Herakles and Hercules: Exploring a Graeco-Roman Divinity

265 Pages·2005·10.372 MB·English

by  Louis Rawlings, Hugh Bowden, Mick Rawlings (editor)

Herakles and Hercules

HERAKLES
and
HERCULES
Exploring
A Graeco-Roman Divinity
Editors
Louis Rawlings

and
Hugh Bowden
Contributors
Hugh Bowden, Guy Bradley, Susan Deacy,
Olivier Hekster, Michael Jameson, Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones,
Ann M. Nicgorski, Eleanor Regina OKell, Louis Rawlings,
Roger Rees, Emma Stafford
The Classical Press of Wales
First published in 2005 by
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IsBn 1–905125–05-4
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Printed and bound in the uk by Gomer Press, llandysul, ceredigion, Wales
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More recently it has published work initiated by scholars internationally . While retaining a special
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cOnTenTs
Page
Introduction Hugh Bowden and Louis Rawlings vii
Part I. Herakles
1. Herakles, Herodotos and the Persian Wars 1
Hugh Bowden (king’s college, london)
2. The family of Herakles in attika 15
† Michael Jameson (stanford university)
3. Herakles and his ‘girl’: athena, heroism and beyond 37
Susan Deacy (roehampton university)
4. Herakles re-dressed: gender, clothing and the construction
of a Greek hero 51
Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones (university of edinburgh)
5. Vice or virtue? Herakles and the art of allegory 71
Emma Stafford (university of leeds)
6. The magic knot of Herakles, the propaganda of
alexander the Great and Tomb II at Vergina 97
Ann M. Nicgorski (Willamette university, Oregon)
Part II. Hercules
7. aspects of the cult of Hercules in central Italy 129
Guy Bradley (cardiff university)
8. Hannibal and Hercules 153
Louis Rawlings (cardiff university)
v
Contents
9. Hercules Furens and nero: the didactic purpose of
senecan tragedy 185
Eleanor Regina OKell (nottingham)
10. Propagating power: Hercules as an example for second-century
emperors 205
Olivier Hekster (radboud university, nijmegen)
11. The emperors’ new names: diocletian Jovius and Maximian
Herculius 223
Roger Rees (university of edinburgh)
Index 241
vi
InTrOducTIOn
Hugh Bowden and Louis Rawlings
This collection had its origins in a conference on Herakles-Hercules in
the Ancient World, held at the university of cardiff in september 1998.
The contributors are a group of scholars whose research does not focus
primarily on the figure of Herakles (or Hercules), but who have found that
the hero (or god) cannot be ignored in their work. The papers cover a wide
chronological span and a wide geographical area, reflecting the ubiquity of
Herakles-Hercules in the Mediterranean world from an early period, and
the enduring power of the myths and ideas associated with him.
To paint the background to the chapters we need to start by going back
to the eighth century bc, with the beginnings of settlement throughout
the Mediterranean by Phoenicians and Greeks. The Phoenicians took
with them the cult of the god Melqart from Tyre, and temples were estab-
lished as far west as cadiz.1 at the same time, Greek settlers were creating
communities in southern Italy and sicily, and it is clear that there was
considerable intercourse between Greeks and Phoenicians, demonstrable
for example in what appears to be a common settlement at Pithekoussai,
and most famously in the adoption of a version of the Phoenician alphabet
for writing Greek.2 By way of the Greeks the alphabet was then adopted
in Italy. Melqart was identified by the Greeks with Herakles. Herodotos
describes the temple at Tyre, which he claims to be a temple of Herakles
(2.43–4, quoted in chapter 1). already in the archaic period stories about
Herakles had him travelling across the whole Mediterranean basin: his
search for the apples of the Hesperides and his theft of the cattle of Geryon
are both associated with the far west.3 Whether it was the presence of
cult-sites of Melqart that led to Greek stories locating Herakles there, or
whether the stories about Herakles aided the identification with Melqart, is
less important than the fact that from an early period the figure of Herakles
was recognized as having an importance beyond the world of the Greeks.4
Wherever Greeks and Phoenicians travelled or settled, indigenous divinities
also became identified with Herakles and Melqart. In Italy, for instance,
Hercules’ presence can be detected in the early religion of rome and the
etruscan cities but, as Bradley argues, we have to be very careful when
vii
Introduction
trying to establish what Herakles-Hercules might have meant to people in
such communities, or in less urbanized areas like umbria and samnium.
His paper nevertheless shows that Hercules was an important recipient
of cult in Italy from at least the sixth century bc. In later centuries, as
rawlings shows, the figure of Melqart-Herakles-Hercules could be used by
more than one side in conflicts within the Mediterranean: both Hannibal
Barca and scipio africanus were seen as his protégés, and Hannibal in
particular, moving between the Punic, Hellenistic Greek and roman
