In ancientGreek andRoman mythology,Cyparissus (Ancient Greek:Κυπάρισσος,romanized: Kupárissos,lit. 'cypress') was a boy beloved byApollo, or, in some versions, by other deities. In the best-known version of the story, the favorite companion of Cyparissus was a tamedstag, which he accidentally killed with his huntingjavelin as it lay sleeping in the woods. The boy's grief was such that it transformed him into acypress tree, aclassical symbol of mourning. The myth is thusaetiological in explaining the relation of the tree to its cultural significance. The subject is mainly known from Greek-inspiredLatin literature andfrescoes fromPompeii.[1] NoGreek hero cult devoted to Cyparissus has been identified.
According to the late antiquity grammarianServius (4th and 5th centuries AD), Cyparissus was the son ofTelephus, and thus the grandson of the heroHeracles.[2]
According to a different tradition, a Cyparissus, though possibly not the same figure, was the son ofMinyas, and the mythical founder of the town Cyparissus (Kyparissos) inPhocis, which later was calledAnticyra.[3]
The tameness of the deer may be the invention of theAugustan poetOvid,[4] and a late literary reversal of the boy's traditional role.[citation needed] Ovid's Cyparissus is so grief-stricken at accidentally killing his pet that he asks Apollo to let his tears fall forever. The god then turns the boy into acypress tree (Latin:cupressus), whose sap forms droplets like tears on the trunk.
Ovid frames the tale within the story ofOrpheus, whose failure to retrieve his brideEurydice from theunderworld causes him to forsake the love of women in favor of that of boys. When Orpheus plays hislyre, even the trees are moved by the music; in the famous cavalcade of trees that ensues, the position of the cypress at the end prompts a transition to the metamorphosis of Cyparissus.[5]
According to one of theVatican Mythographers, another Roman tradition makes the lover out to be the woodland godSilvanus.[6] An invocation byVirgil of "Silvanus who bears the slender cypress uprooted"[7] was explained in thecommentary ofServius[8] as alluding to a love affair. In his brief account, Servius differs from Ovid mainly in substituting Silvanus for Apollo, but also changes the gender of the deer and makes the god responsible for its death:
Silvanus loved a boy(puer) named Cyparissus who had a tame deer. When Silvanus unintentionally killed her, the boy was consumed by sorrow. The lover-god turned him into the tree that has his name, which he is said to carry as a consolation.[9]
It is unclear whether Servius is inventing anaition, a story to explain why Silvanus was depicted holding an evergreen bough, or recording an otherwise unknown version.[10] Elsewhere, Servius mentions a version in which the lover of Cyparissus wasZephyrus, the West Wind.[11] The cypress, he notes, was associated with theunderworld, either because they don't grow back when pruned too severely, or because inAttica households in mourning are garlanded with cypress.[12]
The myth of Cyparissus, like that ofHyacinthus, has often been interpreted as reflecting the social custom ofpederasty in ancient Greece, with the boy the beloved (eromenos) of Apollo.Pederastic myth represents the process ofinitiation into adult male life,[13] with a "death" and transfiguration for theeromenos. "In all these tales", notesKarl Kerényi, "the beautiful boys are doubles of [Apollo] himself."[14]
The stag as a gift from Apollo reflects the custom inArchaic Greek society of the older male (erastēs) giving his beloved an animal, an act often alluded to invase painting.[15] In the initiatory context, the hunt is a supervised preparation for the manly arts of war and a testing ground for behavior, with the stag embodying the gift of the hunter's prey.[16]
Similarly, the myth was used to explain the connection of the cypress tree to mourning and sorrow. Forbes-Irving has argued that the cypress as tree of mourning was mostly a Roman tradition, with little evidence of it playing such a role in Greek society.[17] It is possible however that the earlier Greek source of Cyparissus's myth diverged significantly from the surviving later ones, and was originally used to explain the connection of the cypress to Apollo specifically.[17]
The wordCupressus was used to describe agenus ofcypress trees; this genus was first described in the 18th century by theSwedishbiologistLinnaeus. In modern times there is a taxonomic debate regarding which species should be retained in the genusCupressus.[18]
Media related toCyparissus at Wikimedia Commons
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