#archaic Medusa

[sarafangirlart]

[zebedeezing]

Big lincoln sends you to hell

[lunarphoria]

HELL YEAH

I've been asking the void for some archaic gorgon content and the void told me to make it myself.

[myths-and-chaos]

Please enjoy this Archaic Gorgoneion I saw at a museum last year!

Archaic (800-479 BCE) Greek Medusa had rounded features, a full beard, tusks! And sometimes wings! Also please note the lack of snakes for hair!

[lillatorg]

"About, about, in reel and rout The death-fires danced at night; The water, like a witch's oils Burnt green, and blue and white."

Part of writing stuff down is coming to peace with whatever my weird brain wants to show me. Two years ago I daydreamed that Chay had escaped from some nebulous peril and was…freezing to death in a cave? Because of course Kim was a dragon. Thank you, brain.

Last night my weird brain whispered Andromeda AU and I ran to my four compendiums of romantic poetry to serve up a title. Thank you, Coleridge.

gritted teeth I am finishing Half Bite first because as we saw last fall, I can't write a longfic AND three short stories at once and be a functioning human.

But someday we'll have Water Like Witch Oil (thoughts on title? it made me shiver, but maybe the AC was just turned up too high).

In any case, the one where Chay is sacrificed to a sea monster.

[cursecuelebre]

I know people are use to seeing modern depictions of Gorgons or Medusa as Beautiful women with snakes for hair sometimes with a tail but oh my gods Archaic Gogorn depictions

These are terrifying yet so fucking cool. Like if I saw this at night in the woods I’m running, crying, and praying. This is so uncanny to me.

[sarafangirlart]

This is why in my version they have a cool fight. Sure in written sources he kills he in her sleep, but some vase paintings have her wide away and smiling ear to ear (which like yeah all archaic depictions of her smile but still) and I can’t help but imagine that she’s just so excited to kill this dumb teenager who thinks he’s hot shit coming to her cave trying to kill her in her sleep so she just bullies him the whole fight.

people will be like “omg I love Medusa!!!!” And not even give her tusks or wings or muscles or a beard or basically anything gorgon like besides the snake hair. Come on don’t do my girl like that. Mortal yet most powerful of her sisters. An entity beyond control. A symbol of debilitating terror. Born to a family of powerful monsters and deities. Assigned to Perseus as a definite death trap that he was never supposed to defeat. Like give my girl some respect she damn well deserves it

[comicaurora]

Have you ever notices the weird trait that a lot of the mytic Greek monsters are decendents, or otherwise related to posiden (all sea beasts, cyclops, medusa, minotaur ect) were mostly slain by children of zeus? The rest of the mytic Greek hero's mostly slayed children of typhon and echidna.

Do you think this is somthing to do with the fact that posiden used to the ruler of mychnain pantheon, and zuse took over, so the mytology reflected this by having posiden monster children slain by the heroic children of zeus?

Have you ever noticed any similar patters in mythology involving the chainge of the dominat god?

It's hard to say! The Mycenaean pantheon is very poorly understood since we don't have anything like the corpus of literature we have from Archaic Greece, and as far as I can tell it's mostly been reconstructed from ledgers and the equivalent of receipts - this many jars of stuff to the temple of this god in this region, etc etc. And the idea that Poseidon was central - while apparently widely accepted - doesn't really tell us how Poseidon was characterized back in those days, or how (or if) things shifted to be Zeus-centric later on.

And in the broad scale, it's hard to know for sure if a pantheon's myths reflect an actual shift in what the dominant/central god being worshipped was, or if something else was going on. Mythology rarely maps one-to-one to the historical events it was running in parallel to. There are lots of mythologies with god wars or former leaders of the gods being replaced - Tyr with Odin, Nuada with Lugh, Ra getting merged with a half-dozen different gods to give them his oomph and authority at various times - and it's not clear when a god conflict reflects a real religious shift in who's being worshipped and when it's something else. For instance, classical Greek mythology has loads of themes of sons usurping fathers, starting with Kronos usurping Ouranos and followed by Zeus usurping Kronos - but it doesn't seem like Kronos was historically worshipped in the time before Zeus or anything that simple and clean. Kronos doesn't seem to pre-exist that space of mythology at all.

