Editing Tithonus

{{Short description|Mythological prince of Troy}}
{{Other uses}}
{{Infobox deity
| type = Greek
| name = Tithonus
| image = Red-figure kylix Eos and Tithonos (Boston MFA 95.28) (cropped).jpg
| caption = Attic red-figure kylix with Eos and Tithonus, 5th century BC ([[Museum of Fine Arts, Boston]])
| consort = [[Eos]]
| parents = [[Laomedon of Troy]] and Strymo
| siblings = [[Priam]], [[Lampus]], [[Hicetaon]], [[Clytius]], [[Hesione]], [[Cilla (mythology)|Cilla]], [[Astyoche]], [[Proclia]], [[Aethilla]], [[Clytodora]]
| children = [[Memnon (mythology)|Memnon]], [[Emathion]]
}}
In [[Greek mythology]], '''Tithonus''' ({{IPAc-en|t|ɪ|ˈ|θ|oʊ|n|ə|s}} or {{IPAc-en|t|aɪ|-}}; {{langx|grc|Τιθωνός|Tithonos}}) was the lover of  [[Eos]], Goddess of the Dawn.{{efn-lr|Daughter of the [[Titan (mythology)|Titans]] [[Hyperion (mythology)|Hyperion]] and [[Theia]], Eos ([[Aurora (mythology)|Aurora]] in [[Latin]]) was the sister of [[Helios]] and [[Selene]].  As one of the major offspring of the Titans, she is sometimes referred to as one of the ''Titanides'' (a Titaness; the English plural "Titanesses" is rarely used), but like the [[Twelve Olympians|Olympians]], is usually described by the more general term "goddess".}}  He was a prince of [[Troy]], the son of King [[Laomedon]] by the [[Naiad]] Strymo ({{lang|grc|Στρυμώ}}<!--Unreferenced etymology: "harsh"-->).{{efn-lr|In an alternative version of the myth, mentioned by [[Pseudo-Apollodorus]], Tithonus was the son of [[Cephalus]], another lover of Eos, and father of [[Phaethon]].<ref>Pseudo-Apollodorus, ''Bibliotheca'', [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+3.14.3 3.14.3]</ref>}} The mythology reflected by the fifth-century vase-painters of Athens envisaged Tithonus as a ''[[rhapsode]]'', as attested by the lyre in his hand, on an [[oinochoe]] (wine jug) of the [[Achilles Painter]], ''circa'' 470–460 BC.

An asteroid [[6998 Tithonus|(6998)]] has been named after Tithonus.

==Etymology==
Tithonus has been taken by the allegorist to mean ‘a grant of a stretching-out’ (from ''teinō'' and ''ōnė''), a reference to the stretching-out of his life, at Eos’s plea; but it is likely, rather, to have been a masculine form of Eos’s own name, Titonë – from ''titō'', ‘day<ref>[[John Tzetzes|Tzetzes]] on [[Lycophron]], ''Alexandra'' 941</ref> and onë, ‘queen’ – and to have meant ‘partner of the Queen of Day’.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Graves|first=Robert|title=The Greek Myths - The Complete and Definitive Edition|publisher=Penguin Books Limited|year=2017|isbn=9780241983386|pages=150}}</ref>

==Mythology==
[[File:Tithonos Eos Louvre G438 detail.jpg|thumb|Eos pursues the reluctant Tithonus, who holds a [[lyre]], on an [[Attica|Attic]] ''[[oinochoe]]'' of the [[Achilles Painter]], {{Circa|470–460 BC}} ([[Musée du Louvre|Louvre]]).]]
Eos is said to have taken Tithonus, from the royal house of Troy, to be her lover.{{efn-lr|In the [[Homeric Hymn|Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite]], Tithonus is cited as an example to [[Anchises]], another Trojan prince, later abducted by [[Aphrodite]].}}<ref name="Aphrodite 218">''Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite'', 218 ''ff''.</ref> The myth of Eos and Tithonus' love was known to [[Homer]], who wrote that in the morning Eos rose from the bed she shared with Tithonus in order to give her light to mankind.<ref>[[Homer]], ''[[Odyssey]]'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text.jsp?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0218%3Abook%3D5%3Acard%3D1 5.1]: "And now, as Dawn rose from her couch beside Tithonos - harbinger of light alike to mortals and immortals." Trans. [[Samuel Butler (novelist)|Samuel Butler]].</ref>

