The Lycian peasants, also known as ''Latona and the Lycian peasants'', is a short tale from
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 ...
centered around
Leto
In ancient Greek mythology and Ancient Greek religion, religion, Leto (; ) is a childhood goddess, the daughter of the Titans Coeus and Phoebe (Titaness), Phoebe, the sister of Asteria, and the mother of Apollo and Artemis.Hesiod, ''Theogony' ...
(known to the Romans as Latona), the mother of the Olympian twin gods
Artemis
In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Artemis (; ) is the goddess of the hunting, hunt, the wilderness, wild animals, transitions, nature, vegetation, childbirth, Kourotrophos, care of children, and chastity. In later tim ...
and
Apollo
Apollo is one of the Twelve Olympians, Olympian deities in Ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek and Ancient Roman religion, Roman religion and Greek mythology, Greek and Roman mythology. Apollo has been recognized as a god of archery, mu ...
, who was prohibited from drinking from a pond in
Lycia
Lycia (; Lycian: 𐊗𐊕𐊐𐊎𐊆𐊖 ''Trm̃mis''; , ; ) was a historical region in Anatolia from 15–14th centuries BC (as Lukka) to 546 BC. It bordered the Mediterranean Sea in what is today the provinces of Antalya and Muğ ...
by the people there. The myth's theme tackles the ancient Greek concept of
xenia
Xenia may refer to:
People
* Xenia (name), a feminine given name; includes a list of people with this name
Places United States
''listed alphabetically by state''
* Xenia, Illinois, a village in Clay County
** Xenia Township, Clay County, Il ...
, or hospitality, as well as Leto's special connection to the land of Lycia. The impious Lycians refuse to exercise hospitality, the ritualized guest-friendship termed xenia by the ancient Greeks, or else ''
theoxenia'', which refers specifically to the instances when a god, such as Leto, is involved. The narrative is most famously known from
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 ...
's rendition in the narrative poem ''
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 ...
''.
Mythology
The story of the Lycian peasants is a short one; legend says that after a very troubling labour on
Delos
Delos (; ; ''Dêlos'', ''Dâlos''), is a small Greek island near Mykonos, close to the centre of the Cyclades archipelago. Though only in area, it is one of the most important mythological, historical, and archaeological sites in Greece. ...
, the goddess
Leto
In ancient Greek mythology and Ancient Greek religion, religion, Leto (; ) is a childhood goddess, the daughter of the Titans Coeus and Phoebe (Titaness), Phoebe, the sister of Asteria, and the mother of Apollo and Artemis.Hesiod, ''Theogony' ...
took her newborn infants,
Artemis
In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Artemis (; ) is the goddess of the hunting, hunt, the wilderness, wild animals, transitions, nature, vegetation, childbirth, Kourotrophos, care of children, and chastity. In later tim ...
and
Apollo
Apollo is one of the Twelve Olympians, Olympian deities in Ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek and Ancient Roman religion, Roman religion and Greek mythology, Greek and Roman mythology. Apollo has been recognized as a god of archery, mu ...
, and crossed over to
Lycia
Lycia (; Lycian: 𐊗𐊕𐊐𐊎𐊆𐊖 ''Trm̃mis''; , ; ) was a historical region in Anatolia from 15–14th centuries BC (as Lukka) to 546 BC. It bordered the Mediterranean Sea in what is today the provinces of Antalya and Muğ ...
(a region in southwestern
Asia Minor
Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...
) where she attempted to bathe her children in and drink from a spring she found there. But the local people tried to stop her, stirring the bottom of the spring so that the mud would come up. Enraged over their lack of hospitality, Leto turned them all into frogs, forever doomed to swim and hop in the murky waters of the spring.
