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Cyane, a MythSource painting
Greek

Cyane

01Identity

Cyane in Greek tradition

Cyane was a Sicilian Nymph whose spring lay beside the stream Arethusa. When Pluto carried Persephone away, Cyane rose from the water and stood before his chariot. She told him that he could not take Ceres's daughter without her mother's consent. She compared Persephone's abduction with her own marriage to Anapis, whom she said had courted rather than frightened her.

Pluto would not be stopped. He threw his sceptre into the depths, and the earth opened to receive his chariot. Cyane mourned the goddess and the violated rights of her spring. She dissolved into tears and then into the waters she had once guarded. In the account, her name remains attached to the pool, and its waters are presented as the form her grief takes. She speaks as the spring's Nymph, directly challenging the god who crosses it.

SourceThe Metamorphoses of Ovid, The Flower Gathering and Abduction, printed pp. 174–175

Top questions

The quick answers

  • Who is Cyane?

    Cyane was a Sicilian Nymph whose spring lay beside the stream Arethusa.
02The myths

The myths of Cyane

1 myth, with sources recorded for each.

The Flower Gathering and Abduction

Cyane's spring lies between her and Arethusa, held within a landscape of nearby ridges. The Sicilian Nymph rises from the water as Pluto's chariot approaches with Persephone. She blocks his way and argues that Ceres's daughter should have been asked, not carried off against her mother's will. Cyane grounds the protest in her own life: Anapis loved her, she says, but courted her rather than frightening her into marriage.

Pluto does not accept the rebuke. He drives his sceptre into the spring's depths, and the earth opens beneath the chariot, carrying it down towards Tartarus. Cyane is left to grieve both for the abducted goddess and for the rights of her own water. The loss overwhelms her; she melts into the spring that had been her domain.

The change happens piece by piece. Her limbs soften, her bones bend, and the hard parts of her body lose their shape. Hair, fingers, legs and feet become water, then her back, shoulders, sides and breast dissolve into smaller streams. At the end, water has taken the place of blood, and no body remains to grasp. Cyane's protest has not stopped the chariot, but the spring itself becomes the form through which her mourning continues.

The Flower Gathering and Abduction, a MythSource painting of the scene

2 sources· checked 2026-10-01

  1. 1The Metamorphoses of OvidT1
  2. 2The Metamorphoses of OvidT1

Also mentioned in

Stories elsewhere on MythSource that mention Cyane, each on that figure’s page.