Daphnis and Chlöe (laurel and bright green) In Greek and Latin mythology, a romance by Longus (third century c.e.) of Daphnis, a young shepherd, and Chlöe, a shepherdess. They lived on the island of Lesbos. The tale is a pastoral story about the maturing of love. The theme was a favourite in 17th- and 18th-century France and England and inspired Ravel’s ballet Daphnis and Chlöe (1910). Daphnis is also the name of a Sicilian shepherd in pastoral poetry, credited with the invention of the genre. He was blinded by the Muses and later died for love. He appears in Theocritus and in Vergil’s Eclogues. Daphnis is also the name of a shepherd on Mount Ida transformed to stone by a jealous nymph. Ovid’s Metamorphoses (book 4) tells the tale.
SOURCE:
Encyclopedia of World Mythology and Legend, Third Edition – Written by Anthony S. Mercatante & James R. Dow
– Copyright © 2009 by Anthony S. Mercatante