LP0025 - Herculean Images - Paintings described in Philostratus the Elder's Imagines

Legendary Passages #0025 - Herculean Images -
Paintings described in Philostratus the Elder's Imagines.

    For the next six episodes we shall focus on the origins of Heracles and his early labors. This episode is a series of commentaries on long lost classical paintings, with descriptions of scenes and mythological references.

    The first painting described is The Madness of Heracles, from the night he went mad and killed his own children. Only one of the youths is still standing, no match for his father's unbridled rage.

    The second painting is of Theoidamas, who had been plowing his fields in Rhodes until a hungry Heracles came by. Despite the farmer's curses, the son of Zeus killed his ox and roasts it over an open fire.

    The third painting is The Burial of Abderus, killed by the Mares of Diomedes during Heracles' eighth labor. He builds the handsome youth a grand tomb, and establishes the city known today as Abdera.

    The fourth painting represents Xenia, the Greek custom of hospitality. This painting is mostly of food: roast rabbit and duck, spiced breads, fruits and desserts and fine wine.

    The last painting depicts The Birth of Athena, who bursts forth fully grown and armored from the head of Zeus.

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Herculean Images,
a Legendary Passage,
from Imagines by Philostratus the Elder,
translated by Arthur Fairbanks.

THE MADNESS OF HERACLES

    Fight, brave youths, Heracles, and advance. But heaven grant that he spare the remaining boy, since two already lie dead and his hand is aiming the arrow with the true aim of a Heracles.

    Great is your task, no whit less great than the contests in which he himself engaged before his madness. But fear not at all; he is gone from you, for his eyes are directed toward Argos, and he thinks he is slaying the children of Eurystheus; indeed, I heard him in the play of Euripides; he was driving a chariot and applying a goad to his steeds and threatening to destroy utterly the house of Eurystheus; for madness is a deceptive thing and prone to draw one away from what is present to what is not present.

    Enough for these youths; but as for you, it is high time for you to occupy yourself with the painting. The chamber which was the object of his attack still holds Megara and the child; sacrificial baskets and lustral basins and barley-grains and firewood and missing bowl, the utensils of Zeus Herkeios all have been kicked aside, and the bull is standing there; but there have been thrown on the altar, as victims, infants of noble birth, together with their father's lion's skin.

    One has been hit in the neck and the arrow has gone through the delicate throat, the second lies stretched out full upon his breast and barbs of the arrow have torn through the middle of the spine, the missile having evidently been shot into his side.

    Their cheeks are drenched with tears, and you should not wonder that they wept beyond the due measure of tears; for tears flow easily with children, whether what they fear be small or great.

    The frenzied Heracles is surrounded by the whole body of his servants, like a bull that is running riot, surrounded by herdsmen; one tries to bind him, another is struggling to restrain him, another shouts loudly, one clings to his hands, one tries to trip him up, and others leap upon him.

    He, however, has no consciousness of them, but he tosses those who approach him and tramples on them, dribbling much foam from his mouth and smiling a grim and alien smile, and while keeping his eyes intently fixed on what he is doing, yet letting the thought behind his glance stray away to the fancies that deceive him.

    His throat bellows, his neck dilates, and the veins about the neck swell, the veins through which all that feeds the disease flows up to the sovereign parts of the head.

    The Fury which has gained this mastery over him, you have many times seen on the stage, but you cannot see her here; for she has entered into Heracles himself and she dances through his breast and leaps up inside him and muddles his mind. To this point the painting goes, abut poets go on to add humiliating details, and they even tell of the binding of Heracles, and that too, though they say that Prometheus was freed from bonds by him.

THEIODAMAS

    This man is rough and, by Zeus! in a rough land; for this island is Rhodes, the roughest part of which the Lindians inhabit, a land good for yielding grapes and figs but not favourable for ploughing and impossible to drive over.

    We are to conceive the man as crabbed, a farm labourer of premature old age;  he is Theiodamas the Lindian, if perchance you have heard of him.

    But what boldness! Theiodamas is angry with Heracles, because the latter, meeting him as he ploughed, slew one of the oxen and made a meal of it, being quite accustomed to such a meal.

    For no doubt you have read about Heracles in Pindar, of the time when he came to the home of Coronus and ate a whole ox, not counting even the bones superfluous; and dropping in to visit Theiodamas toward evening he fetched fire (and even dung is good fuel for a fire) and roasting the ox he tries the flesh, to see if it is already tender, and all but finds fault with the fire for being so slow.

    The painting is so exact that it does not fail to show the very nature of the ground; for where the ground presents even a little of its surface to the plough, it seems anything but poor, if I understand the picture.

    Heracles is keeping his thoughts intently on the ox, and pays but scant attention to the curses of Theiodamas, only enough to relax his face into a smile, while the countryman makes after him with stones.

    The mode of the man's garments is Dorian; his hair is squalid and there is grime on his forehead; while his thigh and his arm are such as the most beloved land grants to its athletes.

