tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca/topics/classical-mythology-28062/articlesClassical mythology – The Conversation2018-02-22T19:12:08Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/878592018-02-22T19:12:08Z2018-02-22T19:12:08ZFriday essay: the erotic art of Ancient Greece and Rome<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205459/original/file-20180208-180808-1btn8tj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A fragment of a wall painting showing two lovers in bed from the House of L Caecilius Jucundus in Pompeii, now at Naples National Archaeological Museum</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>In our sexual histories series, authors explore changing sexual mores from antiquity to today.</em></p>
<p>Rarely does L.P. Hartley’s dictum that “the past is a foreign country” hold more firmly than in the area of sexuality in classical art. Erotic images and depictions of genitalia, the phallus in particular, were incredibly popular motifs across a wide range of media in ancient Greece and Rome. </p>
<p>Simply put, sex is everywhere in Greek and Roman art. Explicit sexual representations were common on Athenian black-figure and red-figure vases of the sixth and fifth centuries BC. They are often eye-openingly confronting in nature.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196595/original/file-20171128-2046-16fj3r9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bronze tintinnabula in the shape of flying phalluses, Pompeii, first century AD.
Gabinetto Segreto del Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Romans too were surrounded by sex. The phallus, sculpted in bronze as <em>tintinnabula</em> (wind chimes), were commonly found in the gardens of the houses of Pompeii, and sculpted in relief on wall panels, such as the famous one from a Roman bakery telling us <em>hic habitat felicitas</em> (“here dwells happiness”). </p>
<p>However these classical images of erotic acts and genitalia reflect more than a sex obsessed culture. The depictions of sexuality and sexual activities in classical art seem to have had a wide variety of uses. And our interpretations of these images - often censorious in modern times - reveal much about our own attitudes to sex. </p>
<h2>Modern responses</h2>
<p>When the collection of antiquities first began in earnest in the 17th and 18th centuries, the openness of ancient eroticism puzzled and troubled Enlightenment audiences. This bewilderment only intensified after excavations began at the rediscovered Roman towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum. </p>
<p>The Gabinetto Segreto (the so-called “<a href="http://www.museoarcheologiconapoli.it/en/room-and-sections-of-the-exhibition/3490-2/">Secret Cabinet</a>”) of the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli best typifies the modern response to classical sexuality in art – repression and suppression.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://cir.campania.beniculturali.it/museoarcheologiconazionale/Musei/marcheo/thematic-paths/in-museum/P_RA12">secret cabinet</a> was founded in 1819, when Francis I, King of Naples, visited the museum with his wife and young daughter. Shocked by the explicit imagery, he ordered all items of a sexual nature be removed from view and locked in the cabinet. Access would be restricted to scholars, of “mature age and respected morals”. That was, male scholars only. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=678&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=678&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=678&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=852&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=852&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196596/original/file-20171128-2021-15g95xs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=852&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Erotic terracotta sculptures in a showcase in the Gabinetto Segreto at the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli. Found in a Samnite sanctuary in the old town of Cales (Calvi Risorta).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In Pompeii itself, where explicit material such as the wallpaintings of the brothel was retained <em>in situ</em>, metal shutters were installed. These shutters restricted access to only male tourists willing to pay additional fees, until as recently as the 1960s. </p>
<p>Of course, the secrecy of the collection in the cabinet only increased its fame, even if access was at times difficult. <a href="https://archive.org/details/ahandbookfortra41firgoog">John Murray</a>’s Handbook to South Italy and Naples (1853) sanctimoniously states that permission was exceedingly difficult to obtain: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Very few therefore have seen the collection; and those who have, are said to have no desire to repeat their visit.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The cabinet was not opened to the general public until 2000 (despite protests by the Catholic Church). Since 2005, the collection has been displayed in a separate room; the objects have still not been reunited with contemporary non-sexual artefacts as they were in antiquity. </p>
<p><a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=3jLjZvb9fxQC&pg=PA175&dq=Philip+Lawton+for+the+gentleman+and+scholar&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjd-MjruuDXAhXMjJQKHawICxQQ6AEIJjAA#v=onepage&q=Philip%20Lawton%20for%20the%20gentleman%20and%20scholar&f=false">Literature also felt the wrath of the censors</a>, with works such as Aristophanes’ plays mistranslated to obscure their “offensive” sexual and scatalogical references. Lest we try to claim any moral and liberal superiority in the 21st century, the infamous marble sculptural depiction of Pan copulating with a goat from the collection <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/entry/pan-having-sex-with-goat-_n_2866615">still shocks modern audiences</a>. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196612/original/file-20171128-2089-sayvis.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Marble statue of Pan copulating with goat, found the Villa of the Papyri, Herculaneum. first century AD.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The censorship of ancient sexuality is perhaps best typified by the long tradition of <a href="http://www.neatorama.com/2011/10/18/the-pathology-of-classical-sculpture/">removing genitals from classical sculpture</a>.</p>
<p>The Vatican Museum in particular (but not exclusively) was famed for altering classical art for the sake of contemporary morals and sensibilities. The application of carved and cast fig leaves to cover the genitalia was common, if incongruous. </p>
<p>It also indicated a modern willingness to associate nudity with sexuality, which would have puzzled an ancient audience, for whom the body’s physical form was in itself regarded as perfection. So have we been misreading ancient sexuality all this time? Well, yes.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196620/original/file-20171128-2077-1tq6550.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Marble statue of Mercury in the Vatican collection. The fig leaf is a later addition.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Ancient porn?</h2>