The grammarian
Servius Servius may refer to:
* Servius (praenomen), a personal name during the Roman Republic
* Servius the Grammarian (fl. 4th/5th century), Roman Latin grammarian
* Servius Asinius Celer (died AD 46), Roman senator
* Servius Cornelius Cethegus, Roma ...
implied that the birth of the twins took place between her two visits to Lycia, the first in which she was rejected, and the second where she returned to enact her punishment. Antoninus Liberalis mentions that the spring Leto tried to drink from on her way to the river Xanthos was called Melite; after being driven away by cattle herders who wished to keep the water for their cattle, some wolves befriended her and led her to the Xanthos, where she bathed her children. She then returned to the spring to transform the Lycians into frogs.
One of the
Vatican Mythographers
The so-called Vatican Mythographers () are the anonymous authors of three Latin mythographical texts found together in a single medieval manuscript, Vatican Reg. lat. 1401. The name is that used by Angelo Mai when he published the first edition o ...
records the story and supplants Leto with
Ceres/
Demeter
In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Demeter (; Attic Greek, Attic: ''Dēmḗtēr'' ; Doric Greek, Doric: ''Dāmā́tēr'') is the Twelve Olympians, Olympian goddess of the harvest and agriculture, presiding over cro ...
, who tried to drink from the spring, thirsty as she was after days of looking for her abducted daughter
Persephone
In ancient Greek mythology and Ancient Greek religion, religion, Persephone ( ; , classical pronunciation: ), also called Kore ( ; ) or Cora, is the daughter of Zeus and Demeter. She became the queen of the Greek underworld, underworld afte ...
, who had been snatched by
Hades
Hades (; , , later ), in the ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, is the god of the dead and the king of the Greek underworld, underworld, with which his name became synonymous. Hades was the eldest son of Cronus and Rhea ...
, the king of the
Underworld
The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld.
...
. The anonymous author is the only one to record the variation with Demeter.
Symbolism
Lycian Leto

Leto was particularly worshipped in Lycia, and was seen as the 'national deity' of the Lycians, and similarly Lycia was an important cult center for her two children as well. Leto had an important sanctuary, the
Letoon
Letoon or Letoum (, ) in the Fethiye district of Muğla Province, Turkey, was a sanctuary of Leto located south of the ancient city of Xanthos, to which it was closely associated, and along the Xanthos River. It was one of the most important re ...
, in Lycia, just west of the city of
Xanthos
Xanthos or Xanthus, also referred to by scholars as ''Arna'', its Lycian name, (, Lycian: 𐊀𐊕𐊑𐊏𐊀 ''Arñna'', , Latin: ''Xanthus'') was an ancient city near the present-day village of Kınık, in Antalya Province, Turkey. The ru ...
, along the Xanthos river. Traditionally, the etymology offered for Leto's () name has even been the Lycian word ''lada'', meaning 'wife', although other scholars like
Paul Kretschmer
Paul Kretschmer (2 May 1866 – 9 March 1956) was a German linguist who studied the earliest history and interrelations of the Indo-European languages and showed how they were influenced by non-Indo-European languages, such as Etruscan.
Biogr ...
and
Robert S. P. Beekes have suggested a
pre-Greek
The pre-Greek substrate (or substratum) consists of the unknown pre-Greek language or languages (either Pre-Indo-European or other Indo-European languages) spoken in prehistoric Greece prior to the emergence of the Proto-Greek language in the r ...
origin instead. Although not explicitly stated, it is implied, and apparently understood in antiquity, that the site where the confrontation between Leto and the Lycians took place was the same where the Letoon was erected, as the description matches geography.
The region's name Lycia had been (erroneously) connected by the ancient Greeks to their word for wolf, ''lykos'', and held that the land had taken its name after the friendly wolves who, unlike the rejecting humans, showed hospitality to Leto. Similarly, Leto's son Apollo bore the epithet
Lyceus
The Apollo Lyceus (, ''Apollōn Lukeios'') type, also known as Lycean Apollo, originating with Praxiteles and known from many full-size statue and figurine copies as well as from 1st century BCE Athenian coinage, is a statue type of Apollo show ...
