Medusa and Herophile
by L. M. Spann
Herophile was now unsure if bringing her niece on this journey had been a good idea. Their passage to Pytho had just begun, and the girl was already a distraction. The Hellenic sailors who manned their ship glanced at her endlessly. Herophile worried that their distraction would result in her being lost at sea, somewhere in the Mediterranean.
Medusa was beautiful, and she had some knowledge of this. She shared the rich complexion of the Nubians south of her home in Alexandria, but her ancestry was clear in the broadness of her features and the tight coils of hair that shaped her locs. Her maternal ancestry is Ewe – a nomadic, West African people. Their prophetic work as Sybil brought the women East, to the wealth of the Nile and Egyptian, Nubian and Kush lands. Growing up in Alexandria, Medusa was accustomed to being acknowledged as a unique beauty for her West African features.
Aboard the Spartan ship that sailed Medusa and her aunt, Herophile, to the Mediterranean island, Pytho, the pale men who powered the ship’s oars would pause their rowing for moments at a time to stare, as Medusa passed. Only to return to rowing when prompted by the crack of their captain’s hand against a bright red scalp, burnt from the sun.
“A gorgon,” one of the men spoke. Crack. And back to rowing.
Medusa ignored their stares and murmurings. She was preoccupied, imagining her new life as a Sybil’s apprentice.
* * *
As a Sybil, renowned for the accuracy of her prophetic writing and insightful counsel, Herophile has traveled all of the Egyptian, Nubian and Kush empires advising leadership. Her reputation garnered her attention from the great Libyan Sybil, Pythia, who served as high priestess to the Temple of Apollo at Pytho. Pytho, which was said to be named after Pythia, is a sacred precinct which houses the temples of many deities. Her attentions as an Oracle spread thin, Pythia recommended Herophile to the Spartan lawgiver, Lycurgus, when he came to her requesting guidance in strengthening his city-state. Lycurgus heeded her recommendation and sent for Herophile.
Once Herophile got word of Pythia’s recommendation, she felt the urge to prove herself worthy of her reputation. By no means did she need to, but Herophile and Pythia received their education at the same temple. Pythia had gone on to cross the Mediterranean, gain notoriety in foreign lands, and have a sacred precinct, an entire island, named after her likeness. Allegedly.
Yes, Herophile is a renowned Sybil all along the Nile. But the Nile isn’t the Mediterranean. She had a statue or two, but certainly no island.
She accepted the Spartan lawgiver’s request for her services.
It would mean that she may never return to her home in Alexandria, but maybe she had outgrown Alexandria. Maybe she had outgrown the Nile. It was time to have an island of her own.
It was the prospect that she may never return home that prompted Herophile’s sister to insist that she take Medusa on the journey to Pytho with her.
“She’s always begged me to let her travel with you.”
“This is no trip to Cairo and back. I may not return.”
“Even more reason to bring family. Please. She’s only ever wanted to be your student.”
Herophile paused at this. Her ego was the quickest way to agreement. “She can receive an education at the temples.” Austere. She would not be so easily swayed.
“You know the temples bore her. They bored you. All chanting and reciting verses, and no real experience.”
The repetitive chanting and reciting of verses were meant to put Sybil into a holy trance, so they might hear the divine message of their deity and recite it as prophecy. But Herophile had always found the process horribly stale. It was much more effective to speak directly with the people whose lives would be impacted by her divinations. Knowing people. That is what brings forth Herophile’s most accurate predictions and astute counsel.
If Medusa truly wanted an education in the Sybil priestesshood, serving as Herophile’s apprentice would be exactly that.
“Fine.”
“Fine, you’ll take her with you?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, thank you aunty!” Medusa exclaimed, popping up from behind a large vase of fermenting palm.
* * *
From Alexandria, the two traveled west with temple guides, to Libya. Then across the Mediterranean, on a Spartan ship, to the Greek Island of Pytho. Once there, the Spartan lawgivers would visit Herophile at the Temple of Apollo for her counsel. They came to the temple every two or three months for weeks at a time. The journey from Sparta to Pytho was not long.
Within two years’ time, the city state brought a number of new territories under its control. Expanding its borders and influence north, to Athens, and east across the Mediterranean, into the Persian empire. Under Herophile’s guidance, the city-state adapted military reforms that introduced the three Spartan virtues: equality among citizens, military fitness, and austerity.
Aunty was no fun, but the lawgivers loved her.
Under Herophile’s tutelage, Medusa flourished. She transcribed the prophetic stories of her aunt’s divine possessions voraciously. At some point in her apprenticeship, she began writing the words that spilled from the Sybil’s tongue as, and sometimes before, she uttered them.
When her own apprentices left the Temple of Apollo at Pytho for the same temple at Delphi, Pythia often requested Medusa transcribe her predictions.
Medusa’s skill as an apprentice became so well known, that the Hellenic lawgivers, who came from the surrounding city-states to see the priestesses of the temple, began to take notice of her.
What they saw was a gorgon.
* * *
Not hideous, as lore described them, but strikingly beautiful. Not an immortal creature, but a mortal woman. With black skin, like the Sybil of Alexandria, and snakes that coiled about her head as she transcribed the fury that her Sybil master spoke.
They averted their eyes from her, as they feared being turned to stone.
If they had looked closer, they would have noticed that the snakes slithering about her head were not snakes at all, but locs of hair. Tightly coiled strands that wrapped around themselves to form thicker strands. If they had looked closer, they would have seen that the locs were not slithering at all, but being tossed about by the vigor of her transcription.
But they did not – look closer – as they feared being turned to stone.
Thus, the legend of Medusa took root and spread. The mortal gorgon, posing as a Sybil’s apprentice, at the Temple of Apollo at Pytho.
* * *
As legends go, her story took on a life of its own. Eventually, she was no longer a Sybil’s apprentice, but a seductress whose hair was turned to snakes by a jealous deity. Her head was chopped off by Perseus and mounted to the shield of Athena.
Nonsense.
Medusa, the Medusa who was Herophile’s apprentice, continued to work alongside her aunt. Eventually, the two traveled north, to the territory their counsel enabled the Spartans to conquer. Herophile served as high priestess at the Temple of Diane at Herophil, the sacred precinct named in her likeness.
After Herophile’s death, Medusa took her place as high priestess and Sybil at the Temple of Diane at Herophil. She adopted her master’s name, Herophile.
L. M. Spann is a writer from the Washington D.C. area. She is eager to lend her voice to the genres of fantasy, speculative fiction, sci-fi, and any other genre she gets the courage to try.
Check out more of Spann's work on her blog, https://www.lmspann.com/.