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Herakles' attributes and their appropriation by Eros

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2013

Susan Woodford
Affiliation:
1 Akenside Road London, NW3 5BS

Extract

This note discusses some of the images and ideas that led to the depiction of Eros with the attributes of Herakles (PLATE IVa), an iconographical type that was developed and elaborated in the Hellenistic and Romanperiods.

Eros was not, in fact, the first to appropriate for himself the attributes of Herakles. From an early period popular imagination realised that even the mighty Herakles would occasionally be placed in a situation that lesser creatures could take advantage of. Before the Hellenistic period Kerkopes, satyrs and goat-legged Pans made use of whatever opportunities there were to steal Herakles' attributes; thereafter these subhuman thieves appear to have been replaced by a group of Erotes or a single Eros.

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Notes
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Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1989

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References

1 See LIMC iii A. Hermary, H. Cassimatis and R. Volikomer ‘Eros’ 916, no. 781, 928, nos. 950–4 and N. Blanc and F. Gury ‘Eros/ Amor, Cupido’ 1022, nos. 576–7.

2 The most striking of these was the shield emblem devised by Alkibiades for his own use, Plut. Alk. 16.1, cf. LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 928, no. 944, in the last quarter of the fifth century BC. Some half a century earlier Eros was portrayed on a red-figure Attic lekythos (ARV2 676.14, LIMC iii, ‘Eros’ 928, no. 948) carrying the kerykeion of Hermes, but such an image seems almost a natural extension of the qualities of Eros when compared with the thought-provoking contradictions stimulated by Alkibiades' ‘Eros with a thunderbolt’.

3 For what might be the earliest examples, see A. Hermary, LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 928, nos. 950–1. Hermary believes that the Eros on an Attic plastic vase (Louvre CA 627, his no. 950) of the third quarter of the fourth century BC is holding the attributes of Herakles and that the ring in the National Museum, Naples, no. 25090 (his no. 951), that may well show Eros with a club, was made in the late fourth century BC. Others disagree. For instance, M. Trumpf-Lyritzaki (Griechische Figurenvasen [Bonn 1969] 27, no. 71, and 130 and 160, note 186) maintains that Eros on the plastic vase in the Louvre is seated on a panther-skin (not a lion-skin) and has a garland, not a club and Siviero, R., (Jewellery and Amber of Italy [New York 1959] no. 102Google Scholar) dates the ring in Naples to the third or second century BC.

4 Our most complete extant literary source is Nonnus, Narr. ad Gregor. (see Mythographi Graeci, ed. A. Westermann, Appendix Narralionum 375, no. 39) and see Adler ‘Kerkopen’ RE xi.i 309–13.

5 See Harpokration, s.v. ‘Kerkops’.

6 It was only then that the Kerkopes understood their mother's warning that they should beware of ‘black bottom’, Souda, s.v. ‘Melampygou tuxois’ and Nonnus, op. cit. supra, n. 4.

7 Normally artists preferred to show the climax of the story and depict Herakles carrying a pole over his shoulder with the two Kerkopes suspended upside down, one at each end. A possible exception is the pelike in Berlin, F 2359, ARV 2 1134.12, which, according to the interpretation of Panofka, T. (Poseidon Basileus und Athena Sthenias, 17 Winckelmannsfest [Berlin 1857] 45Google Scholar, pl. I, 1 and 2), shows Herakles pursuing one Kerkops, who carries off his club, while the other Kerkops is depicted on the other side of the vase.

8 For a discussion of illustrations of this story, see Brommer, F.Herakles und Theseus auf Vasen in MalibuGreek Vases in the J. Paul Getty Museum ii (1985) 203–4Google Scholar, Brommer, F.Herakles II—Die unkanonische Taten (Darmstadt 1984) 2832Google Scholar, Pincelli, R.EAA ii, 1959, 508–9Google Scholar, s.v. ‘Cercopi’ and Zancani-Montuoro, P. and Zanotti-Bianco, U.Heraion alia Foce del Sele Il–Il Primo Thesauro (Rome 1954) 185–95Google Scholar, and Woodford, S.KerkopsLIMC viGoogle Scholar (forthcoming).

