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 emblematic 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 “transmasculinity” 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 feminine pronouns (she/her/hers) for Caenis.

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 masculinity 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 transgender 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 transgender, 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 terminology to describe them. 4 Cf. Brisson 1997.10–11 on the important distinction between sex-change and ambiguous sex. 27 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses

(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 transmasculinity, although Ovid lacked a specific term to describe it, is nevertheless 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 masculinity.” The other heroes’ anger comes from the affront that Atalanta’s gendered 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 necessary for constructing both masculine and heroic identities. The Meleager and Atalanta episode is the first time thatvirtus , femininity, 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 masculine 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. Plutarch Coriol. 1.4) appears to Hercules as a goddess. 29 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses

CAENEUS BEFORE OVID: A RECEPTION HISTORY

It would be remiss to leave the Calydonian Boar Hunt without remark- ing on Caeneus’s own presence in that episode—where he does nothing of note. We only know he is there because of his listing in the catalogue of hunters (Met. 8.298–323): “et iam non femina Caeneus” (“Caeneus, no longer a woman” or “Caeneus, not yet a woman,” Metamorphoses 8.305; see below). Caeneus is mentioned in passing, although his connection with Atalanta makes this brief appearance proleptic. Moreover, as Edward Kenney (2011.337) argues, the phrase that introduces him at line 305 also establishes an intertext with Vergil’s Aeneid. The use of the word femina just before the name Caeneus recalls Vergil’s description of him as part of Aeneas’s tour of the underworld: “Caeneus, once a young [man], now a woman, returned and restored to her old form by fate” (“iuvenis quondam, nunc femina, Caeneus / rursus et in veterem fato revoluta figuram,” Aen. 6.448–49). Vergil’s Caeneus is found in the Lugentes Campi, where those who died because of durus amor (“bad love”) wander; it is the same place where Aeneas glimpses Dido.7 Grace West suggests that these details might be original to Vergil, which seems likely.8 Vergil must have known the story of Caenis’ rape by Neptune, however, as it is the most plausible justification for Caeneus appearing amongst the sorrowful lovers.9 Alternatively, with a little further stretching of the imagination, although he is a man when it happens, Caeneus’s eventual death under a pile of stone and lumber could be figured as a “feminine” one: being buried alive was a punishment asso- ciated at Rome with Vestal Virgins. Indeed, the fact that Caeneus does not bleed from battle problematizes his masculinity.10 Perhaps, as Marie Del- court (1953.133) contends, the choice to have Caeneus revert to female form

7 Cf. West 1980, whose study is the fullest investigation of the connection between Dido and Caeneus. 8 West 1980.317; she agrees with the commentary of Norden 1916.445, who also suspects the return to womanhood might be invented by Vergil. 9 So Plessis and Lejay 1920, ad Aen. 6.448. West 1980.316–17 n. 5 finds this reading uncon- vincing and argues for a much more complicated juxtaposition between Caeneus and Dido. The two interpretations are not mutually exclusive, however, and it could easily be the case that the rape justifies Caeneus’s position in the Lugentes Campi, while the relevance to Dido is the reason for Vergil’s attention to the figure. 10 On bloodless death in the Greek context as feminine, see Wissing and Loraux 2014.111–14: “For a man the only honorable death is the one . . . that is brought about by the blade.” On beating, which is also inflicted on Caeneus, as a symbolically “bloodless” death, cf. Phang 2008.124–25. 30 Charlotte Northrop in the Aeneid was a personal one, motivated by Vergil’s personal gender bias. Regardless, it is an odd innovation on Vergil’s part, and one that Ovid apparently rejects. West (1980.317–18) argues that the decision to preserve the figure’s male name in the Aeneid reflects the persistent complication of Caeneus’s gender identity. The ambiguity is preserved in Ovid’s Book 8 (“et iam non femina Caeneus”), although with allusive irony. As we shall see, Ovid also “corrects” Vergil with Caeneus’s (reported) transformation into a bird, meaning the Ovidian Caeneus does not end up in the underworld (cf. Kenney 2011.337). While Metamorphoses 8.305 could mean either “Caeneus, no longer a woman,” or “Caeneus, not yet a woman,” the verse can best be understood as “no longer a woman”—but only retrospectively after Caeneus’s death in Book 12, making this correction another prolepsis. It is clear that Ovid is aware of the various treatments of Caeneus and uses them to create a composite character who fits his poetic needs. That is, he cherry picks traits and tropes from the myth in order to build his own version.11 Ovid plays with the genres and themes of the tradition to create an innovative and humanizing depiction of Caeneus in Book 12. And within that Caeneus tradition, we can identify two parts to the story: the erotic (rape of Caenis) and the heroic (deeds/death of Caeneus). In going after the “Hellenistic background” of Ovid’s Caeneus, Thomas Gärtner (2007) reveals how dissimilar, and quite frankly unprecedented, Ovid’s rape of Caenis actually is when compared to his sources. The means behind Ovid’s innovations will become more apparent with an analysis of the episode’s structure and generic modes.

