94 pages • 3 hours read
Metamorphoses
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During Reading
Reading Questions & Paired Texts
Reading Check and Short Answer Questions on key points are designed for guided reading assignments, in-class review, formative assessment, quizzes, and more.
BOOK 1
Reading Check
1. Who or what is the first being that exists in the cosmos?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Jupiter punish humanity with the flood?
Paired Resource
- Britannica’s biography of the poet Ovid includes relevant details about his family, childhood, career, and personal life.
- This connects to the themes of Myth, History, and Empire and Boundaries and Fluidity.
- How did the events of Ovid’s life influence his poetry?
BOOK 2
Reading Check
1.How does Apollo find out Coronis has been unfaithful to him?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. What is Phaethon’s wish? Why is the Sun unable to deny it?
BOOK 3
Reading Check
1. Who is the mother of Bacchus?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why is Tiresias blinded?
BOOK 4
Reading Check
1. Why does Clytie spread rumors about Leucothoe?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. How does Juno punish Ino and Athamas?
BOOK 5
Reading Check
1. Who is the mother of Proserpine?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Phineus attack Perseus?
BOOK 6
Reading Check
1. How does Niobe anger Latona?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. What does Tereus do to Philomela? How does Philomela communicate what happened to her with her sister Procne?
BOOK 7
Reading Check
1. Why must Medea and Jason flee Thessaly?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. How does Cephalus kill Procris?
BOOK 8
Reading Check
1. With whom does Scylla fall in love?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. How does Icarus die?
BOOK 9
Reading Check
1. Why does Juno hate Hercules?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Telethusa raise her daughter as a boy?
BOOK 10
Reading Check
1. Why does Orpheus descend to the underworld?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. How does Venus help Hippomenes win the hand of Atalanta?
Paired Resource
“Ovid’s Metamorphoses is the Ultimate Sourcebook for Artists”
- This article from the international art magazine Apollo explores the influence Ovid’s Metamorphoses has had on art history.
- This connects to the themes of Myth, History, and Empire and Boundaries and Fluidity.
- What is it that has made Ovid’s Metamorphoses so popular among artists throughout history?
BOOK 11
Reading Check
1. What is the wish Bacchus grants Midas?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Jupiter want Thetis to marry a mortal man, even though she is a goddess?
BOOK 12
Reading Check
1. To whom must Agamemnon sacrifice Iphigenia?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Caenis transform into a man?
Paired Resource
“Sexual Assault of Women in Ancient Rome”
- This article on The Collector discusses instances of sexual assault and inequality in the Roman world.
- This connects to the theme of Sexual Violence and Power.
- How did gender inequalities in the Roman world shape the way sexual assault was seen in Ovid’s times?
BOOK 13
Reading Check
1. Who killed Memnon?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Hecuba gouge out Polymestor’s eyes?
BOOK 14
Reading Check
1. Why does Circe turn Picus into a bird?
2. What name does Romulus assume when he becomes a god?
BOOK 15
Reading Check
1. Who is the philosopher who lives in Croton?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Why does Cipus hide his horns?
Paired Resource
- The Res Gestae Divi Augusti is an ancient inscription recording the achievements of the Emperor Augustus.
- This connects to the themes of Myth, History, and Empire and Boundaries and Fluidity.
- How does Ovid’s epic poem reflect on the Roman empire in the times of Augustus?
Recommended Next Reads
Fasti by Ovid
- This didactic poem is Ovid’s last major poetic work. It includes stories, religious beliefs, and traditions of Roman history as well as the myths connected with the daily rituals of the Roman calendar.
- Shared themes include Myth, History, and Empire, Boundaries and Fluidity, and Sexual Violence and Power.
- Shared topics include epic poetry, Greek and Roman mythology, and ancient Rome.
Aeneid by Virgil
- Virgil’s epic poem explores the mythical origins of Rome and follows the story of Aeneas, a Trojan hero.
- Shared themes include Myth, History, and Empire and Boundaries and Fluidity.
- Shared topics include epic poetry, Greek and Roman mythology, and ancient Rome.
