Argus, Io, Hera, Zeus and Hermes
[ 2006-12-15 10:20 ]
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Reader question: What is Argus-eyed?
My comments:
Someone who is Argus-eyed is a person who's observant,
all-seeing.
In Chinese legend, we have heavenly people who have "eyes that
penetrate a thousand miles" and can detect what you and I can't see, or
"ears that ride the wind" and can hear what the Greeks are saying from
across the seas. Argus on the other hand is a Greek creation. Argus is
said to have 100 eyes, all of which he never has closed at the same time.
After some fun research, I found that:
- Argus is the giant who has 100 eyes and is assigned to keeping
many a watchful eye open on a cow in the disguise of
- Io, who's a young woman so in shape that she distinguishes herself
from all the rest even as a heifer into which she had been metamorphosed
by
- Zeus, her lover who is the king of gods and husband of
- Hera, who finds one day Zeus consorting with Io, one of her maids,
and come barging in to poop the party. And in consequence,
- Zeus, in a not so clever ruse, turns Io into a heifer. But
- Hera, being Hera and none other than the life-long partner of the
king of all gods, is not deceived, cleverly demanding that her husband
give her the shapely animal to keep as a gift. Granted her wish, Hera
swiftly exiles the heifer to somewhere resembling Siberia but ostensibly
green with a fertile pasture, lest heifer ever reunite with her creator,
who as the king of all gods should be above scheming behind her back. To
further act upon her way of thinking, she sends
- Argus Panoptes, the hundred-eyed giant to guard the cow. Thus,
heavenly peace is restored but not for long, because Zeus soon
dispatches
- Hermes, the god of cunning, invention and theft to rescue his lover.
To lull the giant into sleep with all hundred eyes closed tight is no
easy task, as you may very well imagine. So Hermes has to play a flute
with a lilting tune so enchanting that Argus falls into slumber before
Hermes finishes with the first movement. Hermes thus slays the giant and
returns Io to Zeus. Later,
- Hera, in memory of his dead soldier, places Argus' hundred eyes in
the tail of the peacock, her favorite bird. Finally,
- Zeus, in a last attempt to patch up with Hera, vows that he and Io
were just friends and really had nothing going on that would arouse any
paparazzi from the tabloids.
Now, if these run-on sentences fail to pique your interest in Greek
mythology….
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| About the author:
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Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily
since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University.
Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question
for potential use in a
future column. | |
