Acis, Galatea, and Polyphemus (Ovid-Labeled)

Catalogue ID: 05-local-and-lesser/053-acis-galatea-polyphemus-ovid

Cycle: Local and lesser — Sicilian love triangle / river aetiology

Version line: Roman transmission (Ovid); builds on Theocritean Polyphemus–Galatea love

Sources: Ovid, *Metamorphoses* 13.738–897 (Roman — Galatea narrates; Acis crushed; river Acis); Theocritus, *Idyll* 11 (Greek love precedent without Acis — see 05/052); Philoxenus of Cythera, *Cyclops* (dithyramb fragments — classical Greek jealousy motif)

Source file: /workspace/greek-myth-catalogue/05-local-and-lesser/053-acis-galatea-polyphemus-ovid.md

Characters

Acis — mortal youth; crushed by the rock; becomes the river Acis
Amphitrite — Nereid narrator; lover of Acis; object of Polyphemus’s desire
Faunus — father of Acis (Ovid)
Polyphemus — Cyclops rival; singer; killer of Acis
Scylla — listener in Ovid’s frame (before her own metamorphosis)
Symaethis — mother of Acis

Places

Cyclops’s rock seat — stage of the giant’s serenade
Mount Etna — scene of song, love, and murder
River Acis — metamorphosed youth; runs to the Sicilian sea

Themes

Birth

Narrative

Ovid has Galatea tell the story to Scylla: she loved the mortal youth Acis, son of Faunus and a nymph, while the Cyclops Polyphemus loved her with Theocritean song swollen to monstrous scale—boasts, threats, and a panpipe huge as his bulk. Polyphemus found the lovers together and hurled a mass of rock torn from the mountain; Acis was crushed beneath it. Galatea transformed her beloved’s blood into a river: Acis became the river-god Acis, horned and reed-crowned, his waters running to the sea near Aetna. The triangle explains a Sicilian stream and darkens Theocritus’s comic lover into a murderous rival. Philoxenus’s earlier dithyramb had already made Polyphemus a singer competing for Galatea in Greek performance culture; Ovid’s innovation (or Hellenistic elaboration he transmits) is Acis’s death and fluvial rebirth. Catalogue practice: read 05/052 for Greek pastoral desire; read this file for the **Acis aetiology** under Ovid’s name.