M/M: The Story of Cyparissus, Vatican Mythographers 2.177

Cyparissus, Beloved By the Gods

Name:  Vatican Mythographers Date:   10th century CE Region:   Unknown Citation:   Vatican Mythographers 2.177

While the handsome lad Cyparissus was hunting in the forest, Apollo fell in love with him. Apollo gave him a beautiful and tame pet stag as a gift. Cyparissus loved the deer. Growing drowsy, he dozed off under a tree. When he was woken up by a sudden noise, he saw a deer far off, and shot it with an arrow, thinking it was a wild deer. Once he realized what he had done, he panicked, and starved himself to death. As he died, Apollo pitied him, and turned him into the tree that shares his name [the cypress tree]. 

Cyparissus, Beloved By the Gods

Cyparissus speciosus puer dum in silva venaretur, in amorem sui Apollinem compulit. A quo accepit munus cervum pulcherrimum et mansuetum: quem cum diligeret, lassus somnum sub arbore carpere coepit. Subito excitatus strepitu cervum longe vidit; quem credens silvestrem, missa sagitta eum interemit: agnitoque in tantum extabuit, ut ab omni cibo et potu abstineret. Quo tabescente, Apollo misertus eius, vertit eum in arborem sui nominis cupressum.

Vatican Mythographers [10th century CE?] Little is known about the author or origin of the collection of myths known as the Vatican Mythographers, but the work’s first editor Angelo Mai found the collection on a manuscript dating back to the 10th century CE. This volume is a collection of three different mythographers who have assembled various Greco-Roman myths; although many of these myths are basic summaries in Latin, some of them are either analyzed as allegories or compared to Christian thought.