 The blinded Polyphemus seeks vengeance on Odysseus:Guido Reni's painting in theCapitoline Museums | |
| Creature information | |
|---|---|
| Grouping | Cyclopes |
| Family | Poseidon (father) Thoosa (mother) |
| Folklore | Greek mythology |
| Origin | |
| Region | Sicily |
Polyphemus (/ˌpɒliˈfiːməs/ ⓘ;Ancient Greek:Πολύφημος,romanized: Polyphēmos,Epic Greek:[polypʰɛːmos];Latin:Polyphēmus[pɔlʏˈpʰeːmʊs]) is the one-eyed giant son ofPoseidon andThoosa inGreek mythology, one of theCyclopes described inHomer'sOdyssey. His name means "abounding in songs and legends", "many-voiced" or "very famous".[1] Polyphemus first appeared as a savage man-eating giant in the ninth book of theOdyssey. Thesatyr playCyclops byEuripides is dependent on this episode apart from one detail: Polyphemus is made apederast in the play. Later Classical writers presented him in their poems as heterosexual and linked his name with the nymphGalatea. Often he was portrayed as unsuccessful in these, and as unaware of his disproportionate size and musical failings.[2] In the work of even later authors, however, he is presented as both a successful lover and skilled musician. From theRenaissance on, art and literature reflect all of these interpretations of the giant.
In Homer's epic,Odysseus lands on the island of the Cyclopes during his journey home from theTrojan War and, together with some of his men, enters a cave filled with provisions. When the giant Polyphemus returns home with his flocks, he blocks the entrance with a great stone and, scorning theusual custom ofhospitality, eats two of the men. Next morning, the giant kills and eats two more and leaves the cave to graze his sheep.
After the giant returns in the evening and eats two more of the men, Odysseus offers Polyphemus some strong and undiluted wine given to him earlier on his journey. Drunk and unwary, the giant asks Odysseus his name, promising him aguest-gift if he answers. Odysseus tells him "Οὖτις", which means "nobody"[3][4] and Polyphemus promises to eat this "Nobody" last of all. With that, he falls into a drunken sleep. Odysseus takes a wooden stake he had earlier hardened in the fire, returns it to the fire until it is glowing hot, and drives it into Polyphemus's eye. When Polyphemus shouts for help from his fellow giants, saying that "Nobody" has hurt him, they think Polyphemus is being afflicted by divine power and recommend prayer as the answer.
In the morning, the blind Cyclops lets the sheep out to graze, feeling their backs to ensure that the men are not escaping. However, Odysseus and his men have tied themselves to the undersides of the animals and so get away. As he sails off with his men, Odysseus boastfully reveals his real name, an act ofhubris that was to cause problems for him later. Polyphemus prays to his father,Poseidon, for revenge and casts huge rocks towards the ship, which Odysseus barely escapes.
The story reappears in later Classical literature. InCyclops, the 5th-century BC play byEuripides, a chorus of satyrs offers comic relief from the grisly story of how Polyphemus is punished for his impious behaviour in not respecting the rites of hospitality.[5] In this play, Polyphemus claims to be apederast, revealing to Odysseus that he takes more pleasure in boys than in women, and tries to take thesatyrSilenus, whom he kept together with his sons as slaves onMount Etna inSicily, calling him "myGanymede".[6] The scene is infused with low comedy, specifically from the chorus, and Polyphemus is made to look silly: he is drunk when he explains his sexual desire, Silenus is too old to play the part of the young lover, and he himself will be subjected to penetration—with the wooden spike.[7]
In his Latin epic,Virgil describes howAeneas observes blind Polyphemus as he leads his flocks down to the sea. They have encounteredAchaemenides, who re-tells the story of how Odysseus and his men escaped, leaving him behind. The giant is described as descending to the shore, using a "lopped pine tree" as a walking staff. Once Polyphemus reaches the sea, he washes his oozing, bloody eye socket and groans painfully. Achaemenides is taken aboard Aeneas's vessel and they cast off with Polyphemus in chase. His great roar of frustration brings the rest of the Cyclopes down to the shore as Aeneas draws away in fear.[8]
The blinding of Polyphemus and the ruse by which Odysseus and his men escaped his cave are the only two scenes from the Odyssey shown on vases surviving from the seventh century BC (later pottery shows a much wider variety of scenes from the Odyssey).[9] One such episode, on a vase featuring the hero carried beneath a sheep, was used on a 27 drachma Greek postage stamp in 1983.[10]
The blinding was depicted in life-size sculpture, including a giant Polyphemus, in theSperlonga sculptures probably made for the EmperorTiberius. This may be an interpretation of an existing composition, and was apparently repeated in variations in later Imperial palaces byClaudius,Nero and atHadrian's Villa.[11]
Of the European painters of the subject, the FlemishJacob Jordaens depicted Odysseus escaping from the cave of Polyphemus in 1635 (see gallerybelow) and others chose the dramatic scene of the giant casting boulders at the escaping ship. InGuido Reni's painting of 1639/40 (see above), the furious giant is tugging a boulder from the cliff as Odysseus and his men row out to the ship far below. Polyphemus is portrayed, as it often happens, with two empty eye sockets and his damaged eye located in the middle on his forehead. This convention goes back to Greek statuary and painting,[12] and is reproduced inJohann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein's 1802 head and shoulders portrait of the giant (seebelow).
