ERIPHY’LE (4 syl.), the wife of Amphiara’os.  Being bribed by a golden necklace, she betrayed to Polyni-ces where her husband had concealed himself that he might not go to the seige of Thebes, where he knew that he should be killed.  Congreve calls the word Eriph’yle.

  When Eriphyle broke her plighted faith,
  And for a bribe procured her husband’s death.

Ovid, Art of Love, iii.

ERISICH’THON (should be Erysichthon), a Thessaliad, whose appetite was insatiable.  Having spent all his estate in the purchase of food, nothing was left but his daughter Metra, and her he sold to buy food for his voracious appetite; but Metra had the power of transforming herself into any shape she chose, so as often as as her father sold her, she changed her form and returned to him.  After a time, Erisichthon was reduced to feed upon himself.—­Ovid, Metaph, viii. 2 (740 to end).

Drayton says when the Wyre saw her goodly oak trees sold for firewood, she bethought her of Erisichthon’s end, who, “when nor sea, nor land, sufficient were,” ate his own flesh.—­Polyolbion, vii.

  So Erisicthon, once fired (as men say),
  With hungry rage, fed never, ever feeding;
  Ten thousand dishes severed every day,
  Yet in ten thousand thousand dishes needing. 
  In vain his daughter hundred shapes assumed;
  A whole camp’s meat he in his gorge inhumed;
  And all consumed, his hunger yet was unconsumed.

Phineas Fletcher, The Purple Island (1633).

ERLAND, father of Norna “of the Fitful Head.”—­Sir W. Scott, The
Pirate (time, William III.).

ERL-KING, a spirit of mischief, which haunts the Black Forest of
Thuringia.

Goethe has a ballad called the Erl-koenig, and Herder has translated the Danish ballad of Sir Olaf and the Erl-King’s Daughter.

In Goethe’s ballad, a father, riding home through the night and storm with a child in his arms is pursued by the Erl-king, who entices the child with promises of fairy-gifts, and finally kills it.

ERMANGARDE OF BALDRINGHAM (The Lady), aunt of the Lady Eveline Berenger “the betrothed.”—­Sir W. Scott, The Betrothed (time, Henry II.).

ER’MELINE (Dame), the wife of Reynard, in the beast-epic called Reynard the Fox (1498).

ERMIN’IA, the heroine of Jerusalem Delivered.  She fell in love with Tancred, and when the Christian army beseiged Jerusalem, arrayed herself in Clorinda’s armor to go to him.  After certain adventures, she found him wounded, and nursed him tenderly; but the poet has not told us what was the ultimate lot of this fair Syrian.—­Tasso, Jerusalem Delivered (1575).

ERNA’NI, the robber-captain, duke of Segor’bia and Cardo’na, lord of Aragon, and count of Ernani.  He is in love with Elvi’ra, the betrothed of Don Ruy Gomez de Silva, an old Spanish grandee, whom she detests.  Charles V. falls in love with her, and Ruy Gomez joins Ernani in a league against their common rival.  During this league Ernani gives Ruy Gomez a horn, saying, “Sound but this horn, and at that moment Ernani will cease to live.”  Just as he is about to espouse Elvira, the horn is sounded, and Ernani stabs himself.—­Verdi, Ernani (an opera, 1841).