    Such is the deed of Heracles; and this Theiodamas is revered among the Lindians; wherefore they sacrifice a plough-ox to Heracles, and they begin the rites with all the curses which I suppose the countryman then uttered, and Heracles rejoices and gives good things to the Lindians in return for their imprecations.

THE BURIAL OF ABDERUS

    Let us not consider the mares of Diomedes to have been a task for Heracles, my boy, since he has already overcome them and crushed them with his club; one of them lies on the ground, another is gasping for breath, a third, you will say, is leaping up, another is falling down; their manes are unkempt, they are shaggy down to their hoofs, and in every way they resemble wild beasts; their stalls are tainted with flesh and bones of the men whom Diomedes used as food for his horses, and the breeder of the mares himself is even more savage of aspect than the mares near whom he has fallen; but you must regard this present labour as the more difficult, since Eros enjoins it upon Heracles in addition to many others, and since the hardship laid upon him was no slight matter.

    For Heracles is bearing the half-eaten body of Abderus, which he has snatched from the mares; and they devoured him while yet a tender youth and younger than Iphitus, to judge from the portions that are left; for, still beautiful, they are lying on the lion's skin.

    The tears he shed over them, the embraces he may have given them, the laments he uttered, the burden of grief on his countenance; let such marks of sorrow be assigned to another lover; for another likewise let the monument placed upon the fair beloved's tomb carry the same tribute of honour; but, not content with the honours paid by most lovers, Heracles erects for Abderus a city, which we call by his name, and games also will be instituted for him, and in his honour contests will be celebrated, boxing and the pancratium and wrestling and all the other contests, except horse-racing.

XENIA

    This hare in his cage is the prey of the net, and he sits on his haunches moving his forelegs a little and slowly lifting his ears, but he also keeps looking with all his eyes and tries to see behind him as well, so suspicious is he and always cowering with fear; the second hare that hangs on the withered oak tree, his belly laid wide open and his skin stripped off over the hind feet, bears witness to the swiftness of the dog which sits beneath the tree, resting and showing that he alone has caught the prey.

    As for the ducks near the hare (count them, then), and the geese of the same number as the ducks, it is not necessary to test them by pinching them, for their breasts, where the fat gathers in abundance on water-birds, have been plucked all over.

    If you care for raised bread of “eight-piece loves,”  they are here near by in the deep basket. And if you want any relish, you have the loaves themselves – for they have been seasoned with fennel and parsley and also with poppy-seed, the spice that brings sleep – but if you desire a second course, put that off till you have cooks, and partake of the food that needs no fire.

    Why, then, do you not take the ripe fruit, of which there is a pile here in the other basket? Do you not know that in a little while you will no longer find it so fresh, but already the dew will be gone from it? And do not overlook the desert, if you care at all for medlar fruit and Zeus’ acorns, which is the smoothest of trees bears in a prickly husk that is horrid to peel off. Away with even the honey, since we have here this palathè, or whatever you like to call it, so sweet a dainty it is! And it is wrapped in its own leaves, which lend beauty to the palathè.

    I think the painting offers these gifts of hospitality to the master of the farm, and he is taking a bath, having perhaps the look in his eyes of Pramnian or Thasian wines, although he might, if he would, drink the sweet new wine at the table here, and then on his return to the city might smell of pressed grapes and of leisure and might belch in the faces of the city-dwellers.

THE BIRTH OF ATHENA

    These, wonder-struck beings are gods and goddesses, for the decree has gone forth that not even the Nymphs may leave the heavens, but that they, as well as the rivers from which they are sprung, must be at hand; and they shudder at the sight of Athena, who at this moment has just burst forth fully armed from the head of Zeus, through the devices of Hephaestus, as the axe tells us.

    As for the material of her panoply, no one could guess it; for as many as are the colours of the rainbow, which changes its light now to one hue and now another, so many are the colours of her armour. Hephaestus seems at a loss to know by what gift he may gain the favour of the goddess; for his lure is spent in advance because her armour was born with her.

    Zeus breathes deeply with delight, like men who have undergone a great contest for a great prize, and he looks searchingly for his daughter, feeling pride in his offspring; nor yet is there even on Hera’s face any trace of indignation; nay, she rejoices, as though Athena were her daughter also.

    Two peoples are already sacrificing to Athena on the acropolis of two cities, the Athenians and the Rhodians, one on the land and one on the sea, [sea-born] and earth-born men; the former offer fireless sacrifices that are incomplete, but the people of Athens offer fire, as you see yonder, and the savour of burnt flesh. The smoke is represented as fragrant and as rising with the savour of the offerings. Accordingly the goddess has come to the Athenians as to men of superior wisdom who make excellent sacrifices.

    For the Rhodians, however, as we are told, gold flowed down from heaven and filled their houses and their narrow streets, when Zeus caused a cloud to break over them, because they also gave heed to Athena. The divinity Plutus also stands on their acropolis, and he is represented as a winged being who has descended from the clouds, and as golden because of the substance in which he has been made manifest. Moreover, he is painted as having his sight; for of set purpose he has come to them.

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