Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 3,1): Zeus god of the dark sky (earthquake, clouds, wind, dew, rain, meteorits): Text and notes (Cambridge, 1940)

Nephelokokkygia 5 7

The herald sent to men now returns with a golden crown voted
by the states to Pisthetairos; for every one has gone bird-mad and.
is eager to obtain wings. Accordingly, in comes a second group of
visitors, bent on getting them,—a father-beater, Kinesias, an informer,
and lastly Prometheus, who wants to know whether Zeus is

Clearing the clouds off, or collecting them1.
He is desperately anxious to escape notice from above and produces
an umbrella, under cover of which he explains that Zeus is ruined
by the Birds' blockade, that the Triballian gods, yet higher up, are
threatening to come down upon him, and that envoys are now on
their way to treat for peace. But the Birds must make no peace
unless Zeus restores the sceptre to them and hands over Basileia,
the ' Queen,' a beautiful girl who keeps his thunderbolts and other
belongings, to be the bride of Pisthetairos.

The envoys in due course arrive—Poseidon, Herakles, and the
uncouth Triballian2. Pisthetairos is busy preparing a savoury stew

shoulder, where it is gripped by the claws of Zeus' eagle (H. Winnefeld in Pergamon iii.
2- 48 ff. Atlas pi. io = my pi. ix, Die Skulpturen des Pergamon-Museums in Photographien
Berlin 1903 pi. 15, Collignon Hist, de la Sculpt, gr. ii. 520 ff. pi. 12, H. Bulle Der schoene
Mensch im Altertum- Muenchen—Leipzig 1912 p. 599 pi. 296, A. von Salis Der Altar
■von Pergamon Berlin 1912 p. 54 ft". fig. 3, F. Winter Helleiiistische Skulptur (Kunst-
geschichte in Bildern2 I Das Altertum xi—xii) Leipzig 1925 p. 352 fig. 6).

A comparison of these representations will show that Porphyrion is normally (so in
(2)> (3). (j)) conceived as a sturdy antagonist, full of fight and seen from the back as
he stands up to Zeus (Hor. od. 3. 4. 54 minaci Porphyrion statu), but that on occasion
(so in (4)) he borrows the type of a vanquished giant (cp. the youthful figure in the centre
of (5))- His leopard-skin or lion-skin is of course parodied in Aristoph. av. 1249^
v"P<t>vplavas...Trap8a\as (vr/fifievovs.

The giant defeated by Zeus on a red-figured hydria from Vulci, now in the British
Museum (Brit. Mus. Cat. Vases iii. i49f. no. E 165, Lenormant—de Witte £l. mon..cer.
u 8f- Pi- 3- O. Jahn in the Ann. d. Inst. 1869 xii. 183, Overbeck Gr. Kunstmyth. Zeus
P- 365 f. no. 20, J. I). Heazley in the Am. fount. Arch. 1916 xx. 149 no. 9 (assigned to
'the Tyszkiewicz painter'), id. Attic red-figured Vases in American Museums Cambridge
- ass. 1918 p. ;-j Hopph, Ped-fig. Vases ii. 460 no. 8, J. D. Beazley Attische Vasenmaler
d"rotflsurjge„ 5/z/j-Tiibingen 192? p. 116110. 29. Mypl.x is from a'photograph taken by
' e Official Photographer), appears to be wearing a wolf-skin (J. Overbeck loc. cit. says
das Fell eines wilden Thieres, eines Wolfes oder Luchses(?)') and, as he collapses, is
heaving a rock on which is a vine-leaf (Lenormant—de Witte loc. cit. suppose 'une
eu'He de platane'). This would constitute an earlier type of Porphyrion, if we could
b« be sure that it is he.

, S"Pra P- 35-

Tnballos (on whom see J. Schmidt in Roscher Lex. Myth. v. no2f.) could claim
~«ne connexion with the Birds, for a Thracian myth told how his granddaughter

°lyphonte had been transformed into an owl (<rri>{), her two sons by the bear—Agrios
a"a Oreios—into a vulture (yvtf and a sort of swallow (?) (Xo^us) respectively, and their
*'a.ld int° a woodpecker (ftrnj) (Ant. Lib. 21 after Boios ipntoyoHat /J). Not improbably
£r'stophanes regarded T/x^aXXos as the north-Greek form of *Tpt-<pa\\6s, cp. Souid. s.v.

P'WXr,,, Tp,0dX,Tos- 6rona Kvptov xapi 'Apurrotfidrei with Cell. 2. 19. 6 Naevius in
lr'Phallo (Com. Pom. frag. p. 27 Ribbeck), Non. Marc. p. 191, *7 *■ Lindsay Varro