Reading Notes: Cupid and Psyche, Part A

Bibliography: 

Story source: Apuleius's Golden Ass, as translated into English by Tony Kline (2013).

http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/05/myth-folklore-unit-apuleiuss-cupid-and.html

A young woman is taken captive by a band of robbers on her wedding day. She is very upset, and an old woman who is also with the robbers tells her a story to calm her down. There was a Princess, who was the youngest of three daughters, that was said to be an exceptional beauty. Tales of the girl’s beauty spread throughout the land, and eventually, people started journeying to see her. Venus, goddess of love and beauty, took note of these tales. Her shrines were being neglected, her statues ignored, and her altars left cold. Instead, people worshipped the Princess in her place. Enraged, Venus called her son Cupid to make Psyche fall in love with a man who did not have “rank, wealth, even health”.

 

Psyche’s sisters were married, although no one had asked for Psyche’s hand. The people admired her beauty the way they would admire the beauty of a statue. Her father, the King, suspected intervention by the gods. He consulted an Oracle of Apollo. The Oracle gave him a dark prophecy. Psyche was to be taken atop the mountain and left there, to await her husband. Psyche was upset with her parents for letting people name her the ‘new Venus’. She said that is when they should have mourned her, not now. One by one, the people who had carried her to the top of the mountain left, and Psyche was left alone. Zephyr, god of the west wind, carried her to the valley below the mountain, where exhausted by the days tribulations, she fell asleep.

 

She woke to a paradise. She saw a huge palace, clearly crafted by the gods. She entered and was told that the palace was hers. There was food and drink, a bath, and even music for her. She laid down in her bed, knowing that her husband would appear soon. After they slept together, her husband left. This repeated for several nights, and Psyche grew accustomed to her new life, unaware of her families grievances. Her parents had aged greatly in mourning their youngest daughter, and her sisters were trying to comfort them. Psyche’s husband made her promise to ignore the voices of her family, should they ever come to the mountain.

Psyche was beside herself at this and cried for several nights. Eventually, her husband relented and said that she could see her family and even give them gold and jewels from the palace. However, Psyche was not to listen to anything her family said about his appearance or his identity.

 

When Psyche’s sisters came to mourn her, Zephyr brought them to the palace just as he had brought Psyche. They were in awe of Psyche’s home, and all the gold she had, and her happiness. However, Psyche’s sisters soon grew jealous of her. They pressed her about her husband. Psyche called for Zephyr to take them back to the mountain. Psyche’s sisters talked themselves into a fury, lamenting their husbands and their lack of wealth, and eventually developed a plan to punish her for her perceived arrogance.

 

Psyche became pregnant with her husband’s child, and once more swore not to let her sisters’ pressure her into looking at her husband’s face. Her husband warned her once more about the sisters plotting. Her sisters came back, once again growing in their jealously. Having forgotten what she had previously told them, Psyche invented new looks for her husband. They remind her of the prophecy that said she would marry a “brutish creature”. They say that he is waiting until the child she is carrying is full term to eat her. Psyche panicked and told her sisters of her husband’s warnings about seeing his face. The sisters tell her to hide a razor blade under her pillow so that she can kill the monstrous snake that is masquerading as her husband. Only, the lamp revealed Cupid, not a monster! When Psyche tilted the lamp, she spilled some of the wax on Cupid. Cupid woke and fled immediately. Cupid goes to punish Psyche’s sisters and he leaves Psyche there. Psyche wonders into the Kingdom of one of her sisters. Upon hearing what Psyche has done, she throws herself off a cliff so that Cupid will make her his bride. Zephyr does not catch her. The second sister does the same.

Part A ends here.

                                                   Cupid and Psyche