Narcissus in Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology
(*Na/rkissos), a son of Cephissus and the nymph Liriope of
Thespiae. He was a very handsome youth, but wholly
inaccessible to the feeling of love. The nymph Echo, who
loved him, but in vain, died away with grief. One of his
rejected lovers, however, prayed to Nemesis to punish him
for his unfeeling heart. Nemesis accordingly caused
Narcissus to see his own face reflected in a well, and to
fall in love with his own image. As this shadow was
unapproachable Narcissus gradually perished with love, and
his corpse was metamorphosed into the flower called after
him narcissus. This beautiful story is related at length by
Ovid (Ov. Met. 3.341, &c.). According to some traditions,
Narcissus sent a sword to one of his lovers, Ameinias, who
killed himself with it at the very door of Narcissus' house,
and called upon the gods to avenge his death. Narcissus,
tormented by love of himself and by repentance, put an end
to his life, and from his blood there sprang up the flower
narcissus (Conon, Narrat. 24). Other accounts again state
that Narcissus melted away into the well in which he had
beheld his own image (Paus. 9.31.6); or that he had a
beloved twin sister perfectly like him, who died, whereupon
he looked at his own image reflected in a well, to satify
his longing after his sister. Eustathius (Eustath. ad Hom.
p. 266) says that Narcissus was drowned in the well. - A
Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology,
William Smith, Ed.
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