Greek mythology Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...

, Asbolus (

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

: Ἄσβολον or Ἄσβόλη means "sooty" or "carbon dust") was a

centaur A centaur ( ; ; ), occasionally hippocentaur, also called Ixionidae (), is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse that was said to live in the mountains of Thessaly. In one version o ...

. He was a seer and Hesiod calls him an

augur An augur was a priest and official in the ancient Rome, classical Roman world. His main role was the practice of augury, the interpretation of the will of the List of Roman deities, gods by studying events he observed within a predetermined s ...

(''oionistes'' οἰωνιστής) who read omens in the flight of birds.

Mythology

Asbolus foresaw the Centaurs' battle against the

Lapiths The Lapiths (; , ''Lapithai'', Grammatical number, sing. Λαπίθης) were a group of legendary people in Greek mythology, who lived in Thessaly in the valley of the Pineios (Thessaly), Pineios and on the mountain Pelion. They were believed to ...

at Pirithous' wedding, and unsuccessfully attempted to prevent them from attending. The above is mentioned in

Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...

Metamorphoses The ''Metamorphoses'' (, , ) is a Latin Narrative poetry, narrative poem from 8 Common Era, CE by the Ancient Rome, Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his ''Masterpiece, magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the world from its Cre ...

, He appears again when

Heracles Heracles ( ; ), born Alcaeus (, ''Alkaios'') or Alcides (, ''Alkeidēs''), was a Divinity, divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of ZeusApollodorus1.9.16/ref> and Alcmene, and the foster son of Amphitryon.By his adoptive descent through ...

came to visit the centaur Pholus. Pholus opened a jug of wine for him which belonged to all the Centaurs; Asbolus saw Pholus do this and brought the other Centaurs, who, as it was proved by Pirithous' wedding, were unused to the drink. It resulted in a bloodbath in which Pholus and

Chiron In Greek mythology, Chiron ( ; also Cheiron or Kheiron; ) was held to be the superlative centaur amongst his brethren since he was called the "wisest and justest of all the centaurs". Biography Chiron was notable throughout Greek mythology for ...

, as well as Nessus, met their deaths at Heracles' hands. It is said that Asbolus himself was crucified by Heracles' arrows. Tzetzes, ''Chiliades'
5.6=22
/ref>

Namesake

Asbolus' name was given to 8405 Asbolus, a

minor planet According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a minor planet is an astronomical object in direct orbit around the Sun that is exclusively classified as neither a planet nor a comet. Before 2006, the IAU officially used the term ''minor ...

in the outer Solar System. It belongs to the class of

s, whose orbits lie between Jupiter and Neptune.

Notes

References

Hesiod Hesiod ( or ; ''Hēsíodos''; ) was an ancient Greece, Greek poet generally thought to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer.M. L. West, ''Hesiod: Theogony'', Oxford University Press (1966), p. 40.Jasper Gr ...

, ''Shield of Heracles'' from ''The Homeric Hymns and Homerica'' with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, Cambridge, MA.,Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.Greek text available from the same website
* Publius Ovidius Naso, ''Metamorphoses'' translated by Brookes More (1859-1942). Boston, Cornhill Publishing Co. 1922
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
* Publius Ovidius Naso, ''Metamorphoses.'' Hugo Magnus. Gotha (Germany). Friedr. Andr. Perthes. 1892
Latin text available at the Perseus Digital Library
* Tzetzes, John, ''Book of Histories,'' Book V-VI translated by Konstantinos Ramiotis from the original Greek of T. Kiessling's edition of 1826
Online version at theio.com.
Individual centaurs {{Greek-myth-stub