Alseid

In Greek mythology, Alseids ( /ælˈsiːɪdz/ ; Ancient Greek : Ἀλσηΐδες, romanized: Alsēḯdes) were nymphs who inhabited groves. ^[1]

They are mentioned by Apollonius of Rhodes, ^[2] who relates that the woman Cleite hangs herself after the death of her husband, Cyzicus, who was killed by the hero Jason. ^[3] Upon her suicide: ^[4]

Even the woodland nymphs themselves lamented her death, and from all the tears they shed for her from their eyes to the ground, the goddesses made a spring, which they call Cleite, the famous name of the unfortunate bride.

A scholium on the Iliad (from the A family of scholia) ^[5] states explicitly that "Alseids" is the name given to nymphs who occupy groves. ^[6]

Notes

1. Grimal, s.v. Nymphs, p. 313; Oxford Classical Dictionary, s.v. Nymphs, p. 1056.
2. Larson, p. 281 n. 31.
3. Apollonius of Rhodes, 1.1053–1065. On Jason's killing of Cyzicus, see Brill's New Pauly, s.v. Doliones.
4. Apollonius of Rhodes, 1.1065–1069.
5. Erbse, p. 3.
6. Scholia A on Homer's Iliad , 20.8 (Dindorf, p. 193).

References

• Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica , edited and translated by William H. Race, Loeb Classical Library No. 1, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 2009. ISBN   978-0-674-99630-4. Harvard University Press.
• Dindorf, Karl Wilhelm, Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem, Volume II, Oxford, E. Typographeo Clarendoniano, 1875. Internet Archive. Perseus Digital Library.
• Erbse, Hartmut, Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem (Scholia vetera): Volumen V Scholia ad libros Y - Ω continens, Berlin, De Gruyter, 1977. ISBN   9783110069112. doi : 10.1515/9783110850222.
• Grimal, Pierre, The Dictionary of Classical Mythology, Malden, Oxford, and Carlton, Blackwell Publishing, 1986. ISBN   0631201025. Internet Archive.
• Larson, Jennifer, Greek Nymphs: Myth, Cult, Lore, Oxford University Press, 2001. ISBN   978-0-19-512294-7.
• Oxford Classical Dictionary , edited by Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press, 2003. ISBN   0198606419. Internet Archive.