<p>It is difficult to tell to what extent ancient audiences used explicit erotic imagery for arousal. Certainly, the erotic scenes that were popular on vessels would have given the Athenian parties a titillating atmosphere as wine was consumed. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196624/original/file-20171128-2004-1yb39rg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Athenian red-figure kylix, attributed to Dokimasia Painter, c. 480 BC. British Museum.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">The Trustees of the British Museum</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These types of scenes are especially popular on the <em>kylix</em>, or wine-cup, particularly within the <em>tondo</em> (central panel of the cup). <em><a href="http://penelope.uchicago.edu/%7Egrout/encyclopaedia_romana/greece/hetairai/hetairai.html">Hetairai</a></em> (courtesans) and <em><a href="https://womeninantiquity.wordpress.com/2017/03/18/hetaira/">pornai</a></em> (prostitutes) may well have attended the same symposia, so the scenes may have been used as a stimuli.</p>
<p>Painted erotica was replaced by moulded depictions in the later Greek and Roman eras, but the use must have been similar, and the association of sex with drinking is strong in this series.</p>
<p>The application of sexual scenes to oil lamps by the Romans is perhaps the most likely scenario where the object was actually used within the setting of love-making. Erotica is common on mould-made lamps.</p>
<h2>The phallus and fertility</h2>
<p>Although female nudity was not uncommon (particularly in association with the goddess Aphrodite), phallic symbolism was at the centre of much classical art. </p>
<p>The phallus would often be depicted on Hermes, Pan, Priapus or similar deities across various art forms. Rather than being seen as erotic, its symbolism here was often associated with protection, fertility and even healing. We have already seen the phallus used in a range of domestic and commercial contexts in Pompeii, a clear reflection of its protective properties. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1459&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1459&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1459&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1833&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1833&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196606/original/file-20171128-2004-fd2yho.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1833&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Marble Herm, from Siphnos, Greece. c. 520 BC. National Archaeological Museum, Athens.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A herm was a stone sculpture with a head (usually of Hermes) above a rectangular pillar, upon which male genitals were carved. These blocks were positioned at borders and boundaries for protection, and were so highly valued that in 415 BC when the <em>hermai</em> of Athens were vandalised prior to the departure of the Athenian fleet many believed this would threaten the success of the naval mission.</p>
<p>A famous fresco from the House of the Vetti in Pompeii shows Priapus, a minor deity and guardian of livestock, plants and gardens. He has a massive penis, holds a bag of coins, and has a bowl of fruit at his feet. As researcher <a href="http://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1010&context=uhf_2006">Claudia Moser</a> writes, the image represents three kinds of prosperity: growth (the large member), fertility (the fruit), and affluence (the bag of money).</p>
<p>It is worth noting that even a casual glance at classical sculptures in a museum will reveal that the penis on marble depictions of nude gods and heroes is <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24369184">often quite small</a>. Classical cultural ideals valued a smaller penis over a larger, often to the surprise of modern audiences.</p>
<p>All representations of large penises in classical art are associated with lustfulness and foolishness. Priapus was so despised by the other gods he was thrown off Mt Olympus. Bigger was not better for the Greeks and Romans.</p>
<h2>Myths and sex</h2>
<p>Classical mythology is based upon sex: myths abound with stories of incest, intermarriage, polygamy and adultery, so artistic depictions of mythology were bound to depict these sometimes explicit tales. Zeus’s cavalier attitude towards female consent within these myths (among many examples, he raped Leda in the guise of a swan and Danae while disguised as the rain) reinforced misogynistic ideas of male domination and female subservience.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=619&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=619&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=619&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=777&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=777&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196602/original/file-20171128-2025-ineyrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=777&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A mosaic depicting Leda and the swan, circa third century AD, from the Sanctuary of Aphrodite, Palea Paphos; now in the Cyprus Museum, Nicosia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The phallus was also highlighted in depictions of Dionysiac revelry. Dionysos, the Greek god of wine, theatre and transformation was highly sexualised, as were his followers - the male satyrs and female maenads, and their depiction on wine vessels is not surprising.</p>
<p>Satyrs were half-men, half-goats. Somewhat comic, yet also tragic to a degree, they were inveterate masturbators and party animals with an appetite for dancing, wine and women. Indeed the word <em>satyriasis</em> has survived today, classified in the World Health Organisation’s International Classification of Diseases (ICD) as a form of male hypersexuality, alongside the female form, <em>nymphomania</em>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196604/original/file-20171128-2038-667j4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Detail of an Athenian red-figure psykter (cooler) depicting a satyr balancing a kantharos on his penis, painted by Douris, c. 500-490 BC. British Museum.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The intention of the <em>ithyphallic</em> (erect) satyrs is clear in their appearance on vases (even if they rarely caught the maenads they were chasing); at the same time their massive erect penises are indicative of the “beastliness” and grotesque ugliness of a large penis as opposed to the classical ideal of male beauty represented by a smaller one. </p>
<p>Actors who performed in satyr plays during dramatic festivals took to the stage and orchestra with fake phallus costumes to indicate that they were not humans, but these mythical beasts of Dionysus.</p>