CAENIS, CAENEUS, AND VIRTUS: A TRANSFORMATION OF GENDERS AND GENRES

Although the death of Caeneus is the aspect of the character most often treated before the Metamorphoses, Ovid’s version of the hero’s narrative in Book 12 is split into two main sections: the rape and transformation of Caenis, and the death of Caeneus (the erotic and heroic parts of the tradition described above). These narratives bookend the larger battle between the Lapiths and Centaurs. The first narrative is clearly drawn from the Hesiodic Catalogue, where Caenis/Caeneus’s transformation is the first

11 This is a fact that should be evident for material throughout the Metamorphoses. Lateiner 2007.127, for instance, errs when he implicitly assumes that Ovid invented the aetiologies he recounts. 31 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses narrated account,12 although the actual rape is structurally similar to the other rape narratives in the Metamorphoses.13 Ioannis Ziogas identifies this episode as part of Ovid’s structural appropriation of ehoie-poetry.14 In Ovid, Caenis is the most beautiful woman in her region (Thessaly), who spurns various suitors (Met. 12.189–92). In this respect, she resembles the huntress virgins, a group identified by Gregson Davis (1983) as part of a programmatic sequence of hunting and rape myths found throughout the Metamorphoses. In keeping with this sequence, a god, Neptune, finally rapes her (195–97). Afterwards, however, the narrative turns toward the “maiden’s wish” trope common to Ovid’s other gender-transformed characters, Mestra and Iphis: Neptune offers her a wish and the indignant Caenis asks not to be a woman. As scholars have noted, Caenis’ wish and Nep- tune’s response transform not only the character, but also the narrative. Ernst Schmidt points out that after Caenis makes her wish, no new rapes actually take place.15 Thomas Gärtner makes the more salient observation that Caenis’ transformation into Caeneus also transforms the poetic genre from “elegy” into epic.16 The gender transformation effects a shift in the poem from a feminine generic mode to one of appropriately masculine epic. Neptune makes Caenis not only male, but also impenetrable. Impenetrability allows for a strong rejection of femininity: unable to be penetrated either by phallus or sword, Caenis goes from a feminine beauty to a hyper-masculine hero. Caenis beseeches Neptune: “This injustice requires a great prayer, that I might now suffer nothing of the sort. Let me not be a woman” (“magnum . . . facit haec iniuria votum, / tale pati iam posse nihil. Da femina ne sim,” Met. 12.201–02). This rejection parallels the desires of

