Argo
The Argo, the ship of Jason and the Argonauts in Greek myth, struck some onlookers as a monster rather than a vessel. According to certain sources, people had never laid eyes on a ship, so they described her as a creature. Her mission took her from Iolcos to Colchis, in search of the Golden Fleece. Where did her name come from, and who gave it? What was she made of, and which gods took an interest in her? Who steered her, and who helped when the voyage went wrong? And what became of the ship once the quest was over?
Argus, the shipwright, supplies the answer that most accounts give: the vessel took her name from her builder. Not every ancient writer accepted this. Diodorus Siculus recorded that some people traced the name to an old Greek word for swift, which would make it a statement about her speed. Cicero, the Roman senator and orator, proposed a different origin. He linked it to the Argives, the people of Argos in the Peloponnese, a term Homer commonly used for the Greeks. The adjective that describes the ship is Argoan, which travelled from the Greek Ἀργῶος through the Latin Argōus.
Apollodorus gave the Argo fifty oars, every one of them pulled by an Argonaut. That description makes her look like an early version of the penteconter, a type of ship that later carried that name. She was meant for the open sea and built for speed, with a sail to help the rowers. The best source for the myth is the Argonautica by Apollonius Rhodius.
Two goddesses appear in the building story. Hera was said to protect the crew, while Athena was said to help Argus plan or construct the vessel.
Mount Pelion supplied pine for the oars, according to Euripides in his play Medea. Catullus, writing later, described the boat as made of fir-wood. The prow held the most remarkable piece of all, a timber of oak from Dodona, a place sacred to Zeus. That oak could speak in a human voice and deliver oracles.
Thessaly, near Mount Pelion, was the building site. Sextus Propertius, a Roman poet writing in the reign of Augustus, had the ship leave from the port of Pagasae. Catullus went further and called her the first vessel ever to cross the sea. Dionysius Scytobrachion disagreed: he praised her as well made but refused to call her the first ship.
Tiphys, the steersman, learned from Athena how to fasten the sails to the mast, since he had to understand how the ship worked. Other sources say he had already served as a sailor, along with two other members of the crew, and that this earned him the helm. Lynceus also helped guide the ship, because his eyesight was keen by night and by day.
Vases of water and other provisions for the whole crew lasted four days before the ship needed fresh supplies. A bronze tripod was also on board. Herodotus claimed it was given to Triton after the Argonauts became lost in Lake Tritonis and needed his help. To get back on course, the ship had to be carried over land for 12 days.
The Nereids were said to love the Argo. Alongside Triton, they guided her through the most dangerous moments of the Argonauts' journey.
At the Isthmus of Corinth, the Argo was consecrated to Poseidon once her journey was finished. Gods had helped to make her, so she was treated as a sacred object. She became a monument as well as an offering to the gods. Years afterward, a beam fell from the top of the ship and struck Jason, who was asleep on the ground. It killed him. Jason was then translated into the sky, where he became the constellation Argo Navis.
Plays, books and philosophical writings all drew on the Argo in ancient Greece, where she was a familiar motif. Apollonius Rhodius, Pliny and Philostephanus each speculated about her shape. Most imagined a Greek warship of the galley type. Several authors suggested she was the first galley of that kind to venture onto the high seas.
Aristotle put the ship to a different use. In a discussion of ostracism in Athens, he remarked that the Argo left Heracles behind because he was too heavy.
The 1963 film Jason and the Argonauts gives the Argo the look of a Greek warship, with shields lining her sides. Rowers sit along both flanks, and a leader's drumbeat tells them how to pull. A red sail bearing the head of the golden ram marks the goal of the voyage. Eyes are painted on the front of the ship at the waterline, an ancient decorative touch.
The sacred oak appears in the film as the carved head of a woman, with partly extended wings forming the stern. Honor Blackman plays Hera in the film, and the figurehead is modelled on the goddess. It speaks to Jason throughout the story. In the film, Argus the shipbuilder says he was inspired to add this feature. Filmmakers gave the head a practical effect, so its eyes open and close whenever it speaks to Jason.
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Common questions
Who built the Argo?
Most accounts say the shipwright Argus built her and that she took her name from him. Athena was said to have helped him plan or construct the vessel, and Hera protected the crew.
What was the Argo made of?
Euripides says the oars came from pine trees near Mount Pelion, and Catullus says the boat was fir-wood. The prow held a piece of oak from Dodona, a place sacred to Zeus, which could speak and give oracles.
What happened to the Argo after the voyage?
She was consecrated to Poseidon at the Isthmus of Corinth and became a monument. Years later a beam fell from her and killed Jason while he slept. He was then translated into the sky as the constellation Argo Navis.
Was the Argo the first ship?
Catullus wrote that she was the first ship to travel on the sea. Dionysius Scytobrachion called her well made but did not consider her the first.
How does the 1963 film show the Argo?
She looks like a Greek warship with shields along the side, rowers directed by a drumbeat, and a red sail with the golden ram's head. A speaking figurehead modelled on Hera, played by Honor Blackman, talks to Jason.
All sources
23 references cited across the entry
- 1e.g. Robert Cooper Seaton (1912), Rhodius Apollonius: The Argonautica, p. 339
- 2Noah Webster (1832) A Dictionary of the English Language
- 6Apollodorus (1921). The Library with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer. London: Harvard University Press. pp. Chapter 9, Section 1.
- 7Euripides. Medea (Euripides with an English translation by David Kovacs). Cambridge: Harvard University Press. pp. Lines 1-48.
- 8Catullus, Carmina Valerius (1894). Carmina (translated by Sir Richard Francis Burton. London. pp. Poem on Marriage of Peleus and Thetis.
- 9Warner, Rex (1967). The Stories of the Greeks. USA: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, Inc. p. 57.
- 10JournalArgo: The First Ship?Steven Jackson — 1997
- 11BookEssays on European LiteratureErnst Robert Curtius — 2015
- 12P. Ovidius Naso (1813). Commentary on the Heroides of Ovid. London. pp. Hypsipyle Jasoni lines 3–6.
- 13Sextus Propertius (1995). Elegies (translated by Vincent Katz). Los Angeles: Sun and Moon Press. pp. Addressed to Gallus.
- 14The Argo
- 15JournalThe Water Supply of the Argo and Other Oared ShipsAndre Wegener Sleeswyk et al. — January 1998
- 16BookThe landmark Herodotus : the historiesHerodotus — Anchor Books — 2009
- 17BookA commentary on Herodotus with introduction and appendixesW. W. How et al. — Oxford University Press — 1991
- 18Conington, John (1876). Commentary on Vergil's Aeneid, Volume 1. London: Whittaker and Co. pp. Lines 144.
- 19BookThe Medea. Translated into English rhyming verse with explanatory notes by Gilbert MurrayEuripides et al. — New York Oxford University Press — 1912
- 21Hist. Nat. 1.c.56
- 22Aristotle (1944). Politics (Aristotle in 23 Volumes translated by H. Rackham). London: Harvard University Press. pp. Book 3, Section 1284a.
- 23Chaffey, Don, director. Jason and the Argonauts. Columbia Pictures, 1963.