Rock and a hard place

This rather graphically violent story, worthy of a Quentin Tarantino film, is a composite version (drawing on elements from several differing versions, but mostly that written down by Pausanias) of the mountain-spirit Agdistis who was born both male and female - but "adjusted" by Dionysus for reasons that are never wholly clear. When the dual-sexed Agdistis is forcibly made wholly female she becomes identified as the goddess Cybele. The story extends to include the episode with the handsome Attis and the wedding from hell.

There are a number of King Midas's associated with the kingdom of Pessinos, and I have decided rather arbitrarily to make this Midas the same as the infamous gold-fingered one. That Midas has a daughter named Zoe, though in the Pausanias version of the myth the blushing bride is not directly named.

Quite what this story means you will probably need a team of psychoanalysts to work out. It has strong connotations to the kinds of surgery that used to be commonly foisted upon intersex babies and those who had undergone awful accidents (if you are unfamiliar with the fate of David Reimer and the egomaniacal John Money, look it up). However, Greek myth seldom lends itself to straightforward interpretations alone. All I can suggest is, be wary of drinking too much almond milk.

I wanted to record a Greek myth after hearing about the very recent death of Vlassias Rassias, a leading luminary in the movement to restore Hellenismos as a modern faith and was a founding force in the YSEE (Supreme Council of Ethnic Hellenes). The featured painting is by Sandra M Stanton.


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