However, there are tidbits in Greek mythology where a god kills a monster and takes up residence in their place of power, like Apollo killing Python - a monstrous child of Gaia that seems to have potentially been actually worshipped for oracular reasons before Apollo showed up and took over, which would make it a mythical parallel to a real shift in local religious practices. Although again, that is very hard to confirm (and some of the researchers who think that seem to wanna believe it because it very conveniently lets them tie it in with the bible)

this kind of thing is why the deep-dives are my favorite kind of nightmare to subject myself to

So it's hard to say if a myth of a conflict between gods reflects a real-world conflict between religious practices, but all that said, that is a very interesting pattern to note - that Poseidon is more consistently a father of monsters, while Zeus is almost universally a father of heroes.

[tylermileslockett]

Medusa's Gaze (#6 in my "Quest for the Gorgon Head" series)

Part6:

With his winged sandals, Perseus flies over the sea finally coming to the barren lands of the three Gorgon sisters; the immortals- Stheno and Euryale, and the mortal sister-Medusa. Passing amongst the stony victims of animals and mortals alike, he stealthily descends deep into their lair where they sleep. Using Athena’s shield as a mirror, and invisible due to hades helmet, he quietly floats over to Medusa, rising his Adamantine sickle high for the death stroke. But she hears him! She awakes in rage, unleashing the full terrible power of her gaze upon the intruder!

In the oldest, archaic representations of the gorgon in Greek art (tombs, coins, breastplates, rooms,) the frightening head seems to function as an “apotropaic” symbol (protective amulet) to ward off evil, known as a “Gorgoneian". A fascinating aspect of the portrayal of the gorgon head in Ancient Greek art is that she uniquely portrayed as front facing, strikingly meeting the viewer’s gaze head on. While most other God’s and mortal character’s faces and bodies are shown in side profile views.

there are multiple sources for the stories involving Medusa. In Homer’s Odyssey, the gorgon is vaguely referred to as a frightening head from the underworld. In Hesiod's "Theogany,”(700 B.C. Greece)he increases the number to three sisters, with Medusa being a monster from birth who willingly lays with Poseidon, and resides in the far lands with her Gorgon sisters. It's not until 700 years later, in the Roman Poet Ovid's "Metamorphosis" (8 A.D.) that Medusa is completely reinvented as a beautiful mortal, and chaste priestess of Athena, who, after being raped by Poseidon in Athena’s temple, is cruelly cursed by Athena with snake for hairs and a stony gaze, and then exiled.

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[amorphousbl0b]

Something fascinating about Perseus is that his famous journey is a stitching-together of two separate myths.

First he kills Medusa, then on the way back he takes a random diversion to slay a Ketos and rescue Andromeda. This is hardly unusual for Greek stories, which often feature random diversions, but what interested me is that both seem to actually be explanations for things rather than the usual “a hero killed a monster here and that’s why these particular random crossroads are cool and important” formula these things follow.

First, the story of Perseus and Medusa is connected to the image of the Gorgon, a heavily widespread artistic motif. The gorgoneia are hideous heads that adorn architecture, shields, and coins all over Archaic and Classical Greece. They seem to have served a similar function to gargoyles in Christian myth, driving off evil spirits with their fearsome visage. And Perseus cutting the head from Medusa was the tale of how that icon came to be. Well, that might be a bit backwards: the story would’ve been around for quite a while during the Dark Age before it was written down in the 7th century BCE, around the time those gorgoneia started appearing.

Andromeda is entirely unconnected to this except by the single thread of Perseus himself. This is epitomized, in my opinion, by the recurring indecision over whether Perseus killed the ketos with his sword or with Medusa’s head. Did he even have Medusa’s head in the early tellings of the story? Were they connected later? Because what’s interesting about the story of Perseus, Andromeda, Cassiopeia, Cepheus, and Cetus, is that you might recognize all of those names from the stars. Every single character in this myth was a constellation!

