SIRENS

The number of Sirens varies depending on which source you go to for your mythology…maybe because the Sirens left so few alive who could bear witness! These lovely ladies used their haunting voices to lure sailors ever closer to the jagged coastline which would wreck their boats and send them to their deaths.

Why? Well, that’s a good question. Word has it that the Sirens started off as the nereids who were Persephone’s companions when she was kidnapped. Upset at their failure to protect her, Demeter gave them wings and sent them off in search of their friend. When they didn’t return with Persephone, Demeter cursed them to sing death.

Many a man lost his mind and his life to their siren songs, though Odysseus, warned by his lover Circe, stopped up the ears of his crew with wax when they passed by the lethal ladies. But the Sirens sang of secrets Odysseus wanted to hear, so he ordered himself lashed to the mast so that he wouldn’t leap to his doom while he listened to their songs. He thrashed and begged and did his very best to escape with his crew pulling the lashings ever tighter to hold him in place until they were out of earshot.

There’s no record of what Odysseus heard or whether it was worth his torment, but the Sirens, devastated by his escape, apparently threw themselves into rocks against which they’d dashed so many hopes.