sirens
The Seba library treats Siren in 8 passages, across 7 authors (including Padel, Ruth, Kerényi, Karl, Lattimore, Richmond).
Sirens embody the Greek sense that what comes in through ears—poetry, words, music—is both supremely desirable, or treasurable, and lethal.
Padel argues that the Siren is the mythological crystallization of the Greek understanding that auditory knowledge is simultaneously irresistible and fatal, with intellectual content inseparable from sensuous magnetism.
, In and Out of the Mind Greek Images of the Tragic Self, 1994thesis
"Come hither, Odysseus famed in song, great glory of the Greeks! … For we know all that the Greeks and Trojans suffered, by the will of the gods, for Troy. And we know all that happens on the earth, everywhere and at all times!"
Kerényi presents the Homeric Siren-song in full, establishing that the Sirens' temptation is an offer of universal, omniscient knowledge rather than mere erotic or aesthetic pleasure, with their meadow revealed as a field of rotting human remains.
, The Gods of the Greeks, 1951thesis
Any account of the Sirens must include a mention of Acheloos, the most revered of our river-gods, to whom, as well as to Phorkys, is attributed the paternity of the Sirens.
Kerényi situates the Sirens within pre-Olympian genealogy, assigning their origin to the chthonic, liminal figures of Acheloos and Phorkys, thereby grounding them in the matrix of archaic, watery, monstrous divinity.
, The Gods of the Greeks, 1951thesis
"Come this way, honored Odysseus, great glory of the Achaians … for we know everything that the Argives and Trojans did and suffered in wide Troy through the gods' despite. Over all the generous earth we know everything that happens."
Lattimore's translation of the Siren-song foregrounds the claim to total terrestrial knowledge as the operative temptation, reinforcing the depth-psychological reading of the Sirens as figures of dangerous omniscience rather than merely carnal allure.
, Odyssey of Homer, 2009supporting
Can I ask something about the siren? You seem to have described her primarily as a sexual figure. But I was thinking of women like Cleopatra, who seduce with power as much as with sexuality. Is this also part of the anima axis?
Greene explicitly relocates the Siren from a narrowly sexual archetype to the broader negative-anima axis, in which seduction through power and promised fulfilment of unlived potential constitutes the Siren's deeper psychological operation.
, The Development of Personality: Seminars in Psychological Astrology, Volume 1, 1987supporting
The siren's breasts are related to the pitchers on the Star. … Blood and milk represent the alchemical red and white but also suffering and nurturing or death and life.
Place embeds the Siren within an alchemical and Neoplatonic symbol-system, reading her body as a site where the coincidence of opposites — death and life, suffering and nurture — is made visible, thereby linking the Siren to the transcendence of duality.
, The Tarot: History, Symbolism, and Divination, 2005supporting
Even earlier a silver Siren … lists as dedications to Samian Hera a golden Gorgo, the stone.
Seaford notes a silver Siren among votive dedications to Hera at Samos, situating the figure within the material and cultic economy of archaic Greek religion alongside other apotropaic and chthonic images.
, Money and the Early Greek Mind: Homer, Philosophy, Tragedy, 2004aside
Aglaophone, (one of the Sirens), 181
The catalogue preserves the individual name Aglaophone as one of the Sirens, contributing to the mythographic record of their plurality and identity within the Hesiodic tradition.
, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns, and Homerica, -700aside