Editing Charon

{{short description|Ferryman of Hades in Greek mythology}}
{{about|the mythological figure|the moon of Pluto|Charon (moon)|other uses}}
{{distinguish|text=the centaur [[Chiron]]}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2023}}
[[File:Attic Red Figure (White Ground) Lekythos with Charon, attributed to the Tymbos painter, ca 500 - 450 BC, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK (22681344331).jpg|thumb|right|Attic [[red-figure]] [[lekythos]] attributed to the Tymbos painter showing Charon welcoming a soul into his boat, c. 500–450 BC]]

In [[Greek mythology]], '''Charon''' or '''Kharon''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|k|ɛər|ɒ|n|,_|-|ən|audio=LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-Charon.wav}} {{respell|KAIR|on|,_-|ən}}; {{langx|grc|Χάρων}} {{IPA|grc|kʰá.rɔːn}}) is a [[psychopomp]], the ferryman of the [[Greek underworld]]. He carries the souls of those who have been given funeral rites across the rivers [[Acheron]] and [[Styx]], which separate the worlds of the living and the dead.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=Charon {{!}} Myth & Symbols|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Charon-Greek-mythology|access-date=2021-07-21|website=Encyclopædia Britannica|language=en}}</ref> Archaeology confirms that, in some burials, low-value coins known generically as [[Charon's obol]]s were placed in, on, or near the mouth of the deceased, or next to the cremation urn containing their ashes. This has been taken to confirm that at least some aspects of Charon's [[mytheme]] are reflected in some Greek and Roman funeral practices, or else the coins function as a [[viaticum]] for the soul's journey.<ref name=":0" /><ref>Coins were not placed on the eyes; all literary sources specify the mouth. [[Callimachus]], ''Hecale'' fragment 278 in R. Pfeiffer's text ''Callimachus'' (Oxford UP, 1949), vol.2, p. 262; now ordered as fragment 99 by A.S.D. Hollis, in his edition, ''Callimachus: Hecale'' (Clarendon Press, Oxford 1990), pp. 284f., from the [[Suda|Suidas]], English translation [https://books.google.com/books?id=bqVfAAAAMAAJ&dq=mouth+%22Wherefore+only+in+that+city%22+intitle:Callimachus+intitle:and+intitle:Lycophron&pg=PA267 online], specifying the mouth, also ''Etymologicum Graecum'' ("Danakes"). See also Smith's ''[[Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology]]'', entry on "Charon" [https://books.google.com/books?id=0DIGAAAAQAAJ&dq=%22coin+was+placed+in+the+mouth%22+intitle:Dictionary+intitle:of+intitle:Greek+intitle:and+intitle:Roman+intitle:Biography&pg=PA690 online] for placement in the mouth, though archaeology disproves Smith's statement that every corpse was given a [[Coins for the dead|coin]]; see article on [[Charon's obol]].</ref> In [[Virgil]]'s epic poem, ''[[Aeneid]]'', the dead who could not pay the fee, and those who had received no funeral rites, had to wander the near shores of the Styx for one hundred years before they were allowed to cross the river.<ref>[[Virgil]], ''[[Aeneid]]'' 6, 324–330.</ref> Charon also ferried the living mortals [[Heracles]] and [[Aeneas]] to the underworld and back again.

==Name origins==
The name Charon is most often explained as a [[proper noun]] from {{lang|grc|χάρων}} ({{transliteration|grc|charon}}), a poetic form of {{lang|grc|χαρωπός}} ({{transliteration|grc|charopós}}) 'of keen gaze', referring either to fierce, flashing, or feverish eyes, or to eyes of a bluish-grey color. The word may be a euphemism for death.<ref>Liddell and Scott, ''[[A Greek-English Lexicon]]'' (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1843, 1985 printing), entries on χαροπός and χάρων, pp. 1980–1981; ''Brill's New Pauly'' (Leiden and Boston 2003), vol. 3, entry on "Charon", pp. 202–203.</ref> Flashing eyes may indicate the anger or irascibility of Charon as he is often characterized in literature, but the etymology is not certain. The ancient historian [[Diodorus Siculus]] thought that the ferryman and his name had been imported from [[Ancient Egypt|Egypt]].<ref>Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood, ''"Reading" Greek Death'' (Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 359 [https://books.google.com/books?id=WBmyTsFEHEUC&dq=%22flashing+eyes%22+inauthor:sourvinou-Inwood&pg=PA359 online] and p. 390 [https://books.google.com/books?id=WBmyTsFEHEUC&dq=%22Charon%27s+name+is+problematic%22&pg=PA390 online.]</ref> Charon is first attested in the now fragmentary Greek epic poem [[Minyas (poem)|''Minyas'']], which includes a description of a descent to the underworld and possibly dates back to the 6th century BC.<ref>Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood, Charon (1), ''Oxford Classical Dictionary'', 1995, Published online: 7 March 2016
[https://oxfordre.com/classics/abstract/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-1527?sid=oup:orr&genre=book&title=‘Reading’%20Greek%20Death&aulast=Sourvinou-Inwood&date=1995] (accessed 28 September 2020)</ref>