The [[mytheme]] of the goddess' mortal lover is an archaic one; when a role for Zeus was inserted, a bitter twist appeared: according to the [[Homeric Hymn]] to Aphrodite, when Eos asked Zeus to make Tithonus [[immortality|immortal]], she forgot to ask that he be granted [[eternal youth]].{{efn-lr|Compare the mytheme in its original, blissful form, in the pairing of [[Selene]] and [[Endymion (mythology)|Endymion]], a myth that also associated with Asia Minor.  Peter Walcot considers Tithonus a "corrective" example to the myth of Ganymede: "the example of Ganymedes promises too much, and might beguile Anchises into expecting too much, even an ageless immortality".  ("The Homeric 'Hymn' to Aphrodite: A Literary Appraisal" in ''Greece & Rome'' 2nd Series, vol. 38, part 2 (October 1991), pp. 137–155, at 149.)}}{{efn-lr|In one version, Zeus decided he wanted the beautiful youth Ganymede for himself; to repay Eos, he promised to fulfill one wish.}}<ref>''Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite'', 218–238.</ref> Tithonus indeed lived forever,
<blockquote>but when loathsome old age pressed full upon him, and he could not move nor lift his limbs, this seemed to her in her heart the best counsel: she laid him in a room and put to the shining doors. There he babbles endlessly, and no more has strength at all, such as once he had in his supple limbs.<ref name="Aphrodite 218" /></blockquote>

In later tellings, he eventually became a [[cicada]] (''tettix''),<ref name=":rh">Hard, Robin, ''The Routledge Handbook of Greek Mythology: Based on H.J. Rose's "Handbook of Greek Mythology"'', Psychology Press, 2004, {{ISBN|9780415186360}}, [https://books.google.com/books?id=r1Y3xZWVlnIC&pg=PA47 p. 47].</ref><ref>Keightley, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=lWAEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA63 63]; [[Suda]], s.v [https://topostext.org/work/240#si.122 "Old Man Tithonus"].</ref>  eternally living, but begging for death to overcome him.{{efn-lr|In some variants, Eos deliberately turns Tithonus into a cricket or a cicada.}} In the [[Olympian gods|Olympian system]], the "queenly" and "golden-throned" Eos can no longer grant immortality to her lover as [[Selene]] had done, but must ask it of Zeus, as a boon. In the account of [[Hieronymus of Rhodes]] from the third century BC, the blame is shifted from Eos onto Tithonus, who asked for immortality but not agelessness from his lover, who was then unable to help him otherwise and turned him into a cicada.<ref>Tsagalis and Markantonatos, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=sFA_DwAAQBAJ&pg=PT297 297]</ref> [[Propertius]] wrote that Eos did not forsake Tithonus, old and aged as he was, and would still embrace him and hold him in her arms rather than leaving him deserted in his cold chamber, while cursing the gods for his cruel fate.<ref>[[Propertius]], ''Elegies'' [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0494%3Abook%3D2%3Apoem%3D18b 2.18b]</ref>

This myth might have been used to explain why cicadas were particularly noisy during the early hours of the morning, when the dawn appears in the sky.<ref>[[Loeb Classical Library]], ''Homeric Hymns, Homeric Apocrypha, Lives of Homer'', 2003,  [https://archive.org/details/homerichymnshome0000home/page/176/mode/2up?view=theater p. 177, note 48]</ref> Sir [[James George Frazer]] notes that among ancient Greeks and several other peoples there was a widespread belief that creatures that can shed their skin renew their youth and live forever.<ref>See Frazer's note on [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]] [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Apollod.+3.12.4&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0022#note1 3.12.4]</ref> It might also be a reference to the fact that the high-pitched talk of old men was compared to the cicadas' singing, as seen in a passage from the ''[[Iliad]]''.<ref name=":rh"/> In fact the ancient Greeks would use a cicada sitting on a harp as an emblem of music.<ref>{{cite news | url = http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article16435670 | title = The Cicada | newspaper = [[The Sydney Morning Herald]] | date = 21 January 1928 | access-date = 7 June 2013 | page = 21 | publisher = National Library of Australia}}</ref>

Eos bore Tithonus two sons, [[Memnon (mythology)|Memnon]] and [[Emathion]]. According to Quintus Smyrnaeus, Memnon was raised by the [[Hesperides]] on the coast of Oceanus.<ref>Quintus Smyrnaeus, ''Fall of Troy'', ii. 495.</ref> According to the historian [[Diodorus Siculus]], Tithonus, who had travelled east from Troy into [[Assyria]] and founded [[Susa]], was bribed with a golden grapevine to send his son Memnon to fight at Troy against the Greeks.<ref>Diodorus Siculus book 4.75, book 2.22.</ref>

