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Stone-born People in Deucalion’s Story

A reference page linking a name, group, or concept to the materials that discuss it.

A Greek image of humanity renewed from stones after the flood, attested by Pindar and elaborated by Ovid and Pseudo-Apollodorus.

Modern conceptual illustration of receding water, two survivors, a mountain and stones evoking Deucalion; not an archaeological photograph or a documented location. © IL Archive, CC0
Modern conceptual illustration of receding water, two survivors, a mountain and stones evoking Deucalion; not an archaeological photograph or a documented location. © IL Archive, CC0Modern conceptual illustration: IL Archive / CC0 · CC0

Text

Pindar’s ninth Olympian ode describes a stone-born people arising with DeucalionDeucalion in Greek Flood TraditionsA Greek figure linked with the flood, Pyrrha, Prometheus and stone-born people; details differ between Pindar, Pseudo-Apollodorus and Ovid.Glossary · Click to read the explanation and Pyrrha after their descent from Parnassus, within a praise poem for Opus and its lineages. In Pseudo-Apollodorus’s Library, they throw stones over their heads; his become men and hers women. Ovid adds Themis’s riddle: the “great mother’s bones” are stones of the Earth. This feature does not appear in the compared Sumerian and AkkadianAkkadianAn ancient East Semitic language written in cuneiform in Mesopotamia.Glossary · Click to read the explanation passages, but by itself it does not settle the origin of the whole Greek flood story. [2][3][4][11][12]

References and notes

  1. Pindar, Olympian 9.40–56, older Paley translation; poem and context Pindar, Olympian 9, especially 40–56; Paley 19th-century translation Return to the text ↑
  2. Pseudo-Apollodorus, Library 1.7.2; Greek text and Frazer’s 1921 translation Pseudo-Apollodorus, Library 1.7.2; Greek and Frazer 1921 translation Return to the text ↑
  3. Ovid, Metamorphoses 1.163–415, especially 240–415; Brookes More’s 1922 translation Ovid, Metamorphoses 1:163–415, especially 240–415; Brookes More 1922 translation Return to the text ↑
  4. Oxford ETCSL, Sumerian Flood Story, surviving segments C–E Oxford ETCSL Sumerian Flood Story, surviving segments C–E Return to the text ↑
  5. Stephanie Dalley, Atrahasis I–III, PDF pp. 11–14, 16–17 and 26–28; selected passages only Stephanie Dalley, Atrahasis tablets I–III, PDF pp. 11–14, 16–17 and 26–28 Return to the text ↑

Research history

Substantive changes are retained here. Minor copy edits remain in the internal operational log.

  1. Edition 2 · 12 October 2026 · editor:aladmin

    Substantive record update

    Read this revision in its original language (Arabic)

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Cite this record

IL Archive, «Stone-born People in Deucalion’s Story», Edition 2, https://ilarchive.com/en/entities/stone-born-people-deucalion