According to the 2nd-century AD travel writer Pausanias, Aoede /eɪˈiːdiː/ (Ancient Greek: Ἀοιδή, lit. 'Song')1 was thought to be one of the three Muses at Mount Helicon, alongside Mneme and Melete.2 He writes that the Macedonian Pierus replaced them with the nine Muses.3 According to Robin Hard, the names Pausanias gives for these three Muses indicate that it is improbable he "is referring to a genuinely ancient tradition".4 In De Natura Deorum by the Roman writer Cicero, Aoede is described as one of the four oldest Muses, alongside Thelxinoe, Arche, and Melete.5
She lends her name to the moon Jupiter XLI, also called Aoede, which orbits the planet Jupiter.6
Notes
Notes
- For this translation, see Hard, p. 206.
- Hard, p. 206; Pausanias, 9.29.2.
- Pausanias, 9.29.3.
- Hard, p. 206.
- RE, s.v. Aoide; Cicero, De Natura Deorum 3.21 (Rackham, pp. 338–339).
- "Aoede - NASA Science". 2017-11-23. Retrieved 2026-05-05.
References
References
- Cicero, Marcus Tullius, De Natura Deorum in Cicero: On the Nature of the Gods. Academics, translated by H. Rackham, Loeb Classical Library No. 268, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, first published 1933, revised 1951. ISBN 978-0-674-99296-2. Harvard University Press. Internet Archive.
- Hard, Robin, The Routledge Handbook of Greek Mythology: Based on H.J. Rose's "Handbook of Greek Mythology", London and New York, Routledge, 2004. ISBN 020344633X. doi:10.4324/9780203446331.
- Pausanias, Description of Greece, Volume IV: Books 8.22-10 (Arcadia, Boeotia, Phocis and Ozolian Locri), translated by W. H. S. Jones, Loeb Classical Library No. 297, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 1935. ISBN 978-0-674-99328-0. Harvard University Press. Perseus Digital Library.