Hi guysss
So I recently got back into Certamen (the first tournament isn’t too far off!) and I noticed a WHOLE lot of stuff happens on mountains.
I figured it might be useful to list the mountains where important events happened, since they’re important, and it’s hard for me to remember some locations.
Mount Ida
Mount Ida is where the Judgement of Paris happened: In other words, this is where Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite competed for the apple by trying to bribe Paris, and Aphrodite promised the most beautiful woman as his wife. That was Helen. She got the apple, gave an ALREADY MARRIED Helen to Paris, and the Trojan War happened from there.
Baby Zeus is also said in some sources to have been hidden on this mountain!
Mount Dicte
This is another mountain Baby Zeus could be hidden on, to make sure he didn’t get eaten by Cronus because Rhea was NOTTTT having that. The Curetes banged on shields and spears to drown out his crying so Cronus wouldn’t find him. Also where Amalthea gave him milk. Amalthea is a goat. Fun facts.
Mount Siplyus
This is the mountain where Niobe, as a weeping rock sits. See, according to Ovid, Niobe was a queen of Thebes who had fourteen children, seven sons and seven daughters. She didn’t see why people honored Latona (Leto’s Roman name, since this is Ovid), as she only gave birth to two children (Apollo and Diana), while she gave birth to fourteen.
Ignore the part where Latona had to wander the world because she couldn’t give birth on and dry land and was in pain for so so long. Yeah. We’re just gonna ignore that…
Anyway, Niobe orders the worship of Latona to be stopped. Latona gets upset and tells her children, and she barely has to say anything before Apollo and Diana get mad and swear to avenge this offense.
Apollo kills all of Niobe’s sons (He wants to spare Illioneus after he begs for it, but it’s too late and the boy just dies a merciful death). After this, Amphion, Niobe’s husband, kills himself.
And if THAT WASN’T ENOUGH, Niobe STILL insults Leto, saying she’s better because she has more kids still. Diana kills all of Niobe’s daughters while they mourn their brothers, and as Niobe begs for her last daughter to be spared, that daughter dies.
Niobe is frozen as the loss of every one of her kids and her husband, and she turns into a rock on Mount Siplyus. To this day she still cries.
Mount Cithaeron
Mount Cithaeron is where Actaeon gets turned into a stag and torn apart by his hunting dogs and friends after accidentally seeing Artemis bathing in the Gargaphie valley. This story always makes me sad.
It’s also the place where Oedipus is exposed as an infant to try and avert the prophecy. It doesn’t works, he’s found by some shepherds, dropped off at Polybus and Merope’s palace in Corinth, and the prophecy finds it’s way.
And those are the important mountains I can think of! They come up most frequently in Certamen, and I hope this is a good guide for that :3
Bye everyone!