9 For a list of monuments, see Brommer, F.Vasenlisten zur griechischen Heldensage3 (Marburg 1973) 98–9Google Scholar and Brommer, F.Denkmälerlisten zur griechischen Heldensage I: Herakles (Marburg 1971) 97–8Google Scholar, and supra, n. 8.

10 Beazley, J. D.Herakles derubatoApollo (Bolletino dei Musei Provinciali del Salemitano) iii–iv (19631964) 314Google Scholar suggests that a satyr-play involving the theft of Herakles' arms may have been among the earliest satyr-plays by Pratinas as it seems to be reflected on a krater from Padula painted between 510 and 500 BC.

11 See Simon, E. ‘Satyr-plays on vases in the time of Aeschylus’ in The Eye of Greece ed. Kurtz, D. and Sparkes, B. (Cambridge 1982) 136–7Google Scholar and Karouzou, S., BCH lx (1936) 152–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

12 See Simon (n. 11)

13 See the red-figure pelike, Munich 2360 by the Kadmos Painter, ARV 2 1186.30.

14 See, for instance, Brommer, F.Satyrspiele (Berlin 1944) 30Google Scholar and fig. 27 (on p. 32). In some instances it is not easy to decide whether a satyr is simply parodying Herakles or whether he is making use of the hero's weapons, which he has stolen, for his own purposes, e.g. the satyr using a club in his attack on a tree which bears oinochoai and is guarded by a snake, London, British Museum E 539, ARV 2 776.2.

15 McPhee, I., Antike Kunst xxii (1979) 3842Google Scholar. McPhee (41–2) notes the unusualness of this vase with its emphasis on food and drink and its suggestion of the drunkenness of Herakles' sleep, as well as its unique substitution of Paniskoi for the conventional satyr thieves. He suggests that the vase is more likely to reflect a local Apulian dramatic production than the whim of a painter who has slightly modified an old pictorial tradition taken over from Attic vase painting. An older Pan carrying off Herakles' club, while the hero is seated near-by drinking, is shown on a Campana relief from the time of Nero in a private collection in Basel, illustrated in Schefold, K. and Jung, F.Die Urkönige/ Perseus/ Bellerophon/ Herakles und Theseus in der klassischen und hellenistischen Kunst (Munich 1988) p. 183Google Scholar, fig. 221.

16 On a skyphos in Zürich (Schefold and Jung [n. 15] p. 205. fig. 251) a woman, presumably Xenodike, the daughter of Syleus, is shown running off carrying Herakles' club and lionskin while the hero himself is engaged in uprooting Syleus' vines. The scene is probably derived from a satyr-play on the theme of Syleus and is unusual among extant works of art and references in showing a human figure in possession of Herakles' equipment. Less unusually, pygmies were shown in a later painting taking advantage of Herakles asleep—Gulliver-fashion—according to Philostratos the Elder Imagines ii 22. Dr Dyfri Williams has suggested to me that such an image might have been inspired by depictions of Odysseus and his men blinding Polyphemus in which small assailants are shown similarly attacking a sleeping giant. Such images may also lie behind the portrayals of Herakles reclining while Erotes despoil him of his arms, discussed infra.

17 The earliest such image listed in LIMC iii ‘Eros’ is Eros with Hermes' kerykeion on an Attic red-figure lekythos in Leningrad (928, no. 948).

18 Plut. Alk. 16.1 and Athen. xii 534 e, see LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 928, no. 944 and 936 and P. H.von Blanckenhagen Essays in Memory of Karl Lehmann (Locust Valley, New York 1964) 38–42.

19 As reflected in two poems in the Greek Anthology (xvi 214 and 215) which describe statues of Erotes carrying the attributes of various gods including (among others) the thunderbolt of Zeus, the shield and helmet of Ares and the club of Herakles.