Arnold Böcklin pictures the giant as standing on rocks onshore and swinging one of them back as the men row desperately over a surging wave (seebelow), while Polyphemus is standing at the top of a cliff inJean-Léon Gérôme's painting of 1902. He stands poised, having already thrown one stone, which barely misses the ship. The reason for his rage is depicted inJ. M. W. Turner's painting,Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus (1829). Here the ship sails forward as the sun breaks free of clouds low on the horizon. The giant himself is an indistinct shape barely distinguished from the woods and smoky atmosphere high above.
Folktales similar to that of Homer's Polyphemus are a widespread phenomenon throughout the ancient world.[13] In 1857,Wilhelm Grimm collected versions inSerbian,Romanian,Estonian,Finnish,Russian,German, and others; versions inBasque,Sámi,Lithuanian,Gascon,Syriac, andCeltic are also known.[14] More than two hundred different versions have been identified,[13] from around twenty five nations, covering a geographic region extending from Iceland, Ireland, England, Portugal and Africa to Arabia, Turkey, Russia, and Korea.[15][nb 1] The consensus of current modern scholarship is that these "Polyphemus legends" preserve traditions predating Homer.[17][18][19][20][21][22]
Writing more than three centuries after theOdyssey is thought to have been composed,Philoxenus of Cythera took up the myth of Polyphemus in his poemCyclops orGalatea. The poem was written to be performed as adithyramb, of which only fragments have survived, and was perhaps the first to provide a female love interest for the Cyclops.[nb 2] The object of Polyphemus's romantic desire is a sea nymph namedGalatea.[24] In the poem, Polyphemus is not a cave dwelling, monstrous brute, as in theOdyssey, but instead he is rather like Odysseus himself in his vision of the world: He has weaknesses, he is adept at literary criticism, and he understands people.[25]
The date of composition for theCyclops is not precisely known, but it must be prior to 388 BC, whenAristophanes parodied it in his comedyPlutus (Wealth); and probably after 406 BC, whenDionysius I became tyrant ofSyracuse.[26][27] Philoxenus lived in that city and was the court poet of Dionysius I.[28] According to ancient commentators, either because of his frankness regarding Dionysius's poetry, or because of a conflict with the tyrant over a femaleaulos player named Galatea, Philoxenus was imprisoned in the quarries and had there composed hisCyclops in the manner of aRoman à clef, where the poem's characters, Polyphemus, Odysseus and Galatea, were meant to represent Dionysius, Philoxenus, and the aulos-player.[29][30] Philoxenus had his Polyphemus perform on thecithara, a professionallyre requiring great skill. The Cyclops playing such a sophisticated and fashionable instrument would have been quite a surprising juxtaposition for Philoxenus's audience.
