TFTFBT: Bella Rophan at the Palmer House
I recently had the pleasure of staying in Chicago’s
Palmer House hotel. To quote the plaque
on the statue named Bella Rophan; “The focal
point of our lobby elevator foyer is the dramatic bronze sculpture created in
France in the mid 19th century.”
The artist was Emile Herbert 1828-1893.
“The piece depicts a mythical
Greek Warrior on a bridle-free stallion. The fact that the horse is not
tethered has been interrupted that the creature is the spirit of the wind and
that the warrior simply along for the
ride having no control over the winged steed.“ Which is odd because in Pindar, Olympian Ode 13 the poet states
that “Till Pallas
[Athena], goddess maid, brought him (Bellerophon) the bridle and golden
headband.” I was reminded of the
Helmet of Invisibility lent to Perseus, another flying hero.
The plaque continues with “ A curiosity of the work is the python around the warrior’s head, arms
and hand. The inclusion of the serpent is puzzling and no explanation has been
determined.”
Looking at the statue
from the back side I noticed that the body of the “python” as it trailed down
the warrior’s back, grew stouter, wider and shaggier. I think most classicists would recognize this
as the
“Chimera, who snorted raging fire,
a beast great and terrible, and strong and swift-footed. Her heads were three:
one was that of a glare-eyed lion, one of a goat, and the third of a snake,”
(Hesiod, Theogony 319)
Apparently Bellerophon didn’t want to take the whole beast back as
proof of the kill and chose to return to King Iobates of Lycia
with the smallest of the three heads.
I thought the sculpture’s choice of weapons was
interesting . Legend holds that the
Chimera was slain with a lead-tipped lance shoved into the fire-breathing head
or shot to death from above by Bellerophon astride the flying Pegasus with his
bow and arrows. Instead the artist placed into the warriors
hand and object to heavy and un-winged to be an arrow. Maybe the business end of a broken ashen
shafted, bronze tipped spear. At first
glance I was reminded of the double lotus blossom shape of Zeus’ lightning
bolt, but that doesn’t really work either.
Bellerophon is a mystery to me. He is riding - so atypical for Greek myth. I don't remember anybody else doing it, except Hephaestus with his donkey used as a wheelchair. And the myth plot includes a letter.
ReplyDeleteMaya,
ReplyDeleteThe letter Bellerophon carried sad, "Kill the messenger" however Iobates had already establish ed a host/guest relation ship with him. As to the atypicality of Bellaphron; play thst on the Greek revival of the British Empire period. Bellerophon was confounded with St. George. Queen victoria isdued medallion in the name of the British national saint that looked just as naked and sensousal as the statute here. Of corse the saint wore Brittania's helmet (that is Athena's) rather than Hades. I think I have a picture f the medallion. Bi will add the image when I return home
I found two interesting comments on Bellerophon's letter (actually, tablet).
ReplyDeleteR. Bellamy, Bellerophons's Tablet:
"The whole Bellerophon's episode was... unmistakenly Oriental: it not only described Greek correspondence with Asia, but reflected it in a crowd of oriental literary motifs: chiefly in Biblical correspondencies (Potifar's wife, David's letter about Uriah) and in Bellerophon's combat with the monstrous Chimaera... - royal duty as old as Gilgamesh."
(I think, however, that our view may be distorted by the fact that all extant literary sources demonstrably older than the Iliad are Oriental.)
P.A. Rosenmeyer, Ancient Epistolary Fictions: The Letter in Greek Literature
"It is not just the primacy of the Homeric passage, the fact that it is the first appearance of a letter in Greek literature, that gives it such importance... The Bellerophon story in the Iliad... establishes a connection between letter writing and treatury that recurs throughout ancient Greek literature. In Euripides' Palamedes, for example, Odysseus forges a letter from Priam to Palamedes that results in the hero's death... Bellerophon carries a letter... but is not told the contents of his burden. The sealed and unread text will haunt letter carriers in centuries to come; some will have the courage to break open the document and avoid the death planned for them at the hands of the receiver, whereas others, all too obedient, will be killed as soon as they deliver the letter."
In my story, a secret letter saves mankind at one point.