Except Phineas, screw him I guess.

Of note, none of the characters from the Medusa adventure are constellations. Not Danaë or Polydectes or Dictys or Medusa herself, all of whom were much more important to Perseus’s life than Cepheus who did absolutely nothing even in the one story where he matters. Unlike Heracles, whose whole life is an extended constellation myth, Perseus has this one incident, but it’s a dense one, producing five whole star formations from a single monster fight.

It’s hard to figure out when and from what this would’ve arisen, given all these transformations happened during the Dark Age before the reinvention of writing. Nonetheless, this is a great example of the evolution that I find incredibly compelling about studying mythology. Every tale has its seams, stitches haphazard or clean, reminders that this was a living culture and all of these stories we might fall into the trap of treating as fun fictions with quirky characters were as real as any of our modern religious texts and histories.

[haematicartwork]

Medusa having a good time :D

Design breakdown + Explaination below the cut Reblog, do not repost. Comissions are open!

So, I recently had a late-night class on Medusa and her various depictions across time, and I felt very inspired by my prof’s descriptions of her and also intensely frustrated by the mythos as a whole, because unless you buy into one of the dozens of - fun but not historically backed - feminist retellings of her story, there really is nothing satisfying to Medusa, her fate or her death.

But i also felt like the victim part of her life had been more than explored and I honestly just thought her monstrous energy was sick as fuck, so I wanted to show her indulging in a heart and some intestine >:D

Here are some of the sources I used for the design, since she isn't often depicted with wings anymore:

This Vase should be around 600 BC and shows Medusa as a monster with clear inhuman/non feminine features: I borrowed the most from this depiction, since that is what i wanted to embrace. The loincloth is dotted in the style of the depicted fabric, the face has prominent tusks and the large wings turned upwards are also from here.

This is another depiction from a similar timeframe, late archaic/early classical period. This one was mostly an inspiration for the facial features and the way the hair is laid over the head in a way that looks sorta like cornrows, I thought it looked pretty cool!

Lastly, this bust is a roman replica, and is fairly controversial, but I had to include it because the "wing ears" are just awesome and i wanted desperately to include them, even if this bust is significantly younger and removed from the other sources. All in all, I wanted to make an image of Medusa as a "fun" monstrous lady who is living her best life, and not a seductress (ew. looking at you, giuanni versache) or a tragic figure. She most definitely deserved better, but I like to think she enjoyed herself, too. Thanks for reading, if you made it this far! I oversimplified some things for the sake of making this rant short, but I am also only a first year classicism student, and I didn't take notes during the class, so I may have made some mistakes.

[sarafangirlart]

You are not a real monster woman enjoyer if you draw those Medusa x blind girlfriend and Medusa just looks like a normal pretty lady in a snake wig.

[zebedeezing]

Doing a project on archaic Medusa (pre-ovid Hesiod double wings scary Medusa) and can’t get over Poseidon and Medusa having sex in a meadow. I know it doesn’t say exactly what Medusa was getting up to in the Theogony, but I like to think she was running around petrifying people, making a dragons keep of statues bodies, eating raw cattle, scaring the kids etc etc -

And Poseidon bruhhh Poseidon you know he dgaf about non of that miscellaneous loss of life, bad bitch detected, he really pulled out all the stops with his charm magic - ‘a soft meadow amid spring flowers’ uknow

There’s no art of this by the way. None!!

[michael-svetbird]

ATHENA Roccaspromonte:

Italic Terracotta Statue based on the Greek Archaic model, 2nd half of the 4th c. BC [?] From Roccaspromonte, Campobasso Province, Italy Found in 1777, acquired by "Antiken-Cabinet", Vienna, in 1815.

