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Reflections on Medusa

After reading Medusa in mythology, I thought I’d resurrect this older post, regarding the Gorgon aspect of the Goddess Athene.

The Aegis is a coat/shield/breastplate with powerful protective properties. It also acts as a kind of weapon. It was said to belong to Zeus, and was made from the skin of a goat that raised Zeus when he was a baby. Apollo also used it to frighten the Greeks during the Trojan war. But usually it is associated with the goddess Athene. She is often depicted wearing it, fringed with snakes, and in the center is fixed the fearsome head of Medusa

Also I’m thinking of the time when Athene caught sight of her own distorted reflection, with cheeks all puffed up (Gorgon-like?), in a river, whilst playing some pipes, a musical instrument she herself invented. Also, according to Pindar:

…long ago Pallas Athene invented,
weaving in music’s rich refrain
The goulish dirge of the fierce-hearted Gorgons.

…That son of Danae, who reaped the head
Of the fair-cheeked Medusa;
He who, men tell, was from a flowing stream
Of gold begotten. But when the goddess maid delivered
From these labours this man she loved, then she contrived
The manifold melodies of the flute, to make
In music’s notes an image of the shrill
Lamenting cries, strung from Euryale’s
Ravening jaws..

Pindar (Pythian Ode 12. 8-10, 15-22)
(Trans’ Conway, G.S and Revised by R. Stoneman,1997, p. 188-189)

I knew about the myth, but it wasn’t until I read a blog entry ‘The mirror of Athene’ (The site no longer exists), that I saw the possible connection with the disfigured face of Medusa, who herself was once beautiful. Medusa and Poseidon lay together in Athena’s temple, and the Goddess Athene, outraged by the desecration, transformed her beauty into ugliness, and her flowing hair into writhing snakes.

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