==Genealogy==
[[File:Relief from the grave enclosure of Lysimachides. Ca. 320 B.C.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Charon and his boat on a funerary relief, ca 320s BC, [[Kerameikos Archaeological Museum|KAMA]].]]

No ancient source provides a [[genealogy]] for Charon,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hansen |first1=William F. |title=Handbook of classical mythology |date=2004 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |location=Santa Barbara, Calif. |isbn=9781576072264 |pages=136–137}}</ref> except for one reference making him a son of {{ill|Akmon (father of Uranus)|de|Akmon (Vater des Uranos)}}, found in the entry "Akmonides" in the lexicon of [[Hesychius of Alexandria|Hesychius]], which is dubious and the text may be corrupt.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sourvinou-Inwood |first1=Christiane |title="Reading" Greek death: to the end of the classical period |date=2006 |publisher=Clarendon Press |location=Oxford |isbn=9780198150695 |page=308 |edition=Reprinted |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WBmyTsFEHEUC&dq=%22Charon+almost+entirely+lacks+genealogical%22&pg=RA1-PA308}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hard |first1=Robin |last2=Rose |first2=Herbert J. |title=The Routledge handbook of Greek mythology: based on H.J. Rose's Handbook of Greek mythology |date=2008 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=9780415186360 |page=113 |edition=1. publ. in paperback}}</ref> Neither [[Realencyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft|Pauly-Wissowa]] nor [[Dictionnaire des Antiquités Grecques et Romaines|Daremberg and Saglio]] offer a genealogy for Charon.

In ''[[Genealogia Deorum Gentilium]]'', the [[Renaissance_humanism|Italian Renaissance]] writer [[Giovanni Boccaccio]] wrote that Charon, who he identified as the god of time, was a son of [[Erebus]] and [[Nyx|Night]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Boccaccio |first1=Giovanni |last2=Solomon |first2=Jon |title=Genealogy of the Pagan Gods. Volume 1: Books I-V |date=2011 |publisher=Harvard University Press |location=Cambridge, Mass. London, England |isbn=9780674057104 |pages=166–167}}</ref> The idea appears to have originated from the similarity between the names "Charon" and "[[Chronos]]" (a connection already made by earlier writers such as [[Fabius Planciades Fulgentius|Fulgentius]]), the fact that both are said to be very old, and that the [[Geras|god of old age]] is said to be the child of Erebus and Night according to [[Cicero]]'s ''[[De natura deorum]]''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Boccaccio |first1=Giovanni |last2=Papio |first2=Michael |title=Boccaccio's expositions on Dante's Comedy |date=2009 |publisher=Univ. of Toronto Press |location=Toronto |isbn=9780802099754 |page=630}}</ref>

==Appearance and demeanor==
[[File:Thanatos Painter ARV 1228 11 Charon receiving Hermes and a deceased woman (06).jpg|thumb|Charon with punt pole standing in his boat, receiving Hermes psychopompos who leads a deceased woman.  [[Thanatos Painter]], ca. 430 BC]]
[[File:CarontediMichelagelo.jpg|thumb|upright|Charon as depicted by [[Michelangelo]] in his fresco ''[[The Last Judgment (Michelangelo)|The Last Judgment]]'' in the [[Sistine Chapel]]]]

