Cyparissus

thumb|300px|Cyparissus (Vignali)|Cyparissus (c. 1625) by [[Jacopo Vignali: the boy mourns his pet deer (Musée des Beaux-Arts de Strasbourg)]] thumb|250px|Cyparissus, fresco in Pompeii, 1st century

In ancient Greek and Roman mythology, Cyparissus () was a boy beloved by Apollo, or, in some versions, by other deities. In the best-known version of the story, the favorite companion of Cyparissus was a tamed stag, which he accidentally killed with his hunting javelin as it lay sleeping in the woods. The boy's grief was such that it transformed him into a cypress tree, a classical symbol of mourning. The myth is thus aetiological in explaining the relation of the tree to its cultural significance. The subject is mainly known from Greek-inspired Latin literature and frescoes from Pompeii. No Greek hero cult devoted to Cyparissus has been identified.