Youth of humble birth on Cyprus who loved Anaxarete and hanged himself when she mocked him — the inset tale Vertumnus told Pomona to warn against hard-heartedness, not to be confused with Iphis of Crete or the Argive king of the same name.1
Ovid sets the story on Cyprus, where Iphis of lowly stock saw Anaxarete, born of ancient Teucer blood, and felt love burn through every bone. He pleaded at her threshold, sent gifts, and at last confessed to his nurse; when reason could not master his madness he came as a suppliant to Anaxarete's door — and she mocked him.2
He hanged himself before her house with the cords that bore his last words of reproach. When Anaxarete was forced to look upon his funeral procession, she hardened into stone from feet to face — still shown in Salamis, a maiden turned to marble for cruelty. Vertumnus, disguised as an old crone, told Pomona the tale to soften the orchard nymph's heart.3
The name is shared with Iphis daughter of Teleutas in Crete, whom her mother raised as a boy until Isis changed her sex on her wedding eve — and with Iphis son of Alector in the Argive king-list. The Salaminian youth belongs only to Ovid's Italian book and the inset that won Pomona for Vertumnus.4
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the spine ignites as you read · hover a bond on the card — every mention of them lights in the story