Menippe and Metioche

In Greek mythology, Menippe and Metioche were daughters of Orion. After Orion was killed they were brought up by their mother, and Athena taught them the art of weaving and Aphrodite gave them beauty. Once their homeland Aonia at the base of Mt. Helicon was struck by a plague, and the oracle of Apollo Gortynius, when consulted, ordered the inhabitants to propitiate the two Erinnyes by the sacrifice of two maidens, who were to offer themselves to death of their own accord. Menippe and Metioche offered themselves; they thrice invoked the infernal gods, and killed themselves with their shuttles. Persephone and Hades metamorphosed them into comets. The Aonians erected them a sanctuary near Orchomenus, where a propitiatory sacrifice was offered to them every year by youths and maidens. The Aeolians called these maidens Koronides.^[1][2][3]

References

1. ^ Ovid, Metamorphoses, 13. 685 ff
2. ^ Antoninus Liberalis, Metamorphoses, 25
3. ^ Scholia on Homer, Iliad, 18. 486

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology by William Smith (1870).