"Minerva was originally an Italic deity identified with .. Athena later. This statue corresponds to the Athena Promachos type, the 'vanguard' and protector in war. The goddess wears .. Peplos and [her] characteristic breastplate [Aegis] with the [broken off] head of Medusa. Her arms once held a shield and a lance." [txt ©KHMV]

KunstHistorisches Museum, Vienna | KHMV ["Ancient Greece and Rome", Kabinett 7] • Web : https://www.khm.at/en • FB : https://www.facebook.com/KHMWien • IG : @kunsthistorischesmuseumvienna

KHMV | Michael Svetbird phs©msp | 13|08|23 6200X4100 600 [I.-III.] The photographed object is collection items of KHMV, photos are subject to copyrights. [non commercial use | sorry for the watermarks]

📸 Part of the "Reliefs, Friezes, Slabs, Sculpture" MSP Online Photo-gallery:

👉 D-ART: https://www.deviantart.com/svetbird1234/gallery/72510770/reliefs-friezes-slabs-sculpture

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[pomegranates-art]

archaic medusa from vase paintings

no head ver

[mask131]

Another bullet-point list about Medusa, this time from an article of the "Dictionary of Literary myths", written by Camille Dumoulié.

The paradox of Medusa as a character is that she seems to gain life as she is killed: for her story, her myth, is much more "living" and "active" after she has been reduced to an inanimate head.

Another paradox the mixture of beauty and horror that leads to Medusa's face being an object of fascination: her face is pure horror, her gaze kills, and yet her face was used as an apotropaic mask, a talisman that saved by repelling evil forces. This reinforces Medusa as the embodiment of ambiguity.

Medusa's head is one of the most archaic symbols of Ancient Greece: it might be an echo of Humbaba's head from the legend of Gilgamesh.

Jean-Pierre Vernant (in "La Mort dans les Yeux", "Death in the eyes"), offered the interpretation of Medusa's head as the "face of the warrior" according to Greek imagery: her mouth wide open, her terrifying hair, the ear-piercing shrieks, all can recall the "warrior's fury", the terrifying side of war. Medusa's head in fact regularly appears in the context of wars: Hesiod describes The Shield of Herakles, in the Iliad it appears on Agamemnon's shield and on Athena's aegis.

On another side, Gorgô also embodies what cannot be depicted or represented: it is death, invisible and that no one can look upon, just like Hades himself. in Hesiod's Theogony, just like in Homer's Odyssey, Medusa is the guardian of terrifying places: the edges of the world, in the realm of endless Night for Hesiod, the Underworld and realm of the dead for Homer. This specific role was perpetuated by other authors - Dante in his Divine Comedy, Milton in his Paradise Lost. Placed at the door of the afterlife, she prevents the living from entering.

In the Christian world, Medusa became a symbol for the Devil. She appears in the Arthurian mythos, in the "Livre d'Artus", part of the vulgate cycle of the Grail novels - reinterpreted as a female monster named "Laide Semblance" (Ugly Seeming), living at the bottom of a river, and who kills not by petrifying but by swallowing waters.

There are many elements highlighting the ambiguty of Medusa, and/or her tragic nature. For example, there is the story of how Athena gifted Esculape (Asclepios) with two drops of blood from Gorgô - one can heal and even resurrect, the other is a deadly poison. Medusa's blood, as a result, is the very embodiment of the Greek concept of "pharmakon" - and it explains why her deadly and dangerous face becomes an apotropaic mask, it is also a pharmakon.

It is very clear that there is a rivality opposing Athena and Medusa. The most famous version of this enemity comes from Ovid's Metamorphosis, where Athena punished Medusa after she was raped by Poseidon inside her temple, soiling the sanctuary of the virgin goddess. But there is an older Greek story (which was reused for example by Mallarmé in his 1880 Les Dieux antiques) which makes this rivalry more personal: Medusa was cursed because she claimed she was more beautiful than Athena.