Read "...letter writing and treachery", of course.
DeleteOf course the irony of letters as plot devices during the Heroic age, is that few bronze age people can read or write
ReplyDeleteThinking more about it, Bellerophon's tablet seems to me almost as anachronistic as if we depict Columbus using a phone. I even start to doubt the authenticity of the entire Diomedes-Glaucus episode. Though maybe I needn't. Homer makes his heroes use iron, extrapolating this metal back to the Bronze Age. Maybe he does the same with the letters. (I don't think anyone in Homer's time would still remember that the Bronze Age Greeks had Linear B.)
ReplyDeleteI think also of Cadmus, anachronistically credited with bringing the alphabet from Phoenicia. The difference is that this is just a late and disposable ornament added to the Cadmus story, while the tablet is an integral part of Bellerophon's myth and its removal would require a thorough revision of the plot.
My gods use Linear B, but it is beyond the abilities of many of them (e.g. Thetis).
I am now reading M. L. West's "Greek Epic Fragments" (I found it somewhere in the Web for free, in PDF format). It points out another peculiarity of the same episode:
ReplyDelete"The story of Dionysus and Lycurgus... is dragged oddly into the Iliad in the episode where Glaucus relates to Diomedes the history of Sisyphus of Ephyra and his descendants (6.130 - 140, 152 - 211). Nowhere else in the Iliad or the Odyssey does Dionysus have such prominence."
Maya,
ReplyDeleteYou are brillant! At Hour 25 this morning we discussed the unexpected power and influence of Thetis. I pointed that in Sparta per Alcman Thetis is a primordial goddess. Your comment suggests that Homer consciously inserted the syory to emphasis Thetis' role. Brillant
Thank you!
ReplyDeleteWas the discussion oral? I "spy" on the Hour 25 forum, but haven't seen it there.
Did you know that Thetis buried Ajax the Lesser? I learned it only yesterday, though I've actively searched for all events related to her.
"[E.6.6] And Athena threw a thunderbolt at the ship of Ajax; and when the ship went to pieces he made his way safe to a rock, and declared that he was saved in spite of the intention of Athena. But Poseidon smote the rock with his trident and split it, and Ajax fell into the sea and perished; and his body, being washed up, was buried by Thetis in Myconos.146"
(Apollodorus, http://www.theoi.com/Text/ApollodorusE.html#5)
Note 146 says:
"...According to the Scholiast on Hom. Il. xiii.66 Ajax was cast up on the shore of Delos, where Thetis found and buried him. But as it was unlawful to be buried or even to die in Delos (Thuc. 3.104), the statement of Apollodorus that Ajax was buried in Myconus, a small island to the east of Delos, is more probable..."
(http://www.theoi.com/Text/ApEb.html#146)
I wonder, why did Thetis bury Ajax? Was this a humanitarian or a political act? My guess: the latter. Ajax, as far as I know, had not been a close friend of Achilles. However, the gods who killed him were Thetis' old opponents. And I think the scholiast knew well what he was writing. If Apollo, the killer of Achilles, was strongly against burials on Delos, Thetis could decide to do just that. She was not bound by bans imposed on mortals.
Maya M.
ReplyDeleteSarah and I are taking a Homeric Vocabulary class. The significance of Thetis came up in class when we were translating Zeus' stuttering request that she get Achilles torelease Hector's body.
As to Ajax the Lesser being buried by Thetis, that's amazing! I thoght at first maybe Ajax and Achilles were cousins, but that was tge other Ajax. I don't know what to think.
I am not sure about Zeus' request to Thetis.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, here he deviates from his habitual bully language. However, I think this may be a sign of strength, rather than weakness. Some say that his earlier threats reveal insecurity. Here, he has a rock-solid cause - for first and only time in the narrative. Maybe Thetis deep down know it and therefore obeys immediately, though she did not and would not stop Achilles unprompted. Maybe Zeus has waited for days in hope that she would do this, or Achilles would stop on his own.
Incidentally, the initiative for Hector's burial comes from Apollo. Thetis is not present, but is likely to learn about it later. So, maybe her burial of Ajax is a message to Apollo, "You are all for burying dead bodies, aren't you? Here is one for you!"