<p>Early collectors of classical art were shocked to discover that the Greeks and Romans they so admired were earthy humans too with a range of sexual needs and desires. But in emphasising the sexual aspects of this art they underplayed the non-sexual role of phallic symbols.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87859/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Craig Barker does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From phallus-shaped wind chimes to explicit erotica on lamps and cups, sex is everywhere in ancient Greek and Roman art. But our interpretations of these images say much about our own culture.Craig Barker, Education Manager, Sydney University Museums, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/617382016-07-21T20:17:54Z2016-07-21T20:17:54ZFriday essay: secrets of the Delphic Oracle and how it speaks to us today<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131329/original/image-20160721-31129-11e95cj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Temple of Apollo at Delphi, where the wisdom of the oracle was dispensed.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Janet Lackey/flickr</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Imagine a place to go in times of doubt and uncertainty, where one can find out what to do and what to avoid, straight from a reliable source. A place where all questions have tangible answers and all problems a solution. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, such a place does not exist today. But did it once? </p>
<p>In the ancient world, oracles such as the one at Delphi famously promised to reveal the past, present and future. They were the apex of a sizeable pyramid of institutions and individuals dealing in futures (of the non-economic kind), which also included itinerant seers and personal oracle collections. </p>
<p>Yet Delphi and its like rarely provided simple answers. Take the famous example of King Croesus of Lydia. Croesus asked at Delphi whether he should wage war against the Persians. He was told that he would destroy a great empire. </p>
<p>Taking the response to predict victory, he launched a military confrontation with Xerxes, Persia’s mighty king. Croesus did end up destroying an empire – his own. </p>
<p>This example is by no means unique. The ancient historian <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-the-histories-by-herodotus-53748">Herodotus</a>, who reports it in The Histories, cites many similar stories of prediction and fulfilment. And the picture does not look much different in many other ancient reports of Delphic prophecies. </p>
<p>More often than not, it seems, those drawing on the gods to know the unknowable did not receive a straightforward answer. Instead, they faced a new question: did they understand the real meaning of the prophecy? </p>
<h2>A voice of authority</h2>
<p>In the ancient world, the Delphic Oracle was the highest religious authority. Nestled on Mount Parnassus in Phocis in central Greece, the oracle was open for business once a month except during winter. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131309/original/image-20160720-31134-171649y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Veduta Of Delphi, With A Sacrificial Procession by Claude Lorrain, (1645).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At the core of the oracle’s operations was a priestess, the Pythia, who delivered the responses directly to the enquirer from the inner sanctum of Apollo’s temple. She was considered a mouthpiece of the omniscient god of prophecy. </p>
<p>On consultation day, people flocked to Delphi to enquire about an eclectic mix of concerns: politics and warfare, of course, but also religion, health, lovesickness and offspring – to name just a few issues. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1212&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1212&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1212&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1523&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1523&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131303/original/image-20160720-31137-j3xg0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1523&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Priestess of Delphi by John Collier, 1891.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Among those consulting the oracle were some of the most (in)famous and illustrious individuals of the ancient world. Socrates’ friend Chaerephon enquired whether anyone was wiser than Socrates. Apparently he was told that no-one was. </p>
<p>Yet what did this really mean – that Socrates was indeed the wisest person in the world or that there was someone equally knowledgeable? Another predictable question is the one Cicero asked: how to become famous.</p>
<p>The neurotic Roman emperor Nero, meanwhile, tried to learn the timing of his own death from the Delphic oracle. He was told to “beware of the 73rd year” and so considered himself safe, but was murdered shortly after by Galba who was – you guessed it – 73 years old. </p>
<p>Alexander the Great did not even get to ask a question, arriving at the oracle on a day it was closed. The Pythia declined to deliver prophecies. Yet “no” was never an option for Alexander. </p>
<p>When he tried to drag the priestess into the temple by force, she cried, “You are invincible, youth!” – whereupon Alexander turned around and left. He had the prediction he wanted. </p>
<p>Everyone, it seems, got the oracle they deserved. The questions asked at Delphi and at the numerous other oracular centres of the ancient world reveal as much about the enquirer as the capacity of the Pythia to anticipate past, present and future events. </p>
<h2>How did it work?</h2>
<p>How did the Pythia deliver the prophecies? Modern visitors to the oracle are obsessed by the question. Surely there is a secret to be revealed? A mystery to be uncovered? Or at least a clever trick to be unmasked? </p>
<p>Interestingly, the ancients themselves seemed entirely oblivious to the “how”. They did not ask – let alone answer it for us in any satisfying way.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=741&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=741&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131310/original/image-20160720-31125-m0ebzu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=741&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">King Aegeus consults the Pythia, who is seated. Attic red-figure kylix, 440–430 BC.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Was the answer obvious to them? Or was this, perhaps, a religious secret not to be discussed? Whatever the case, for years, the theory that the Pythia was “inspired” by vapours emerging from the ground has fascinated present-day visitors of the ancient oracle. </p>
<p>This theory, based on late, unreliable and misunderstood evidence, has once again been reignited by <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/2001/010717/full/news010719-10.html">new geological research</a> in the area of Delphi demonstrating the presence of light hydrocarbon gases, which are known to have hallucinogenic effects. The mystery lives on – as do the vapours. </p>
