This article is about the mythological goddess. For the island, see
Rhodes. For the city, see
Rhodes (city). For the ancient Greek emporium in Spain, see
Roses, Girona.
Various parents were given for Rhodos.
Pindar makes her a daughter of
Aphrodite with no father mentioned,[2] although scholia on Pindar add
Poseidon as the father;[3] for
Herodorus of Heraclea she was the daughter of Aphrodite and Poseidon,[4] while according to
Diodorus Siculus she was the daughter of Poseidon and
Halia, one of the
Telchines, the original rulers of Rhodes.[5] According to
Apollodorus (referring to her as "Rhode") she was a daughter of Poseidon and
Amphitrite, and full sister to
Triton.[6] However, for
Epimenides, her father was
Oceanus,[7] while according to a scholion on Odyssey 17.208 (calling her "Rhode"), her father was the river-god
Asopus, thus making her a
Naiad.[8] Perhaps misreading Pindar, Asclepiades ("presumably the mythographer"
Asclepiades of Tragilus) gives her father as Helios.[9]
Rhode together with Helios or Poseidon were the ancestors of
Ialysus,
Cameirus and
Lindus, eponyms of the cities of Rhodes.[10]
Mythology
The poet
Pindar tells the story, that when the gods drew lots for the places of the earth, Helios being absent received nothing. He complained to Zeus about it, who offered to make the division again. Helios refused, for he had seen a new island about to rise from the sea. So Helios, with
Zeus' consent, claimed a new island (Rhodes), which had not yet risen from the sea. And after it rose from the sea he lay with her and produced seven sons.[11] According to another source, it was Helios himself who caused the water overflowing the island to disappear, and after that he named this island "Rhodes" after Rhodos.[12]
By Helios, Rhodos was the mother of the
Heliadae, who succeeded the Telchines as rulers of Rhodes. According to Pindar, Rhodos had, by Helios, seven sons.[13] Pindar does not name the sons, but according to
Diodorus Siculus, the Heliadae were
Ochimus,
Cercaphus,
Actis, Macar (i.e.
Macareus),
Candalus,
Triopas, and
Tenages.[14] Diodorus Siculus also says that Helios and Rhodos had one daughter,
Electryone. A scholion to Pindar gives the same list of sons, with Macareus (for Macar) and naming the last Heliadae as Phaethon, "the younger, whom the Rhodians call Tenages".[15] The older Phaethon referred to here probably being the famous
Phaethon (whose story is told by
Ovid) who drove Helios' chariot.[16] The scholion on Odyssey 17.208 (perhaps drawing on either of the lost tragedies Heliades (Daughters of Helios) by
Aeschylus, and Phaethon, by
Euripides), also makes Rhodos the mother, by Helios, of this famous Phaethon, as well as three daughters:
Lampetie,
Aigle, and
Phaethousa.[17] (In the Odyssey, Lampetie and Phaethousa, the shepherds of Helios' cattle and sheep on
Thrinacia, are instead the daughters of Helios by
Neaera.)[18]
When
Aphrodite cursed Helios and made him fall in love with a mortal princess named
Leucothoe, he is said to have forgotten about Rhodos, among other lovers.[19]
Culture
While Rhodian coins were known for displaying the magnificent head of
Helios, some of them showed the head of Rhodos; additionally, the
rose (Greek rhodon) became the island's symbol.[20] During the
Hellenistic period, she was worshipped in Rhodes as the island's tutelary goddess.[21]
^Scholion to Pindar, Olympian 7.132a (Fowler 2001,
p. 205), which quotes
Hellanicus of Lesbos as calling their mother "Rhode" rather than "Rhodos". Fowler 2013,
p. 591 in his list of the sons of Rhodos and Helios given by the scholion to Pindar, omits (apparently inadvertently) Ochimos, though he does mention him later (p. 592) as one of the brothers (along with Cercaphus) as not having participated in the murder of Tenages.
^Fowler 2013, p. 592, says that "It is probably safe to assume ... but not quite certain". For Ovid's account see Metamorphoses1.750–2.324
^Gantz, p. 32;
Frazer,
note 2 to Apollodorus, 3.14.3; Fowler 2013,
p. 591. The scholion cites "the tragedians" as his source; for an account of these two lost plays, and their being possible sources for the scholion, see Gantz, pp. 31–32.
^Eiben, Susanne (2006). "Rhode". In Cancik, Hubert; Schneider, Helmuth; et al. (eds.).
Rhode. Brill's New Pauly. Brill Reference Online.
doi:
10.1163/1574-9347_bnp_e1022570. Retrieved April 27, 2023.
References
Apollodorus, Apollodorus, The Library, with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
Diodorus Siculus, Diodorus Siculus: The Library of History. Translated by C. H. Oldfather. Twelve volumes.
Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. 1989.
5.55.
Fowler, R. L. (2000), Early Greek Mythography: Volume 1: Text and Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2000.
ISBN978-0198147404.
Fowler, R. L. (2013), Early Greek Mythography: Volume 2: Commentary, Oxford University Press, 2013.
ISBN978-0198147411.
Hard, Robin, The Routledge Handbook of Greek Mythology: Based on H.J. Rose's "Handbook of Greek Mythology", Psychology Press, 2004,
ISBN9780415186360.
Homer; The Odyssey with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, PH.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1919.
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.