, an epithet which, although usually indicating his youth and connection to light (''lyke''), had been interpreted occasionally to denote Apollo's connection to wolves and Lycia.
Thanks to Antoninus Liberalis citing the earlier writers
Menecrates of Ephesus
Menecrates of Ephesus (; ; 330–270 BC) was a Greek didactic poet of the Hellenistic period. Menecrates composed a poem titled ''Works,'' which was inspired by Hesiod's ''Works and Days,'' This poem also incorporated a discussion of bees, drawi ...
and
Nicander
Nicander of Colophon (; fl. 2nd century BC) was a Greece, Greek poet, physician, and grammarian.
The scattered biographical details in the ancient sources are so contradictory that it was sometimes assumed that there were two Hellenistic authors ...
as the sources for his tale, Leto's arrival in Lycia can be dated to around the early fourth century BC, a period during which the city of Xanthos would have been a mixed settlement of Greeks and local Lycians.
Stephanos of Byzantium recounts a story of how an elderly Lycian woman named Syessa received and entertained Leto in her cottage, a sharp contrast to the unhospitable peasants, like the wolves; Polycharmos held that Apollo and Leto had been both born in
Araxa
Araxa () was a city of ancient Lycia, according to Alexander Polyhistor, in the second book of his ''Lyciaca''. Ptolemy places it near Sidyma. It is located at a place called Ören, near Fethiye, on the upper portion of the Xanthus River.
An ...
, up in the Xanthos valley, which seems to be a Hellenistic innovation. Stitching those fragments together, a story can be assembled, in which the twins are born in Araxa, Leto comes to Xanthos, the wolves lead her to the water, while Syessa offers her food, and Leto finally establishes her shrine.
Hospitality
Xenia, in an ancient Greek concept, is understood to mean 'guest-friendship' or 'ritualized friendship', and was an institutionalized relationship rooted in generosity, gift exchange, and reciprocity. Offering hospitality to strangers, whether ethnic Greeks or foreigners, was seen as a moral obligation, and was based on two basic rules; the respect of the hosts towards the guests, who must provide a meal, bath and gifts, and the respect of the guests towards the hosts, who have to be courteous and not overstay their welcome.
The Lycian peasants, who callously attempted to stop a fatigued mother and her young children from using the water of the pond thus broke a very sacred rule and concept of ancient Greek culture, and thus paid by being transformed into creatures that were regarded as hideous and disgusting.
Art

In post-antiquity art, the myth of Leto's transformation of the peasants into frogs of the pond became very popular, the most popular depiction of Leto. This scene, dubbed called ''Latona and the Lycian Peasants'' or ''Latona and the Frogs'', became very popular in
Northern Mannerist
Northern Mannerism is the form of Mannerism found in the visual arts north of the Alps in the 16th and early 17th centuries. Styles largely derived from Italian Mannerism were found in the Netherlands and elsewhere from around the mid-century, es ...
art, as it allowed a combination of mythology with landscape painting and scenes of peasantry, combining history painting and genre painting. In later art, the Lycian peasants became the scene in which Leto exclusively appeared in. In paintings, Leto is usually portrayed with the two little children by the lake, while the peasants, about to be changed into frogs, are in a short distance away from her.
In the
Gardens of Versailles
The Gardens of Versailles ( ) occupy part of what was once the ''Domaine royal de Versailles'', the royal demesne of the Palace of Versailles, château of Versailles. Situated to the west of the Palace of Versailles, palace, the gardens cover so ...
,
France
France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
, lies the
Latona Fountain, built in 1670, which depicts the myth; on the top tier stands a statue of Leto with her children Artemis and Apollo surrounded by six lead half-human, half-frog sculptures placed around the perimeter of the basin.
The four tiers are covered in 230 pieces of marble, composed of the white and grey-veined
Cararra, greenish marble from
Campan
Campan (; ) is a commune in the Hautes-Pyrénées department in the Occitanie region of south-western France.
Geography
Campan stands in a valley of the same name at the confluence of the rivers Adour and Adour de Payolle. It is situated on ...
