Echo

(Ἠχώ), an Oreade, who when Zeus was playing with the nymphs, used to keep Hera at a distance by incessantly talking to her. In this manner Hera was not able to detect her faithless husband, and the nymphs had time to escape. Hera, however, found out the deception, and she punished Echo by changing her into an echo, that is, a being with no control over its tongue, which is neither able to speak before anybody else has spoken, nor to be silent when somebody else has spoken. Echo in this state fell desperately in love with Narcissus, but as her love was not returned, she pined away in grief, so that in the end there remained of her nothing but her voice. (Ov. Met. 3.365-401.) There were in Greece certain porticoes, called the Porticoes of Echo, on account of the echo which was heard there; thus, there was one stoa at Hermione with a threefold, and one at Olympia with a sevenfold echo. (Paus. 2.35.6, 5.21.7.) Compare Wiesler, Die Nymphe Echo : eine kunstmythologische Abhandlung, Göttingen, 1844. [L.S]

(Ἠχώ). A daughter of Aër and Gaea, who chiefly resided in the vicinity of the Cephissus. She was once one of Heré's attendants; but, having offended that goddess by her deception, she was deprived, in a great measure, by her of the power of speech. Heré declared that in future she should have but little use of her tongue, and immediately she lost all power of doing any more than to repeat the sounds which she heard. Echo happening to see the beautiful youth Narcissus, became deeply enamoured of him. But, her love being slighted, she pined away till nothing remained of her but her voice and bones. The former still exists, the latter were converted into stone (Ovid, Met. iii. 341 foll.).