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Beginning with Chaos and the primal origin of the world, he must know everything down to the story of Cleopatra the Egyptian.The compendium of mythology that follows is notable not only for its brevity but for its arrangement on geographical lines, which is unique, and I think was ado: by Lucian as an aid to memory, since the passage was clearly composed off-hand and very little retouched. He must have thought of it not only as displaying his own command of mythology and knowledge of what Pindar calls “the short road” in story-telling, but as a help to dancers, libretto-writers, and audiences, and incidentally of interest to the latter as a memorytest (cf. True Story, 1; The Dead Come to Life, 6; Mistaken Critic, 6). This is certainly the way in which most of its readers will want to use it now. Those who, perhaps from interest in it as a dancer’s repertory, wish to study it and find the notes given here and the further hints in the Index insufficient to their purpose should make use of Sir J. G. frazer’s Apollodorus (L.C.L.), which will make it all plain sailing. Let this be the range we prescribe for the dancer’s learning, and let him know thoroughly all that lies within it: the castration of Uranus, the begetting of Aphrodite, the battle of the Titans, the birth of Zeus, the stratagem of Rhea, the substitution of the stone, the fetters of Cronus, the casting of lots among the three brothers.Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades, for their respective dominions.