It seems that Thetis does not value humans outside her bloodline and cannot understand them. She could bring up Hephaestus but not Achilles, because upbringing means bringing the child up to the world, and Achilles' world is human. Unable to give her son guidelines, she resorts to giving him whatever he wants.
ReplyDeleteI see now that Thetis is much like Heracles. Both are victims of divine plots, but the true cause of their tragedies is having more power than they can control. Not surprisingly, both ruin their marriages and kill some of their children.
ReplyDeleteMaya M.
ReplyDeleteAdmittedly, Thetis ditched Peleus. He was a second-rate hero who lost a wrestling match to a girl and suspiciously accidently killed too manyrelatives. As to ditching Achilles, who wants to get emotionally attached to somerhing that is going to die so soon.
Also, along the lines of my growing belief that the Iliad was actually the Homeric Hymn to Thetis: Emily Schurr suggests that the "thea" invokes in the opening line is not the Muse Calliope, Thetis herself
Bill
I think Schurr may very well be right. It is remarkable how Thetis, despite her absolute cluelessness about all things human, makes Achilles regain his humanity at the end. And Homer stops here, at the sublime point, before Achilles continues his business.
ReplyDeleteIn the "Greek Epic Fragments", West argues that Homer invented the entire episode with the body of Hector and revised the plot of the myth accordingly. In the original version, Achilles was killed immediately after killing Hector (as Thetis predicts in the Iliad 18:95-96). Homer let him survive that day. This forced posthomeric poets to introduce Memnon as a substitute to Hector.
In my translation, the opening line is an address to the Muse. Had I not read English comments on it (notably Schurr's), I would not know about the "thea". This means being at the mercy of translators!
Talking about Peleus' criminal record, did you mention that Telamon & Peleus murder their half-brother, and later Telamon loses his favorite son, Peleus his only one (or all 7, if you prefer)? I wonder, chance or "divine justice".
I have just found the source for the quote about Peleus. It is "The Origin of the Gods" by R. S. Caldwell:
ReplyDelete"...Clearly Zeus forced Thetis to marry a mortal not so much because he was angry for being scorned but because he was afraid of the son greater than his father; why else would he choose as Thetis' husband Peleus, a second-rate hero with the dubious distinction of having been defeated in wrestling by a woman, Atalanta?"
Maya M.
ReplyDeleteGod bless you for the Peleus-Atalanta quote. I couldn't find the source for that.
Where Homer chose to stop and start his tale has all to do with the subtitle of the Iliaid; The Wrath of Achilles. The story starts when Achilles get angry and ends in a shower of tears with Priam, when he is no longer angry. The rest of the Epic Cycle is for other Epics to tell.
Plenty of English translators assumed the goddess that Homer addressed was "Calliope". We know what happens when we ass-u-me.
Here's a question. The Theogony grants a lot of honor and power to Hecate. The theory is that Hecate was big in Asia Minor where the poets family was from. With all we've said about Thetis, should we be looking for a Homer-Thetis connection?
Interesting question about Homer and Thetis. Some suppose that Homer was a Ionian. I've read that the Phaecians resemble the Ionians. Herodotus writes how the Ionian Greeks told the Persians about Thetis and instructed them to sacrifice to her.
DeleteHowever, I would vote for Thessaly. The Iliad is centered on Achilles who is from there. The name Homer is said to be Aeolic, and Aeolic was spoken not only in parts of Ionia but also in Thessaly. And Thessaly had a cult of Thetis:
"Thetis and Cheiron in Thessaly"
http://kernos.revues.org/1769
The wrath of Achilles... How do you think, what would have happened without this wrath? We conventionally ass-ume that the request of Thetis, which Zeus accepted with apparent (or well-acted?) reluctance, jeopardized his plan and forced him to devise new wise stratagems ad hoc. However, in the opening lines, the poet clearly says that the plan of Zeus was fulfilled exactly through this wrath. And we know the situation before the wrath: the Greeks occupying themselves by, as you said, ritual warfare, not too eager to kill Trojans and storm the fortress. They seemed quite happy to capture Trojans alive and to take ransom for them, to loot the countryside and to make sex with captive women (by the time of the wrath of Achilles, I guess the Achaeans had to set an elementary school for the offspring born of such "unions").
