Insatiable Salmacis and the assault of young Hermaphroditus

I support women's rights AND women's wrongs but goddamn...

TW // sexual violence

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Allow me to INTRODUCE one of the most problematic female characters in all of Greek myth (and my god that’s really saying something), Salmacis! We love a sex positive icon but we can’t endorse attempted sexual assault!!? But this is such a rare example of active female sexuality in Greek myth?? So we have to talk about it??

François-Joseph Navez, The Nymph Salmacis and Hermaphroditus, 1829. Wikicommons.

As f*cked up/problematic as this mythological woman is, I really do feel that it’s important to discuss her story. The fact of the matter is women have intense sexual urges and women do commit assault.

I’m in about 23 minds about this one if that wasn’t obvious. I’ll present you with piles of info and a few different takes and leave the rest up to you.

We get the story from Ovid, the Roman poet who wrote during the reign of Augustus, who tells us that saucy little Salmacis was atypical; she was a vain little minx who rejected the famously chaste cult of the goddess Artemis, ignoring the pleas of her nymph sisters, in favour of the fellas. Wild spaces and wild animals were often conflated with virginal women in ancient myth; both untouched and untamed. Whilst Salmacis is clearly ~ wild ~ in a particular way, she wanted to separate herself from this association. She took self-care VERY seriously, taking long baths, changing her hair frequently and carefully selecting her outfits (nothing but respect). Maybe she’s presented as a truer representation of womanhood, unlike the other nymphs who deny their femininity and their womanly duties in favour of trotting after the moon goddess, hunting beasts in the wild.

So the story goes ~ Hermaphroditus, a handsome YOUTH, left home to see the big, bright world. He stumbled across a gorgeous, shining pool with crystal clear water. Little did he KNOW, the nymph Salmacis dwelt there. She caught sight of him and fell instantly in love with him and immediately proposed marriage. God the CHAOS. Hermaphroditus started blushing which of course only made him more handsome. The young fellow freaked out and rejected her, begging her “enough!!” Salmacis slunk away, claiming to yield her spring to him, and went to hide in the bushes. A key part of all great love stories.

Hermaphroditus, now alone, or so he thought, stripped down and took a dip. Salmacis was spellbound (yes, still in the bushes), her desire grew and grew, she became frenzied with her need of him. She tore her clothes off and dove into her spring, grabbed him and forced upon him kisses and caresses. He tried to fight her off but that only allowed her to wrap herself around him even more, entwining herself around him like a snake. He continued to try to deny her, she cried that he could fight all he wanted, “You’ll not escape! The gods ordain that you and I shall never part!” For some reason which is still baffling, the gods heard her prayer (it turns my stomach to think how many prayers like these were ignored in myth when made by women suffering just like Hermaphroditus). In a horrific twist, the gods took the nymph’s prayer literally - Salmacis and Hermaphroditus were FUSED, turning into one body and face, neither man nor woman, a body that was both and neither. (This is where we the term hermaphrodite comes from). They become ONE (you know those couples who completely absorb each other and they only use the term “we”? This is like that but LITERAL and WORSE). There’s also some pretty grim victim-blaming; Salmacis finds Hermaphroditus especially irresistible as he’s swimming in her OWN pool naked, the water glancing over his skin to make him look like a sort of sexy flower. (To each their own). 

On a slightly more positive note, Salmacis’ transgressive behaviour constitutes a rare ancient example of active female sexuality, which exposes the fact that sexual reserve on the part of women is a socially-conditioned behaviour rather than an innate trait.

The potency of transformation in a conceptual, abstract sense, keeps me (and many others) CRAWLING back to Ovid time and time again. Whilst Ovid’s work is filled with a whole bunch of sexual assaults perpetrated against women, he IS regarded as the ancient author most concerned with presenting the female perspective. It is broadly agreed that he has a greater amount of empathy for the women that populate his stories. Maybe in a weird way this transformation, this conflation, is oddly empowering as Salmacis attains those privileges associated with being male? All she has to give up is her entire identity as an individual???

What do YOU think of this myth?

References:

Hopman, Marianne Govers. 2012. Scylla: myth, metaphor, paradox. Cambridge University Press. [eBook].

Desire and Rape in the Feminine: The Tales of Echo and Salmacis: An Ovidian Answer to Propertius 1.20. Jacqueline Fabre-Serris.

‘Listening With’ Ovid Intersexuality, Queer Theory, and the Myth of Hermaphroditus and Salmacis. Vanda Zajko.