III. Id. 11th
Now, Phrygian Tithonus, thou dost complain that thou art abandoned by thy spouse, and the watchful Morning Star comes forth from the eastern waters. Go, good mothers (the Matralia is your festival), and offer to the Theban goddess the yellow cakes that are her due. Adjoining the bridges and the great Circus is an open space of far renown, which takes its name from the statue of an ox: there, on this day, it is said, Servius consecrated with his own sceptered hands a temple to Mother Matuta. Who the goddess is, why she excludes (for exclude she does) female slaves from the threshold of her temple, and why she calls for toasted cakes, do thou, O Bacchus, whose locks are twined with clustered grapes and ivy, (explain and) guide the poet’s course, if the house of the goddess is also thine. Through the compliance of Jupiter with her request Semele was consumed with fire:” Ino received thee, young Bacchus, and zealously nursed thee with the utmost care. Juno swelled with rage that Ino should rear the son who had been snatched from his leman mother; but that son was of the blood of Ino’s sister. Hence Athamas was haunted by the furies and by a delusive vision, and, little Learchus, thou didst fall by thy father’s hand. His sorrowful mother committed the shade of Learchus to the tomb and paid all the honours due to the mournful pyre. She, too, after tearing her rueful hair, leaped forth and snatched thee, Melicertes, from thy cradle. A land there is, shrunk with narrow limits, which repels twin seas, and, single in itself, is lashed by twofold waters. Thither came Ino, clasping her son in her frenzied embrace, and hurled herself and him from a high ridge into the deep.
Panope and her hundred sisters received them scatheless, and smoothly gliding bore them through their realms. They reached the mouth of thick-eddying Tiber before Ino had yet received the name of Leucothea and before her boy was called Palaemon. There was a sacred grove; it is doubtful whether it should be called the grove of Semele or the grove of Stimula: they say that it was inhabited by Ausonian Maenads. Ino inquired of them what was their nation; she learned that they were Arcadians and that Evander was king of the place. Dissembling her godhead, the daughter of Saturn slily incited the Latian Bacchanals by glozing words: “Too easy souls! O blinded hearts! This stranger comes no friend to our assemblies. Her aim is treacherous, she would learn our sacred rites. Yet she has a pledge by which we can ensure her punishment.” Scarce had she ended, when the Thyads, with their locks streaming down their necks, filled the air with their howls, and laid hands on Ino, and strove to pluck the boy from her. She invoked the gods whom still she knew not: “Ye gods and men of the land, succour a wretched mother!” The cry reached the neighbouring rocks of the Aventine. The Oetaean hero had driven the Iberian kine to the river bank; he heard and hurried at full speed towards the voice. At the approach of Hercules the women, who but a moment before had been ready to use violence, turned their backs shamefully in womanish flight. “What would’st thou here, O sister of Bacchus’ mother?” quoth Hercules, for he recognized her; “doth the same deity who harasses me harass thee also?” She told him her story in part, but part the presence of her son induced her to suppress; for she was ashamed to have been goaded into crime by the furies.
Rumour—for she is fleet—flew far on pulsing wings, and thy name, Ino, was on many lips. It is said that as a guest thou didst enter the home of loyal Carmentis and there didst stay thy long hunger. The Tegean priestess is reported to have made cakes in haste with her own hand and to have quickly baked them on the hearth. Even to this day she loves cakes at the festival of the Matralia. Rustic civility was dearer to her than the refinements of art. “Now,” said Ino, “reveal to me, O prophetess, my future fate, so far as it is lawful; I pray thee, add this favour to the hospitality I have already received.” A brief pause ensued, and then the prophetess assumed her heavenly powers, and all her bosom swelled with majesty divine. Of a sudden you could hardly know her again; so holier, so taller far was she than she had been but now. “Glad tidings I will sing: rejoice, Ino, thy labours are over,” said she. “O come propitious to this people evermore! Thou shalt be a divinity of the sea: thy son, too, shall have his home in ocean. Take ye both different names in your own waters. Thou shalt be called Leucothea by the Greeks and Matuta by our people: thy son will have all authority over harbours; he whom we name Portunus will be named Palaemon in his own tongue. Go, I pray ye, be friendly, both of ye, to our country!” Ino bowed assent, she gave her promise. Their troubles ceased: they changed their names: he is a god and she a goddess.
You ask why she forbids female slaves to approach her? She hates them, and the source of her hatred, with her leave, I will tell in verse. One of thy handmaids, daughter of Cadmus, used often to submit to the embraces of thy husband. The caitiff Athamas loved her secretly, and from her he learned that his wife gave toasted seed-corn to the husbandmen. She herself, indeed, denied it, but rumour affirmed it. That is why she hates the service of a woman slave. Nevertheless let not an affectionate mother pray to her on behalf of her own offspring: she herself proved to be no lucky parent. You will do better to commend to her care the progeny of another; she was more serviceable to Bacchus than to her own children. They relate that she said to thee, Rutilius, “Whither dost thou hasten? On my day in thy consulship thou shalt fall by the hand of a Marsian foe.” Her words were fulfilled, and the stream of the Tolenus flowed purple, its water mingled with blood. When the next year was come, Didius, slain on the same day, doubled the forces of the foe.
Cite This Text