Charon is depicted in the [[Art in ancient Greece|art of ancient Greece]]. [[Classical Athens|Attic]] funerary [[Pottery of ancient Greece|vases]] of the 5th and 4th centuries BC are often decorated with scenes of the dead boarding Charon's boat. On the earlier such vases, he looks like a rough, unkempt Athenian seaman dressed in reddish-brown, holding his ferryman's pole in his right hand and using his left hand to receive the deceased. [[Hermes]] sometimes stands by in his role as [[psychopomp]]. On later vases, Charon is given a more "kindly and refined" demeanor.<ref>{{cite journal |first=L. V. |last=Grinsell |title=The Ferryman and His Fee: A Study in Ethnology, Archaeology, and Tradition |journal=[[Folklore (journal)|Folklore]] |volume=68 |year=1957 |issue=1 |pages=257–269 [p. 261] |jstor=1258157 |doi=10.1080/0015587X.1957.9717576 }}</ref>

In the 1st century BC, the [[Latin poetry|Roman poet]] [[Virgil]] describes Charon, manning his rust-colored skiff, in the course of [[Aeneas]]'s [[descent to the underworld]] (''[[Aeneid]]'', Book 6), after the [[Cumaean Sibyl]] has directed the hero to [[The Golden Bough (mythology)|the golden bough]] that will allow him to return to the world of the living:
<blockquote>There Charon stands, who rules the dreary coast;<br>A sordid god: down from his hairy chin<br>A length of beard descends, uncombed, unclean;<br>His eyes, like hollow furnaces on fire;<br>A girdle, foul with grease, binds his obscene attire.<ref>[[Virgil]], ''[[Aeneid]]'' [http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:latinLit:phi0690.phi003.perseus-eng1:6.295-6.336 6.298–301], as translated by [[John Dryden]].</ref></blockquote>

Other Latin authors also describe Charon, among them [[Seneca the Younger|Seneca]] in his tragedy ''Hercules Furens'', where Charon is described in verses 762–777 as an old man clad in foul garb, with haggard cheeks and an unkempt beard, a fierce ferryman who guides his craft with a long pole. When the boatman tells Heracles to halt, the Greek hero uses his strength to gain passage, overpowering Charon with the boatman's own pole.<ref>See [[Ron Terpening|Ronnie H. Terpening]], ''Charon and the Crossing: Ancient, Medieval, and Renaissance Transformations of a Myth'' (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, 1985 and London and Toronto: Associated University Presses, 1985), pp. 97–98.</ref>

In the second century, [[Lucian of Samosata|Lucian]] employed Charon as a figure in his ''Dialogues of the Dead'', most notably in Parts 4 and 10 ("Hermes and Charon" and "Charon and Hermes").<ref>For an analysis of these dialogues, see Terpening, pp. 107–116.</ref>

[[Image:Gustave Doré - Dante Alighieri - Inferno - Plate 10 (Canto III - Charon herds the sinners onto his boat).jpg|thumb|left|In the ''[[Divine Comedy]]'', Charon forces reluctant sinners onto his boat by beating them with his oar. ([[Gustave Doré]], 1857).]]

In the 14th century, [[Dante Alighieri]] described Charon in his ''[[Divine Comedy]]'', drawing from Virgil's depiction in ''Aeneid'' 6. Charon is the first named mythological character Dante meets in the underworld, in Canto III of the ''[[Divine Comedy|Inferno]]''. Dante depicts him as having eyes of fire. Elsewhere, Charon appears as a mean-spirited and gaunt old man or as a winged demon wielding a double hammer, although Michelangelo's interpretation, influenced by Dante's depiction in the ''Inferno'', shows him with an oar over his shoulder, ready to beat those who delay ("batte col remo qualunque s'adagia", ''Inferno'' 3, verse 111).<ref>For an analysis of Dante's depiction of Charon and other appearances in literature from antiquity through the 17th century in Italy, see [[Ron Terpening|Terpening]], ''Charon and the Crossing''.</ref> In modern times, he is commonly depicted as a living skeleton in a [[cowl]], much like the [[Grim Reaper]]. The French artist [[Gustave Dore]] depicted Charon in two of his illustrations for Dante's ''Divine Comedy''. The Flemish painter [[Joachim Patinir]] depicted Charon in his ''Crossing the River Styx''. And the Spanish painter [[Jose Benlliure y Gil]] portrayed Charon in his ''La Barca de Caronte''.

