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( Muse)
In Greek mythology, the Muses (Ancient Greek a? µ??sa?, hai mousai [1] perhaps from the Proto-Indo-European root *men- "think"[2]) are a sisterhood of goddesses or spirits, their number set at nine by Classical times, who embody the arts and inspire the creation process with their graces through remembered and improvised song and stage, writing, traditional music, and dance. They were water nymphs, associated with the springs of Helicon and with Pieris, from which they are sometimes called the Pierides. The Olympian system set Apollo as their leader, Apollon Mousagetes. Not only are the Muses explicitly used in modern English to refer to an inspiration, as when one cites his/her own artistic muse, but they are also implicit in words and phrases such as "amuse", "museum", "music", and "musing upon".[3] According to Hesiod's Theogony (seventh century BC), they are the daughters of Zeus, king of the gods, and Mnemosyne, goddess of memory. For Alcman and Mimnermus, they were even more primordial, springing from Uranus and Gaia. Pausanias records a tradition of two generations of Muses; the first being daughters of Uranus and Gaia, the second of Zeus and Mnemosyne. Another, rarer genealogy is that they are daughters of Harmonia (the daughter of Aphrodite and Ares) which contradicts the myth in which they were dancing at the wedding of Harmonia and Cadmus. Compare the Roman inspiring nymphs of springs, the Camenae, the Völva of Norse Mythology and also the apsaras in the mythology of classical India. According to Pausanias in the later second century AD,[4] there were three original Muses Aoide ("song" or "voice"), Melete ("practice" or "occasion"), and Mneme ("memory"). Together, these three form the complete picture of the preconditions of poetic art in cult practice. In Delphi three Muses were worshipped as well, but with other names Nete, Mese, and Hypate, which are the names of the three chords of the ancient musical instrument, the lyre. Alternatively they were called Cephisso, Apollonis, and Borysthenis, whose names characterise them as daughters of Apollo. In later tradition, four Muses were recognized Thelxinoe, Aoede, Arche, and Melete, said to be daughters of Zeus and Plusia (or of Uranus). One of the persons associated with the Muses was Pierus. By some he was called the father (by a Pimpleian nymph called Antiope by Cicero) of a total of seven Muses, called Neilo (?e???), Tritone (???t???), Asopo (?s?p?), Heptapora (?pt?p??a), Achelois, Tipoplo (??p?p??), and Rhodia. [5]
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