12 Frag. 87 MW = Phlegon Mir. 5 p. 74 Keller = FGrHist 257 F 36; this fragment is the only extant use of the name Caenis before Ovid. 13 On the structure of rape narratives in the Metamorphoses and their programmatic function for the poem, see Davis 1983. For a Hesiodic reading of Ovid’s rape narratives, cf. Ziogas 2013. 14 Ziogas 2013.180–209 analyses the Hesiodic elements of both the rape and the Battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs in detail, and argues convincingly that Ovid has tried to frame both narratives in terms of the Catalogue. Choice (ehoie)-poetry is a genre that focuses on cataloguing the rapes of mortal women by the gods. For the study that coined the term “ehoie-poetry” and first described it as a genre, cf. Rutherford 2000. 15 Schmidt 1991.108, echoed by Gärtner 2007.892–93; attempts are made at rape—e.g., Glaucus and Scylla—but none are successful. 16 Gärtner 2007.892–93. I must add the caveat that Gärtner characterizes the Caenis story as elegy, while I prefer to describe it as ehoie-poetry, following Rutherford 2000 and Ziogas 2013. 32 Charlotte Northrop other virginal figures in the Metamorphoses; her prayer echoes Daphne’s request to her father in Book 1: “Let me enjoy eternal . . . / virginity; Diana’s father once gave this to her” (“da mihi perpetua . . . / virginitate frui; dedit hoc pater ante Dianae,” 1.486–87). Therefore, Daphne and the characters patterned on her reject their own femininity when they reject penetrative sex with male partners. Caenis’ prayer in the Metamorphoses is the culmination of this tendency and takes the concept to its logical con- clusion: “da femina ne sim.” Unlike in the Hesiodic account, she does not ask for impenetrability to weapons; she merely asks for immunity from phalluses. It is Neptune who “takes the gift one step further,” as Edward Kenney (2013.404) puts it, and makes Caeneus invulnerable to all forms of masculine penetration, including martial penetration. Thus Neptune’s power helps Caenis/Caeneus achieve what other virginal victims could not: a total rejection of feminine passivity and penetrability. From a female victim of rape, Caeneus then becomes a locus for the treatment of virtus and masculinity. As Alison Keith (1999.232–33) emphasizes, the campfire stories of the Achaeans in Book 12, which frame the story of Caeneus, take on the subject of virtus in a kind of reimag- ining of Homer’s klea andron (“famous deeds of men”; Met. 12.159–60: “virtusque loquendi / materia est,” “Virtus is the subject of their talk”; cf. Homer Il. 9.189). While Ovid’s reader will already be familiar with the gendered complications offered by Atalanta, the surprised reaction of the Achaeans to Nestor’s mention of Caeneus’s transgender identity (Met. 12.175–76) emphasizes that this figure will complicate the heroes’ under- standing of gender. Caeneus’s transformation represents not only the spectrum between femininity and masculinity, but also the tensions involved in the construction of a hero’s identity. Masculinity, in the ancient mind, was at once both a natural and a cultivated status. The overarching idea is that a man’s birth and his actions define his masculinity, but only when he has obtained the status of a vir can he possess virtus.17 Caeneus represents an affront to this conception, because although his actions are masculine, they are incongruous with his birth. At the same time, if a man fails to be masculine, he risks his heroic identity. This risk is evident from the story of Achilles, who is (pointedly) the one who asks Nestor to tell the story of Caeneus (Met. 12.176–81). Achilles’ sojourn on Skyros, during which he dressed as a woman and

17 Cf. Santoro L’Hoir 1992.9–28 on the distinction between homo and vir in late-republican Latin prose, and Alston 1998 on viri and the exercise of power. 33 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses hid in the women’s quarters, threatened his destiny as the greatest hero of the Trojan War. Ovid himself, in the Ars Amatoria, provides the lengthi- est Latin account of Achilles at Skyros before Statius. While Achilles’ birth made him male, Ovid says his actions made him a man: “forte erat in thalamo virgo regalis eodem; / haec illum stupro comperit esse virum” (“By chance there was a royal maiden in the same room; / through viola- tion she knew he was a man [virum],” Ars 1.698–99). Although Ovid nods to the tradition in which Achilles was convinced to fight after Odysseus left weapons in the women’s quarters at Ars 1.691–96, where he contrasts feminine objects with masculine ones, it is Achilles’ actions—his violence and masculine penetration—that, Ovid suggests, return him to the heroic, masculine path. What Achilles learned on Skyros in the Ars Amatoria, therefore, can reasonably be expected to motivate his interest in Caeneus’s gender in the Metamorphoses. It is Achilles’ voice that rises above the din of questions and requests Caeneus’s story, asking first about his change of sex, and then going on to ask about martial matters (Met. 12.176–81). Cae- neus is a monstrum (175) to the Greeks as a whole, but Achilles’ presence and prominence suggest that Caeneus might not be that strange after all. Thus Ovid uses innuendo to evoke the aspects of the heroic tradition that had already queered gender in order to characterize Caeneus’s masculinity and justify his role in masculine epic. Nevertheless, Ovid has recourse not only to epic, but also to ehoie-poetry and elegy. The subtle allusion to Achilles on Skyros and the masculinizing rape of Deidamia depicted in the Ars are the deft means Ovid employs to create a sense of justification and tradition for Caeneus’s transmasculinity. Thus reinforced, the narrative is ready to progress to the epic story implied by Caeneus’s transformation. However, questions of gender will arise again, and we shall see how Ovid handles masculinity in an epic setting when we discuss both Caeneus and his cismasculine18 foil, Cygnus.

