The Unfortunate Maiden
From Ancient Tales From Many Lands by Rachel M. Fleming, 1922.
From: Unknown To: 1922 C.E.
Location: Argolis, Greece
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From Ancient Tales From Many Lands by Rachel M. Fleming, 1922.
Argolis was the first state to be founded in the country which is now called Greece. Its first king was Inachos, a god who rose out of the river that waters the grassy plain on which great herds of cattle pastured in his time. Now Inachos had a most lovely daughter, lo, who, however, was not a goddess, but only a poor mortal. Her wondrous beauty brought lo nothing but grief and pain, for Zeus, the King of the gods, looked down upon Argolis and saw lo. So lovely was she that he began to admire her very much, and could think of nothing else. This vexed Hera, the Queen of the Gods, especially as lo was only a mortal, and in her rage and jealousy she began to think what evils and troubles she could bring upon the unhappy maiden.
For some time past, lo had been troubled with strange dreams, so at last she asked her father what he thought they meant. At that time, if anyone among the people of that land had strange dreams, he used to send a messenger to the Speaking Oak of Dodona. This wonderful tree would reply to any questions which it was asked, and would give advice as to what mortals ought to do if they wanted to please the gods.
So Inachus sent some one to ask what lo's dreams meant, and if he ought to do anything about them. Picture his grief and dismay when the messenger brought back word that if he wished to avoid the wrath of the gods, and to save the whole of his race from destruction, he must drive his poor, pretty daughter lo out of his home and kingdom. Unhappy Inachos shed many tears, but alas! he dared not disobey the gods, so lo was driven forth a homeless wanderer.
No sooner had Inachos done this cruel deed than Hera, in her rage and spite, changed lo into a white heifer, and thus put an end to her beauty. Besides this, she sent a horrid gadfly to torment the poor heifer with its stings. At the pain of its sharp sting, lo rushed down to the Springs of Lerna, to try to cool her burning smart in its clear waters.
Poor lo! as she rushed along half mad with pain, there suddenly rose from the ground Argus, the thousand-eyed, who had been sent by Hera to goad the poor heifer still further, and to watch over her night and day lest anyone should drive away the gadfly and comfort her. Thus to lo's other misfortunes was added the constant presence of this thousand-eyed herdsman, whose fierce looks filled her with terror and dismay.
She wandered across the plains of Greece, and came to the Speaking Oak of Dodona. Here she got her first bit of comfort, for the Oracle hailed her as a maiden who would become the wife of a king, and the mother of a race of kings. But even as the oak was speaking, the gadfly stung her into madness, and she rushed wildly away to the shores of the Adriatic, which for a long time was called the Ionian Gulf, in memory of her.
Still driven by the stinging gadfly and the fierce herdsman, she wandered on till she came to an untrodden waste of wild desert, and there she saw some one whose misfortunes were as great as her own. For, chained to a lonely rock, with no shelter from the blazing summer sun, or the chill, piercing winter winds, was the god Prometheus. He had been fastened there by the orders of Zeus, who was furiously angry, because Prometheus had stolen fire from heaven, and had taught mortals how to use it. As Prometheus was a god, and could not die, but must stay chained to the rock in this wild lonely spot for evermore, his punishment was terrible indeed.
When lo reached the foot of the rock and looked up. she begged Prometheus to tell her who he was, and why he was thus tortured, but even as she was asking him, the gadfly stung her again. She sobbed out most pitifully, "Oh! the gadfly again pierces my poor flesh. O Mother Earth! listen to my prayers and save me from the crafty herdsman who drives me, weary and hungry, by the sandy shores. O King of the gods! take pity on me. Burn me with fire, stifle me beneath the earth, or give me as a prey to the wild sea monsters, but save me from this terrible fate. Listen to the prayers of a poor maiden, for a maiden I am, though I bear the horns of a heifer."
Then Prometheus called to her by name, and he and lo told one another of their misfortunes. Prometheus sorrowfully told lo that her troubles were not nearly over, and that if she was weeping and weary now, he did not know in what state she would be before she reached the place where her wanderings were to cease. He told her that great as her misfortunes were, she was happier than he, for there would come a time when her sorrows would end, but that he must be tortured for ever.
The gadfly then stung lo so fiercely that the fit of madness overtook her again, and with wildly beating heart and terror in her eyes, she dashed on again.
Facing the rising sun, she crossed the great steppes, which had not at that time felt the plough of man. She passed great hordes of Nomad Scyths, who moved from place to place in wicker cots raised on wheeled cars, and who could shoot the arrow with deadly aim. She saw the home of that fierce race which early learnt to make sharp iron weapons, but she did not dare to go near them, for their weapons were more deadly than the Scythian arrows.
She mounted the passes of the lofty Caucasus, where the high peaks seemed to reach the very sky, and all the time the gadfly and the herdsman pursued her, quite deaf to her piteous sobs and entreaties.
She passed the Sea of Azof and the Crimea, and thus left Europe for Asia, by the Straits of Bosphorus, which still bear witness to her crossing in their name, which is just the Greek way of saying Oxford. In her wanderings she saw many wonderful sights, the troops of armed women who fought as fiercely as any men, the three swan-shaped sisters, who had only one eye and one tooth between them, their three other sisters, the Gorgons, whose snaky locks made them so hideous that no mortal dared gaze upon them. She also came to the griffins—great dogs with the heads of hawks—and to a wild tribe of riders on horseback, who lived near the streams that wash down gold in their sands.
At last her wanderings brought her to the coast of the eastern Mediterranean, and passing southwards by Syria, and then turning west, she came to the land of Egypt. Here at last peace and rest came to her, for Zeus was able to free her from Hera's toils. He gently stroked the poor heifer, and at the soothing touch of his divine hand, lo became once more a lovely maiden. The gadfly and the herdsman disappeared, and she settled down in peace at Canopus, a city on the western edge of the Nile delta. Here was born to her a son, who became king of all those fertile plains that are watered by the mighty Nile. I hope he loved lo, and comforted her and helped her to forget what a sad and weary time she had had while she was a homeless wanderer through Europe and Asia.
Fleming, Rachel M. Ancient Tales From Many Lands. Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1922.
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