<p>One thing, however, is clear as soon as one considers the prophecies themselves. The oracles that have come down to us – around 600 questions and answers from Delphi preserved in a wide range of historical and literary texts and in the form of inscriptions – are not the result of some drug-induced state of mind. Most likely they are the product of oral tradition spun around events that may or may not have really happened at Delphi and elsewhere.</p>
<p>As a result, many oracles are like poetry in the often astonishing and exhilarating ways their central images and metaphors always and invariably find a specific referent in the world: figurative and concrete, allusive and illusive.</p>
<p>Phalanthus of Sparta, for example, received a prediction that he would win both a city and a territory “when rain falls from cloudless sky”. After several failed attempts to take a city, he remembered the oracle. Surely it was impossible for him ever to win military success – just as unlikely as for rain to fall from clear sky.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=250&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=250&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=250&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=314&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=314&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131340/original/image-20160721-31137-ebkbmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=314&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In despair, he laid his head in his wife’s lap and bemoaned his fate. His wife, however, felt such sympathy for her husband that she started to cry. </p>
<p>Her name, we learn, was Aethra (ancient Greek for “clear sky”) and her tears the drops of rain that fell seemingly out of the blue. The same night Phalanthus sacked the city of Tarentum in southern Italy.</p>
<h2>The real and the imaginary</h2>
<p>Oracles like this one typically feature paradoxes, metaphors and images that are also the heart of poetic language. The reading of these prophecies, then, requires extraordinary diligence, a special sense for words and their meaning, and the willingness and capacity to look at the world in new and creative ways.</p>
<p>The exiled king Arcesilaus enquired at Delphi about the possibility of returning to Cyrene. The oracle foretold that his family would remain in power for eight generations, but added a personal message to the king: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>As for yourself, when you return to your country, be gentle. If you find the oven full of jars, do not bake them but send them off with the wind. But if you do heat the oven, enter not the land surrounded by water, for otherwise you will die, and the best of the bulls with you.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>After his return to Cyrene, Arcesilaus took great care to sidestep the prophecy but readily took revenge on his adversaries. When some of them fled into a tower, he had wood stacked around it and set it on fire. Too late he registered that in doing so he had “heated the oven full of jars”. Arcesilaus died soon after in the coastal town of Barca. </p>
<p>Some oracles and the accounts told about them are not authentic. The Pythia cannot possibly have predicted the events leading up to Arcesilaus’ death. Yet this does not mean we can simply dismiss this evidence as the stuff of literary fiction. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131307/original/image-20160720-31151-bnnno.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lycurgus Consulting the Pythia by Eugene Delacroix, 1835/1845.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Questions of authenticity are relevant to the social and political histories of the ancient world and the role of oracles within them. The cultural historian and historians of religions also want to know: What kind of questions did the ancients put to the oracle, real or imaginary? How far into the future did they look? And what religious beliefs, insights and general truths are contained in the stories told about the oracle?</p>
<p>For the ancients, Delphi was as much a place of the real as the imaginary. It was a site to which one could travel and ask questions. But it was also – perhaps even more so – an imaginary site around which meaningful religious narratives could be spun. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131339/original/image-20160721-31137-1k5pwu7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Remains of the Oracle of Zeus at Dodona.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The evidence from another oracular site confirms this. At the Oracle of Zeus at Dodona, enquirers at the oracle wrote their questions onto lead tablets, which were then folded and submitted to the sanctuary. Hundreds of these tablets have been found, giving very good insight into the questions asked at that oracle:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Did Dorkilos steal the cloth?</p>
<p>God. Gerioton asks Zeus concerning a wife whether it is better for him to take one.</p>
<p>Cleotas asks Zeus and Dione if it is better and profitable for him to keep sheep.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>And, <a href="http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=8674516&fileId=S0075426900094064">somewhat more sensitively</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Lysanias asks Zeus Naios and Deona whether the child is not from him with which Annyla is pregnant.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In their straightforwardness, these questions resemble those oracles from Delphi that were inscribed in stone right after the consultation and so less likely to be subject to embellishment. Taken together, this evidence illustrates that in the main very simple questions were asked at oracles – relegating the elaborate tales of prediction and fulfilment to the realm of the imaginary. </p>
<p>Note also that to answer these questions does not require great predictive capacities. Good common sense and, perhaps, some insight is all that’s needed. Nor do these questions really concern the deep future: mostly they reflect simple concerns of the day to day. </p>
<h2>Delphi’s modern legacy</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, the Delphic oracle is no longer in business – at least, not of the oracular kind. In 390/1 CE the Roman emperor Theodosius I closed it down in a bid to end pagan cults. However, the excavated site is now a booming tourist destination and well worth the visit. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131330/original/image-20160721-31125-1wg2j4t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Altar of Apollo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Andy Hay/flickr</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Every time has its own oracles. The legacy of Delphi lies not so much in fortune-tellers, soothsayers and horoscopes: the central and authoritative role of the oracle in the ancient world is reflected in more serious ways we try to anticipate the future.</p>
