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TEIRESIAS

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Originally appearing in Volume V26, Page 508 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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TEIRESIAS , in See also:

Greek See also:legend, a famous Theban seer, son of Eueres and Chariclo. He was a descendant of Udaeus, one of the men who had sprung up from the See also:serpent's See also:teeth sown by See also:Cadmus. He was See also:blind from his seventh See also:year, for whichvarious causes were alleged. Some said that the gods had blinded him because he had revealed to men what they ought not to know. Others said that See also:Athena (or See also:Artemis) blinded him because he had seen her naked in the See also:bath; when his See also:mother prayed Athena to restore his sight, the goddess, being unable to do so, purged his ears so that he could understand the speech of birds, and gave him a See also:staff wherewith to See also:guide his steps (See also:Apollodorus iii. 6). According to Sostratus, author of an elegiac poem called Teiresias, he was originally a girl, but had been changed into a boy by See also:Apollo at the See also:age of seven; after undergoing several more transformations from one See also:sex to the other, she (for the final sex was feminine) was turned into a See also:mouse and her See also:lover Arachnus into a See also:weasel (See also:Eustathius on Odyssey, p. 1665). Teiresias' See also:grave was at the Tilphusian See also:spring; but there was a See also:cenotaph of him at See also:Thebes, and also in later times his " See also:observatory," or See also:place for watching for omens from birds, was pointed out (See also:Pausanias ix 16; See also:Sophocles, See also:Antigone, 999)• He had an See also:oracle at See also:Orchomenus, but during a See also:plague it became silent and remained so in See also:Plutarch's See also:time (De Defectu Oraculorum, 44). According to See also:Homer (Od. x. 492, xi. 90), Teiresias was the only See also:person in the See also:world of the dead whom See also:Proserpine allowed to retain his memory and See also:intellect unimpaired, and See also:Circe sends See also:Odysseus to consult him concerning his return See also:home.

He figured in the See also:

great paintings by See also:Polygnotus in the Lesche at See also:Delphi.

End of Article: TEIRESIAS

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