Editing Pyramus and Thisbe (section)

== Mythology ==
=== Ovid ===
Pyramus and Thisbe are two lovers in the city of [[Babylon]] who occupy connected houses. Their respective parents, driven by rivalry, forbid them to wed. Through a crack in one of the walls they whisper their love for each other. They arrange to meet near a tomb under a [[mulberry tree]] and state their feelings for each other. Thisbe arrives first, but upon seeing a lioness with a bloody mouth from a recent kill, she flees, leaving behind her cloak. When Pyramus arrives, he is horrified at the sight of Thisbe's cloak: the lioness had torn it and left traces of blood behind, as well as its tracks. Assuming that a wild beast had killed her, Pyramus kills himself, falling on his sword, a typical Babylonian way to commit suicide, and in turn splashing blood on the white mulberry leaves. Pyramus' blood stains the white mulberry fruits, turning them dark. Thisbe returns, eager to tell Pyramus what had happened to her, but she finds Pyramus' dead body under the shade of the mulberry tree. Thisbe, after praying to their parents and the gods to have them buried together and a brief period of mourning, stabs herself with the same sword. In the end, the gods listen to Thisbe's lament, and forever change the color of the mulberry fruits into the stained color to honor forbidden love. Her wish to be buried together with Pyramus is also granted; the lovers' ashes are preserved in one urn. Pyramus and Thisbe are models of love that is faithful to the very end.

=== Origins and other versions ===
Ovid's is the oldest surviving version of the story, published in 8 AD, but he adapted an existing [[aetiological myth]]. While in Ovid's telling Pyramus and Thisbe lived in [[Babylon]], and [[Ctesias]] had placed the tomb of his imagined king [[Ninus]] near that city, the myth probably originated in [[Cilicia]] (part of Ninus' [[Babylonia]]n empire) as Pyramos is the historical Greek name of the local [[Ceyhan River]]. The metamorphosis in the primary story involves Pyramus changing into this river and Thisbe into a nearby spring. A 2nd-century mosaic unearthed near [[Nea Paphos]] on [[Cyprus]] depicts this older version of the myth.<ref>{{cite book |last1= Miller|first1= John F.|last2= Newlands|first2= Carole E.|date= 2014|title= A Handbook to the Reception of Ovid|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=7fijBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA38|publisher= John Wiley & Sons|pages= 38–39|isbn= 978-1118876121}}</ref> This alternative version also survives in the ''[[progymnasmata]]'', a work by [[Nicolaus Sophista]], a Greek sophist and rhetor who lived during the fifth century AD.<ref>[[Nicolaus Sophista]], ''[[Progymnasmata]]'' 2.9</ref><ref>{{cite book | title = Μυθογραφοι. Scriptores poeticæ historiæ Græci. Edidit A. W. Gr | first1 = Anton | last1 = Westermann | date = 1843 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=phldAAAAcAAJ | page = [https://books.google.com/books?id=phldAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA384 384]}}</ref>

[[File:Antakya Archaeological Museum Mosaics in Portico of the Rivers Pyramos and Thisbe in 2019 01.jpg|thumb|center|350px|Pyramus and Thisbe depicted as fresh water deities on a Roman mosaic from [[Antioch]].]]