CYGNUS AND CAENEUS: IMPENETRABILITY, DEATH, AND GENDER

At a lull in the fighting around Troy, the Argive heroes settle into camp and begin to discuss virtus (Met. 12.159–60: “virtusque loquendi / materia est”). It is assumed that Achilles relates the story of Cygnus, an impenetrable

18 Cis being the opposite of trans in Latin, cismasculinity is the logical opposite of transmasculinity. 34 Charlotte Northrop warrior whom he killed—although the story had already been presented to the reader in Ovid’s narratorial voice (Met. 12.71–145). The Cygnus story prompts a second one, that of Caeneus, told by the aged Nestor, who claims to have witnessed the events first hand. It is no accident that these stories are juxtaposed, for they share the common theme of impenetrable warriors being killed. As we explore the tropes and intertexts in the Caeneus episode, we see how the link between Cygnus and Caeneus is part of Ovid’s innovative treatment of masculinity in heroic epic. Caeneus’s traits are hyper-masculine and his struggles reflect the Iliadic battles of the heroes who are listening to Nestor’s story. At the same time, however, the Centauromachy in which Caeneus fought is itself a legendary clash between civilization and barbarism, human and inhu- man.19 Thus the battle is an example of alexikakia, that is, the slaying of the monsters that threaten civilization.20 However, as with so many aspects of Caeneus’s narrative, his alexikakia is confused when the centaur Latreus summarizes the argument against Caeneus’s virility: he was born a woman and his manhood was bought by rape (Met. 12.470–74). As Ziogas points out, this is a play on the standard epic taunt that one’s opponents are sub- masculine.21 Ovid takes this topos and turns it into a generic question: does Caeneus belong in ehoie or martial epic? (cf. Ziogas 2013.204). Is he, indeed, a monstrum in the Iliadic context? Caeneus’s answer to the taunts of the centaur is about the most masculine response possible: without a word, he hurls his spear and penetrates Latreus with his phallic weapon “where man meets horse” (“qua vir equo commissus erat,” 12.478). It does not take a very perverse imagination to realize that, on a centaur, this is approximately the place where a human’s groin and genitals would be located. The scene is reminiscent of Ancaeus’s taunt to Atalanta and subsequent comeuppance in Book 8. There the hero chided a female character for not only participating, but even excelling, in masculine activities (8.392–400). His subsequent fatal groin wound, killing him by way of his male organ, ironized his misogynistic stance. The imag- ery goes further in Book 12, however, because Latreus’s wound reminds the reader that the centaur is not wholly a “man” himself; where his phallus and testes should be, there is instead a connection between human and

19 Cf. Reed 2013.400–01 for a list of centauromachies in literature, history, and art. 20 While alexikakia (“driving out evil”) does not appear in extant ancient Greek, it can be reasonably derived from the word alexikakos (“one who drives out evil”). 21 Ziogas 2013.203 with n. 70 lists parallels in epic from Homer to Vergil. 35 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses equine forms. Latreus argues that Caeneus’s birth brands him a woman; Caeneus’s response shows that not only are his actions and abilities more masculine than those of the centaurs, but his form is also more human.22 The reaction of Monychus, lamenting the un-masculine perfor- mance of the other centaurs against Caeneus (12.499–509), embodies the continued irony of the centaurs’ claim to manhood. While referring to Caeneus as vix vir, “scarcely a man,” he ironically praises his own kind’s biformity (12.501–03). Caeneus’s birth belies his masculinity, but equally the centaurs’ biformity complicates their own manliness and humanity.23 The play between the oddities of the two sides suggests that, while Caeneus is part of the Lapith force that clears out the uncivilized centaurs, his own identity makes him monstrous as well. The two sides vie for a chance to color the other as unnatural. Alexikakia is at stake for both. Ovid does not explicitly resolve the question (the narrative ends with Caeneus’s death). He ultimately leaves the decision up to the reader as to which side is the more monstrous, and which side performs alexikakia. However, in his abilities and actions, Caeneus is unquestion- ably masculine: perhaps even too masculine. While Latreus attacked him for being born female, Monychus urges the centaurs to gang up on him because of his very threatening strength and impenetrability. But how to kill an impenetrable man? The only solution is suffocation, as Monychus urges his comrades to try (12.507–09). In the end, the centaurs pile up trees, a weapon they had been accustomed to using in previous versions of Caeneus’s death. However, in Ovid, they bury Caeneus in a hyperbolic amplification of the individual tree clubs used in the Hesiodic Shield and elsewhere. Moreover, while the Hesiodic Caeneus was beaten down into the underworld, Ovid’s Caeneus is instead deprived of air under the weight of trees and stone (12.516–20). This death threatens to problematize Caeneus’s masculinity. Suffocation is generally regarded as a feminine death.24 How- ever, as much as the tradition problematizes Caeneus’s masculinity, Ovid

