9/8/2015

Poseidon
and the Sea

Tripartite Division
Draw lots
Sky, ocean, realm of the dead

Poseidon speaks:
Since we are three brothers born by Rheia to Kronos,
Zeus, and I, and the third is Hades, lord of the dead men.
All was divided among us three ways, each given his domain.
I when the lots were shaken drew the grey sea to live in
forever; Hades drew the lots of the mists and the darkness,
and Zeus was allotted the wide sky, in the cloud and the
bright air.
But earth and high Olympos are common to all three.
(Homer, Iliad 15.18793, transl. Lattimore)

Poseidon?
Zeus?

attributes

Poseidon (or Zeus?)

c. 120100 B.C.E.
Getty Museum 96.AB.151

Zeus (or Poseidon?)

c. 460 B.C.E.
Athens, National Archaeological Museum X 15161

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Poseidon (Latin: Neptune)

Artistic representations:
Trident
Sea creatures

Uncontrollable
strength

Earthquakes
Horses

Poseidon and Medusa

Neptune Baths, Ostia (Italy)

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 01.8070

Late 5th c. B.C.E.

Walter Crane, study for Neptunes Horses (c. 1892)

Poseidons Horse: the Hippocamp

British Museum, Vase B428
c. 520 B.C.E.

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Seahorse: genus Hippocampus

Pelops greets Poseidon

Met Museum, NY 21.88.162

Poseidons Family and Affairs

Amphitrite
Daughter of Nereus

Grants favors to those he rapes

Amymone: spring
Caenis: invulnerability and sex-change
Mestra: shape-changing
Pelops: magical horses

Poseidon and Amphitrite, Zeus and Hera, with Ganymede

Athens, c. 430 B.C.E.
British Museum 1847,0909.6 , Vase E82

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Monstrous Sons
Physically monstrous
Mentally monstrous
Triton

Triton and Theseus

Greek, c. 470 B.C.E.
Louvre, Paris MNC 746

Pegasos
Corinthian tetradrachm

Triton

Bronze Triton furniture appliqu

1st c. B.C.E. 1st c. C.E.
Louvre Museum, Durand Collection 1825

Triton

Triton mosaic
2nd c. B.C.E.
Sparta Archaeological Museum

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The Life Aquatic

Fish
Sea-monsters
Other sea-gods
Pontos
Oceanos & Tethys (Titans)
Foster-parents of Hera
World-encircling river
Parents of rivers & springs
Parents of Oceanids (daughters of Oceanos)
Roman mosaic from Gaziantep, Turkey
1st/2nd c. C.E.
Zeugma Mosaic Museum

Old Men of the Sea

Nereus
Proteus
Phorkys
Nereids (daughters of
Nereus)

Thetis
Amphitrite
Thetis and the Nereids with the arms of Achilles

was Getty 86.AE.611, late 5th c. B.C.E.

Prophetis Ilias, above Cape Caphereus (source: www.southevia.gr)

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The Sea
Economic importance
Fishing
Traveling
Trading

Minoan stirrup-jar
Palaikastro, Crete, c. 1500 B.C.E.
Archeological Museum, Herakleion

The Sea
Love-hate relationship
Great goods, great
evils

Two-faced

Mount Ochi, Cape Caphereus (source: www.southevia.gr)

The Sea
Shape-changing
Rebirth and purification
Deification

Sea-storms
Mystery