DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14696#0077
28 Death by lightning as euthanasia
slain1. The earliest definite version of the occurrence is in the
Bakcliai of Euripides, who speaks of—
Semele brought to bed by the lightning-fire2
and further of—•
The flame of Zeus-fire living yet3.
These expressions may be taken to imply the more primitive idea
that Zeus descended upon Semele in the form of a lightning-flash.
And such seems to be the conception of Philostratos also. For, in
describing a picture of Semele's death, he notes the personified figures
of stern-looking Thunder and Lightning with flashing eyes, and
adds that fire was dashing down from the sky upon the palace, but
makes no mention of Zeus beyond saying that 'A cloud of fire
compassed Thebes about and burst upon the roof of Kadmos, when
Zeus went courting Semele4.' Nonnos too in his high-flown style
makes Semele beseech her lover:
Oh, I would clasp the flame I love, and joy
To feel the flash, to finger thunderbolts5.
The same author goes on to tell how Zeus took the bride whom he
had burnt to dwell with him in heaven :
Yea, with pure gleaming fire she laved afresh
Her form and won Olympos' endless life6.
As Pindar had phrased it, nearly a thousand years before,—
She lives among the Olympians, slain by the roar
Of lightning, long-haired Semele,
And Pallas loves her ever,
And Zeus the sire too, and his ivied son7.
Semele was in fact a typical Diobletos. The Naxians declared that
Zeus ' struck Semele with a thunderbolt before she brought forth
her child, in order that being born, not of a mortal mother, but of
two immortal parents, he might be immortal from his birth8/ Charax
of Pergamon, a historian of the second or third century A.D., is even
more explicit : 'When the thunderbolt fell and she gave birth, she
1 Hyg- fab- 167, Lact. Plac. in Stat. Theb. 2. 71, 3. 274, 9. 425, Myth. Vat. 1. 151,
2. 78.
2 Eur. Bacch. 3 Xe/j-eXri \oxev9el<x' a<TTpaTrr)<p6pu> nvpi, cp. id. 90.
3 Eur. Bacch. 8 Atov Trvpbs £ti £u>aav <p\6ya.
4 Philostr. mai. imagg. 1. 14. 1 f.
5 Norm. Dion. 8. 310 f.
6 Id. id. 8. 413 (., cp. Aristeid. or. 4 (i. 47 Dindorf) 6 Zevs.. .tt)v /xev Se^eX^v e/c ffy
■yrjs eis tov "QXvfxirov KopLifa 5ta vvpos, k.t.X.
7 Pind. 01. 2. 27 ff., cp. Pyth. it. 1.
8 Diod.5.52. On the sources of Diodoros' fifth book see E. Schwartz in Pauly—Wissowa
Real-Enc. v. 678.
slain1. The earliest definite version of the occurrence is in the
Bakcliai of Euripides, who speaks of—
Semele brought to bed by the lightning-fire2
and further of—•
The flame of Zeus-fire living yet3.
These expressions may be taken to imply the more primitive idea
that Zeus descended upon Semele in the form of a lightning-flash.
And such seems to be the conception of Philostratos also. For, in
describing a picture of Semele's death, he notes the personified figures
of stern-looking Thunder and Lightning with flashing eyes, and
adds that fire was dashing down from the sky upon the palace, but
makes no mention of Zeus beyond saying that 'A cloud of fire
compassed Thebes about and burst upon the roof of Kadmos, when
Zeus went courting Semele4.' Nonnos too in his high-flown style
makes Semele beseech her lover:
Oh, I would clasp the flame I love, and joy
To feel the flash, to finger thunderbolts5.
The same author goes on to tell how Zeus took the bride whom he
had burnt to dwell with him in heaven :
Yea, with pure gleaming fire she laved afresh
Her form and won Olympos' endless life6.
As Pindar had phrased it, nearly a thousand years before,—
She lives among the Olympians, slain by the roar
Of lightning, long-haired Semele,
And Pallas loves her ever,
And Zeus the sire too, and his ivied son7.
Semele was in fact a typical Diobletos. The Naxians declared that
Zeus ' struck Semele with a thunderbolt before she brought forth
her child, in order that being born, not of a mortal mother, but of
two immortal parents, he might be immortal from his birth8/ Charax
of Pergamon, a historian of the second or third century A.D., is even
more explicit : 'When the thunderbolt fell and she gave birth, she
1 Hyg- fab- 167, Lact. Plac. in Stat. Theb. 2. 71, 3. 274, 9. 425, Myth. Vat. 1. 151,
2. 78.
2 Eur. Bacch. 3 Xe/j-eXri \oxev9el<x' a<TTpaTrr)<p6pu> nvpi, cp. id. 90.
3 Eur. Bacch. 8 Atov Trvpbs £ti £u>aav <p\6ya.
4 Philostr. mai. imagg. 1. 14. 1 f.
5 Norm. Dion. 8. 310 f.
6 Id. id. 8. 413 (., cp. Aristeid. or. 4 (i. 47 Dindorf) 6 Zevs.. .tt)v /xev Se^eX^v e/c ffy
■yrjs eis tov "QXvfxirov KopLifa 5ta vvpos, k.t.X.
7 Pind. 01. 2. 27 ff., cp. Pyth. it. 1.
8 Diod.5.52. On the sources of Diodoros' fifth book see E. Schwartz in Pauly—Wissowa
Real-Enc. v. 678.