DeleteAgamemnon later claims to have been deceived by Ate, who had deceived even Zeus. I wonder, however, was this Ate, or Zeus himself, who had direct control over the (sub)consciousness of Agamemnon and proved this by sending him a dream?
To be fair to both Peleus and Thetis, their marriage hardly had a chance.
ReplyDelete"...We are told the story of how Peleus had become alarmed and had called out when he saw his wife putting the baby Achilles in the fire; at this Thetis threw the baby down and leaped into the sea, never to return. This version has parallels in many folk tales about humans marrying mermaids: after spending a very short while with her husband, the mermaid is offended by something he does, or by a taboo he breaks, and she leaves for her home in the sea, never to be seen with him again."
Footnote: "See motifs B 81.2 (mermaid marries man) and B 81.2.1 (mermaid has son by human father) in Thompson (1955: vol 1, p 370f), with motif T 111.0.1 (marriage to supernatural wives who disappear, Thompson, 1955: vol 5, p 352)."
Quotes from P.J. Heslin, The Transvestite Achilles: Gender and Genre in Statius' Achilleid
Maya M,
ReplyDeleteI look forward to reading "Thetis and Cheiron in Thessaly". If we are going to assume that Homer is Thessalian because of Thetis cult and his Aeolic name. There is a problem. he never actually mentions Thessaly in the Iliad and all those people the Achaeans attack while waiting for Troy to fall are Aeolic. Which leads me to one ludicrous explanation if we which to continue with the Thetis/Homer connection. My logic starts with "No man is a profit in his own home town." So presumably he wasn't successful in Thessaly and migrated to Ionia where his fame developed as did his Ionic vocabulary. Still bitter about his rejection by his own people, he erased Thessaly from history and took revenge on all the Aeolic speakers by dooming their cities. Crazy and un proveable I know, but it is the only way I can see to explain his connection to Thetis. ugh!
The name "Thessaly" is late - after the Mycenaean demise. I don't know about Homer's time, but even if Homer knew it, he could know also of its modernity and decide to avoid it as an anachronism. In Mycenaean times Thessaly was called Aeolia. As far as I see, Aeolia is not used by Homer, either. I think he calls this land "Hellas".
Delete"Those again who held Pelasgic Argos, Alos, Alope, and Trachis; and those of Phthia and Hellas the land of fair women, who were called Myrmidons, Hellenes, and Achaeans; these had fifty ships, over which Achilles was in command." (Iliad 2).
"In its earliest occurrences the name Hellas refers to two northern provinces, Thessalian Phthiotis and (according to Aristotle) the region around Dodona in Epirus; and that it was later extended first to the whole of Thessaly, then to everything north of the Isthmus at Corinth, and finally to the Peloponnese and the islands, till at last the name Hellenes applied to all nonbarbarians."
(J. Burckhardt, The Greeks and Greek Civilization, http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/b/burckhardt-greeks.html)
I like your hypothesis about Homer not being a prophet in his homeland. Reminds me of Aeschylus who (as Aristophanes tells us) did not like the Athenians.
Homer vents his menis by writing about the menis of Achilles?
DeleteMaya M,
ReplyDeleteAeschylus was disliked because of blasphemy. Legend has it that Euripides, who was fond of writing about Theban princes being torn apart & eaten, was torn apart and eaten by a pack of dogs. Of course, my favorite (Sophocles) lived to a ripe old age loaded with temporal and heroic honors.
Okay so this weekend I am going to type up all our comments here into a ludicrous paper;" Homer was Thessalonian" (Aeolian)
I am looking forward to it!
ReplyDelete"On Homer’s Birthplace
Antipater of Sidon (fl. c. 100 B.C.)
Translated by J. H. Merivale
From Colophon some deem thee sprung,
From Smyrna some, and some from Chios;
These noble Salamis have sung,
While those proclaim thee born in Ios;
And others cry up Thessaly
The mother of the Lapithæ."
(Emphasis mine.)