Though named after Charon, the Etruscan death-demon [[Charun]] has a different origin and functions, being an assistant to Death as well as psychopomp and guardian, delivering the newly dead to the underworld by horseback or chariot. He is winged, with pointed ears and a hideous and threatening appearance, and has a vulture's beak. He is armed with a very large hammer, with which to "mercilessly pummel" the dead.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Abel |first=Ernest |title=Death Gods: an Encyclopedia of the Rulers, Evil Spirits, and Geographies of the Dead |publisher=ABC-CLIO, LLC |year=2009 |isbn=9780313357138 |pages=41, 61, 125, 139 |language=English}}</ref><ref>DeGrummond, Nancy & Simon, Erika, ''The Religion of the Etruscans'', University of Texas Press, 2006, p. 57.</ref>

==The Acheron and the Styx==
{{Greek myth (Hades)}}
Most accounts, including [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] (10.28) and later [[Dante Alighieri|Dante]]'s ''Inferno'' (3.78), associate Charon with the swamps of the river [[Acheron]]. Ancient Greek literary sources such as [[Pindar]], [[Aeschylus]], [[Euripides]], [[Plato]], and [[Callimachus]] also place Charon on the Acheron. Roman poets, including [[Propertius]], [[Ovid]], and [[Statius]], name the river as the [[Styx]], perhaps following the geography of Virgil's underworld in the ''[[Aeneid]],'' where Charon is associated with both rivers.<ref>See [http://www.theoi.com/Khthonios/Kharon.html Kharon at theoi.com] for collected source passages with work and line annotations, as well as images from [[pottery of ancient Greece|vase paintings]].</ref>

==In astronomy==
[[Charon (moon)|Charon]], the largest moon of the [[dwarf planet]] [[Pluto]], is named after him.<ref>{{cite web | title=Two of Pluto's Moons Get Names From Greek Mythology's Underworld| author=Dennis Overbye|newspaper=[[The New York Times]] | date=2 July 2013 | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/03/science/space/two-of-plutos-moons-get-names-from-greek-mythologys-underworld.html | archive-url=https://archive.today/20221111154144/https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/03/science/space/two-of-plutos-moons-get-names-from-greek-mythologys-underworld.html| archive-date=2022-11-11 | url-status=live}}</ref>

==In paleontology==
The hadrosaurid ''[[Charonosaurus]]'' is named in Charon's honor because it was found along the banks of the Amur River in the Far East.<ref>Godefroit, Pascal; Shuqin Zan; Liyong Jin (2000). "Charonosaurus jiayinensis n. g., n. sp., a lambeosaurine dinosaur from the Late Maastrichtian of northeastern China". ''[[Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences]]'', Série IIA. 330: 875–882. Bibcode:2000CRASE.330..875G. doi:10.1016/S1251-8050(00)00214-7.</ref>

==See also==
* [[Charun]] – in many respects, an Etruscan equivalent to Charon
* [[Coins for the dead]]
* ''[[Isle of the Dead (painting)|Isle of the Dead]]'' – a painting by Swiss [[Symbolism (arts)|Symbolist]] artist [[Arnold Böcklin]] 
* [[Manannán mac Lir]] – Ferryman from [[Irish mythology]]
* [[Manunggul Jar]] – Early depiction similar figure on burial jar from [[Tabon Caves]] on [[Palawan]]
* [[Phlegyas]] – a Greek king seen ferrying Dante and Virgil across the Styx in [[Inferno (Dante)]]
* [[Urshanabi]] – Ferryman from [[Mesopotamian mythology]]

==References==
'''Notes'''
{{Reflist}}

'''Bibliography'''
* Bzinkowski, Michal (2017). ''Masks of Charos in Modern Greek Demotic Songs: Sources, Representations, and Context''. Krakow: [[Jagiellonian University]] Press. {{ISBN|978-83-233-4330-1}}.
* [[William Smith (lexicographer)|Smith, William]] (1873). [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0104%3Aentry%3Dcharon-bio-1 "Charon"]. ''[[Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology]]''. London.

== External links ==
{{commons category}}
{{Wiktionary|Charon}}
* [https://iconographic.warburg.sas.ac.uk/category/vpc-taxonomy-000297 The Warburg Institute Iconographic Database (images of Charon)] 

{{Greek religion}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Charon (Mythology)}}
[[Category:Greek underworld]]
[[Category:Greek death gods]]
[[Category:Residents of the Greek underworld]]
[[Category:Psychopomps]]
[[Category:Characters in Book VI of the Aeneid]]
[[Category:Metamorphoses characters]]
[[Category:Chthonic beings]]
[[Category:Characters in the Divine Comedy]]