worlds, found him a figure that could be understood wherever he went.
When Greek communities dealt with Herakles, they recognized him as
someone who had once been part of their world, and in many ways still
was. Jameson shows that, in attika, the cults of relatives and associates
of Herakles were an acknowledgement of athenian involvement in his
family’s history, and Bowden indicates how Herakles’ past actions and his
present power could be understood by Herodotos and others to play a role
in recent history. This kind of interpretation, as rawlings points out, could
be rejected by some Greeks, such as Polybius, but it nevertheless remained
popular with others, and with roman writers such as silius Italicus, who
used it in his reading of the Hannibalic War. But Herakles-Hercules had
a much wider range of meanings to the Greeks and romans. His labours,
carried out while he was in servitude to eurystheus, are first mentioned
in the Iliad (19.132–3). Thus from as far back as we can trace, Herakles
was presented as a hero who had to endure hardship and injustice, and did
so nobly.5 at the same time he could also be a dangerous and destructive
figure (e.g. Hom. Il. 11.690–3; 14.250–1). How the athenians represented
this complexity is the subject of deacy’s paper, and llewellyn-Jones’ paper
is a warning against trying to read too much into some of these represen-
tations. On the other hand, stafford explores ways in which the patient,
suffering Herakles came to be used as a model for virtuous behaviour. His
complicated character nevertheless made him an attractive figure ‘to think
with’ for many different groups in a wide variety of religious, cultural
and political contexts. His appearances on the athenian dramatic stage,
in attic vase painting – much of which appears to have been exported to
Italy – or his representation in the form of cheap lead figurines dedicated
and deposited in appennine sanctuaries, or on the coinages of Greek
and Italian communities, are testament to his cross-cultural popularity,
accessibility, and malleability.
The pivotal moment in the story of Herakles is the career of alexander
the Great. For the first time we have a man who is willing to identify
himself with the hero, and indeed to try to emulate and surpass his
deeds.6 Quite how much the rivalry between alexander and Herakles
viii
Introduction
is the creation of later historians rather than a part of alexander’s own
mission is not clear, but it is certain that alexander did make considerable
use of Heraklean iconography, the subject of nicgorski’s paper. In doing
so, alexander created a pattern which subsequent rulers were happy to
follow. Herakles was a traveller, a conqueror and a founder of cities, and
all of these things alexander imitated. But as nicgorski also points out,
he had other associations with more down-to-earth areas of life, not least
agriculture, and these too were available to the monarch who styled himself
after the hero.
alexander’s association with Herakles was imitated by Hannibal, but it
is with the roman emperors that we see the identification most thoroughly
explored. Both ‘bad’ emperors like nero, domitian and commodus, and
‘good’ emperors like Trajan, Hadrian and antoninus Pius could find aspects
of the hero to advertise. Okell shows how the virtuous stoic Hercules,
the figure stafford explores, could be held up by seneca as a model for
his charge, nero, while that emperor had other, perhaps more exciting,
Herculeses to choose if he wished. Hekster suggests that for domitian and
commodus, and certainly for their detractors, it was Hercules the slayer of
wild beasts and lawless men that provided a role-model, while for Trajan
and Hadrian, Hercules was a general and a traveller, not to mention a hero
associated with Hadrian’s home province of Baetica.7 It was in a similar
spirit in the third century ad that Postumus, in his breakaway Gallic
empire, placed representations of Hercules and his labours on his coinage.
rees discusses this development and then what might be seen as the final
classical reinvention of Hercules. The adoption of the signum Herculius
by Maximian, to accompany diocletian’s Jovius, was a way of symbolizing
the relationship between the two augusti – Maximian was diocletian’s
adoptive son and co-labourer in the task of bringing order to the world.
But in the language of panegyric the distinction between emperor and hero
is effectively elided away: Maximian is not simply imitating Hercules, he is
Hercules. all the deeds of the hero celebrated over the previous thousand
years are to be taken as belonging to Maximian himself.
From the discussions in this volume it becomes clear that Herakles-
Hercules was a figure who gave strength to a host of individuals and
groups in antiquity. They constructed identities from their association
with the hero and drew meaning from his mythical exploits. In turn they
contributed greatly to the enrichment of his mythology and, above all, to
the abiding appeal of this Greco-roman divinity.
during the final stages of the preparation for publication, Michael
Jameson passed away. This volume is respectfully dedicated to his
memory.
ix