All in all, Medusa seems to appear as a sort of negative double of Athena, that the goddess tries to destroy. The common elements between the two are numerous: for example the snakes, which were animals of Athena, or the fascinating gaze (Athena is famously the "grey-eyed goddess", and her bird is the owl with huge eyes) ; finally, as she bears the monster's head on her aegid, the goddess manifests Medusa's terror when she is angry or in battle. By the Aeneid, Athena manifests her anger by having flames shot out of her eyes - all of this highlights how Medusa and Athena seems to two faces of a coin, the two sides of a same sacred power.

In a way, Perseus himself becomes a double of his monstrous foe: using Medusa's head, he petrifies his enemies and causes death all around him. And according to Ovid, as he flew over Africa, out of some sort of carelessness or neglect, he allowed blood-drops of the Gorgon to fall on the ground, creating venomous snakes and thus multiplying the lethal power of Medusa. Some artists tried to explore this intimacy between Perseus and Medusa - such as B. Cellini's Perseus, where the faces of Perseus and Medusa look strangely alike ; or Paul Klee's Spirit fought evil, where the roles are inversed, Medusa disappears on the side while Perseus is up-front with a dreadful expression on his face.

This theme of double and reflections highlights the manifestation in the Medusa myth of the superstition of the "evil eye", which to be fought must be countered by a "third eye/magical eye" (like the one of the Graeae, stolen by Perseus), or be sent back through a mirror - the one Perseus uses, gifted by Athena. The motif of the mirror causing death opens parallels with the legend of Narcissus, another figure doomed for his vanity.

Robert Graves' books (note by me: NOT AT ALL A GOOD RESSOURCE! A lot of it has been proven completely invented, but it is important to know in term of the evolution of the Medusa-symbol) proposed the reading of Perseus and Medusa's fight as a memory of a "gender war" when the matriarchal society became patriarchal: Gorgô's mask would have originally been used by women to scare away men from their sacred ceremonies, mysteries reserved to women. Mysteries honoring the "triple Moon goddess" - Graves bringing back the fact that in Orphic texts the moon is called "the Gorgon's head". He also imagined that the mask of Gorgô was worn by maidens who tried to protect themselves from the lust of men - and the victory of Perseus over Medusa means the end of the rule of women, and the temples being conquered by men, who hid away Medusa's head and became masters of the divine.

The theories of Graves fed an entire movement of thought highlight Medusa as a manifestation of the Great Goddess or Mother Goddess, whose face was hidden in rituals by Gorgo's mask: Medusa was tied to the depths of the sea, and to the terrible power of nature ; and these readings were also tied to Freud's psychanalytic analysis of Medusa, where he links the beheading with the castration, the snkaes with the phalluses, the petrification with the erection, and turns the fight against Medusa into a sexual initiation against a motherly figure. Under this angle, Perseus vanquishes the "castrating woman", and is armed with the phallic-erection tool, wich allos him to conquer Andromeda, the virgin maiden, by killing the sea-monster (another evil twin of the woman).

To go back in time, this motif of vanquishing Medusa as a seduction or sexual initiaton can be retrospectively read in some "variations" of the Andromeda myth, like saint Georges vanquishing the dragon. But more interestingly, it is the Arthurian "Livre d'Artus" story which echoes this reading - where the Laide Semblance monster lives within the land of a "maid", who asks the king not only to send a knight to kill the monster, but also demands a man to be brought to her as her husband: it almost seems that killing the monster is a needed condition for the knight to marry the virgin girl.

Medusa has a certain link to music. Aristotle, in his "Politics" (I. VIII) makes a difference between the music that helps teaching, and the cathartic music tied to the bacchic trances. This second, Dionysian music, is tied to the flute and must be avoided. To justify this, he evokes a legend about Athena: when she played the flute, her face was deformed until she looked ugly, and so she rejected the instrument. However, according to Pindar's Pythics, it as Athena herself who invented the flute in an attempt to recreate an unnatural sound - the sound of the snakes on Medusa's head, as she was beheaded by Perseus. As such, it becomes clear that, as she played, Athena didn't just became ugly: her face started to mimick the one of Gorgô. We find back this confusion between the monster and the goddess.