20 LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 928–9, nos. 944–63 and ‘Eros/Amor, Cupido’ 1020–4, nos. 564–88 and 1028, nos. 613–18 gives a good general survey of assimilations of the image of Eros with other gods and of Eros (or Erotes) with the attributes of other gods. In some cases these images may carry profound significance, but as time goes on and they appear on humble lamps and such like, the motifs seem to have been degraded to little more than decorative themes.

21 Greek Anthology xvi 103 and 104.

22 Lysippos was known to have made a bronze Eros for Thespiae (Paus. ix 27.3), but there is no hint that this Eros was shown in possession of the attributes of Herakles. Eros stringing his bow, a statue that exists in several Roman copies, is generally thought to be a reflection of this Lysippean Eros, see Pollitt, J. J.Art in the Hellenistic Age (Cambridge 1986) 48Google Scholar and fig. 40 and LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 880, no. 352, pl. 627, figs 352a and b. Although some of these Roman copies, e.g. Venice, Mus. Arch. 121 (LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 880, no. 352 b) and British Museum 1673 include a lionskin lying over the tree stump beside Eros, this is obviously an addition made by the copyist, as neither the tree stump nor its covering would have been part of the original bronze composition. Apparently once the image of Eros with the attributes of Herakles had become common, a few—but not all—copyists felt that the inclusion of the lionskin would be an enhancement of the Lysippean image.

23 See LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 928, chapter xiiAc.

24 Louvre CA 627, se M. Trumpf-Lyritzaki (n. 3) pl. 11, FV 71.

25 According to LIMC iii ‘Eros’, no. 950 Eros is seated on a lionskin holding a club in the pose of Lysippos' Herakles Epitrapezios, while Trumpf-Lyritzaki (as n. 3) 27,130 and 160, note 186 is emphatic that the animal skin is not the lion-skin of Herakles and the nobbly object to the right is not a club but a garland.

26 See LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 937–8 and pl. 126, fig. 1255.

27 See E. Speier EAA iii, 429–30, s.v. ‘Eros’. For instance, the attentive Erotes hovering around Aphrodite in Macron's cup illustrating the Judgement of Paris (Berlin, F 2291, ARV 2 459, 4) in the early fifth century BC and in the early fourth century BC, the baby Erotes emerging from a chest shown on an Apulian squat lekythos (Taranto, Museo Nazionale Archeologico 4530), see Arias, , Hirmer, and Shefton, A history of Greek vase painting (London 1962) 389–90Google Scholar and pl. 238.

28 Described by Lucian, Herodotus and Aetion 4–6 LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 906, no. 641.

29 Translated by H. W. and F. G. Fowler. I wonder if images of Erotes with the shield and helmet of Ares (according to Greek Anthology xvi 214 and 215) are not derived from images of Erotes playing with the armour of Alexander.

30 Naples, Mus. Naz. 9000, Bastet, F. L.BABesch xliv (1969) 146Google Scholar, fig. 3; Naples, Mus. Naz. Sala 54, Scharmer, H.Der Gelagerte Herakles (Berlin 1971)Google Scholar no. 14, fig. 8; and Pompeii, Casa del Sirico vii 1, LIMC iii ‘Eros/Amor, Cupido’ 1028, no. 616, pl. 720.

31 Apollodorus Bibl. ii 6.3; Diodorus Siculus iv, 31.6 and Hyginus Fab. 32 among others, and see Ovid Heroides 9.55 ff. for reversal with respect to transvestitism.

32 Greifenhagen, A., ‘Zwei motive Pompejanischer Wandgemälde auf Goldglas und TonlampenMJBK xvi (1965) 52Google Scholar.

33 Pompeii, Casa del Sirico, (cf. n. 30).

34 Bowdoin College 1906.2, Herbert, K.Ancient art in Bowdoin College (Cambridge, Mass. 1964)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, no. 75, pl. 7, dated third to first century BC.

