NEGOTIATING BOUNDARIES

In the fifth century BC that literary interest takes off, in Pindar and Aeschylus. In art Thetis offers less interesting opportunities, however, than the theme of his abduction of Europa from Sidon (Phoenicia). There, Zeus is transformed into a bull riding the waves with Europa on his back. This is a favorite scene from as early as 560 BC (LIMC Europe 22) up to the wall-paintings of Pompeii. It must have figured, too, in early poems such as the Europeia of Eumelos. This is a momentous myth because Europa's brother Kadmos must search for her and in the process transform his nationality from Phoenician to Greek (Euripides, fr. 819 Kannicht2) - in order to found Theves. This myth therefore negotiates the boundaries between Europe (to which she gives her name) and Asia, between Greek identity and the identity of the Phoenicians, to whose mercantile supremacy the Greeks succeeded, travelling the seas for trade and discovery.