Who was Apollonius of Rhodes?

Apollonius of Rhodes

Apollonius of Rhodes was a Greek poet and scholar of the third century BC. He wrote the Argonautica, the only full-scale Greek epic that survives from between Homer and Virgil. The poem is a main source for some versions of Medea’s choices, the death of Apsyrtus and the marriage on Drepane. Details of his life are disputed. His title may come from living on Rhodes or from a Rhodian family.

In short

Apollonius of Rhodes wrote the Argonautica in the third century BC. It is the only full-scale Greek epic that survives from between Homer and Virgil.
The ancient Lives give confused accounts of his move to Rhodes. Modern scholars think his title comes either from living there or from a Rhodian family.
In Book 3, Eros shoots Medea because the gods asked him to, and the poem then follows her thinking. The gods force her passion, but her later decisions are still her own.
Apollonius makes Apsyrtus a grown man in pursuit, whom Medea lures into an ambush and Jason kills. Apollodorus instead makes him a child whom Medea kills and cuts apart.
On Drepane, Arete warns Medea and Jason of the condition Alcinous has set, so they can marry before he announces his judgement.
Medea defeats Talos by calling on destructive spirits and fixing her gaze on him. He grazes his weak ankle, loses his ichor and falls.

The poet and his poem

Apollonius of Rhodes was a Greek poet and scholar. In the middle of the third century BC he wrote the Argonautica, a long poem about Jason and the voyage of the ship Argo. It is the only full-scale Greek epic, or long poem about heroes, that survives from between Homer and Virgil.

He spent most of his career in Alexandria, but little about his life is certain. The ancient Lives, short biographies written about him in antiquity, give confused accounts. They tell of him moving away after the poem was badly received. Modern scholars prefer two other explanations of his title: a time living on Rhodes, or a family that came from Rhodes. Neither account proves that he was born there, or that he revised and recited the poem there. The title cannot settle which explanation is right. For myth, the secure evidence is the poem, not the story told about its author.

What Eros changes

Jason has come to the hall of Aeetes, the father of Medea. The god Eros enters unseen. He crouches behind Jason, draws a fresh arrow and shoots Medea beneath the heart. The arrow burns like flame, and Eros leaves the hall laughing. The gods asked for this because Jason needs her help.

The wound does not complete the story. It starts the poem’s long attention to what Medea thinks before she acts. Book 3 follows the turmoil the shot causes. Medea argues with herself. She weighs what she owes her family against what she feels for the stranger. She must decide whether to give Jason the means to survive her father’s tests.

So in this version the gods do force her passion. That explains why desire comes on so strongly. It does not erase the decisions that follow. Apollonius keeps both pressures in view.

Which Apsyrtus the poem kills

In Book 4, Medea’s brother Apsyrtus closes in as a leader of the pursuit from Colchis, her homeland. He is a grown commander, not a child carried aboard the Argo. Medea sends him into a meeting set up as a trap. Jason waits in ambush and kills him.

The poem divides the blame exactly. Medea plans the deception and lures her brother within reach. Jason does the killing. The poem never lets the ambush become a chance meeting. Nor does it let the arrow of Eros fully explain what Medea now chooses to do.

Apollodorus, whose book the Library retells the Greek myths, gives a version that cannot fit with this one. There Medea takes a young Apsyrtus aboard when she flees Colchis. As her father Aeetes chases them, she kills the child and cuts him apart. She throws the pieces away so that their father must stop to gather them. This cannot be added to the story of Apollonius as another stage of the same event. The brother cannot be both the grown pursuer lured ashore and the child passenger killed during the escape.

Why the marriage comes before the judgement

On Drepane, the people of Colchis demand that Medea be sent back. Alcinous, who rules there, decides on the condition for his answer. If Medea is still unmarried, she must be returned. If she is already Jason’s wife, he will not part her from her husband.

Arete hears the decision before it is announced. She sends a warning to Jason, and the pair marry that night. Only afterwards does Alcinous give his judgement. The marriage does not follow a ruling in their favour. It happens before the ruling, so that Medea meets the condition the ruling depends on.

Apollonius makes the order clear: a private decision, a warning, the marriage, and then the public judgement. Arete cannot cancel the king’s condition. She can give Medea and Jason the knowledge they need to act before it closes around them. The outcome depends on what the pair do with that warning, not on Alcinous changing his mind later.

How Talos falls

Near Crete, the bronze guardian Talos keeps the Argo from landing. He breaks rocks from the cliff and throws them at the ship. Medea answers from the deck. She calls on destructive spirits and fixes her gaze on him, aiming her power without touching him.

Her attack does not melt or pierce his bronze body. As Talos lifts more stones, he grazes his weak ankle against a rock. Ichor, the fluid that runs in the gods, flows out of the wound. He loses his strength, sways and falls. Apollonius ends the scene with the open ankle, the running ichor and the bronze body striking the ground, not with a contest of strength.

Places to visit

Rhodes

Dodecanese

Apollonius’s title links him to Rhodes, but the evidence gives no single sure reason. Modern scholars think of either a time living on the island or a Rhodian family, while the story of his move there in the ancient Lives is confused.
Rhodes