Πιεριδες
The name Pierides derives from the district of Pieria in Thrace. According to legend the Pierides were nine maidens who wanted to outshine the Muses. They were the daughters of Pierus and Evippe. They possessed especially beautiful singing voices; so they went to Mount Helicon, home of the Muses, and challenged them to a singing contest. They were unsuccessful, and to punish them the Muses changed them into magpies, according to Ovid, or into various birds, according to Nicander. The latter gives the names of the nine Pierides as Colymbas, Iynx, Cenchris, Cissa, Chloris, Acalanthis, Nessa, Pipo and Dracontis. According to Pausanias, the Pierides had the same names as the Muses, and the children attributed to the Muses such as Orpheus, for example, were the children of the Pierides, since the Muses remained eternally virgin.
{E2 DICTIONARY OF CLASSICAL MYTHOLOGY}