35 He is shown asleep on a glass intaglio, Berlin Staatl. Mus. FG 4210, Furtwängler Beschreibung pl. 31,4210 and on a marble table leg, Thessaloniki Mus. 4363, Th. Stefanidou-Tiveriou Trapezophora tou Mouseiou Thess. (Thessaloniki 1985) 42–5, no. 4. (I am grateful to Dr Olga Palagia and Dr Korinna Pilafidis-Williams for this reference.)

36 For instance, plaster relief, Hildesheim, Pel.-Mus 1125, C. Reinsberg Studien zur Hellenistischen Toreutik (Hildesheim 1980) fig. 104; bronze relief disk, London, British Museum BM 857, Scharmer (as n. 30), no. 17, fig. 10, LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 926, no. 914, pl. 660; Pompeian wall painting, Loewy, E.RömMitt xii (1897) 144, fig. 1Google Scholar; clay relief medallion, Nîmes, Mus. de la Maison Carrée, LIMC iii ‘Eros/Amor, Cupido’ 1029, no. 620 (with drawing); marble sarcophagus relief, Rome, Villa Doria Pamphili, Calza, R. et al. Antichità di Villa Doria Pamphili (Rome 1977)Google Scholar no. 183, pl. 115, LIMC iii ‘Eros/Amor, Cupilo’ 1028–9, no. 619, pl. 720; glass intaglio, Berlin Staatl. Mus. FG 1327, Furtwängler Beschreibung pl. 15, 1327 (and see also Berlin FG 1326, 4208 and 4209).

37 The idea of contrasting the size of the huge hero and the small Erotes by means of showing the Erotes struggling with Herakles' club may have been stimulated, in part, by Timanthes' painting in which the great size of the Cyclops is indicated by satyrs measuring his thumb with a thyrsus (Pliny NH xxxv 74) though the disparity in size here is not so great and Aetion's painting may have served as prototype enough.

38 Vatican, Braccio Nuovo (Amelung Kat. I, no. 109) P. P. Bober and R. O. Rubinstein Renaissance artists and antique sculpture (London 1986) fig. 67. Robertson, M.A history of Greek art ii (Cambridge 1975)Google Scholar fig 176c suggests that the statue in the Vatican is a copy after a bronze original of the second century BC. The uncertainty of dating in the Hellenistic period makes it possible, however, that the image of the Nile was earlier and may have contributed to the creation of this type of Herakles with Erotes.

39 See LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 916, no. 781 and 928 nos. 95 1–4 and ‘Eros/Amor, Cupido’ 1028, nos 613–15 and 617–18 and pl. 720, 618.

40 See LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 916, no. 781.

41 See LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 928, no. 953; ‘Eros/Amor, Cupido’ 1022, nos. 576–7.

42 See H. R. Goette, AA (1986) 722–4.1 am grateful to Dr Hélène Cassimatis for this reference.

43 As Apollo learned to his cost, Ovid, Met. i 456 ff.

page 204 note 1 For instance: Eros with Herakles in the garden of the Hesperides—Pelike, Yale University (Stoddard coll) 138 (Baur Cat. Stoddard 93, pi. IX; Metzger, Représentations 203, no. 20); Hydria, British Museum E 227 (CVA [Great Britain 8] pi. 93, Metzger Représentations 202, no. 19, pi. XXVII/I); Calyx krater, Paris, Petit Palais 327 (CVA [France 15] pi. 14, 1—4, 6, Metzger Représentations 204, no. 23, pi. XXVII, 3); Eros with Herakles and Hebe—Hydria, British Museum E 244 (CVA [Great Britain 8] pi. 98, 5) Metzger Représentations 49, no. 26, 216, no. 54); Volute krater, Berlin, Staatl. Mus (Antike Kunst xii [1969] 63 and pi. 34, 1); and Eros with Herakles feasting—Bell krater, Musée d'Angers (Metzger Représentations 216, no. 55, pi. XVI, 3); Calyx krater, Athens, Nat. Mus 14627 (ARV2 1451.4) and see LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 926, no. 913.

page 204 note 2 Getty Mus. 79 AE 119.

page 204 note 3 For instance, Kephisodotos' Eirene with the infant Ploutos or Praxiteles' Hermes with the infant Dionysus.