22 Does Caeneus have a penis? There is no doubt in my mind that he does. Apollonius Rhodius refers to his son (Arg. 1.57–58). One wonders whether “he wanders the Peneian fields,” Peneiaque arva pererrat (Met. 12.209), ostensibly referring to Thessaly, might be meant as a pun. 23 A frequent observation in scholarship: cf. Lateiner 2007.139–40 and Reed 2013.434–35. 24 Jocasta, in Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyrannos, is probably the most memorable example. In the Metamorphoses, Arachne hangs herself. On Jocasta’s hanging suicide as a feminine one, see Bollack 1990.857. On strangulation and suffocation as feminine deaths in general, see Loraux 1984.208–17. On strangulation as a rejection of rape, see King 2002.86–88. 36 Charlotte Northrop also undermines the tradition itself. This is where the example of Cygnus becomes pertinent. One function of Cygnus in the Metamorphoses is to provide a parallel with Caeneus. Nestor draws that parallel immediately on hearing about Achilles’ battle with Cygnus (though Caeneus’s transgender identity makes the marvel of that hero greater: cf. Met. 12.174–75). Achil- les had already asked and answered the question of how to kill an impenetrable foe. His duel with Cygnus sees Achilles try a variety of methods to slaughter him; in the end he uses suffocation.25 In fact, Cygnus dies a rather embarrassing feminine death, stran- gled with his own helmet straps (140–45): his death is rather like an episode of rape. Ziogas (2013.192) points out that the transition between the Cygnus and Caeneus narratives at 12.172 recalls the ehoie (“or such as”) transitional style of the Hesiodic Catalogue, another problematizing of the masculine identity of Cygnus. And finally, the structure of the pursuit and slaying of the hero mimics Ovid’s other ehoie rapes. Achilles pursues Cygnus, who is always fleeing; Cygnus repulses Achilles’ attempts to penetrate him. Finally, Achilles makes him die a feminine death. In this respect, the struggle to kill Cygnus “unmans” Cygnus (to borrow terminology from Keith’s study of heroic masculinity in the Metamorphoses), despite his hyper-masculine impenetrability.26 Although he is unmanned, Cygnus proves that strangulation is a solution to impenetrability, and not to his femininity. The reader might expect Caeneus to be similarly unmanned. Instead, he is arguably elevated beyond masculinity into divinity. While Cygnus was felled by one superior foe, it takes an army of centaurs to bring down Caeneus. In this regard, fighting so many foes at once, Caeneus lives up to the heroic ideal of “lonely pre-eminence” (cf. Hardie 1993.3– 11). Moreover, his superhuman abilities call for a superhuman response. Whereas in previous versions of the myth, he was hammered into the ground like a nail, in Ovid, he is buried. Monychus calls for the centaurs to pile up “stones, logs . . . and whole mountains . . . with their forests” (“saxa, trabesque . . . totosque . . . montes / . . . silvis,” Met. 12.507–08).27 When

