With the rediscovery of
classical antiquity
Classical antiquity (also the classical era, classical period or classical age) is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD centred on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ...
in the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...
, the poetry of
Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
became a major influence on the imagination of poets and artists, and remained a fundamental influence on the diffusion and perception of
classical mythology
Classical mythology, Greco-Roman mythology, or Greek and Roman mythology is both the body of and the study of myths from the ancient Greeks and ancient Romans as they are used or transformed by cultural reception. Along with philosophy and poli ...
through subsequent centuries.
* L. Burn, ''Greek Myths'', 75 From the early years of the Renaissance, artists portrayed subjects from
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
and
Roman mythology
Roman mythology is the body of myths of ancient Rome as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans. One of a wide variety of genres of Roman folklore, ''Roman mythology'' may also refer to the modern study of these representa ...
alongside more conventional Christian themes. Among the best-known subjects of Italian artists are
Botticelli's ''
Birth of Venus
''The Birth of Venus'' ( it, Nascita di Venere ) is a painting by the Italian artist Sandro Botticelli, probably executed in the mid 1480s. It depicts the goddess Venus arriving at the shore after her birth, when she had emerged from the sea ...
'' and ''
Pallas and the Centaur'', the
''Ledas'' of
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
and
Michelangelo, and
Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael (; or ; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of composition, and visual a ...
's ''
Galatea
Galatea is an ancient Greek name meaning "she who is milk-white".
Galatea, Galathea or Gallathea may refer to:
In mythology
* Galatea (Greek myth), three different mythological figures
In the arts
* ''Aci, Galatea e Polifemo'', cantata by H ...
''.
Through the medium of
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
and the works of Ovid, Greek myth influenced medieval and Renaissance poets such as
Petrarch
Francesco Petrarca (; 20 July 1304 – 18/19 July 1374), commonly anglicized as Petrarch (), was a scholar and poet of early Renaissance Italy, and one of the earliest humanists.
Petrarch's rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited ...
,
Boccaccio
Giovanni Boccaccio (, , ; 16 June 1313 – 21 December 1375) was an Italian writer, poet, correspondent of Petrarch, and an important Renaissance humanist. Born in the town of Certaldo, he became so well known as a writer that he was some ...
and
Dante
Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian people, Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', origin ...
in
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
.
In northern Europe, Greek mythology never took the same hold of the visual arts, but its effect was very obvious on literature. Both Latin and Greek classical texts were translated, so that stories of mythology became available. In England,
Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for '' The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He w ...
, the
Elizabethans and
John Milton were among those influenced by Greek myths; nearly all the major English poets from
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...
to
Robert Bridges
Robert Seymour Bridges (23 October 1844 – 21 April 1930) was an English poet who was Poet Laureate from 1913 to 1930. A doctor by training, he achieved literary fame only late in life. His poems reflect a deep Christian faith, and he is ...
turned for inspiration to Greek mythology.
Jean Racine
Jean-Baptiste Racine ( , ) (; 22 December 163921 April 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western traditi ...
in
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
and
Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as tr ...
in
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
revived Greek drama.
Racine reworked the ancient myths – including those of
Phaedra
Phaedra may refer to:
Mythology
* Phaedra (mythology), Cretan princess, daughter of Minos and Pasiphaë, wife of Theseus
Arts and entertainment
* ''Phaedra'' (Alexandre Cabanel), an 1880 painting
Film
* ''Phaedra'' (film), a 1962 film by ...
,
Andromache
In Greek mythology, Andromache (; grc, Ἀνδρομάχη, ) was the wife of Hector, daughter of Eetion, and sister to Podes. She was born and raised in the city of Cilician Thebe, over which her father ruled. The name means 'man battler ...
,
Oedipus and
Iphigeneia
In Greek mythology, Iphigenia (; grc, Ἰφιγένεια, , ) was a daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra, and thus a princess of Mycenae.
In the story, Agamemnon offends the goddess Artemis on his way to the Trojan War by hunting ...
– to new purpose.
[L. Burn, ''Greek Myths'', 75]
In the 18th century, the philosophical revolution of the
Enlightenment spread throughout Europe. It was accompanied by a certain reaction against Greek myth; there was a tendency to insist on the scientific and philosophical achievements of Greece and Rome. The myths, however, continued to provide an important source of raw material for dramatists, including those who wrote the
libretti
A libretto (Italian for "booklet") is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major l ...
for
Handel's operas ''
Admeto
' ("Admetus, King of Thessaly", HWV 22) is a three-act opera written for the Royal Academy of Music with music composed by George Frideric Handel to an Italian-language libretto prepared by Nicola Francesco Haym. The story is partly based on Eu ...
'' and ''
Semele
Semele (; Ancient Greek: Σεμέλη ), in Greek mythology, was the youngest daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia, and the mother of Dionysus by Zeus in one of his many origin myths.
Certain elements of the cult of Dionysus and Semele came from ...
'',
Mozart's ''
Idomeneo
' (Italian for '' Idomeneus, King of Crete, or, Ilia and Idamante''; usually referred to simply as ''Idomeneo'', K. 366) is an Italian language opera seria by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto was adapted by Giambattista Varesco from a Frenc ...
