The Hellenes - tireless travelers, adventurers, sea robbers and merchants - possessed an inexhaustible imagination. They settled the low, two and a half kilometers, Mount Olympus immortal and beautiful in appearance, but essentially insidious gods who always rejoiced if people had trouble. The Greeks surrounded their unkind gods with retinues of beautiful girls - nymphs - and scary satyrs - half people, half animals. Satyrs and nymphs did not live on cloudless celestial distances with higher gods, but on earth.
Nymphs and satires - gods of what?
Fantasy of the ancient Greeks knew no bounds, and when the enlightened Europeans learned the myths and traditions of the Hellenes during the Renaissance, the ancient gods, satyrs and nymphs served as an inexhaustible source of inspiration for writers, artists and musicians. They learned that the spirits of the mountains were nymphs of oread, forests and trees - dryads, sources - mollusks. In the meadows and valleys lived limnades and tunes, and in the seas and oceans - Nereids and oceans. About many of them the Greeks have interesting legends, but more on that below. Peter Paul Rubens created a wonderful portrait of two fauns.
Their appearance - curly, unkempt tangled hair with a wreath of grape leaves and horns, flattened nose, red from drunkenness and in powerful hands - a bunch of grapes from which wine is made - fully corresponds to the descriptions of the Greeks. Only the tail is not visible. Satyrs did not have specific habitats: on their goat legs they were always lustful, often drunk, they rode everywhere, chasing nymphs, until they were called to service by the god Dionysus or the god Pan. This description should answer the question: “Lower deities, satyrs and nymphs, gods of what?” These are the spirits that populated, according to the Greeks, all of their surrounding nature. Satyrs often chased nymphs, having the most base impulses, but beautiful girls ran away from them.
Legends of nymphs
Satires and nymphs in myths did not always coexist. The story of the nymph Daphne tells how Eros laughed at the beautiful Phoebus, firing an arrow at him, evoking love, and at the nymph Daphne - killing. So perfection itself, Phoebe, seeing Daphne, began to pursue her, begging for love. But the daughter of the river god Peneus, quickly running away from the persecution and feeling that she was being abandoned, prayed to her father. She asked him to help her escape and rob her of her earthly appearance. And immediately her slender camp began to be covered with bark, her hands raised in supplication turned into branches and foliage rustled on them. The girl turned into a laurel tree. With sadness he stood next to Phoebus laurel. He asked him for branches to make himself a wreath, and the tree rustled with foliage and, in agreement, bowed the crown to Apollo. Nymphs peeking out from tree branches made up the retinue of Phoebe's sister, hunter of Artemis.
And what a fun it was - the laughter of the girls, the barking of dogs. And when Artemis was tired of hunting, then all together they would go round dances to the sounds of Kefara Phoebe.
In the mountains and valleys
In the legend below, satyrs and nymphs are not united again. Nymph Echo, to her misfortune, met nobody who loved the beautiful Narcissus. She could not talk to him herself, since the goddess Hera allowed her only to answer someone’s speeches. And Narcissus, punished by Aphrodite for not responding to Echo's tender feelings, fell in love with himself and died, peering at his reflection in the water.
Grape picking
Sometimes nymphs and satyrs meet peacefully and collect together the fruits that the earth gives them.
The picture of Rubens depicts just such a moment. In the foreground is a powerful satyr who holds a wicker basket filled with bunches of green and black grapes and other fruits. Behind him is a charming nymph who helped him. This time is a time of complete harmony in nature.
Dionysus and Pan
Among the retinue of the mysterious, mocking and formidable god Dionysus, one can meet not only satyrs, but also the god Pan. Hermes was his father, and the nymph Dryopa was his mother. When Pan was born, the mother, casting only one glance at the child, ran away in horror. Oh nightmare! The kid had a beard, goat legs and horns. But Hermes was delighted with his child and carried him to show the Olympians. Those all just laughed merrily. Pan went down to the earth and began to live on it. Shady groves and mountains became his refuge. In them Pan grazes herds and plays the flute. Nymphs gather at him and dance around him. The sounds of his flute are gentle and full of sadness. After all, Pan was in love with the wonderful nymph Siringa, who, in order not to answer his love, turned into a reed on the banks of the river. The grieved Pan of reeds made himself a flute-syringa and has not parted with it ever since.
Satire
They look like Pan, but do not have his nobility. They are lazy, lecherous, always drunk and love to sing. When the satyrs do not accompany Dionysos, they spend time in search of nymphs.
Playing flutes, sitting under the shady crowns of trees, they try to attract the attention of beautiful girls. But their rudeness and arrogance push women away from them. All who envy them, try to escape from the satyrs. They, along with the maenads, participate in the bacchanalia and orgiastic festivities of Dionysus. According to legend, it was the satyrs who saved Ariadne when she escaped from the island of Crete. After this, Ariadne became the wife of Dionysus. Satyrs are wild, untamed nature.
So the Greeks perceived nature, populating it with nymphs, deities and spirits of forests, fields, mountains, water, but there was no complete serenity in it, therefore satires appeared.