Lelante

{{short description|Greek mythological figure}}

{{distinguish|Lelantos}}

{{Infobox character

| name = Lelante

| gender = Female

| title = Queen

| significant_other = Munichus

| children =

| lbl21 = Birthplace

| data21 = Molossia

}}

In Greek mythology, Lelante ({{langx|grc|Ληλάντη|Lēlántē}}) is a minor figure, a queen of the Molossians, who was transformed into a bird by the will of Zeus, the god of justice, in order to escape a fiery death.

Family

She was the wife of the Molossian king Munichus and the mother by him of three sons, Philaeus, Alcander and Megaletor, and of a daughter Hyperippe.

Mythology

The entire family was seen as just and righteous and therefore especially favored by the gods. One day raiders attacked them in the fields; the family ran off to their house and began to throw various objects at them in self-defense, whereupon the offenders set the house ablaze. The god of justice, Zeus would not let the just family suffer such a cruel and undeserving death, so he changed them all six of them into various birds; Lelante became a green woodpecker.Ovid, Metamorphoses [https://www.loebclassics.com/view/ovid-metamorphoses/1916/pb_LCL043.279.xml 13.717]Antoninus Liberalis, [https://topostext.org/work/216#14 14]{{sfn|Celoria|1992|page=14}}

See also

{{portal|mythology|ancient Greece}}

References

{{reflist}}

Bibliography

  • Antoninus Liberalis, The Metamorphoses of Antoninus Liberalis translated by Francis Celoria (Routledge 1992). [https://topostext.org/work/216 Online version at the Topos Text Project.]
  • {{cite book | last = Celoria | first = Francis | title = The Metamorphoses of Antoninus Liberalis: A Translation with a Commentary | publisher = Routledge | date = 1992 | isbn = 0-415-06896-7}}
  • Ovid, Metamorphoses, Volume II: Books 9-15. Translated by Frank Justus Miller. Revised by G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 43. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1916.

{{Metamorphoses in Greek mythology}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Deeds of Zeus

Category:Queens in Greek mythology

Category:Metamorphoses into birds in Greek mythology

Category:Epirotic mythology

{{greek-myth-royal-stub}}