- hymen
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/huy"meuhn/, n. Anat.a fold of mucous membrane partly closing the external orifice of the vagina in a virgin.[1605-15; < LL hymen < Gk hymén skin, membrane, the virginal membrane]
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Greek god of marriage.He was usually thought to be a son of Apollo by one of the Muses, perhaps Calliope. Other accounts called him the son of Dionysus and Aphrodite. In Attic legend he was a beautiful youth who rescued a group of young women, including his beloved, from a gang of pirates. He obtained the girl in marriage, and their happy life was invoked in many wedding songs.* * *
also called Hymenaeus,in Greek mythology, the god of marriage, whose name derives from the refrain of an ancient marriage song. Unknown to Homer, he was mentioned first by the 5th-century-BC lyric poet Pindar as the son of Apollo by one of the Muses. Various Muses are mentioned as his mother: Calliope (ancient commentary on Pindar), Clio (Apollodorus), Terpsichore (Alciphron), and Urania (Catullus and Nonnus). Other accounts made him the son of Dionysus and Aphrodite, and as such he would have been a god of fruitfulness. In Attic legend he was a beautiful youth who rescued a group of women, including the girl he loved, from a band of pirates. As a reward he obtained the girl in marriage, and their happy life caused him ever afterward to be invoked in marriage songs.* * *
Universalium. 2010.