<p>We have an enduring desire to enquire into what is beyond the here and now, which manifests in our – frequently futile – attempts to control what comes next.</p>
<p>Economic forecasts try to model future expectations based on past experiences, but – much like ambiguous oracles – they are usually vague enough to allow for a way out if things go wrong: <em>past returns do not indicate future gains…</em></p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131332/original/image-20160721-31159-vh1bmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A modern oracle?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jeffrey L. Cohen/flickr</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Google and other search engines invoke the idea that the entire, collective knowledge of humanity – everything that can possibly be known – is only a few clicks away. This is, of course, mere illusion. As with the ancient oracles, answers provided in this way are only ever as good as the question asked.</p>
<p>Finally, the language in which many politicians cloak promises of events to come is directly reminiscent of the metaphors and ambiguities of many Delphic responses. The example of Croesus’ “great empire that will be destroyed” seems uncomfortably apposite in light of modern-day conflicts and international politics.</p>
<h2>Know thyself!</h2>
<p>Given that the oracular is still very much alive we may wonder how Delphi still speaks to us today, which insights remain relevant and what kind of knowledge stands the test of time. </p>
<p>The ancients themselves asked the oracle that last question. Both Croesus of Lydia and Chilon of Sparta enquired at Delphi about what was best to know. Both received a response saying that to “know thyself” (<em>gnōthi seauton</em>) was best.</p>
<p>Know thyself! In many ways this is the tag line of the Delphic brand. The motto was inscribed into the forecourt of the temple of Apollo at Delphi, clearly visible to those wishing to consult the oracle. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=817&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=817&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=817&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1026&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1026&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/131338/original/image-20160721-31137-22bsca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1026&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Head of Nero (reign 54–68 CE). After 64 BC.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It is also the implicit moral message of many accounts of oracle consultations recounting the (frequently unhappy) consequences of misinterpreting the oracle’s words. Overconfidence ends in downfall. If only Croesus had looked beyond his own circumstances… If only Nero had considered the world in more complex terms…</p>
<p>Oracles did not provide simple answers to simple questions – nor do their modern counterparts. Rather, all attempts to look into the future provide the incentive for us to examine our own expectations, to confront our own desires and our own ways of make-believe. </p>
<p>If we rise to the challenge we find more often than not that things are different from how they first appear. Delphi continues to remind those of us prepared to listen that, to be successful in the world, we must consider other realities which may look very different from our own.</p>
<p><br></p>
<hr>
<p><em>Have you ever been to “Delphi”? If not, check out the online <a href="http://www.homeromanteion.com">Homeromanteion</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/61738/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Julia Kindt receives funding from the Australian Research Council (ARC).</span></em></p>Cicero asked: ‘how to become famous?’ Nero sought to know the timing of his death. The Oracle at Delphi offered pronouncements on all manner of topics - yet as with Google today, the question posed was as important as the answer.Julia Kindt, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/601662016-06-02T20:23:51Z2016-06-02T20:23:51ZFriday essay: Feminist Medusas and outback Minotaurs – why myth is big in children’s books<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124881/original/image-20160602-26863-1wu2b10.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A mosaic of a gorgon's head from the floor of a Roman bathroom </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ad Meskens/Wikimedia Commons</span></span></figcaption></figure><blockquote>
<p>Gorgon: a vicious female monster with sharp fangs. Her power was so strong that anyone attempting to look upon her would be turned to stone. The Gorgon wore a belt of serpents that intertwined as a clasp, confronting each other. There were three Gorgons, and each one had hair made of living snakes. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8130338-the-gorgon-in-the-gully">The Gorgon in the Gully</a> (2010), Melina Marchetta’s delightful book for 10-12 year olds, no one has ever seen a Gorgon. But one apparently lives in a small valley near the sports fields at the school attended by a boy called Danny. When Danny looks up Gorgon on the internet, he finds the above definition. And his local Gorgon’s reputation for fierceness is only equalled by its record as a hoarder of balls.</p>
<p>So when Danny’s ball goes into the gully, and Simmo, the School Bully, dares him to go in after it, Danny is caught between his fear of the Gorgon, and his fear of being a “gutless wonder”. </p>
<p>His mother advises him to: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>look at whatever you’re scared of from a different angle. Look at it up really close. Find a friend at school who’s not afraid to look at things up close with you. </p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=806&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=806&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=806&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1013&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1013&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124879/original/image-20160602-1943-94lrfe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1013&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ŧhe ₵oincidental Ðandy</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Which is what Danny does. Gradually, he becomes friends with Simmo, and they work together to confront the Gorgon. When they finally do, they discover it is nothing like their imaginings. Indeed it’s not a Gorgon at all. It is a gentle old man who has been wondering when the children are going to retrieve their balls. In conquering his fear, Danny conquers the Gorgon, gets his ball back and becomes known as “Gorgon-buster”.</p>
<p>The Gorgon in the Gully goes neatly to the core of the Medusa allegory: if fear is petrifying, one needs to know how to look at it “up close”.
