The Legendary Midas
The legendary King Midas of Phrygia helped out a drunk satyr – a male nature spirit with a horse’s tail and ears – who rewarded Midas by granting him a wish. Midas’ wish to turn all he touched into gold was granted, only for it to backfire. It made Midas fabulously wealthy in the short term, but it was not a superpower that he could turn on and off at will. It remained permanently on, and all that Midas touched turned into gold, whether he wanted it to or not. That included his beloved daughter, who perished when Midas inadvertently turned her into a golden statue. His food and drink was also turned into gold, so Midas died of thirst and starvation – although in another version, the god Dionysus lifted the curse after Midas learned his lesson.
The experience made Midas hate wealth and riches. So he left his palace and moved to the countryside, to follow the simple life as a worshipper of Pan, the god of the wild. Later, Pan challenged the god Apollo to a musical contest, and Midas was one of the judges. All the judges and witnesses declared Apollo the winner, except Midas, who sided with Pan. A ticked off Apollo stated that Midas “Must have the ears of an ass!“, and promptly turned the king’s ears into those of a donkey. Of course, those legendary Midas stories never actually happened in real life. However, as seen below, several ancient kings of Phrygia, in modern Turkey, answered to that name.