25 Cygnus is hard to trace in the mythographic tradition due to his fairly common name (the Metamorphoses actually has three figures named Cygnus). It seems, though, that he was mentioned by authors such as pseudo-Hesiod and Aristotle. For a list of the figure’s possible appearances in literature before Ovid, see Reed 2013.389. 26 Cf. Keith 1999.239, who says that Ovid “unmans” his male heroes, but equally “unwom- ans” his female heroines. 27 It is unclear to what extent the heap of materials is original to Ovid. Acusilaus (FGrH 2 F 22 = F22 Fowler) mentions that the centaurs were set on Caeneus by Zeus after the hero 37 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses buried under this mass, Caeneus even manages to shake it violently, like an earthquake under Mt. Ida, Nestor says (12.520–21). Such a collection of huge objects, and the earth-shaking power of their prisoner, is reminiscent not of heroic epic, but of the cosmic Typho- nomachy. Mountains and huge rocks are used to imprison the Titans and other massive divinities. The Cretan Mt. Ida, if this is the one Nestor means, concealed the infant Jupiter and would connect Caeneus’s struggles to the thunderous cries of the infant god.28 Within the Metamorphoses, Caeneus can also be paralleled with Typhoeus, imprisoned under Etna in Book 5. As Joseph Reed (2013.400–01) notes, even the centaurs themselves are elevated to a cosmic level, since Ovid gives them the names of Titans and Giants. A parallel with the immortals is further emphasized when Ovid questions whether Caeneus dies at all. There is debate, says Nestor, some say he went to Tartarus (12.522–23); “some” (alii, 522) must refer to Hesiod, Pindar, Apollonius, and, especially, Vergil. Nestor ends up endorsing a new interpretation, however, one that is possibly unique to Ovid: Caeneus became a bird.29 In this respect, Ovid “corrects” Vergil’s account of the hero’s rever- sion to a female body. TheMetamorphoses prefers progressive transformation: changes are usually one way, and characters do not generally revert to their old shapes.30 Ovid maintains that pattern here in Caeneus’s story, making the figure’s form increasingly new, going from girl, to man, to bird. His avian nature transports him to heaven, giving him a new life in the realm of the gods.31 Caeneus thus defies the taunts of the centaurs and completes a progressive (if tragic) arc towards quasi-divinity and, ultimately, metamorphic immortality. This reading would make Caeneus one of the first in a series of heroes who are deified towards the end of the Metamorphoses. Aeneas, Romulus (along with his wife), Hippolytus/Virbius, and, finally, Caesar and

claimed honors reserved for the gods and his killers left a rock on the spot where he was driven into the underworld. Nevertheless, a single rock is not the mass of materials used by the centaurs in Ovid, and it is Ovid who suggests the divine status of Caeneus. 28 Which Mt. Ida Nestor means is uncertain. The mountain on Crete, which the concealed, infant Jupiter shook, would make Caeneus seem even more godlike. The mountain in Asia Minor, seat of Cybele, could connect Caeneus to the goddess’ gender-bending cult. On gender transgression in the cult of Cybele, see Roscoe 1996. 29 That Caeneus’s transformation into a bird is an Ovidian original detail is suggested by Reed 2013.435. His interpretation is given added weight by the lack of recognition this version receives even in later sources, such as Servius. 30 The obvious exception to this rule is Tiresias, whose transformation was unwanted in the first place. This rule also does not cover protean figures like Mestra or deities like Thetis. 31 Caeneus’s forward progression from girl, to man, to bird is particularly appropriate given the possible etymology of his name from καινͅίζω, “to renew.” 38 Charlotte Northrop

Augustus are all at least promised translation to heaven. (Hercules provides an earlier paradigmatic example.) With Caeneus saved from Tartarus and translated to the sky, he belongs to this sequence of apotheoses. Throughout Caeneus’s confrontation with the centaurs, Ovid establishes that a trait like virtus is defined by actions and abilities, rather than birth. Caeneus’s virtus is, however, exaggerated and overweening. His is a flame that burns brighter but shorter. In this regard, he functions as a suit- able parallel to Achilles and the Iliadic narrative Ovid largely erases. Like Achilles, as we said above, he emerges from a passive feminine role (albeit in a more literal sense) to become a masculine killing machine. Ovid uses Caeneus’s life and death to blend both a Homeric and a Hesiodic poetics of heroism, evoking ehoiai, the Trojan War, and both the Gigantomachy and Typhonomachy in the figure’s characterization. Through his emphasis on the Gigantomachy and Typhonomachy, Ovid also suggests Caeneus’s connection to the theme of alexikakia and apotheosis. Traditionally, the Battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs was treated as a clash (even the final clash) between human civilization and uncivilized, wild monstrosity.32 Caeneus, instrumental in the Lapith victory, is part of this civilizing influence, making him an alexikakos who rids the world of the centaurs’ uncivilized pollution.33 However, even this aspect of his character is complicated when he becomes something like a Giant or Titan himself. The course of the narrative ultimately shifts, to the point that the centaurs must ironically cleanse the battlefield of Caeneus’s own savage masculinity and imprison him like a Titan under a figurative mountain. Therefore, Caeneus represents heroic qualities as a spectrum between binary oppositions: femininity-masculinity, appropriate-excessive virtus, monstrosity-alexikakia. By inhabiting the extremes of these binaries, he perfectly embodies the theme of metamorphosis.

