Parnassus

alternative Parnassos

1. A mountain in central Greece, adjacent the site of the ancient city of Delphi, that in Greek mythology was sacred to Apollo and the Corycian nymphs and was the home of the Muses.

   Go down beside thy native rill, ⁠On thy Parnassus set thy feet, ⁠And hear thy laurel whisper sweet About the ledges of the hill.

   1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto XXXVII”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 57

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   Phocis separates the Aonian from the Actæan region; a fruitful land while it was a land; but at that time it had become a part of the sea, and a wide plain of sudden waters. There a lofty mountain rises towards the stars, with two tops, by name Parnassus, and advances beyond the clouds with its summit.

   1851, Ovid, “Book 1”, in Henry T. Riley, transl., The Metamorphoses of Ovid, volumes 1—Books I–VII, London: George Bell & Sons […] , published 1893

2. figurativelyThe home of poetry, literature, and learning.

   […] "He's arguably the best pitcher on the Mets," the preening sportswriter writes, aspiring to Parnassus, which Red Smith reached by never using words like "arguably."

   2001, William Zinsser, On Writing Well, page 70

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   Such lovely and truly British poetry cannot be too often brought to view; we shall therefore insert in thk part of our work several of these gems of our Parnassus, distinguishing by a different character such acts and attributes as appear properly to belong to the Fairy of popular belief.

   1828, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, volume II, London: William Harrison Ainsworth, page 128

   His intrinsic beauty and power meant nothing to the hundreds of thousands who were acclaiming him and buying his books. He was the fad of the hour, the adventurer who had stormed Parnassus while the gods nodded.

   1908 September – 1909 September, Jack London, chapter XLIII, in Martin Eden, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, published September 1909, →OCLC

3. A small town in Hurunui district, north Canterbury, New Zealand, named after Mount Parnassus.