Apollodorus, Library, ed. Sir James George Frazer, 1.1.4

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[4]
But Earth, grieved at the destruction of her children, who had been cast into Tartarus, persuaded the Titans to attack their father and gave Cronus an adamantine sickle. And they, all but Ocean, attacked him, and Cronus cut off his father's genitals and threw them into the sea; and from the drops of the flowing blood were born Furies, to wit, Alecto, Tisiphone, and Megaera.¹ And, having dethroned their father, they brought up their brethren who had been hurled down to Tartarus, and committed the sovereignty to Cronus.

Library. Apollodorus. ed. Sir James George Frazer. Cambridge, MA. 1921.

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Current edition Perseus

Library (English) (Apollodorus. The Library, Vol 1-2. Frazer, James George, Sir, translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.)

Editions (1)

Βιβλιοθήκη Perseus (Apollodorus. The Library, Vol 1-2. Frazer, James George, Sir, editor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.) — 1.1.4 focus

[4] ἀγανακτοῦσα δὲ Γῆ ἐπὶ τῇ ἀπωλείᾳ τῶν εἰς Τάρταρον ῥιφέντων παίδων πείθει τοὺς Τιτᾶνας ἐπιθέσθαι τῷ πατρί, καὶ δίδωσιν ἀδαμαντίνην ἅρπην Κρόνῳ. οἱ δὲ Ὠκεανοῦ χωρὶς ἐπιτίθενται, καὶ Κρόνος ἀποτεμὼν τὰ αἰδοῖα τοῦ πατρὸς εἰς τὴν θάλασσαν ἀφίησεν. ἐκ δὲ τῶν σταλαγμῶν τοῦ ῥέοντος αἵματος ἐρινύες ἐγένοντο, Ἀληκτὼ Τισιφόνη Μέγαιρα. τῆς δὲ ἀρχῆς ἐκβαλόντες τούς τε καταταρταρωθέντας ἀνήγαγον ἀδελφοὺς καὶ τὴν ἀρχὴν Κρόνῳ παρέδοσαν.

Notes on the current edition

Library

1. Compare Hes. Th. 156-190 . Here Apollodorus follows Hesiod, according to whom the Furies sprang, not from the genitals of Sky which were thrown into the sea, but from the drops of his blood which fell on Earth and impregnated her. The sickle with which Cronus did the deed is said to have been flung by him into the sea at Cape Drepanum in Achaia ( Paus. 7.23.4 ). The barbarous story of the mutilation of the divine father by his divine son shocked the moral sense of later ages. See Plat. Rep. 2, 377e-378a ; Plat. Euthyph. 5e-6a ; Cicero, De natura deorum ii.24.63ff. Andrew Lang interpreted the story with some probability as one of a worldwide class of myths intended to explain the separation of Earth and Sky. See Andrew Lang, Custom and Myth (London, 1884), pp. 45ff. , and as to myths of the forcible separation of Sky and Earth, see E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture, i.322ff.

Apollodorus Library 1.1.4

ed. Sir James George Frazer

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