And like the hero Perseus assisted by the goddess Athena, who used a reflective shield to deflect Medusa’s stare and avoid being petrified, Danny finds a way to look closely at his fears from different angles, and to overcome them. </p>
<h2>Lurking in literature</h2>
<p>Monsters from classical myth have been lurking in the gullies of Western literature for a long time – in retellings and adaptations, and acting as symbols and metaphors for aspects of the human experience. </p>
<p>They’ve been surfacing recently in fantasy for children and young adults. Imaginary Medusas, realistically drawn Minotaurs, as well as a multitude of many-headed Scyllas, Hydras and Cerberuses: they all appear in Australian children’s and YA fiction.</p>
<p>Why are so many contemporary writers reconnecting with the monsters of classical myth? I think it’s partly because they provide profound connections to issues of identity, coming of age, and finding one’s place in the world. These are fundamental matters in children’s literature, which aims to educate and socialise children to fit in, and also to express their concerns about the world and their place in it. </p>
<p>And writers are working now in a globalised context, with a rich cornucopia of referents. The mash-up culture of film, television, gaming and comic book franchises is a case in point, in which protagonists connect with figure after figure from myth and legend. </p>
<p>It’s fun to play with mythical beasts. And it’s interesting to connect to them as well. </p>
<p><iframe id="tc-infographic-237" class="tc-infographic" height="850" src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/infographics/237/c86b73747b2b9f41ed905517177d79509863fd2f/site/index.html" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>Mixing with Medusa</h2>
<p>Connecting with Medusa can mean confronting her monstrous powers, facing the fear she represents. It can also mean sympathising with her. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Latin/Metamorph4.htm#anchor_Toc64106272">As Ovid tells it</a>, in one version of the myth (which like all classical myth has many variants), Medusa was seduced (or raped) by Poseidon in Athena’s temple, and Athena transformed her beautiful hair into snakes as a punishment for this defilement. Like many monstrous tales in Greek mythology, it doesn’t seem fair.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124873/original/image-20160602-2812-1mju9ns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">sookie</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today, some Australian writers are more sympathetic to Medusa, as can be seen in <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7243114-the-gaze-of-the-gorgon">The Gaze of the Gorgon</a> (2002), by Karen R. Brooks. This is the second novel in a four-part portal fantasy in which a magic necklace takes 13 year old Cassandra Klein to Morphea, a mystical realm in which myths and fairytales are living and real. There, she does battle with the witch Hecate, who is trying to get control over this fantasy world, and who forces Medusa to use her powers to turn the Morpheans to stone.</p>
<p>But when Caz meets Medusa, she discovers that she is, in fact, an unwilling tool of Hecate. Together, they agree to “reverse the evil” that has been done, and give the petrified ones back their lives. This means that Caz has to kill Medusa.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Gazing at the bowed head of the Gorgon, Caz took a deep breath. ‘I am so sorry,’ she whispered. And before she could change her mind, raised the sword above her head and dropped her arms.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=944&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=944&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=944&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1186&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1186&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124893/original/image-20160602-26863-sfnwqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1186&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Gaze of the Gorgon, by Karen Brooks.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lothian Books (2002)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Caz and her friends gather the blood spurting from Medusa’s neck, and use it to heal wounds and revive the petrified. By willingly submitting to Caz’s blade, Medea’s death-dealing monstrosity is transformed into healing powers. It’s a revisionist take on the subject that comments on and compensates for the essential unfairness of Medusa’s treatment, both at the hands of Brooks’s Hecate, and Poseidon and Athena. </p>
<h2>Mining hidden fears</h2>
<p>This revisionist approach, which challenges the original myths, can also be seen in treatments of the Minotaur. To summarise the famously tangled myth: it is half-bull, half-man, the product of a union between Pasiphae, the queen of Crete, and a snow-white bull sent to the King (Minos) by Poseidon for sacrifice. </p>
<p>Because Minos kept the bull alive, Poseidon punished the family by making Pasiphae fall in love with it. And when she gave birth to the Minotaur, King Minos had it shut away in the Labyrinth, created by the master-inventor, Daedalus. Minos demanded regular sacrifice of Athenian youths and maidens – to be sent into the Labyrinth and devoured by the Minotaur. </p>
