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In Greek mythology, the Lampads or Lampades (Ancient Greek: Λαμπάδες, from Ancient Greek: λαμπάς, romanized: lampás, lit. 'torch') are torch-bearing nymphs who follow the goddess Hecate.

Sources

According to a scholium on Homer's Iliad, the Lampades are among the types of nymphs mentioned by the lyric poet Alcman (fl. seventh century BC); the scholiast describes them as the nymphs "who carry torches and lights with Hecate", a description which Timothy Gantz claims was probably a creation of the scholiast, rather than of Alcman or another writer. According to Claude Calame, the scholium's connection of these nymphs with Hecate is likely related to the common association of the goddess with torches.

In Greek hexameters from Selinus dating to the fourth century BC, there is mention of "goddesses, bright with torches", which Sarah Iles Johnston interprets as referring to the Lampades, pointing to their attestation as torch-carrying goddesses, and their association with Hecate, who is mentioned immediately after these figures in the text.

Notes

1. Serafini, p. 14. On lampás, see LSJ λαμπάς.
2. Scholia minora on Homer's Iliad, 6.21 .
3. Gantz, p. 141.
4. Calame, p. 486. For a more detailed discussion of the Alcman fragment in the context of Hecate's association with torches, see Serafini, pp. 13–5.
5. Johnston, pp. 32; Jordan and Kotansky, p. 57. Jordan and Kotansky render the last word of the phrase as αμπάδας.
6. Johnston, pp. 32–3. Other scholars have provided differing interpretations: Jan Bremmer suggests identification with Demeter and Persephone, while Richard Janko points to Hecate and Persephone as possible candidates.

References

• Calame, Claude, Alcman: Introduction, texte critique, témoignages, traduction et commentaire, Rome, Edizioni dell'Ateneo, 1983. Internet Archive.
• Campbell, David A., Greek Lyric, Volume II: Anacreon, Anacreontea, Choral Lyric from Olympus to Alcman, Loeb Classical Library No. 143, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 1988. ISBN 978-0-674-99158-3. Online version at Harvard University Press. Internet Archive.
• Gantz, Timothy, Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, Two volumes: ISBN 978-0-8018-5360-9 (Vol. 1), ISBN 978-0-8018-5362-3 (Vol. 2).
• Johnston, Sarah Iles, "Goddesses with Torches in the Getty Hexameters and Alcman fr. 94", in Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Vol. 191 (2014), pp. 32–35. Internet Archive.
• Jordan, David R., and Roy D. Kotansky, "Ritual Hexameters in the Getty Museum: Preliminary Edition", in Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Vol. 178 (2011), pp. 54–62. JSTOR 41616753.
• Liddell, Henry George, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, revised and augmented throughout by Sir Henry Stuart Jones with the assistance of Roderick McKenzie, Clarendon Press Oxford, 1940. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library.
• Page, Denys Lionel, Sir, Poetae Melici Graeci, Oxford University Press, 1962. ISBN 978-0-198-14333-8.
• Serafini, Nicola, "La Dea Ecate, le Torce e le Ninfe Lampadi: Un Frammento di Alcmane da Rivalutare (Fr. 63 Davies)", in Quaderni Urbinati di Cultura Classica, Vol. 104, No. 2 (2013), pp. 11–22. JSTOR 24645051.

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