Dolus

In Classical mythology, Dolus (Deception)[1] is a figure who appears in an Aesopic fable by the Roman fabulist Gaius Julius Phaedrus, where he is an apprentice of the Titan Prometheus. According to the Roman mythographer Hyginus, Dolus was the offspring of Aether and Terra (Earth),[2] while Cicero has Dolus being the offspring of Aether and Dies (Day).[3]

Prometheus and Guile[edit]

Dolus appears as a character in one of the Aesopic fables (number 535 in the Perry Index), by the Roman poet and fabulist Gaius Julius Phaedrus, titled Prometheus and Guile (Prometheus et Dolus), subtitled On Truth and Falsehood (De ventate et mendacio).[4] In Phaedrus's fable, Prometheus appears as a sculptor in clay who can bring to life the figures he creates. Having just made a sculpture of Truth, he is called away by Jove, leaving his workshop in the hands of his apprentice Dolus. Out of sense of rivalry, Dolus fashions an exact duplicate of Prometheus's Truth, except for the fact that, because he has run out of clay, Dolus' figure has no feet. When Prometheus returns he marvels at Dolus's work, and wishing to take credit for the amazing skill required to make so exact a duplicate, he fires both clay figures in his kiln. When both figures come to life, Prometheus' Truth walks gracefully forward, while Dole's figure stands fixed unable to walk. Ever after Dolus's figure was called Falsehood. In closing the fabulist says that when people say that Falsehood has no feet, he agrees, adding the moral (similar to the idiom "the truth will out"):

Now and then counterfeits bring men profit at the start, but in the long run the truth itself comes to light.[5]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ Meissel, s.v. Dolus.
  2. ^ Hyginus, Fabulae Preface, 3.1.
  3. ^ Cicero, De Natura Deorum 3.44.
  4. ^ Perry, pp. 376–379.
  5. ^ Perry, p. 379

References[edit]

  • Cicero, Marcus Tullius, De Natura Deorum in Cicero: On the Nature of the Gods. Academics, translated by H. Rackham, Loeb Classical Library No. 268, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, first published 1933, revised 1951. ISBN 978-0-674-99296-2. Online version at Harvard University Press. Internet Archive.
  • Hyginus, Gaius Julius, Fabulae, in The Myths of Hyginus, edited and translated by Mary A. Grant, Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1960. Online version at ToposText.
  • Meissel, Franz-Stefan, s.v. Dolus in Brill’s New Pauly, Antiquity volumes edited by: Hubert Cancik and Helmuth Schneider, English Edition by: Christine F. Salazar, Classical Tradition volumes edited by: Manfred Landfester, English Edition by: Francis G. Gentry. Online version.
  • Perry, Ben Edwin, Babrius, Phaedrus. Fables., translated by Ben Edwin Perry, Loeb Classical Library No. 436, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 1965. ISBN 978-0-674-99480-5. Online version at Harvard University Press.
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