The goddess of memory, mother of the Muses.
[Greek Mnēmosunē, from mnēmosunē, memory, from mnēmē.]
Dictionary:
Mne·mos·y·ne (nĭ-mŏs'ə-nē, -mŏz'-) ![]() |
[Greek Mnēmosunē, from mnēmosunē, memory, from mnēmē.]
| Classical Literature Companion: Mnēmosynē |
| Columbia Encyclopedia: Mnemosyne |
| Wikipedia: Mnemosyne |
| Greek deities series |
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|---|---|
| Primordial deities | |
| Olympians | |
| Aquatic deities | |
| Chthonic deities | |
| Personified concepts | |
| Other deities | |
| Titans | |
| The Twelve Titans: | |
| Oceanus and Tethys, | |
| Hyperion and Theia, | |
| Coeus and Phoebe, | |
| Cronus and Rhea, | |
| Mnemosyne, Themis, | |
| Crius, Iapetus | |
| Children of Hyperion: | |
| Eos, Helios, Selene | |
| Daughters of Coeus: | |
| Leto and Asteria | |
| Sons of Iapetus: | |
| Atlas, Prometheus, | |
| Epimetheus, Menoetius | |
| Sons of Crius: | |
| Astraeus, Pallas, | |
| Perses | |
Mnemosyne (Greek Mνημοσύνη, pronounced /nɪˈmɒzɪni/ or /nɪˈmɒsəni/) (sometimes confused with Mneme or compared with Memoria) was the personification of memory in Greek mythology. This titaness was the daughter of Gaia and Uranus and the mother of the Muses by Zeus.
In Hesiod's Theogony, kings and poets receive their powers of authoritative speech from their possession of Mnemosyne and their special relationship with the Muses.
Zeus and Mnemosyne slept together for nine consecutive nights and thereby created the nine Muses. Mnemosyne also presided over a pool[2] in Hades, counterpart to the river Lethe, according to a series of 4th century BC Greek funerary inscriptions in dactylic hexameter. Dead souls drank from Lethe so they would not remember their past lives when reincarnated. Initiates were encouraged to drink from the river Mnemosyne when they died, instead of Lethe. These inscriptions may have been connected with Orphic poetry (see Zuntz, 1971).
Similarly, those who wished to consult the oracle of Trophonius in Boeotia were made to drink alternately from two springs called "Lethe" and "Mnemosyne". An analogous setup is described in the Myth of Er at the end of Plato's Republic.
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| Best of the Web: Mnemosyne |
Some good "Mnemosyne" pages on the web:
Greek Mythology www.pantheon.org |
| Terpsichore (dance) | |
| urania | |
| Muse (Greek Mythology Any of the nine daughters) |
Copyrights:
![]() | Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more | |
![]() | Classical Literature Companion. The Concise Oxford Companion to Classical Literature. Copyright © 1993, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. Read more | |
![]() | Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/. Read more | |
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