Golden Fleece
Golden Fleece names 3 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Golden Fleece the subject of a celebrated Grecian myth
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
the subject of a celebrated Grecian myth. A mother, whose boy and girl were in danger, appealed to Mercury for assistance. He gave her a ram with a golden fleece, on which she placed her two children to be conveyed to a place of safety. The ram sprang into the air and took his course toward the east. The girl, whose name was Helle, fell from her seat into the sea, in that part now called the Hellespont. The boy kept his hold and he reached the land of Colchis on the eastern shore of the Black Sea . Here he sacrificed the ram and gave its fleece to the king of that country, who had received him hospitably. The fleece was hung up in a sacred grove and guarded night and day by a dragon that never slept. Later, Jason, with his ship, Argo, and his crew, known as the Argonauts, set out to obtain the Golden Fleece. The cruise of the Argo has been supposed by some to be another version of Noah's deluge; by others the Golden Fleece is held to typify the wealthbringing caravan commerce of the East, the land of Colchis being the point at which this traffic reached the Black Sea. See Argonauts
Golden Fleece ORDER OF THE, the Toison d'or
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
ORDER OF THE, the Toison d'or, a military order instituted by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, in 1429, on the occasion of his marriage with the Portuguese princess, Isabella. The order now belongs to both Austria and Spain. The knights carry suspended from their collars the figure of a sheep or fleece in gold. GOLDEN GATE. a channel two miles wide, forming the entrance to the Bay of San Francisco, and washing the N. shore of the peninsula on which San Francisco is built. It is defended by Fort Point, at the N. W. extremity of the peninsula, and by a fort on Alcatraz Island, inside the entrance.
Golden Fleece in classical mythology
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
in classical mythology, the fleece of gold in quest of which Jason undertook the Argonautic expedition to Colchis. The fleece was suspended in an oak-tree in the grove of Ares (Mars), and was guarded by a dragon. When the Argonauts came to Colchis for the fleece, Medea put the dragon to sleep, and Jason carried the fleece away. See ARGONAUT; JASON; MEDEA.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
The myth itself reads today much as it did in 1910 and 1921: Jason, the Argo, the sleepless dragon and Medea's sleeping-draught are still told the same way, though the speculation Aiton's reports "another version of Noah's deluge" has long since dropped out of serious scholarship, and the favoured modern guess is that the fleece recalls the Colchian practice of catching river gold in sheepskins laid in mountain streams. The Order of the Golden Fleece has changed more. Collier's 1921 note that "the order now belongs to both Austria and Spain" was written just after the Habsburg monarchy fell in 1918; the Austrian branch survives as a private dynastic honour of the head of the House of Habsburg rather than a state order, while the Spanish branch is still conferred by the reigning monarch and has admitted women, Princess Leonor receiving it in 2018. And the Golden Gate that Collier's describes only by its forts has been spanned since 1937 by the suspension bridge that now gives the channel its fame.
Written for this edition, 2026.