- Aeneid on SuperSummary
Reading Questions Answer Key
BOOK 1
Reading Check
1. Chaos (“Opening” and “The Creation”)
Short Answer
1. As humanity becomes increasingly violent, one man, Lycaon, tries to trick Jupiter, and Jupiter punishes humanity by wiping them out with a flood. (“The Ages of Mankind”)
BOOK 2
Reading Check
1. The raven tells him. (“The Raven and the Crow”)
Short Answer
1. Phaethon demands to drive the light-bringing chariot of his father, the Sun. The Sun cannot deny this wish because he has already made a solemn vow to grant Phaethon’s wish, and gods cannot break their vows. (“Phaethon (cont.)”)
BOOK 3
Reading Check
1. Semele (“Semele and the Birth of Bacchus”)
Short Answer
1. Tiresias sides with Jupiter when he and Juno have an argument over whether men or women enjoy sex more. This angers Juno, so she strikes him blind. (“Tiresias”)
BOOK 4
Reading Check
1. Because she is jealous of her (“The Sun in Love”)
Short Answer
1. Juno sends the Fury Tisiphone to make Ino and Athamas mentally ill, causing them to kill their children. (“Athamas and Ino”)
BOOK 5
Reading Check
1. Ceres (“The Rape of Proserpine”)
Short Answer
1. Phineus attacks Perseus at his wedding to Andromeda because he was originally supposed to marry her. (“Perseus’s Fight in the Palace of Cepheus”)
BOOK 6
Reading Check
1. By boasting that she has more children than her (“Niobe”)
Short Answer
1. Tereus rapes Philomela, the sister of his wife Procne, and then cuts out her tongue. Philomela manages to communicate what happened to her with her sister by weaving the story on a tapestry. (“Tereus, Procne, and Philomela”)
BOOK 7
Reading Check
1. Because Medea murders Pelias (“Medea and Pelias: Her Flight”)
Short Answer
1. Cephalus accidentally kills Procris while he is hunting in the woods; he hits her with his spear while she is spying on him from her hiding place in the trees. (“Cephalus and Procris”)
BOOK 8
Reading Check
1. Minos (“Scylla and Minos”)
Short Answer
1. While Icarus and his father Daedalus are fleeing from Crete on wings that Daedalus fashioned from birds’ feathers and wax, Icarus flies too close to the sun. This melts the wax holding his wings together and causes him to fall to his death. (“Daedalus and Icarus”)
BOOK 9
Reading Check
1. Because he is the illegitimate son of her husband Jupiter and one of his mortal lovers (“The Birth of Hercules”)
Short Answer
1. Telethusa’s husband Ligdus prays for a son when Telethusa becomes pregnant. Telethusa pretends that the daughter she gives birth to is a boy so that Ligdus will accept the child. (“Iphis and Ianthe”)
BOOK 10
Reading Check
1. To retrieve his bride Eurydice, who died on their wedding day (“Orpheus and Eurydice”)
Short Answer
1. Atalanta will only marry the man who can beat her in a race, so Venus gives Hippomenes three golden apples to help him. He uses them to distract Atalanta and win the race. (“Atalanta”)
BOOK 11
Reading Check
1. To turn everything he touches into gold (“Midas”)
Short Answer
1. Jupiter learns from an oracle that Thetis will give birth to a son greater than his father, so he makes sure she marries a mortal to prevent her son from disrupting the divine status quo. (“Peleus and Thetis”)
BOOK 12
Reading Check
1. Diana (“The Expedition Against Troy”)
Short Answer
1. Though born a girl, Caenis is transformed into a man (called Caeneus) after her lover Neptune grants her one wish, and she chooses to be transformed into a man. (“Caenis”)
BOOK 13
Reading Check
1. Achilles (“Memnon”)
Short Answer
1. Hecuba gouges out Polymestor’s eyes because he murdered her son, Polydorus. (“Hecuba, Polyxena, and Polydorus”)
BOOK 14
Reading Check
1. Because he rejects her (“Picus and Canens”)
2. Quirinus (“Legends of Early Rome; The Apotheosis of Romulus”)
BOOK 15
Reading Check
1. Pythagoras (“The Doctrines of Pythagoras”)
Short Answer
1. Cipus learns from a seer that a horned man is destined to become the king of Rome. Not wanting to be king, Cipus hides his horns. (“Cipus”)
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