Hesiod Th. 183-187 appears to have made use of a tradition in which human beings came from trees.
Perhaps under the influence of the pairing of « ash » and « bronze » in Homer (Il. 20, 322 and 22, 225), Hesiod makes his bronze race the offspring of ash-trees.
The Hesiodic myth in which the Melian nymphs primarily figure, namely the castration of Ouranos, has similarities to the Neoplatonic myth of Zagreus (Proclus, in R. 2, 74-75 ; Olympiodorus, in Phd. 1, 1, 3).
Both myths depict a « Titanic » act of destruction and separation that leads to the birth of humans ; both myths furthermore seek to account for a divine element that human nature retains from its origins.