page 204 note 4 For instance, Iris carrying the infant Hermes on a hydria, Munich 2426 (ARV2 189.76) or Hermes carrying the infant Dionysus on a calyx krater, Vatican 16586 (ARV2 1017.54).

page 204 note 5 Glass intaglio, Oxford, Ashmolean Mus. FR 78 (Boardman/Vollenweider Oxford gems i [1978] 112, pi. 64, 382).

page 204 note 6 Glass intaglio. Hanover, Kestner Mus. (AGD iv, pi. 47, 309).

page 204 note 7 M. L. Vollenweider Die Steinschneidekunst und ihre Kunstler in Spätrepublikanischer und Augusteischer Zeit (Baden Baden 1966) 102,

page 204 note 8 A. Furtwängler ML (Roscher) ‘Herakles’ 2249. See glass intaglio, Berlin, Staatl. Mus. FG 4206/7 (Furtwängler Beschreibung pi. 31, 4207), glass intaglio, Berlin, Staatl. Mus. FG 1325 (Furtwängler Beschreibung pi. 15, 1325), Cornelian intaglio, Vienna, Kunsthist. Mus. IX B 656 (AGOe i, pi. 46, 268); Chalcedony intaglio, Florence, Mus. Arch. (Milani Guida [1912] pi. 135.8).

page 204 note 9 Glass intaglio, Hanover, Kestner Mus. (AGD iv, pi. 47, 309).

page 204 note 10 Chalcedony intaglio, Florence, Mus. Arch. (Milani Guida [1912] pi. 135.8).

page 204 note 11 For instance, glass intaglio, Berlin, Staatl. Mus. FG 1325 (Furtwängler Beschreibung pi. 15, 1325) and Cornelian intaglio, Vienna, Kunsthist. Mus. IX B 656 (AGOe i, pi. 46, 268).

page 204 note 12 Two glass intaglios appear to show Herakles and Eros standing on opposite sides of an altar (Hanover, Kestner Mus. AGD iv, pi. 121, 927 and Vienna, Kunsthist. Mus. XI B 324, AGOe i, pi. 15, 656). A sardonyx cameo in Leningrad, Herm. Mus. 294 (O. Neverov Antique Cameos [1971] no. 27) shows Eros pouring bath water over a crouching Herakles in the presence of a woman (Omphale?). A jasper intaglio, Munich, Münzslg A 2002 (AGD iii, pi. 254, 2716) shows Herakles seated on a rock holding his club in front of him with three Erotes, one flying towards his shoulder, one mid-air in front of him, one holding his club, possibly trying to pull it away. An intaglio, Berlin, Staatl. Mus. FG 7568, shows Herakles seated with club and lion-skin, with a skyphos in one hand. Eros reaches a wreath to him. A glass intaglio fragment (Munich, Münzslg. AGD i, 3 pi. 302, 3109) shows Herakles opposite Eros, who is looking into a krater. A coin of Herakleia (Rec. Gen.) 78) shows Herakles seated, holding out a hand to Eros, down on one knee, holding Herakles' club while another Eros is shown in a tree (for other coins, see LIMC iii ‘Eros’ 926, nos. 915-19). A bone relief in Alexandria (Greco-Rom. Mus. GR 23891) shows Herakles standing with his club under his arm and Eros on his shoulder. C. Praschniker Parthenonstudien (Augsburg 1928) 215 f. suggested that Eros on East Metope 11 of the Parthenon is accompanying Herakles in his fight against the giants and in this opinion he is followed by many (but by no means all) scholars. For a summary of views, see E. Berger Der Parthenon in Basel: Dokumentation zu den Metopen (Mainz 1986) 57 and 66-8.

page 204 note 13 Many colleagues have kindly given me suggestions and helpful criticism on this note and I would like to thank Donald Bailey, Lucilla Burn, Catherine Hobey-Hamsher, Olga Palagia and Dyfri Williams. Some have disagreed with my conclusions and none are responsible for my mistakes, but all have been extremely generous.