Hylonome (; from ) was a female centaur in

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 ...

Mythology

Hylonome was present at the 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 ...

, where she lost her husband, the centaur

Cyllarus Cyllarus (Ancient Greek: Κύλλαρος) was a centaur in Greek mythology. Mythology The below is mentioned in Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'', He was handsome and valiant, and dearly loved his centaur wife Hylonome. He participated in the bat ...

, whom she loved very much. Heartbroken, she then took her own life to join him. The centaur lovers' episodic digression and their "ideally mutual relationship", within Nestor's narration of the Battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs in ''Metamorphosis'' 12.

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 ...

alludes to two didactic poems,

Lucretius Titus Lucretius Carus ( ; ; – October 15, 55 BC) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem '' De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, which usually is t ...

' "

De Rerum Natura (; ''On the Nature of Things'') is a first-century BC Didacticism, didactic poem by the Roman Republic, Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius () with the goal of explaining Epicureanism, Epicurean philosophy to a Roman audience. The poem, writte ...

" and Ovid's own "Ars Amatoria III". In the Cyllarus-Hylonome interlude he explores

hybridity Hybridity, in its most basic sense, refers to mixture. The term originates from biology and was subsequently employed in linguistics and in racial theory in the nineteenth century. Young, Robert. ''Colonial Desire: Hybridity in Theory, Culture and ...

itself illustrating the relationships and "possible combinations of a number of conceptual opposites: natura and cultus, human and animal, male and female, love and war, and the contrasting values of lyric-elegiac and

epic poetry In poetry, an epic is a lengthy narrative poem typically about the extraordinary deeds of extraordinary characters who, in dealings with gods or other superhuman forces, gave shape to the mortal universe for their descendants. With regard t ...

Citations

General and cited references

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

(1922). ''

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 ...

''. Translated by Brookes More. Boston: Cornhill Publishing Co
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
Individual centaurs Characters in Greek mythology Metamorphoses characters {{Greek-myth-stub