Kyparissos

In Greek mythology, Cyparissus or Kyparissos (Greek: Κυπάρισσος, "cypress") was a boy beloved by Apollo, or in some versions by other deities. In the best-known version of the story, the favorite companion of Cyparissus was a tamed stag, which he accidentally killed with his hunting javelin as it lay sleeping in the woods. The boy's grief was such that it transformed him into a cypress tree, a classical symbol of mourning. The myth is thus aetiological in explaining the relation of the tree to its cultural significance.

Cyparissus was the son of Telephus, and his story is set in Chios. The subject is mainly known from Hellenized Latin literature and frescoes from Pompeii. No Greek hero cult devoted to Cyparissus has been identified.

The myth of Cyparissus, like that of Hyacinthus, has often been interpreted as reflecting the social custom of pederasty in ancient Greece, with the boy the beloved (eromenos) of Apollo. Pederastic myth represents the process of initiation into adult male life, with a "death" and transfiguration for the eromenos. "In all these tales," notes Karl Kerenyi, "the beautiful boys are doubles of [Apollo] himself."

The stag as a gift from Apollo reflects the custom in Archaic Greek society of the older male (erastēs) giving his beloved an animal, an act often alluded to in vase painting. In the initiatory context, the hunt is a supervised preparation for the manly arts of war and a testing ground for behavior, with the stag embodying the gift of the hunter's prey.

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