ESHMUN
Phoenician
c. 1200 BCE to c. 400 CE
The Phoenician deity Eshmun was a god of healing, just as Jason's name means "healer" and in his earliest incarnation was likely also closely associated with medicinal plants and healing. Eshmun's mythology parallels that of Jason in several ways. First, of course, is the connection to healing. Second is his relationship to a powerful female figure. Just as Jason marries and is destroyed by the attentions of Medea, likely once a goddess figure, Eshmun is pursued by Astronoë (almost certainly a form of Astarte or Ishtar), resulting in his death and resurrection, much as Medea, for love of Jason, is said to have killed and rejuvenated him in a cauldron. Finally, Eshmun's brothers are the mysterious Kabeiroi, the chthonic gods of Lemnos and Samothrace into whose mysteries Jason is initiated. (They also serve as a chorus in a lost Argonaut play by Aeschylus.) It is possible that the similarities between these myth cycles and that of Jason caused Lemnos and Samothrace to be included as stops on Jason's journey. The following passages provide the primary textual discussions of Eshmun and his myth cycle. |
LIFE OF ISIDORE
DAMASCIUS
c. 500 CE
Possibly a fragment of Philo’s History of Phoenicia (c. 100 CE)
Summarized in Photios I, Bibliotecha (820-870 CE)
The principle source for the myth of Eshmun is Photios I's summary (codex 242) of Damascius' Life of Isidore (Vita Isidori), a memoir of his teacher. Damascius was the last pagan scholar of the Academy of Athens founded by Plato. This passage from the Life appears to preserve a fragment of the earlier History of Phoenicia compiled by Philo of Byblos, who claimed to be translating the work of Sanchuniathon, an alleged Phoenician historian from Berytus (Beirut) who lived prior to the Trojan War. The consensus today, however, is that Sanchuniathon was a fictional character and that the work bearing his name was a Greek compilation and interpretation of Phoenician myths and texts.
The first part of Photius’ summary of Damascius’ text is paraphrased in George Stanley Faber, The Origin of Pagan Idolatry Ascertained from Historical Testimony and Circumstantial Evidence, vol. 2 (London: 1816), 262:
According to Sanchoniatho, Sydyk or the just man, who is clearly the patriarch Noah, was the father of the seven Cabiri, who were the builders of the first ship or the ship Argo: and to them an eighth brother was added, thence denominated Esmuni, but properly called Asclepius. Respecting him Damascius relates, that, although worshipped by the Greeks, he was really neither Greek nor Egyptian, but a Phoenician god peculiarly adored at Berytus or the city of the Baris, where the Cabiri had consecrated the relics of the ocean or the deluge: that he was a youth of such beauty as to engage the affections of the goddess Astronoe, the mother of the gods: and that, finding himself perpetually followed by her while engaged in the chase, he at length, to avoid her importunities, castrated himself with a hatchet.
The interpretation of the Argo as the ship of the Kabeiroi is based on the Enlightenment-era idea that Noah's Ark was equivalent to the Argo because the names sound alike. This theory is not supported by evidence and was not held in Antiquity.
The remainder of Damascius’ text is paraphrased in George Rawlinson’s History of Phoenicia (London: Longman, Greens, and Co., 1889), 335-336:
According to Damascius, he was the eighth son of Sydyk, whence his name, and the chief of the Cabeiri. Whereas they were dwarfish and misshapen, he was a youth of most beautiful appearance, truly worthy of admiration. Like Adonis, he was fond of hunting in the woods that clothe the flanks of Lebanon, and there he was seen by Astronoë, the Phoenician goddess, the mother of the gods (in whom we cannot fail to recognise Astarte), who persecuted him with her attentions to such an extent that to escape her he was driven to the desperate resource of self-emasculation. Upon this the goddess, greatly grieved, called him Paean, and by means of quickening warmth brought him back to life, and changed him from a man into a god, which he thenceforth remained. The Phoenicians called him Esmun, 'the eighth,' but the Greeks worshipped him as Asclepius, the god of healing, who gave life and health to mankind.
Eshmun was considered one of the Kabeiroi (Cabeiri or
Cabiri), the mysterious gods of Lemnos and Samothrace, into whose
mysteries the Argonauts were initiated. Interestingly, the Kabeiroi
were, according to Phoenician legends, responsible for the same feat
that later mythographers would assign to Argus, the creation of the
first ship, a possible reason for later including these gods in the Argonaut myth:
"SANCHUNIATHON"
A fragment of Philo’s History of Phoenicia (c. 100 CE)
Preserved in Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica, book I, ch. 10. (early 4th c. CE)
Translated in Isaac Preston Cory, Ancient Fragments, 2nd ed.(London: William Pickering, 1832), 9:
From Misor descended Taautus, who invented the writing of the first letters: him the Egyptians called Thoor, the Alexandrians Thoyth, and the Greeks Hermes. But from Sydyc descended the Dioscuri, or Cabiri, or Corybantes, or Samothraces: these (he says) first built a ship complete.
From these descended others; who were the discoverers of medicinal herbs, and of the cure of poisons and of charms.
[...]
These things, says he, the Caberi, the seven sons of Sydyc, and their eighth brother Asclepius, first of all set down in the records in obedience to the commands of the god Taautus.
"SANCHUNIATHON"
A fragment of Philo’s History of Phoenicia (c. 100 CE)
Preserved in Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica, book I, ch. 10. (early 4th c. CE)
Translated in Isaac Preston Cory, Ancient Fragments, 2nd ed.(London: William Pickering, 1832), 9:
From Misor descended Taautus, who invented the writing of the first letters: him the Egyptians called Thoor, the Alexandrians Thoyth, and the Greeks Hermes. But from Sydyc descended the Dioscuri, or Cabiri, or Corybantes, or Samothraces: these (he says) first built a ship complete.
From these descended others; who were the discoverers of medicinal herbs, and of the cure of poisons and of charms.
[...]
These things, says he, the Caberi, the seven sons of Sydyc, and their eighth brother Asclepius, first of all set down in the records in obedience to the commands of the god Taautus.