, and red marble from
Languedoc
The Province of Languedoc (, , ; ) is a former province of France.
Most of its territory is now contained in the modern-day region of Occitanie in Southern France. Its capital city was Toulouse. It had an area of approximately .
History
...
. A copy of the Latona fountain was built in the gardens of
Herrenchiemsee
Herrenchiemsee is a complex of royal buildings on Herreninsel, the largest island in the Chiemsee lake, in southern Bavaria, Germany. Together with the neighbouring isle of Frauenchiemsee and the uninhabited Krautinsel, it forms the municipali ...
, a palace complex in
Bavaria
Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...
,
Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
.
The tale has also inspired music, like the ''Verwandlung der lycischen Bauern in Frösche'' ("Transformation of the Lycian Peasants into Frogs") by Austrian composer
Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf
Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf (2 November 1739 – 24 October 1799) was an Austrian composer and violinist. He was a friend of both Haydn and Mozart.
(webpage has a translation button)
His best-known works include the German singspiel '' Doktor un ...
, one among the several symphonies composed based on tales from Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''.
Gallery
File:Chiemsee Brunnen auf Herrenchiemsee 4.JPG, Leto in the Fountain on Herreninsel, Chiemsee.
File:Jan_Brueghel_-_Latona_en_de_Lycische_boeren.jpg, ''Latona and the Lycian Peasants'', ca. 1605, by Jan Brueghel the Elder.
File:Bassin Latone Jardin Château Versailles - Versailles (FR78) - 2021-12-19 - 6.jpg, Fountain of Latona, Versailles
The Palace of Versailles ( ; ) is a former royal residence commissioned by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, Yvelines, Versailles, about west of Paris, in the Yvelines, Yvelines Department of Île-de-France, Île-de-France region in Franc ...
.
File:Les metamorphoses d'Ovide - en latin et en françois (1767) (14579684100).jpg, Leto and the Lycian peasants.
File:Latona and the Peasants of Lycia, by Francois Lemoyne, 1721, oil on canvas - Portland Art Museum - Portland, Oregon - DSC09064.jpg, ''Latona and the Peasants of Lycia'', by Francois Lemoyne, 1721, oil on canvas.
File:Joshua Cristall - Latona and the Lycian Peasants - 96.1210 - Museum of Fine Arts.jpg, Latona by Joshua Cristall.
File:(Narbonne) Latone et les paysans de Lycie - Andrea Locatelli - Musée des Beaux-Arts de Narbonne.jpg, ''Latona and the peasants of Lycia'', by Andrea Locatelli, ca 1720–1741.
See also
*
Baucis and Philemon
Baucis and Philemon () are two characters from Greek mythology, only known to us from Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''. Baucis and Philemon were an old married couple in the region of Tyana, which Ovid places in Phrygia, and the only ones in their t ...
*
Lycaon
*
Milk of Hera
*
Polyphemus
Polyphemus (; , ; ) is the one-eyed giant son of Poseidon and Thoosa in Greek mythology, one of the Cyclopes described in Homer's ''Odyssey''. His name means "abounding in songs and legends", "many-voiced" or "very famous". Polyphemus first ap ...
References
Bibliography
*
Antoninus Liberalis
Antoninus Liberalis () was an Ancient Greek grammarian who probably flourished between the second and third centuries AD. He is known as the author of ''The Metamorphoses'', a collection of tales that offers new variants of already familiar myths ...
, ''The Metamorphoses of Antoninus Liberalis'' translated by Francis Celoria (Routledge 1992)
Online version at the Topos Text Project.*
*
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*
Online version at Perseus.tufts Library.*
External links
The Warburg Institute Iconographic Database (images of Latona)*
{{Authority control
Leto
Lycia
Mythological people from Anatolia
Metamorphoses characters
Metamorphoses into animals in Greek mythology
Deeds of Demeter
Artemis in art
Apollo in art
Culture of ancient Greece