The Marriage of Iphis & Ianthe: Faustus Sabaeus (1580)

Name: Faustus Sabaeus Date: 16th century CE   Region:  Brixia [Brescia, modern Italy] Citation:   Illustrated Myths of Ovid

 Note: The last line is not published here, as it uses a bodily humor pun 

Iphis was a woman. By hiding in a man’s clothing

Even her father believed she was a man.

Her father promised her in marriage to pretty Ianthe,

A bride for a bride, a woman marrying a woman.

The day of the wedding draws near…

The bride approaches…

Venus was there

And Juno was there 

And Hymen was there...

and Iphis ended up marrying Ianthe.

 

De Iphide

Iphis erat mulier: latitantem in veste virili

vicini, immo pater credidit esse marem.

Deceptus genitor pulcram huic despondet Ianthem:

cum sponsa sponsa ut virgine virgo cubet.

Taede accenduntur: procedit nupta, Cythere,

Et Iuno praesens...et Hymen...

[et] potitur namque Iphis Ianthe.

Faustus Sabaeus [16th century, modern Italy] was a librarian of the Vatican library who composed numerous poems on mythology-based themes.

The Tragic Story of Petale, Greek Anthology 9.245

Name:   Antiphanes of Macedon Date:      1st century BCE Region:      Macedon [modern Greece] Citation:     Greek Anthology 9.245

Not Hymenaeos [1], but Hades

Attended Petale’s ill-fated wedding night.

For when the newlywed bride fled in fear

Through the darkness

From her first taste of love

[A common fear for maidens],

Guard dogs tore her limb from limb.

The hope we had in seeing her wed

Is now undone by her corpse.  

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[1] Hymen/Hymenaeos was the personification of weddings and marriage.

Δυσμοίρων θαλάμων ἐπὶ παστάσιν οὐχ Ὑμέναιος, ἀλλ᾽ Ἀίδης ἔστη πικρογάμου Πετάλης. δείματι γὰρ μούνην πρωτόζυγα Κύπριν ἀν᾽ ὄρφνην φεύγουσαν, ξυνὸν παρθενικαῖσι φόβον, φρουροδόμοι νηλεῖς κύνες ἔκτανον: ἣν δὲ γυναῖκα ἐλπὶς ἰδεῖν, ἄφνως ἔσχομεν οὐδὲ νέκυν.

Infaustorum thalamorum ad torum non Hymenaeus, sed Pluto adstitit amare-nuptae Petales. Prae timore enim sola quum primam Venerem per noctem fugeret, communem virginibus metum, vero uxorem eam domus-custodes immites canes occiderunt: quam sperabamus videre, illico habuimus ne mortuam quidem. Translated into Latin  by Johann Friedrich Duebner

Antiphanes of Macedon [1st century BCE] Little is known about this author, but he lived during the 1st century BCE and several poems of his are preserved in the Greek Anthology.