Crocus

Crocus (Greek Krokos) was a young man of Greek mythology who was changed into the crocus flower, while the girl Smilax, who loved him, became the smilax plant. The ancient sources only allude to the story: Ovid names the pair among the transformations of his Metamorphoses, and Pliny the Elder tells that Smilax was changed after Crocus slighted her love.

Crocus and Smilax in Ovid

In the Metamorphoses, Alcithoe, one of the daughters of Minyas, lists several transformations she will pass over in order to tell the story of the fountain Salmacis: Celmis, who became adamant, the Curetes, born from a shower of rain, and “Crocus turned into small flowers with Smilax” (Ovid, Metamorphoses 4.274–284). Ovid says only that both were changed into small flowers; he does not say who they were or why they were changed. Pliny the Elder adds the reason in his account of the smilax, an ivy-like plant: it was held to be ill-omened and kept out of sacred rites and garlands, because the maiden Smilax was changed into this shrub when her love was slighted by the youth Crocus (Pliny, Natural History, book 16). Ovid mentions Crocus once more in the Fasti, where the goddess Flora names Hyacinthus, Narcissus, Crocus, Attis and Adonis, the son of Cinyras, and speaks of the honour that arose, through her, from their wounds (Ovid, Fasti 5.223–228).

Crocus and Hermes

The story that Crocus was a companion of Hermes, whom the god accidentally killed in a game of discus, is often repeated in modern retellings. Ovid and Pliny do not tell it. The best-known discus accident belongs to another flower-myth, that of Hyacinthus, whom Apollo killed involuntarily with a cast of the discus (Apollodorus, Library 1.3.3; Ovid, Metamorphoses 10.162–219).

The Flower in Greek Poetry

The plant itself appears in early poetry. In the Iliad, when Hera deceives Zeus on Mount Ida, the earth sends up dewy lotus, crocus and hyacinth to make a soft bed beneath them (Homer, Iliad 14.346–349). In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Persephone is gathering roses, crocuses, violets and other flowers when she is seized by Hades (Homeric Hymn to Demeter 2.5–8), and later the crocus is among the flowers she was picking with the daughters of Ocean (Hymn to Demeter 2.425–428). None of these passages treats the crocus as the transformed body of a man.

Crocus Sources

Ovid, Metamorphoses 4.274–284, 10.162–219, and Fasti 5.223–228; Apollodorus, Library 1.3.3; Pliny the Elder, Natural History, book 16; Homer, Iliad 14.346–349; Homeric Hymn to Demeter 2.5–8, 2.425–428.

See Also: Hermes, Hyacinthus, Apollo, Persephone, Narcissus, Adonis, Attis