The [[Tithonus poem]] is one of the few nearly complete works of the Greek lyric poet [[Sappho]], having been pieced together from fragments discovered over a period of more than a hundred years.{{efn-lr|The first modern printing of the complete poem was published in two sections by Michael Gronewald and Robert W. Daniel in ''Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik'' vol. 147, pp. 1–8, and vol. 149, pp. 1–4 (2004); an English translation by [[Martin Litchfield West|Martin West]] is printed in the ''Times Literary Supplement'', 21 or 24 June 2005.  The right half of this poem was previously found in fragment 58 L-P.  The fully restored version can be found in M. L. West, "The New Sappho", in ''Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik'', vol. 151, pp. 1–9 (2005).}}
 
Eos (as [[Thesan]]) and Tithonus (as Tinthu or Tinthun) provided a pictorial motif inscribed or cast in low relief on the backs of [[Etruscan civilization|Etruscan]] bronze hand-mirrors.{{efn-lr|As on one in the [[Vatican Museums]], Museo Gregoriano Etrusco, acc. no. 12241}}<ref>Marilyn Y. Goldberg, "The 'Eos and Kephalos' from Caere: Its Subject and Date", in ''American Journal of Archaeology'' vol. 91, part 4, pp. 605–614, fig. 2 (October, 1987).</ref>

==In modern culture==
* Tithonus as an aged immortal is mentioned in Book I, Canto II, Stanza VII of Edmund Spenser's ''[[The Faerie Queene]]''.
* "[[Tithonus (poem)|Tithonus]]" by [[Alfred Tennyson]] was originally written as "Tithon" in 1833 and completed in 1859.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/tennyson/tithonus.html|title=Victorian Web: Alfred Tennyson's "Tithonus"|accessdate=2006-09-02}}</ref> The poem is a dramatic monologue in [[blank verse]] from the point of view of Tithonus. Unlike the original myth, it is Tithonus who asks for immortality, and it is [[Aurora (mythology)|Aurora]], not Zeus, who grants this imperfect gift. As narrator, Tithonus laments his unnatural longevity, which separates him from the mortal world as well as from the immortal but beautiful Aurora.
* German philosopher [[Johann Gottfried Herder]]'s book "Tithonus und Aurora" was published in 1792.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f7lRAAAAcAAJ|title=Tithonus und Aurora|publisher=[[Ettinger]]|year=1792}}</ref>
* "Tithon" is mentioned in the poem "On Imagination" by [[Phillis Wheatley]].
* [[Sappho]]'s "Old Age Poem", sometimes known as the "[[Tithonus poem]]", discusses beauty and ageing.

== See also ==
{{Portal|Mythology|Ancient Greece}}

* [[Aurora (goddess)|Aurora]]
* [[Cumaean Sibyl]], another mortal who was granted an extended lifetime but not eternal youth
* [[Tithonus (The X-Files)]], an episode of the X-Files that is a modern retelling of the story.
* [[Selemnus (god)|Selemnus]], a mortal man who was abandoned by his immortal lover after growing old
* [[Myia (mythology)|Myia]], another mythological insect.

==Footnotes==
{{Reflist|group=lower-roman|30em}}

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==Further reading==
* [[Robert Graves|Graves, Robert]], ''The Greek Myths: The Complete and Definitive Edition.'' Penguin Books Limited. 2017. {{ISBN|978-0-241-98338-6|024198338X}}
*Segal, Charles. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/44578386 "Tithonus and the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite: A Comment."] ''Arethusa'' 19, no. 1 (1986): 37–47. Accessed May 10, 2020.

== External links ==
{{Commons category|Tithonus}}
{{Wikiquote}}
{{EB1911 poster|Tithonus}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060929201235/http://tls.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25337-1886659,00.html Sappho's poem]
* [http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/TITHONUS.HTML Tennyson's poem] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/19970214035953/http://charon.sfsu.edu/Tennyson/TITHONUS.HTML |date=1997-02-14 }}
* {{cite web | url=http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/tennyson/tithonus.html|title=Victorian Web: Alfred Tennyson's "Tithonus"|accessdate=2006-09-02}}

{{Metamorphoses in Greco-Roman mythology}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Trojans]]
[[Category:Princes in Greek mythology]]
[[Category:Metamorphoses into arthropods in Greek mythology]]
[[Category:Tithonian| ]]
[[Category:Mythological insects]]
[[Category:Mythological rape victims]]
[[Category:Immortality]]
[[Category:Consorts of Eos]]