Philoxenus'sCyclops is also referred to inAristotle'sPoetics in a section that discusses representations of people in tragedy and comedy, citing as comedic examples theCyclops of bothTimotheus and Philoxenus.[31][32][33]
The text of Aristophanes's last extant playPlutus (Wealth) has survived with almost all of its choral odes missing.[34] What remains shows Aristophanes (as he does to some extent in all his plays) parodying a contemporary literary work — in this case Philoxenus'sCyclops.[34][35][27] While making fun of literary aspects of Philoxenus's dithyramb, Aristophanes is at the same time commenting on musical developments occurring in the fourth century BC, developing themes that run through the whole play.[36] It also contains lines and phrases taken directly from theCyclops.[37]
The slave Cario, tells the chorus that his master has brought home with him the god Wealth, and because of this they will all now be rich. The chorus wants to dance for joy,[38] so Cario takes the lead by parodying Philoxenus'sCyclops.[39][40] As a solo performer leading a chorus that sings and dances, Cario recreates the form of a dithyramb. He first casts himself in the role of Polyphemus while assigning to the chorus the roles of sheep and goats, at the same time imitating the sound of a lyre: "And now I wish — threttanello! — to imitate the Cyclops and, swinging my feet to and fro like this, to lead you in the dance. But come on, children, shout and shout again the songs of bleating sheep and smelly goats."[33][41] The chorus, however, does not want to play sheep and goats, they would rather be Odysseus and his men, and they threaten to blind Cario (as had Odysseus the drunken Cyclops) with a wooden stake.[36]
The romantic element, originated by Philoxenus, was revived by later Hellenistic poets, includingTheocritus,Callimachus,Hermesianax,[42] andBion of Smyrna.[43]
Theocritus is credited with creating the genre ofpastoral poetry.[44] His works are titledIdylls and of theseIdyll XI tells the story of the Cyclops' love for Galatea.[45] Though the character of Polyphemus derives from Homer, there are notable differences. Where Homer's Cyclops was beastly and wicked, Theocritus's is absurd, lovesick and comic. Polyphemus loves the sea nymph Galatea, but she rejects him because of his ugliness.[46][47] However, in a borrowing from Philoxenus's poem, Polyphemus has discovered that music will heal lovesickness,[48] and so he plays thepanpipes and sings of his woes, for "I am skilled in piping as no other Cyclops here".[49] His longing is to overcome the antithetic elements that divide them, he of earth and she of water:[49]
Ah me, would that my mother at my birth had given me gills, That so I might have dived down to your side and kissed your hand, If your lips you would not let me...
The love of the mismatched pair was later taken up by other pastoral poets. The same trope of music being the cure for love was introduced by Callimachus in his Epigram 47: "How excellent was the charm that Polyphemus discovered for the lover. By Earth, the Cyclops was no fool!"[50] A fragment of a lost idyll by Bion also portrays Polyphemus declaring his undying love for Galatea.[51] Referring back to this, an elegy on Bion's death that was once attributed toMoschus takes the theme further in a piece ofhyperbole. Where Polyphemus had failed, the poet declares, Bion's greater artistry had won Galatea's heart, drawing her from the sea to tend his herds.[52] This reflected the situation inIdyll VI of Theocritus. There two herdsmen engage in a musical competition, one of them playing the part of Polyphemus, who asserts that since he has adopted the ruse of ignoring Galatea, she has now become the one who pursues him.[53]
The successful outcome of Polyphemus's love was also alluded to in the course of a 1st-century BC love elegy on the power of music by the Latin poetPropertius. Listed among the examples he mentions is that "Even Galatea, it's true, below wild Etna, wheeled her brine-wet horses, Polyphemus, to your songs."[54] The division of contrary elements between the land-based monster and the sea nymph, lamented in Theocritus's Idyll 11, is brought into harmony by this means.
WhileOvid's treatment of the story that he introduced into theMetamorphoses[55] is reliant on the idylls of Theocritus,[nb 3] it is complicated by the introduction of Acis, who has now become the focus of Galatea's love.
While I pursued him with a constant love,
the Cyclops followed me as constantly.
And, should you ask me, I could not declare
whether my hatred of him, or my love
of Acis was the stronger. —They were equal.[1]
There is also a reversion to the Homeric vision of the hulking monster, whose attempt to play the tender shepherd singing love songs is made a source of humour by Galatea:
Now, Polyphemus, wretched Cyclops, you
are careful of appearance, and you try
the art of pleasing. You have even combed
your stiffened hair with rakes: it pleases you
to trim your shaggy beard with a reaping hook.[58]
In his own character, too, Polyphemus mentions the transgression of heavenly laws that once characterised his actions and is now overcome by Galatea: "I, who scorn Jove and his heaven and his piercing lightning bolt, submit to you alone."[59]
Galatea listens to the love song of Polyphemus while she and Acis lie hidden by a rock.[60] In his song, Polyphemus scolds her for not loving him in return, offers her rustic gifts and points out what he considers his best feature — the single eye that is, he boasts, the size of a great shield.[61] But when Polyphemus discovers the hiding place of the lovers, he becomes enraged with jealousy. Galatea, terrified, dives into the ocean, while the Cyclops wrenches off a piece of the mountain and crushes Acis with it.[62] But on her return, Galatea changes her dead lover into the spirit of the Sicilian river Acis.[63]
That the story sometimes had a more successful outcome for Polyphemus is also attested in the arts. In one of the murals rescued from the site ofPompeii, Polyphemus is pictured seated on a rock with acithara (rather than a syrinx) by his side, holding out a hand to receive a love letter from Galatea, which is carried by a wingedCupid riding on a dolphin.
