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Hercules Timeline Project

The Great Hercules

The Heracles of Euripides

Citations

Hercules

Heracles as written by Euripides is a tragedy from 1416 BCE (Euripides). The tragedy focuses on the return of Hercules from his twelfth labor to his home in Thebes. After being away from his family for many years and accomplishing the most difficult tasks of the twelve labors he comes home to a desperate situation in which he doesn't need to kill a beast but instead a king that wants Hercules' family dead (Euripides). Being the hero that Hercules is he of course saved his family, but shortly after he fell into complete madness and murdered his children, wife, and nearly his father. Waking from his madness he faces the harsh reality that he massacred his own family and falls into a depression, wishing to commit suicide (Euripides).

Throughout this tragedy the audience is exposed to multiple sides

of the great hero Hercules. He evolves from an heroic demi-god ready to see his family, to a warrior fighting a tyrant, to a madman murdering his loved ones, to a depressed and mentally beat human wanting to rid of the pain. Hercules is portrayed as a very complex being that has both tragic flaws and heroic qualities.

Somewhere along Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's action movies he played the role of Hercules in the movie Hercules. This film doesn't focus the twelve labors or defeating the titans that many of the other Hercules stories do. Instead it focuses on his life as a mercenary and fighting for local kings that want him dead. This film is unclear whether or not Hercules is actually a god or if he is just a strong man. Their portrayal shows Hercules' life as a mercenary that has worked for kings and defeated beasts, but he hasn't done it alone. He is the leader of a small group that goes on these missions together. One member of the group is a storyteller that exaggerates the stories of their adventures so that they can make more money and gain more influence over the people and their enemies. In this film they spent most of the time fighting for a king that helped to kill his wife and children because the king felt that Hercules was becoming to powerful. The change of a king killing Hercules' family takes away a key part of the relationship with Hera. This makes the audience believe that he may not be an actual god because of how little interaction Hercules has with the gods. I believe that Paramount decided to portray Hercules this way to make him seem as human and realistic as possible. They did this by focusing not on mystical beasts and gods, but instead kings and their armies. This may have been a decision to try and get the viewers to relate to Hercules as much as possible and feel his pain in his loss to his family.

This engraving by Hendrick Goltzius is known for its extreme portrayal of Hercules. Commonly known as the Bulbous man, this engraving shows a massive portayal of Hercules in which he has excessive amounts of muscles all over his body. Hercules is featured in the engraving three times; all of which he is shown as extremely muscular. This engraving shows the raw and unforgiving strength that Hercules posseses as you see him killing two creatures in the background. The engraving was made in the Netherlands during the Dutch rebellion against Spain and was meant to represent the Dutch nation as a whole (Goltzius). This is not a common portrayal of Hercules and this is because it was made during the mannerism movement. The mannerism movement "launched a highly imaginative period in art following the climax of perfection that naturalistic painting had reached in Renaissance Italy" (Seiferle). A key design feature in the movement was to make the body parts seem realistic, this was clearly accomplished by Goltzius (Seiferle). Goltzius combined the two large movements going on at one time into his engraving that left the viewers more than likely feeling scared and astounded by the strength of Hercules.

2018

1416 BCE

1997

1589

1534

Disney's Hercules

Hercules and Cacus

Introduction

Conclusion

Hercules is by far one of the most famous ancient Greek figures, all the way from Ancient Greece to the current day. His myth is the epitome of trials and success in adventure. Hercules was born into a hectic life with an angry godess plotting his demise, in Hera. Half god and half human, Hercules was able to handle most of what was thrown at him by the goddess, but not all went in his favor. Hercules' life seemed to be cursed by extreme ups and downs which caused him to be one of the most memorable Greek heroes. Hercules' life served as an example for all as to what a person can overcome in his life but to remind us that even a demi-god will have extremely difficult trials.

The sculpture on the left is of Hercules and the fire breathing Cacus. The myth of Hercules and Cacus tells that Cacus steals Hercules' oxen and takes it back to his cave. Hercules realizing this goes into the cave unconcerned and kills Cacus despite his fire breathing (Bandinelli). The myth shows the complete power and confidence that Hercules has. He does not hesitate going up against this monster and handles it quite well. This sculpture by Bandinelli portrays Hercules in the same confidence that that the myth tells of. Hercules' positioning over Cacus shows that he is dominant because he is standing over him. He seems unconcerned that he has a fire breathing man right below him while he looks off into the distance.

The sculture itself was finished in 1534 and was comissioned as a compliment to Michaelangeno's David. The positioning of Hercules' feet and head are very similar to David's. Michaelangelo was originally supposed to sculpt this piece but it was transferred to Bandinelli when the Medici family returned to power. The confidence and power that Hercules possesses in this sculpture represents the unruly power that the Medici family had over Italy. Hercules was the perfect choice if you want to pick a figure that was clearly the strongest creature on the planet. He utterly destroyed all of his opponents and this is what the Medici wanted to portray themselves as.

The Walt Disney version of Hercules is different in many ways than the other portrayals in history, mostly due to the fact that this story was meant to be for children. In this cartoon version we see a much more vulnerable and kinder portrayal of the myth completely. The main difference is the relationship between Hercules and Hera. The actual myth tells that Hera is out to kill Hercules because he is not her son, but Zeus's (Hercules). In the majority of the other versions Hera is out to kill Hercules. Since the audience for Disney movies is children, they decided to not put in the vile things that Hera forces Hercules to do. The idea of Hades, the god of the underworld, being the villain is much easier for children to understand. Hades continually throws monsters at a young Hercules trying to find his weakness as Hercules becomes more confident in his strength. There are some similarities as we see Hercules fall in love with a woman that could ultimately lead to his downfall. Overall, in this film Hercules is portrayed as a young impressionable hero that wants to prove to the gods, himself, Meg, and the people of Greece that he is worthy of being a god. He conquers monsters, falls in love, and becomes a god just as one would predict from a Disney movie; but remember it was meant to be for children.

Since the myth of Hercules has so many different adventures and side stories to tell, the myths have been retold countless amounts of times in countless amounts of ways. The myth is so vast that there is room for as many portrayals as you can think of. The five examples that I chose for this project each focus on different aspects of the myth of Hercules. The tragedy by Euripides focuses on the complexity of the hero, the statue exemplifies the confidence and power of Hercules, the engraving shows off the raw strength he possessed, Disney displayed the courage and heart of the demi-god, and Paramount explained that Hercules had to live in reality every now and then. Each author of each portrayal took the pieces and qualities of Hercules that they needed in order to tell their version of the story for a new audience to see.

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