The Hellenes - tireless travelers, adventurers, sea robbers and merchants - had an inexhaustible imagination. They populated the low, two and a half kilometers, Mount Olympus with immortal and beautiful outwardly, but essentially insidious gods, who always rejoiced if people had troubles. The Hellenes surrounded their unkind gods with retinues of beautiful girls - nymphs - and scary satyrs - half people, half animals. Satyrs and nymphs did not live in cloudless heavenly expanses with the highest gods, but on earth.
Nymphs and satyrs - gods of what?
The fantasy of the ancient Greeks knew no bounds, and when enlightened Europeans learned the myths and legends of the Hellenes during the Renaissance, the ancient gods, satyrs and nymphs served as an inexhaustible source of inspiration for writers, artists and musicians. They learned that the spirits of the mountains were the nymphs of the Oread, the spirits of the forests and trees were the dryads, and the spirits of the springs were the naiads. In the meadows and valleys lived limnads and napei, and in the seas and oceans - nereids and oceanids. The Greeks composed interesting legends about many of them, but more on that below. Peter Paul Rubens createdwonderful portrait of two fauns.
Their appearance - curly unkempt hair with a wreath of grape leaves and horns, a flattened nose red from drunkenness and in powerful hands - a bunch of grapes from which wine is made - fully corresponds to the descriptions of the Greeks. Only the tail is missing. Satyrs did not have specific habitats: on their goat legs, always lustful, often drunk, they galloped everywhere, chasing nymphs, until they were called to service by the god Dionysus or the god Pan. This description should answer the question: "Inferior deities, satyrs and nymphs, gods of what?" These are spirits that, according to the Greeks, inhabited all the nature around them. The satyrs often pursued the nymphs with the basest motives, but the beautiful girls ran away from them.
Legends of the nymphs
Satyrs and nymphs in myths did not always coexist. The story of the nymph Daphne tells how Eros laughed at the beautiful Phoebus, shooting an arrow at him, causing love, and killing the nymph Daphne. So perfection itself, Phoebus, seeing Daphne, began to pursue her, begging for love. But the daughter of the river god Peneus, quickly running away from persecution and feeling that her strength was leaving her, prayed to her father. She asked him to help her escape and take away her earthly appearance. And immediately her slender figure began to be covered with bark, her hands raised in prayer turned into branches and foliage rustled on them. The girl turned into a laurel tree. With sadness, Phoebus stood next to the laurel. He asked him for branches to make himself a wreath, and the tree rustled its leaves and as a signagreement bowed the crown to Apollo. The nymphs peeking out from the branches of the trees made up the retinue of Phoebe's sister, Artemis's hunter.
And what fun it was - girls laughing, dogs barking. And when Artemis got tired on the hunt, then they all danced together to the sounds of Phoebe's cithara.
In mountains and valleys
In the legend below, satyrs and nymphs do not unite again. The nymph Echo, to her misfortune, met the beautiful Narcissus who does not love anyone. She could not speak to him herself, since the goddess Hera allowed her only to respond to someone's speeches. And Narcissus, punished by Aphrodite for not responding to the tender feelings of Echo, fell in love with himself and died, peering at his reflection in the water.
Grape harvest
Sometimes nymphs and satyrs meet peacefully and gather together the fruits that the earth gives them.
The painting by Rubens depicts just such a moment. In the foreground stands a powerful satyr who holds a wicker basket filled with bunches of green and black grapes and other fruits. Behind him stands a charming nymph who helped him. This time is the time of complete harmony in nature.
Dionysus and Pan
Among the retinue of the mysterious, mocking and formidable god Dionysus, you can meet not only satyrs, but also the god Pan. His father was Hermes and his mother was the nymph Dryopa. When Pan was born, the mother, having cast only one glance at the child, ran away in horror. Oh nightmare! The kid had a beard, goat legs and horns. But Hermes was delighted with his child and took him to show the Olympians. They all just laughed. Pan descended to earth and began to live on it. Shady groves and mountains became his refuge. In them, Pan tends herds and plays the flute. Nymphs gather to him and dance around him. The sounds of his flute are gentle and full of sadness. After all, Pan was in love with the wonderful nymph Syringa, who, in order not to return his love, turned into a reed on the banks of the river. The saddened Pan made himself a syringa pipe from a reed and has not parted with it since then.
Satires
They look like Pan, but don't have his nobility. They are lazy, dissolute, always drunk and love to sing at the same time. When the satyrs do not accompany Dionysus, they spend their time looking for the nymphs.
Playing flutes, sitting under the shady trees, they try to attract the attention of beautiful girls. But their rudeness and arrogance repel women from them. Everyone who sees them tries to escape from the satyrs. Together with the maenads, they participate in the bacchanalia and orgiastic festivities of Dionysus. According to legend, it was the satyrs who saved Ariadne when she fled from the island of Crete. After that, Ariadne became the wife of Dionysus. Satyrs are wild untamed nature.
This is how the Greeks perceived nature, populating it with nymphs, deities and spirits of forests, fields, mountains, water, but there was no complete serenity in it, which is why satyrs appeared.
