the east of the Black Sea. Sheep fleeces, sometimes stretched over a wooden frame, would be submerged in the stream, andgold flecks borne down from upstreamplacer deposits would collect in them. The fleeces would be hung in trees to dry before the gold was shaken or combed out. Alternatively, the fleeces would be used on washing tables inalluvialmining of gold or on washing tables at deepgold mines.[j] Judging by the very early gold objects from a range of cultures, washing for gold is a very old human activity.
Strabo describes the way in which gold could be washed:
It is said that in their country gold is carried down by the mountain torrents, and that the barbarians obtain it by means of perforatedtroughs and fleecy skins, and that this is the origin of the myth of the golden fleece—unless they call themIberians, by the same name as thewestern Iberians, from the gold mines in both countries.
Another interpretation is based on the references in some versions to purple or purple-dyed cloth. The purple dye extracted from thepurple dye murex snail and related species was highly prized in ancient times. Clothing made of cloth dyed withTyrian purple was a mark of great wealth and high station (hence the phrase "royal purple"). The association of gold with purple is natural and occurs frequently in literature.[k]
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The following are the chief among the various interpretations of the fleece, with notes on sources and major critical discussions:
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