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Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid's Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses Charlotte Northrop Arethusa, Volume 53, Number 1, Winter 2020, pp. 25-41 (Article) Published by Johns Hopkins University Press DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/are.2020.0000 For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/762106 [ This content has been declared free to read by the pubisher during the COVID-19 pandemic. ] CAENEUS AND HEROIC (TRANS)MASCULINITY IN OVID’S METAMORPHOSES CHARLOTTE NORTHROP Caeneus is a problematic figure among Ovid’s heroes in the Meta- morphoses:1 he aspires to an epic heroism that makes him unique among transgender characters elsewhere in the poem.2 This incongruity forms the basis of the taunts from his centaur opponents. However, instead of just being an aberration among Ovid’s hero characters, Caeneus is actually emblem- atic of the traits that define heroism in the Metamorphoses. Ovid does not shy away from questions of gender identity or generic congruity but makes these questions fundamental to the Caeneus episode and its metatextual relationship with the poem and its poetic tradition. This article argues that Ovid’s treatment of Caeneus is comparable to his treatment of other hero figures, and that his version of Caeneus problematizes the traditional epic relationship between gender identity and genre. Ovid presents a vision of transmasculinity that is innovative when compared with earlier versions of Caeneus and similar mythical figures. His Caeneus narrative is, therefore, a locus for reflection on the nature of heroism within Ovid’s “little Iliad.” To begin, it is necessary to define “transgender” and “transmas- culinity” in terms applicable to Augustan literature. I shall then explore the definition of a “hero” as a character identity in the Metamorphoses; resolve the inherent generic conflict in the Caeneus story; establish which parts of the Caeneus episode are likely Ovidian innovations; connect the 1 I use Tarrant’s OCT of the Metamorphoses. All translations are my own. I would like to thank Ingo Gildenhard, Christina Tsaknaki, Philip Hardie, Roy Gibson, and the anonymous reviewer for their insightful and kind advice in writing this article. 2 For the sake of simplicity, I use masculine pronouns (he/him/his) for Caeneus, and femi- nine pronouns (she/her/hers) for Caenis. 25 Arethusa 53 (2019) 25–41 © 2020 by Johns Hopkins University Press 26 Charlotte Northrop innovative themes of Ovid’s Caeneus to programmatic aspects of his little Iliad and other hero narratives in the poem; and, finally, in light of the foregoing arguments, suggest an Ovidian interpretation of heroic mascu- linity and gender identity based on the Caeneus episode. TRANSGENDER AND TRANSMASCULINE The use of the term transgender today is based on personal identification; it is necessary for an individual to say: “I am transgender,” before others can make a definite identification. Therefore, it is nearly impossible for us to apply this sense of the word to people and characters in the ancient world: they simply lacked the vocabulary to self-identify. Similarly, any derivatives of the word, including transmasculinity, are difficult to apply. Nevertheless, there is still ample reason to use the word transgender here, so long as we qualify its usage. The basic meaning of the term transgen- der as “someone who changes the gender assigned at birth,” is perfectly applicable to characters in the ancient world, because that is precisely what Caeneus and other transgender characters do.3 As a result, when we use the term in this article, it should be understood to refer to the basic physi- cal state of Ovid’s corpora mutata (“transformed bodies”; cf. Met. 1.1–2). We must also resist the urge to apply terms like hermaphrodite or intersex: Lutz Graumann (2017.181–82) rightly cautions that intersex con- ditions are difficult to diagnose in the ancient world, owing to the unreli- ability of ancient medical texts; moreover, there is nothing in the Caeneus episode to suggest a medical cause for the hero’s sex change. As for the term hermaphrodite, we can safely reject it as well, since Ovid actually depicts Hermaphroditus himself as having ambiguous sexual characteris- tics, not switching from one end of the gender spectrum to the other like Caeneus.4 Thus transgender is the most descriptively accurate term avail- able to us for Caeneus’s identity. If we are able to find a working technical definition of transgen- der, then we can establish one for transmasculinity as well. In its modern sense, transmasculinity refers to the expression of masculinity by a transman 3 Cf. Brisson 1997.9–10; while Brisson uses the French word bisexuelle, he nevertheless identifies sex-changing figures in the ancient world and argues for the use of modern ter- minology to describe them. 4 Cf. Brisson 1997.10–11 on the important distinction between sex-change and ambiguous sex. Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 27 (female-to-male transgender person). Here again, we can justify using the modern terminology because it is functionally descriptive: since he is a transgender man, we can describe Caeneus’s masculinity as an expression of transmasculinity. An important goal of this study is to show that trans- masculinity, although Ovid lacked a specific term to describe it, is never- theless the unifying theme throughout the Caeneus episode. THE OVIDIAN HERO: VIRTUS AND GENDERED EXPECTATIONS In order to understand why transmasculinity is a unifying theme, we first need to characterize the relationship between masculinity and heroism in Ovidian poetics. In the Metamorphoses, Ovid brings together myths from disparate sources, traditions, and genres; he unites them by accentuating common themes. Ovid’s poem, which at least aspires to the epic genre, contains a number of hero characters. These include his monster-slaying Cadmus (who cuts a Herculean figure—reminiscent of Aeneid 8—when he battles a dragon while wearing a lion skin at Met. 3.52–54), the Odyssean Perseus, and, of course, Achilles, Odysseus, and Aeneas.5 These are warriors from heroic epics. Indeed, they are sometimes transplanted so crudely that their incongruities within the poem become an Ovidian meta-joke. We need only point to someone like Perseus, whose “frustration” as a hero and narrat- ing subject are explored by Stephen Wheeler (1999.183–85). We can also think of the heroes who hunt the Calydonian Boar in Metamorphoses 8, where the heroes’ repeated failures turn the scene into an “epic burlesque,” as Nicholas Horsfall (1979) so eloquently dubs it. All the while, as Betty Nagle (1988) elucidates, other heroes are sidelined and silenced throughout the narrative. Although Ovid engages the tradition of heroic epic head-on, he does so mockingly, even dismissively. Nevertheless, the Calydonian Boar Hunt in Book 8 provides an important model for Ovid’s treatment of heroism and gender. Much of the tension between the characters in this episode is centered on Atalanta, her “intrusion” into a male-dominated genre, and Meleager’s favoritism towards her. Meleager, upon seeing Atalanta draw first blood, makes a bold procla- mation: “‘meritum’ dixisse ‘feres virtutis honorem’” (“He said: ‘You have 5 On the “Homeric” nature of Ovid’s Perseus, cf. Nagle 1988.26. 28 Charlotte Northrop the deserved honor of virtus,’” Met. 8.387). The wordvirtus , often translated as “strength,” is, in fact, a word with gendered connotations for heroism. Thevir - of virtus betrays its alternative, and presumably original, meaning of “manliness,” or even “masculinity” (Varro Ling. 5.73 and Cicero Tusc. 2.43). Ovid was aware of this gendered connotation and flipped it on its head at the beginning of Ars Amatoria 3, when he says of the deified Vir- tus: “ipsa quoque et cultu est et nomine femina Virtus” (“Virtus herself is also female in both attire and name,” Ars 3.23).6 In the Metamorphoses, he problematizes this gendered association even further: as Horsfall (1979.327) notes, Ovid has Meleager give virtus to Atalanta, while the traditional feminine “blush” (erubuere, Met. 8.388) is transferred to the shame-faced male heroes. This gendered confusion leads not only to the taunts and death of the misogynist Ancaeus (Met. 8.391–402), but also to the conflict between Meleager and his uncles over the spoils (Met. 8.426–44). Meleager’s comment summarizes the affront created by Atalanta’s triumph: she succeeds in a traditionally masculine activity that the male characters failed at repeatedly. Giving her the “honor of virtus” is essentially the same as awarding her the “honor of masculin- ity.” The other heroes’ anger comes from the affront that Atalanta’s gen- dered actions cause their own masculinity. While their reactions suggest that they consider masculinity a zero-sum game in that Atalanta’s success robs them of something, in effect, Atalanta demonstrates to the reader that actions definevirtus , even for females. This revelation does not undermine the gendered connotations of the word, it leads us instead to conclude that heroic masculinity, at least in the Metamorphoses, is a constructed identity. Therefore we can define virtus as an acquired, gendered trait that is neces- sary for constructing both masculine and heroic identities. The Meleager and Atalanta episode is the first time thatvirtus , femi- ninity, and heroism are in conflict with one another in theMetamorphoses . While the questions of Atalanta’s virtus and rights in war end indecisively with a fight between male heroes that does not come to a satisfactory con- clusion, the same questions are posed again in the Caeneus episode. Here, however, Ovid explores the gendered nature of virtus in more explicit terms; transgender identity is the device that enables his exploration. 6 Gibson 2003.95–96 points out a parallel for this play on the grammatical gender of mas- culine qualities in Xenophon’s Memorabilia 2.1.21–33, in which Ἀρετή (“excellence,” the closest Greek equivalent to virtus in definition and masculine connotation; cf.
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