HYACINTHUS,[1] in Greek mythology, the youngest son of the Spartan king Amyclas, who reigned at Amyclae (so Pausanias iii. 1. 3, iii. 19. 5; and Apollodorus i. 3. 3, iii. 10. 3). Other stories make him son of Oebalus, of Eurotas, or of Pierus and the nymph Clio (see Hyginus, _Fabulae_, 271; Lucian, _De saltatione_, 45, and _Dial. deor._ 14). According to the general story, which is probably late and composite, his great beauty attracted the love of Apollo, who killed him accidentally when teaching him to throw the _discus_ (quoit); others say that Zephyrus (or Boreas) out of jealousy deflected the quoit so that it hit Hyacinthus on the head and killed him. According to the representation on the tomb at Amyclae (Pausanias, _loc. cit._) Hyacinthus was translated into heaven with his virgin sister Polyboea. Out of his blood there grew the flower known as the hyacinth, the petals of which were marked with the mournful exclamation AI, AI, "alas" (cf. "that sanguine flower inscribed with woe"). This Greek hyacinth cannot have been the flower which now bears the name: it has been identified with a species of iris and with the larkspur (_Delphinium Aiacis_), which appear to have the markings described. The Greek hyacinth was also said to have sprung from the blood of Ajax. Evidently the Greek authorities confused both the flowers and the traditions.
The death of Hyacinthus was celebrated at Amyclae by the second most important of Spartan festivals, the Hyacinthia, which took place in the Spartan month Hecatombeus. What month this was is not certain. Arguing from Xenophon (_Hell._ iv. 5) we get May; assuming that the Spartan Hecatombeus is the Attic Hecatombaion, we get July; or again it may be the Attic Scirophorion, June. At all events the Hyacinthia was an early summer festival. It lasted three days, and the rites gradually passed from mourning for Hyacinthus to rejoicings in the majesty of Apollo, the god of light and warmth, and giver of the ripe fruits of the earth (see a passage from Polycrates, _Laconica_, quoted by Athenaeus 139 d; criticized by L. R. Farnell, _Cults of the Greek States_, iv. 266 foll.). This festival is clearly connected with vegetation, and marks the passage from the youthful verdure of spring to the dry heat of summer and the ripening of the corn.