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Rebecca Mullins and Rafael Snell-Feikema

S2
Literary Analysis
26 November 2013
Greek Virtue in Ovids Metamorphoses
Deucalion and Pyrrha is an influential section of Ovids Metamorphoses, a collection
of Roman myths in the form of a narrative poem that has been the inspiration for writers from
Chaucer to Shakespeare. The poem, which follows a similar plot to that of the Abrahamic flood
myth, uses the concept of exile and its effects on the characters to espouse the desired attributes
of citizens of classical Greece, specifically piety, respect for authority, and compassion. This
concept of the flood as renewal back towards the natural illustrates the interplay between
religion, society, and the natural world.
Exile is a powerful theme in many works of literature, and in many cases, it works to
pressure characters into personal growth. Typically, the attributes that the characters of exile
stories display are considered to be the virtuous positions of those in their former society.
Furthermore, the purpose of the flood in the myth was to cleanse the society of its negative
aspects, which strengthens the idea that the character traits of Deucalion and Pyrrha are
desirable.
Deucalion and Pyrrha experience their exile, There was no other land, / The sea had
drowned it all, by the hands of their gods (Ovid lines 320-321). They are profoundly isolated,
and this desperation fuels their path to virtue. Deucalion saw that world, all desolation, / All
emptiness, all silence, and his tears, says Ovid, showing Deucalions realization that he is
solitary (345-346).
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Through this pain, Deucalion and Pyrrha are shown the value of each other and thus
exemplify their compassion. These are classical Greek virtues, philia and agape, philia being the
concept of friendship or affection, and agpe being the concept of love for humanity. In ancient
Greek society, the word philia incorporated not only friendship with a singular person, but also
loyalty to ones family and society. Agpe communicated the mutual love between humans and
higher powers such as a god. The third type of love known to the ancient Greeks was eros, also
known as lust (Moseley). However, eros was considered to be irrational and not found to be a
virtuous trait in classical Greek society, and therefore is not present in Deucalion and Pyrrhas
story. The love that the two feel for each other is epitomized by the lines:
Poor woman -- well, we are not all alone
Suppose you had been, how would you bear your fear?
Who would console your grief? My wife, believe me,
Had the sea taken you, I would have followed (Ovid 355-358).
Piety is the next attribute to come out in the couple. The gods have drawn the pair into
this sorrow, and yet the two still pray and ask for their counsel, as they trust absolutely the
judgment of the gods, and additionally, faced with this abandonment, they have nowhere else to
turn: and having wept and prayed, / Resolved to make petition to the goddess / To seek her
aid through oracles. Together (Ovid 364-366). This is a classical Greek virtue, as shown by
the prevalence of piety (honoring the gods and their laws) in their philosophical and tragic
works (Mikalson 165).
It is this piety that makes them wish to follow the words of the gods as closely as
possible. However, they have to find an interpretation that suits their morals, showing their
absolute constraint to this sense of honor for both their gods and their laws. When instructed by
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Themis to Cover your heads, loosen your robes, and throw / Your mothers bones behind
you! (Ovid 381-382), they take effort to follow his orders exactly while preserving their
morality and the morality of their religion:
...surely
The holy oracles would never counsel
A guilty act. The earth is our great mother,
And I suppose the bones the goddess mentions
Are the stones of earth; the order means to throw them,
The stones, behind us (Ovid 391-396).
At once, the passage illustrates their beholdenness to following authority as well as to following
their morality. Solon of Athens gives the following piece of classical Greek moral legalism:
Obey the lawful authorities, whether you think they are right or not (Adams). This obedience
does not however preclude their ability to recognize the order as a riddle. The answer that they
find, which preserves the honor of their mother and the ideas of Pyrrha, is therefore an exhibition
of another virtue of the Greeks: integrity, truth to oneself (Ten Essential Virtues).
Accordingly, the true message of the poem is one of renewal. The society before the
flood was sinful and evil, and the gods sent a flood to cleanse it. Deucalion and Pyrrha survived,
the only mortal beings to remember the old society, and as such, they represent a risk. This is
why the riddle asks for the discard of their mothers bones, metaphorically the society which
has perished behind them. When Deucalion decides that it must mean the stones of earth, for
the earth is our great mother, he has chosen the earth and the natural as his mother and affirmed
them over the ills of the old society, effectively discarding its ideals, with the only caveats being
his character and the character of his wife. Society has been refreshed.
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In Deucalion and Pyrrha, the society prior to the flood was intended to be punished by
the gods, but also purified. Purified implies that several of the constructs of the society were
positive, and these were retained after the flood through the retention of the couple of
Deucaulion and Pyrrha, who are pious, loving, compassionate, and have a strong sense of
constructed morals. In this way, the poem gives the idea that there are some traits which are
consistently good, even in a sinful society, and that it is these traits that must always be
preserved, and that are not necessarily natural.

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Works Cited
Adams, John Paul. "Greek Virtue." California State University Northridge. California State
University Northridge, 25 May 2009. Web. 12 Nov. 2013.
Mikalson, Jon. "Piety and Honor." Honor Thy Gods: Popular Religion in Greek Tragedy. Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991. 165-202.
Moseley, Alexander. "Philosophy of Love." Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Internet
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 17 Apr. 2001. Web. 12 Nov. 2013.
Ovid. Deucalion and Pyrrha. Metamorphoses. Trans. Rolfe Humphries. Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1961.
Ten Essential Virtues. Cortland: SUNY Cortland, n.d. Print.