Anaxarete and Iphis (Ovid-Labeled)

Catalogue ID: 05-local-and-lesser/157-anaxarete-iphis-ovid-roman

Cycle: Local and lesser — Cypriot / Roman metamorphosis / hard-hearted beloved

Version line: Roman transmission (Ovid) — stone-hearted maiden; Aphrodite’s vengeance

Sources: Ovid, *Metamorphoses* 14.698–761 (**Roman**—labeled); cf. brief Greek local notices of a stone Aphrodite at Salamis (Cyprus) in later mythographers

Source file: /workspace/greek-myth-catalogue/05-local-and-lesser/157-anaxarete-iphis-ovid-roman.md

Characters

Anaxarete — scornful maiden; turned to stone
Eros — avenger of the slighted lover
Iphis — rejected lover; hangs himself

Places

Anaxarete’s window — place of the petrifaction
Salamis — setting and statue display

Themes

Narrative

In Ovid’s Roman telling set on Cyprus, the humble youth Iphis loved the noble Anaxarete; she scorned him without pity. He hanged himself at her door. As she watched the funeral pass from a window, unmoved, Aphrodite turned her to stone—the statue afterward shown at Salamis in Cyprus as a warning against hard love. Catalogue the tale as Ovid-primary Roman metamorphosis with a Cypriot cult statue aetiology, distinct from Pygmalion’s living statue.