In another fresco, also dating from the 1st century AD, the two stand locked in a naked embrace (seebelow). From their union came the ancestors of various wild and war-like races. According to some accounts, theCelts (Galati in Latin, Γάλλοi in Greek) were descended from their son Galatos,[64] whileAppian credited them with three children,Celtus,Illyrius andGalas, from whom descend theCelts, theIllyrians and theGauls respectively.[65]
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There are indications that Polyphemus's courtship also had a more successful outcome in one of the dialogues ofLucian of Samosata. There Doris, one of Galatea's sisters, spitefully congratulates her on her love conquest and she defends Polyphemus. From the conversation, one understands that Doris is chiefly jealous that her sister has a lover. Galatea admits that she does not love Polyphemus but is pleased to have been chosen by him in preference to all her companions.[66]
That their conjunction was fruitful is also implied in a later Greek epic from the turn of the 5th century AD. In the course of hisDionysiaca,Nonnus gives an account of the wedding ofPoseidon and Beroe, at which theNereid "Galatea twangled a marriage dance and restlessly twirled in capering step, and she sang the marriage verses, for she had learnt well how to sing, being taught by Polyphemos with a shepherd'ssyrinx."[67]
DuringRenaissance andBaroque times Ovid's story emerged again as a popular theme. In SpainLuis de Góngora y Argote wrote the much admired narrative poem,Fábula dePolifemo y Galatea, published in 1627. It is particularly noted for its depiction of landscape and for the sensual description of the love of Acis and Galatea.[68] It was written in homage to an earlier and rather shorter narrative with the same title by Luis Carillo y Sotomayor (1611).[nb 4] The story was also given operatic treatment in the very popularzarzuela ofAntoni Lliteres Carrió (1708). The atmosphere here is lighter and enlivened by the inclusion of the clowns Momo and Tisbe.
In France the story was condensed to the fourteen lines ofTristan L'Hermite's sonnet "Polyphème en furie" (1641). In it the giant expresses his fury upon viewing the loving couple, ultimately throwing the huge rock that kills Acis and even injures Galatea.[69] Later in the century,Jean-Baptiste Lully composed his operaAcis et Galatée (1686) on the theme.[nb 5]
In ItalyGiovanni Bononcini composed the one-act operaPolifemo (1703). Shortly afterwardsGeorge Frideric Handel worked in that country and composed the cantataAci, Galatea e Polifemo (1708), laying as much emphasis on the part of Polifemo as on the lovers. Written in Italian, Polifemo's deep bass solo "Fra l'ombre e gl'orrori" (From horrid shades) establishes his character from the start. After Handel's move to England, he gave the story a new treatment in hispastoral operaAcis and Galatea with an English libretto provided byJohn Gay.[nb 6] Initially composed in 1718, the work went through many revisions and was later to be given updated orchestrations by bothMozart andMendelssohn.[71] As a pastoral work it is suffused with Theocritan atmosphere but largely centres on the two lovers. When Polyphemus declares his love in the lyric "O ruddier than the cherry", the effect is almost comic.[72][nb 7] Handel's rival for a while on the London scene,Nicola Porpora, also made the story the subject of his operaPolifemo (1735).