<p>The Athenian hero Theseus volunteered to go. Ariadne (daughter of Minos and Pasiphae) helped him find his way in and out of the labyrinth, using a ball of thread to guide him. He repaid her by abandoning her on an island, where she was discovered and taken up by Bacchus.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124876/original/image-20160602-2812-1p27hwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Theseus killing the Minotaur in Hyde Park’s Archibald Fountain.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Gord Webster</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Jennifer Cook’s <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2618852-ariadne">Ariadne: The Maiden and the Minotaur</a> (2005) is set in ancient Greece, and tells this story from the point of view of a key player, the princess Ariadne, or Ari. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=966&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=966&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=966&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1213&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1213&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124897/original/image-20160602-26863-lsjfag.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1213&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ariadne: The Maiden and the Minotaur, by Jennifer Cook.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lothian Books (2005)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Cook’s Ari is an impatient, irreverent, lively modern teenager, highly critical of her family. </p>
<p>Here, Cook draws attention to the point that the Minotaur is Ariadne’s blood relation, recasting it as Ari’s little brother “Tori”, a disabled child, Pasiphae’s illegitimate son (born from an affair, but not an affair with a bull). To his family, Tori is a symbol of shame and disgrace, both illegitimate and disabled. </p>
<p>In Cook’s story, it’s the Labyrinth, designed to contain many vicious traps, and King Minos’ insistence on the sacrifices, that kill the Athenians not the Minotaur.</p>
<p>In conspiring with Theseus, Ari saves Tori, and escapes with him. Far from being abandoned by Theseus and taken up by Bacchus she finds true love elsewhere, fading out of recorded story, with satisfaction. </p>
<p>When I asked Cook what drove this depiction of a feisty Ariadne, she replied:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I remember hearing the Minotaur myth and wondering about Ariadne and thinking how typical it was of the Greek hero Theseus to get all of the help from her and then take all of the credit. To add insult to injury he dumps her and takes off with her sister. And her reward? To get ‘married’ (Greek myth parlance for raped) by Dionysos [Bacchus]. And yes, I did my honours degree in feminist history.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Cook’s feminism, coupled with her sympathy for the Minotaur as unwitting victim of a dysfunctional family (and also of the gods), influences her approach to the myth. In essence it is a coming-of-age story, in which Ariadne identifies the true monsters in her family. Tori stands for all that the family is ashamed of; the myth of the Minotaur stands for the lies people tell when the truth is too frightening. In caring for Tori and rescuing him, Ari demonstrates modern Australian ideas of love, justice, and empathy far different from the stark ironies of the Ancient Greek myths. </p>
<h2>Liberating and facing the Minotaur</h2>
<p>These modern Australian attitudes can be seen too, in Myke Bartlett’s fantasy novel for teenagers, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15713714-fire-in-the-sea">Fire in the Sea</a> (2012), in which a terrifying Minotaur comes to Australia on a mystical mission to restore the lost city of Atlantis to life: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>All eyes were on the matted fur of his head, the exposed and bloodied teeth, and the horns. The head of a bull, the body of a man, the teeth of a lion. </p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=929&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=929&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=929&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1167&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1167&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124891/original/image-20160602-1946-1stmxjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1167&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fire in the Sea, by Myke Bartlett.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Text Publishing, 2012</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In this story, fantasy elements intrude on the real world and have to be dealt with by the protagonist, a teenage orphan called Sadie. She faces a brutally bestial fighting machine in the Minotaur. Yet as the story unfolds, Sadie discovers the Minotaur is a slave to Atlantis’s head priestess, Lysandra, acting against its will to keep her in power. </p>
<p>In the novel’s end game, when Lysandra’s realm is disintegrating below the waves, Sadie confronts the Minotaur, believing she is ready to kill it. But she looks into its eyes, and sees flickers of humanity. Unable to slay the beast, she severs the chain around its neck, liberating it from servitude. </p>
<p>Here, Bartlett points to the tragedy of the Minotaur’s origins: as an unwitting byproduct of the gods’ and humans’ treachery, it is forced to act as a symbol of monstrosity. </p>
<p>The book also makes a point that life is worth the risk of death. As an orphan who has witnessed her parents’ death, Sadie is deeply afraid of dying. Letting the Minotaur go means risking that it will kill her: what she is most afraid of. </p>
<h2>Worse things than death?</h2>
<p>But perhaps there are worse things than death. And in <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3083278-requiem-for-a-beast">Requiem for a Beast</a> (2007), writer-illustrator-musician Matt Ottley uses the figure of the Minotaur to explore the pain of monstrous pasts, personal and national. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124895/original/image-20160602-1951-1fh0byq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Requiem For A Beast, by Matt Ottley.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Hachette Australia (2007)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Requiem for a Beast is the story of a young stockman who confronts his own, his father’s and his country’s past. During a routine muster, he tracks down a magnificent bull that has evaded capture. He traps it in a ravine, where it falls and is badly wounded. Knowing that if he does not act, it will die a lingering death, the boy takes his knife and kills the bull. </p>
