[25]
And as they sailed past the Sirens,1 Orpheus restrained the
Argonauts by chanting a counter-melody. Butes alone swam off to the Sirens, but Aphrodite
carried him away and settled him in Lilybaeum.
After the Sirens, the ship encountered Charybdis and Scylla and the Wandering Rocks,2 above which a great flame and
smoke were seen rising. But Thetis with the Nereids steered the ship through them at the
summons of Hera.
Having passed by the Island of Thrinacia, where are the kine of the Sun,3 they came to
Corcyra, the island of the Phaeacians, of which
Alcinous was king.4 But when the Colchians could not
find the ship, some of them settled at the Ceraunian mountains, and some
journeyed to Illyria and colonized the Apsyrtides
Islands. But some came to the Phaeacians, and finding the
Argo there, they demanded of Alcinous that he should give up Medea. He
answered, that if she already knew Jason, he would give her to him, but that if she were
still a maid he would send her away to her father.5 However, Arete, wife of Alcinous, anticipated matters by marrying
Medea to Jason;6 hence the
Colchians settled down among the Phaeacians7 and the Argonauts put to sea with
Medea.
1 About the Argonauts and the Sirens, see Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.891-921; Orphica, Argonautica 1270- 1297; Hyginus, Fab. 14.
2 Compare Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.922ff. These Wandering Rocks are supposed to be the Lipari islands, two of which are still active volcanoes.
3 Compare Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.964-979, according to whom the kine of the Sun were milk-white, with golden horns.
4 About the Argonauts among the Phaeacians, see Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.982ff.; Orphica, Argonautica 1298-1354; Hyginus, Fab. 23.
5 Compare Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.1106ff.; Orphica, Argonautica 1327ff.
6 Compare Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.1111-1169; Orphica, Argonautica 1342ff.
7 Compare Ap. Rhod., Argon. iv.1206ff.
Apollodorus. Apollodorus, The Library, with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921. Includes Frazer's notes.
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