CONCLUSIONS: OVID ON CAENEUS AND TRANSMASCULINITY

It should be clear by now that Ovid’s Caeneus both emblematizes and problematizes just about every trait or identity attached to him. His identity shifts continuously throughout his episode, going from woman to man to bird to (figurative) deity. His transformations reflect the general Ovidian

32 On the Centauromachy, see Snell 1982.35 and duBois 1982.55. 33 He is an alexikakos, regardless of the centaurs’ claims to alexikakia in slaying him. 39 Caeneus and Heroic (Trans)Masculinity in Ovid’s Metamorphoses preference for one-way metamorphoses, a fact that also helps explain Ovid’s rejection of the version of Caeneus found in Vergil. Likewise, his gender identity also reflects the Ovidian bias towards progressive transformation. When the centaurs attempt to test Caeneus’s virtus, they find no trace of penetrable femininity. Instead, they find themselves penetrated by Caeneus’s thrusting weapons and unmanned by his indomitable masculinity. In rela- tion to the example provided by the Atalanta episode, we understand that heroism, while formed by masculine exploits, is not limited by the hero’s birth. Nor does the hero’s past determine his future: just as Achilles’ flight to Skyros proves inconsequential in the Trojan War, so does the centaur’s charge that Caeneus’s masculinity was bought by rape. Likewise, our com- parison of Cygnus’s and Caeneus’s deaths indicates that Ovid juxtaposes those characters in order to emphasize that transmasculinity is equal to cismasculinity in the Metamorphoses. This treatment of gender and masculinity is emblematic of Ovid’s wider attitude towards his corpora mutata. Ovid’s Pythagoras says it most distinctly when he remarks that nature is the renewer of things (novatrix rerum) and that nothing can remain the same thing it once was (Met. 15.252–61). When Caenis became Caeneus, she ceased to be the same thing she was before. Again, this pattern repeats when Caeneus becomes a bird, ceasing to be a man and becoming something else. The regular- ity of Ovid’s progressive metamorphoses suggests that Ovid casts these changes as the inexorable will of nature. The mistake the centaurs make when they call Caeneus a woman is that they fail to understand this will. The woman, Caenis, is a dead form and Caeneus, the man, is the living creature. Although even this shape is temporary (like all living things), Ovid shows that it is possible for the feminine to be transformed into the masculine, and for this masculinity to equal or surpass other men. The con- tinuing comparisons between trans- and cismasculine characters ultimately serve to reinforce this interpretation. We see an affirmation that Ovid’s metamorphoses are real, not a façade or mask; we should take Pythago- ras (and Ovid too) literally when he speaks of new forms. While changed bodies may retain traits of their former selves (Galanthis’ red hair, Perdix’ fear of heights or, indeed, Caeneus’s inability to bleed), their beings truly are changed. Unlike Latreus and the other centaurs, Ovid seems to say, we should be wary of thinking otherwise. Just as Caeneus’s gender is emblematic of the poem’s attitude towards metamorphosis, the generic questions of the Caeneus episode are emblematic of the Metamorphoses’ shifting generic modes. Ovid allows his poem to follow the generic modes that best fit his characters’ shifting 40 Charlotte Northrop identities as it drifts between elegy, ehoie, and epic. Caeneus’s gender is an affront to the Achaeans at Troy because they are comfortably ensconced in an epic setting before Nestor’s revelation about Caeneus’s sex throws them into confusion. Ovid then turns this confusion into orderliness: the erotic narrative quickly gives way to a war story; Caeneus’s masculine identity is challenged but ultimately confirmed; finally, Caeneus dies a death that is comparable to a death on the Iliadic battlefield. His identity problematizes both genre and gender, but ultimately affirms the former while queering the latter.

Earlham College

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