<p>Coming of age can mean confronting one’s demons, coming to terms with one’s past. And as the boy reflects on his encounter with the bull, his story is told through flashbacks: to his childhood, to learning of his father’s shameful story – he had been part of a group of men who had killed a young Aboriginal boy – and reflections about the Stolen Generation.</p>
<p>This book is shot through with iconic Australian imagery – the big sky, the harsh but beautiful landscape, the image of the drover and the muster. And linking them to the boy’s inner drama is the image of the Minotaur. </p>
<p>Otley anchors this specifically to a key memory from the boy’s childhood: visiting a museum with his father, they enter the mythology room, where the father explains the myth of the Minotaur. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>What was it that happened that day? Why did that strange beast follow me – out of the museum and into the rest of my life? It hunted me, tracked me through the years, and slowly drew my spirit – who I was – from me until there was nothing left.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>What indeed? What is Ottley’s Minotaur? A symbol of the repressed and repression? Of the violence of Australia’s past? A symbol of the demons teenagers face as they transition from childhood to adulthood, and come of age? </p>
<p>The book connects classical myth to the teenage experience, and also to the iconic myths and stories of Australian culture, while considering important national issues like the Stolen Generation. It runs the risk of imposing the standards of the Western canon onto the local context (<a href="http://eprints.qut.edu.au/72924/3/72924(pub.pdf)">as Erica Hately points out</a> yet it also shows the power of classical material to open up important discussions about our own culture.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124890/original/image-20160602-1943-1snv0f3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A minotaur relaxes at Bondi beach.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nicole Grech, photograph by Bentley Smith</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Myth in our DNA</h2>
<p>I’ve focused here on Medusas and Minotaurs. But Australian authors explore many other mythical beasts, engaging with their entertaining, fun and scary aspects. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=911&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=911&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=911&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1144&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1144&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/124896/original/image-20160602-7105-10x2s5l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1144&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chasing Odysseus (The Hero Trilogy #1), by Sulari Gentill.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Pantera Press (2011)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Geoffrey McSkimming’s energetic diesel-punk adventure series, <a href="http://cairojim.com/chronicles">Cairo Jim</a>, exploits the resonant power of myths from Gorgons to Satyrs. Ian Trevaskis takes children back in time to help the ancient heroes fight ancient foes in <a href="http://iantrevaskis.com.au/">Hopscotch: Medusa Stone</a>. </p>
<p>Terry Denton finds the more cuddly aspects of the Minotaur in <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1243976.The_Minotaur_s_Maze">The Minotaur’s Maze</a> (2004), while Phillip Gwynne turns Cerberus, the three-headed guard-dog to the underworld, into a computer program in <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17927570-bring-back-cerberus">Bring Back Cerberus</a> (2013). And in <a href="http://sambowring.com/the-zoo-of-magical-and-mythological-creatures/">The Zoo of Magical and Mythological Creatures</a> (2009), Sam Bowring’s hero, Zackary, becomes the keeper of a whole zoo of magical creatures.</p>
<p>Sulari Gentill’s <a href="https://www.panterapress.com.au/shop/product/9/chasing-odysseus">Hero Trilogy</a> retells Homer’s Odyssey from the point of view of a girl called Hero. When I asked Gentill what it was about classical myth she thought connected to young readers, she said there was an engaging familiarity to them:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I suspect that there is a kind of DNA that classical/ancient myth has contributed to all the stories that have come after them in Western literature. Consequently there’s a strange familiarity to them even if one has never heard the particular legend before. They add to our appreciation of new stories and we feel a connection even if we don’t know why. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>We might think that Medusa and the Minotaur are buried in the past. But they surface in the present surprisingly often: testing our bravery; challenging our ideas about monstrosity and danger; and revealing the continued influence of classical antiquity, and its power in literature for our young readers. </p>
<p><br></p>
<p><em>This is an edited version of “Medusas and Minotaurs: Metamorphosis and Meaning in Australian Contexts,” presented at <a href="http://mythicalbeasts.obta.al.uw.edu.pl/">Chasing Mythical Beasts … The Reception of Creatures from Graeco-Roman mythology in Children’s and Young Adults’ Culture as a Transformation Marker</a>, hosted by the Centre for Studies on the Classical Tradition in the Faculty of Artes Liberales, University of Warsaw (May 12-15).</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/60166/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Hale does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Australian writers are embracing monsters from classical mythology, which provide profound connections to issues of identity and coming of age. Which mythical beast are you? Try our author’s quiz and find out.Elizabeth Hale, Senior Lecturer in English and Writing (children's literature), University of New EnglandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.