Later in the centuryJoseph Haydn composedAcide e Galatea (1763) as his first opera while in Vienna.[nb 8] Designed for an imperial wedding, it was given a happy ending centred on the transformation scene after the murder of Acis as the pair declare their undying love.[73]Johann Gottlieb Naumann was to turn the story into a comic opera,Aci e Galatea, with the subtitlei ciclopi amanti (the amorous cyclops). The work was first performed in Dresden in 1801 and its plot was made more complicated by giving Polifemo a companion, Orgonte. There were also two other lovers, Dorinda and Lisia, with Orgonte Lisia's rival for Dorinda's love.[74][nb 9]
After John Gay's libretto in Britain, it was not until the 19th century that the subject was given further poetical treatment. In 1819 appearedThe Death of Acis byBryan Procter, writing under the name of Barry Cornwall.[75] A blank verse narrative with lyric episodes, it celebrates the musicianship of Polyphemus, which draws the lovers to expose themselves from their hiding place in a cave and thus brings about the death of Acis. At the other end of the century, there wasAlfred Austin's dramatic poem "Polyphemus", which is set after the murder and transformation of the herdsman. The giant is tortured by hearing the happy voices of Galatea and Acis as they pursue their love duet.[76] Shortly afterwardsAlbert Samain wrote the 2-act verse dramaPolyphème with the additional character of Lycas, Galatea's younger brother. In this the giant is humanised; sparing the lovers when he discovers them, he blinds himself and wades to his death in the sea. The play was first performed posthumously in 1904 with incidental music by Raymond Bonheur.[77] On this the French composerJean Cras based his operatic 'lyric tragedy'Polyphème, composed in 1914 and first performed in 1922. Cras took Samain's text almost unchanged, subdividing the play's two acts into four and cutting a few lines from Polyphemus's final speech.[77]
There have also been two Spanish musical items that reference Polyphemus's name.Reginald Smith Brindle's four fragments for guitar,El Polifemo de Oro (1956), takes its title fromFederico García Lorca's poem, "The riddle of the guitar". That speaks of six dancing maidens (the guitar strings) entranced by 'a golden Polyphemus' (the one-eyed sound-hole).[78] The Spanish composer Andres Valero Castells takes the inspiration for hisPolifemo i Galatea from Gongora's work. Originally written for brass band in 2001, he rescored it for orchestra in 2006.[79]
Paintings that include Polyphemus in the story of Acis and Galatea can be grouped according to their themes. Most notably the story takes place within a pastoral landscape in which the figures are almost incidental. This is particularly so inNicolas Poussin's 1649 "Landscape with Polyphemus" (see gallerybelow) in which the lovers play a minor part in the foreground.[80] To the right, Polyphemus merges with a distant mountain top on which he plays his pipes. In an earlier painting by Poussin from 1630 (now housed at theDublin National Gallery) the couple are among several embracing figures in the foreground, shielded from view of Polyphemus, who is playing his flute higher up the slope. Another variation on the theme was painted byPietro Dandini during this period.
An earlier fresco byGiulio Romano from 1528 seats Polyphemus against a rocky foreground with a lyre in his raised right hand. The lovers can just be viewed through a gap in the rock that gives onto the sea at the lower right.Corneille Van Clève (1681) represents a seated Polyphemus in his sculpture, except that in his version it is pipes that the giant holds in his lowered hand. Otherwise he has a massive club held across his body and turns to the left to look over his shoulder.
Other paintings take up the Theocritan theme of the pair divided by the elements with which they are identified, land and water. There are a series of paintings, often titled "The Triumph of Galatea", in which the nymph is carried through the sea by her Nereid sisters, while a minor figure of Polyphemus serenades her from the land. Typical examples of this were painted byFrançois Perrier,Giovanni Lanfranco andJean-Baptiste van Loo.
A whole series of paintings byGustave Moreau make the same point in a variety of subtle ways.[81] The giant spies on Galatea through the wall of a sea grotto or emerges from a cliff to adore her sleeping figure (seebelow). Again, Polyphemus merges with the cliff where he meditates in the same way that Galatea merges with her element within the grotto in the painting at Musée d'Orsay. The visionary interpretation of the story also finds its echo inOdilon Redon's 1913 paintingThe Cyclops in which the giant towers over the slope on which Galatea sleeps.[82]
French sculptors have also been responsible for some memorable versions.Auguste Ottin's separate figures are brought together in an 1866 fountain in theLuxembourg Garden. Above is crouched the figure of Polyphemus in weathered bronze, peering down at the white marble group of Acis and Galatea embracing below (see above). A little laterAuguste Rodin made a series of statues, centred on Polyphemus. Originally modelled in clay around 1888 and later cast in bronze, they may have been inspired by Ottin's work.[83]
A final theme is the rage that succeeds the moment of discovery. That is portrayed in earlier paintings of Polyphemus casting a rock at the fleeing lovers, such as those byAnnibale Carracci, Lucas Auger andCarle van Loo.Jean-François de Troy's 18th-century version combines discovery with aftermath as the giant perched above the lovers turns to wrench up a rock.
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Polyphemus is mentioned in the "Apprentice" chapter ofAlbert Pike'sMorals and Dogma (1871), as, within Scottish Rite Freemasonry, Polyphemus is regarded as a symbol for a civilization that harms itself using ill directed blind force.[84]
ThePolyphemus moth is so named because of the large eyespots in the middle of the hind wings.[85]
A species of burrowing tortoise,Gopherus polyphemus, is named after Polyphemus because of their both using subterranean retreats.[86]
Infolkloristics, the episode of the blinding of Polyphemus is also known asPolyphemsage and classified in theAarne-Thompson-Uther Index as ATU 1137, "The Ogre Blinded (Polyphemus)".[87]
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Specific artworks discussed above
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