Danais (epic)

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For other uses, see Danais (disambiguation).

The epic Danais,[1] written by one of the cyclic poets, though the name has not survived and narrating these events, does not survive,[2] but the Danaid tetralogy of Aeschylus undoubtedly draws upon its material. It is represented in the table of epics in the received canon on the very fragmentary "Borgia table"[3] as "Danaides".

See Danaus for the epic's subject matter.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Danais is also a genus of butterfly, lepidopterists being prone to supplying classical names for butterflies.
  2. ^ Two lines were quoted by a later poet.
  3. ^ W. McLeod, "The "Epic Canon" of the Borgia Table: Hellenistic Lore or Roman Fraud?" Transactions of the American Philological Association 115 (1985:161f).