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Key Details
Type
RealmMythology
Greek Pantheon
Coordinates
39.916°N, 25.236°E
About This Location
Where the smith fell
Homer says Zeus (or Hera) hurled Hephaestus from Olympus; he fell on Lemnos and the Sintians cared for him. The island's volcano and smith-cult (Hephaestia) make the landing local. The Argonautica adds Hypsipyle and the Lemnian women who had killed their men. Philoctetes is marooned here in tragedy. Lemnos is a workshop and a wound: fire, isolation, and a woman-ruled interlude the Argonauts sail into. The forge is inferred from the fall, not described as a tourist plant.
Primary Sources
“All day I fell, and with the setting sun I landed on Lemnos, and little life was in me.”
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