A Large Chariot on a Hot, Sunny Day

During a lull in the Memorial Day procession in my little town, traffic  was allowed through, and a very large RV bearing the brand name Phaeton drove past me.   Here you can see the very amusing introductory page of this amazing motorhome and enjoy a Latin frisson in the text.  Also amusing was the vehicle following the Phaeton, a truck pulling a motorboat with a large Mercury engine.

Phaethon, the son of Helios, god of the sun, wanted to drive his father's chariot, i.e., the sun, across the sky for a day, but alas, the horses sensed a beginner at the reins. The poet Ovid tells Phaethon's story in Metamorphoses at the end of Book 1 and into Book 2. Early automobile designers gave Phaethon’s name, with the slight spelling change, to a style of sedan, and the name persisted throughout the twentieth century into the twenty-first; Volkswagen makes a model called a Phaeton. But to my eye the Chrysler Phaeton 1997 concept car definitely shares some of the glory of the chariot of the sun. See it here.