Melia (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Melia or Melie (Ancient Greek Μελία, Μελίη) was the name of several figures.^[1] The name Melia comes from μελία, the ancient Greek word for ash-tree.^[2] In the plural, the Meliae were a class of nymphs associated with trees, particularly ash-trees. There were several other nymphs (or possible nymphs) named Melia, not necessarily associated with trees, these include:^[3]

• Melia, a Theban cult figure, who was the mother of Tenerus and Ismenus, by Apollo. She was said to be a daughter of Oceanus.
• Melia, mother of Phoroneus and Aegialeus, by her brother Inachus, the Argive river-god. She was also said to be a daughter of Oceanus.
• Melia, an Oceanid and a Bithynian nymph, who was the mother, by Poseidon, of Amycus, king of the Bebryces.
• Melia, the mother by Silenus of Dolion, the eponym of the Doliones. This is according to the third-century BC poet and grammarian Alexander Aetolus, as reported by the late first-century BC-early first-century AD geographer Strabo.^[4]
• Melia, the mother by Apollo of Keos, the eponym of the island Keos, according to the third-century BC poet Callimachus.^[5]

Two other personages named Melia, are known from scholia citing the fifth-century BC mythographer Pherecydes:

• Melia, daughter of King Agenor of Tyre and (daughter of King Belus of Egypt), and the sister of Phoenix and . She and her sister became the wives of their first cousins (and uncles) Danaus and Aegyptus, sons of Belus.^[6]
• Melia, one of the Niobids, the children of Amphion and his wife Niobe, slain by Apollo and Artemis, because of a boast by Niobe. According to the scholia, Pherecydes said she had seven brothers: , Phereus, Eudoros, , Xanthus, and Argeius, and six sisters: Chione, Clytie, , , and Pelopia.^[7]

Notes[]

References[]

• Callimachus: Aetia, Iambi, Hecale and Other Fragments; Musaeus: Hero and Leander. Edited and translated by C. A. Trypanis, T. Gelzer, Cedric H. Whitman. Loeb Classical Library No. 421. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1973. ISBN 978-0-674-99463-8. Online version at Harvard University Press.
• Fontenrose, Joseph Eddy, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and Its Origins, University of California Press, 1959. ISBN 9780520040915.
• Fowler, R. L. (2000), Early Greek Mythography: Volume 1: Text and Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN 978-0198147404.
• Fowler, R. L. (2013), Early Greek Mythography: Volume 2: Commentary, Oxford University Press, 2013. ISBN 978-0198147411.
• Gantz, Timothy, Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, Two volumes: ISBN 978-0-8018-5360-9 (Vol. 1), ISBN 978-0-8018-5362-3 (Vol. 2).
• Smith, William; Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, London (1867). Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
• Strabo, Geography, translated by Horace Leonard Jones; Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. (1924). LacusCurtis, Online version at the Perseus Digital Library, Books 6–14.

This article includes a list of Greek mythological figures with the same or similar names. If an for a specific Greek mythology article referred you to this page, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended Greek mythology article, if one exists.