[332] Ἢ λάθετ᾽, ἢ οὐκ ἐνόησεν· ἀάσατο δὲ μέγα θυμῷ. (Iliad, ix. 533). The destructive influence of Atê is mentioned before, v. 502. The piety of Xenophôn reproduces this ancient circumstance,—Οἴνεως δ᾽ ἐν γήρᾳ ἐπιλαθομένου τῆς θεοῦ, etc. (De Venat. c. i.)
[333] These priests formed the Chorus in the Meleager of Sophoklês (Schol. ad Iliad. _ib._ 575).
Such is the legend of Meleager in the Iliad: a verse in the second book mentions simply the death of Meleager, without farther details, as a reason why Thoas appeared in command of the Ætôlians before Troy.[335] Though the circumstance is indicated only indirectly, there seems little doubt that Homer must have conceived the death of the hero as brought about by the maternal curse: the unrelenting Erinnys executed to the letter the invocations of Althæa, though she herself must have been willing to retract them.
Later poets both enlarged and altered the fable. The Hesiodic Eoiai, as well as the old poem called the Minyas, represented Meleager as having been slain by Apollo, who aided the Kurêtes in the war; and the incident of the burning brand, though quite at variance with Homer, is at least as old as the tragic poet Phrynichus, earlier than Æschylus.[336] The Mœræ, or Fates, presenting themselves to Althæa shortly after the birth of Meleager, predicted that the child would die so soon as the brand then burning on the fire near at hand should be consumed. Althæa snatched it from the flames and extinguished it, preserving it with the utmost care, until she became incensed against Meleager for the death of her brother. She then cast it into the fire, and as soon as it was consumed the life of Meleager was brought to a close.
[336] Pausan. x. 31. 2. The Πλευρώνιαι, a lost tragedy of Phrynichus.
We know, from the sharp censure of Pliny, that Sophoklês heightened the pathos of this subject by his account of the mournful death of Meleager’s sisters, who perished from excess of grief. They were changed into the birds called Meleagrides, and their never-ceasing tears ran together into amber.[337] But in the hands of Euripidês—whether originally through him or not,[338] we cannot tell—Atalanta became the prominent figure and motive of the piece, while the party convened to hunt the Kalydônian boar was made to comprise all the distinguished heroes from every quarter of Greece. In fact, as Heyne justly remarks, this event is one of the four aggregate dramas of Grecian heroic life,[339] along with the Argonautic expedition, the siege of Thêbes, and the Trojan war. To accomplish the destruction of the terrific animal which Artemis in her wrath had sent forth, Meleager assembled not merely the choice youth among the Kurêtes and Ætôlians (as we find in the Iliad), but an illustrious troop, including Kastôr and Pollux, Idas and Lynkeus, Pêleus and Telamôn, Thêseus and Peirithous, Ankæus and Kêpheus, Jasôn, Amphiaraus, Admêtus, Eurytiôn and others. Nestôr and Phœnix, who appear as old men before the walls of Troy, exhibited their early prowess as auxiliaries to the suffering Kalydônians.[340] Conspicuous amidst them all stood the virgin Atalanta, daughter of the Arcadian Schœneus; beautiful and matchless for swiftness of foot, but living in the forest as a huntress and unacceptable to Aphroditê.[341] Several of the heroes were slain by the boar, others escaped by various stratagems: at length Atalanta first shot him in the back, next Amphiaraus in the eye, and, lastly, Meleager killed him. Enamoured of the beauty of Atalanta, Meleager made over to her the chief spoils of the animal, on the plea that she had inflicted the first wound. But his uncles, the brothers of Thestius, took them away from her, asserting their rights as next of kin,[342] if Meleager declined to keep the prize for himself: the latter, exasperated at this behavior, slew them. Althæa, in deep sorrow for her brothers and wrath against her son, is impelled to produce the fatal brand which she had so long treasured up, and consign it to the flames.[343] The tragedy concludes with the voluntary death both of Althæa and Kleopatra.