Clotho

Clotho is one of the three Fates, or Moirai, with her sisters Lachesis and Atropos. Her name is the one that Hesiod places first in his list of the three. In Plato’s myth of Er, she is the Fate who ratifies the lot a soul has chosen at the touch of her spindle. The poets say the Fates spin the thread that sets the course of each mortal life.

Clotho’s Family

The sources give the Fates different parents. In Hesiod’s Theogony the Moirai are first listed among the children of Night, together with the Keres (Hesiod, Theogony 217–222). Later in the same poem Zeus marries Themis, and she bears the Horae and the Moirai, Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos, “who give mortal men both good and evil” (Hesiod, Theogony 901–906). Apollodorus follows this second account and calls Clotho a daughter of Zeus and Themis (Apollodorus, Library 1.3.1). In Plato’s Republic the three Fates are the daughters of Necessity (Ananke) (Plato, Republic 10.617c).

The Spinner

Homer does not name the Fates separately. He says instead that Fate spun a thread for each person at birth. Fate “spun with her thread” what Achilles would suffer (Iliad 20.127–128), and Hecuba says the same of Hector (Iliad 24.209–210). Plato gives each of the three Fates a part. They sit on thrones around the spindle of Necessity and sing along with the Sirens: Lachesis sings of what has been, Clotho of what is, and Atropos of what is to be. Clotho helps to turn the outer rim of the spindle with her right hand, Atropos the inner circles with her left, and Lachesis lends a hand to both (Plato, Republic 10.617c–d). After a soul has drawn its lot and chosen a life from Lachesis, it is led first to Clotho, who ratifies the choice under her hand and the turning of the spindle, and then to Atropos, who makes what was spun irreversible (Plato, Republic 10.620d–e). In the Laws, Plato lists them as Lachesis, Clotho and Atropos, and says that Atropos makes irreversible what Clotho has ratified (Plato, Laws 12.960c).

Hesiod names the three together as the ones who give mortals good and evil, with no separate task for each; the parts assigned above are Plato’s. Neither Homer nor Hesiod says that Clotho decides when anyone is born or dies. They say only that the Fates fix the course of a life.

Clotho in Myth

The Fates appear as a group in a few myths; Clotho is named on her own in Pindar’s story of Pelops.

• Pelops. Pindar says that Clotho lifted Pelops out of a pure cauldron, and that he came out with a shining shoulder of ivory (Pindar, Olympian 1.26–27).
• Meleager. When the child was seven days old, the Fates came and declared that he would die when the brand then burning on the hearth was consumed (Apollodorus, Library 1.8.2).
• The Giants. In the war of the gods against the Giants, the Fates fought with bronze clubs and killed Agrius and Thoas (Apollodorus, Library 1.6.2).
• Typhon. When Zeus chased the wounded Typhon to Mount Nysa, the Fates deceived him into tasting the ephemeral fruits, believing that they would strengthen him (Apollodorus, Library 1.6.3). They did not kill him. Zeus overcame Typhon.
• Admetus. Apollo tricked the Fates (Euripides, Alcestis 12–14), obtaining as a favour that Admetus could escape death if someone chose to die in his place. When the day came, neither his father nor his mother would do so, but his wife Alcestis died in his stead (Apollodorus, Library 1.9.15).

Worship

Pausanias records sanctuaries of the Fates at Corinth (Pausanias 2.4.7) and at Sparta, beside the grave of Orestes (Pausanias 3.11.10). At Olympia he saw an altar of the Fates near the altar of Zeus the Bringer of Fate (Pausanias 5.15.5).

Clotho Sources

Homer, Iliad 20.127–128, 24.209–210; Hesiod, Theogony 217–222, 901–906; Pindar, Olympian 1.26–27; Euripides, Alcestis 12–14; Plato, Republic 10.617c–d, 10.620d–e and Laws 12.960c; Apollodorus, Library 1.3.1, 1.6.2–3, 1.8.2, 1.9.15; Pausanias 2.4.7, 3.11.10, 5.15.5.

See Also: The Fates, Lachesis, Atropos, Zeus, Themis, Typhon, Alcestis, Admetus, Pelops, Apollo