'', and
Gluck
Christoph Willibald (Ritter von) Gluck (; 2 July 1714 – 15 November 1787) was a composer of Italian and French opera in the early classical period. Born in the Upper Palatinate and raised in Bohemia, both part of the Holy Roman Empire, he g ...
's ''
Iphigénie en Aulide
''Iphigénie en Aulide'' ('' Iphigeneia in Aulis'') is an opera in three acts by Christoph Willibald Gluck, the first work he wrote for the Paris stage. The libretto was written by François-Louis Gand Le Bland Du Roullet and was based on Jean ...
''.
By the end of the century,
Romanticism
Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...
initiated a surge of enthusiasm for all things Greek, including Greek mythology. In Britain, it was a great period for new translations of Greek tragedies and
Homer
Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the ...
's works, and these in turn inspired contemporary poets, such as
Keats
John Keats (31 October 1795 – 23 February 1821) was an English poet of the second generation of Romantic poets, with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. His poems had been in publication for less than four years when he died of tuberculos ...
,
Byron
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the ...
, and
Shelley.
[L. Burn, ''Greek Myths'', 75–76] The
Hellenism of
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previo ...
's
poet laureate
A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch ...
,
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his ...
, was such that even his portraits of the quintessentially English court of
King Arthur are suffused with echoes of the Homeric epics. The visual arts kept pace, stimulated by the purchase of the
Parthenon marbles
The Elgin Marbles (), also known as the Parthenon Marbles ( el, Γλυπτά του Παρθενώνα, lit. "sculptures of the Parthenon"), are a collection of Classical Greek marble sculptures made under the supervision of the architect and sc ...
in 1816; many of the "Greek" paintings of
Lord Leighton
Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton, (3 December 1830 – 25 January 1896), known as Sir Frederic Leighton between 1878 and 1896, was a British painter, draughtsman, and sculptor. His works depicted historical, biblical, and classical subje ...
and
Lawrence Alma-Tadema
Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, (; born Lourens Alma Tadema ; 8 January 1836 – 25 June 1912) was a Dutch painter who later settled in the United Kingdom becoming the last officially recognised denizen in 1873. Born in Dronryp, the Netherlands, ...
were seriously accepted as part of the transmission of the Hellenic ideal.
[L. Burn, ''Greek Myths'', 76]
American authors of the 19th century, such as
Thomas Bulfinch
Thomas Bulfinch (July 15, 1796 – May 27, 1867) was an American author born in Newton, Massachusetts, known best for ''Bulfinch's Mythology'', a posthumous combination of his three volumes of mythologies.
Life
Bulfinch belonged to a well-educat ...
and
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was an American novelist and short story writer. His works often focus on history, morality, and religion.
He was born in 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, from a family long associated with that t ...
, believed that myths should provide pleasure, and held that the study of the classical myths was essential to the understanding of English and American literature.
[Klatt-Brazouski, ''Ancient Greek and Roman Mythology'', 4] According to Bulfinch, "The so-called divinities of Olympus have not a single worshipper among living men. They belong now not to the department of theology, but to those of literature and taste."
[T. Bulfinch (1855)]
''The Age of Fable: Or, Stories of Gods and Heroes''
p.11. Sanborn, Carter, and Bazin. In more recent times, classical themes have been reinterpreted by such major dramatists as
Jean Anouilh
Jean Marie Lucien Pierre Anouilh (; 23 June 1910 – 3 October 1987) was a French dramatist whose career spanned five decades. Though his work ranged from high drama to absurdist farce, Anouilh is best known for his 1944 play ''Antigone'', an a ...
,
Jean Cocteau
Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau (, , ; 5 July 1889 – 11 October 1963) was a French poet, playwright, novelist, designer, filmmaker, visual artist and critic. He was one of the foremost creatives of the s ...
, and
Jean Giraudoux
Hippolyte Jean Giraudoux (; 29 October 1882 – 31 January 1944) was a French novelist, essayist, diplomat and playwright. He is considered among the most important French dramatists of the period between World War I and World War II.
His wo ...
in France,
Eugene O'Neill
Eugene Gladstone O'Neill (October 16, 1888 – November 27, 1953) was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Nobel Prize in Literature, literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into the U.S. the drama tech ...
in America, and
T. S. Eliot in England, and by great novelists such as the Irish
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...
and the French
André Gide
André Paul Guillaume Gide (; 22 November 1869 – 19 February 1951) was a French author and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature (in 1947). Gide's career ranged from its beginnings in the symbolist movement, to the advent of anticolonialism ...
.
Richard Strauss,
Jacques Offenbach
Jacques Offenbach (, also , , ; 20 June 18195 October 1880) was a German-born French composer, cellist and impresario of the Romantic period. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s to the 1870s, and his uncompleted opera ' ...
and many others have set Greek mythological themes to music.
See also
*
Greek mythology in popular culture
Elements of Greek mythology appear many times in culture, including pop culture. The Greek myths spread beyond the Hellenistic world when adopted (for example) into the culture of ancient Rome, and Western cultural movements have frequently i ...
References
{{Reflist
External links
Classical Mythology in European Art teaching resource on mythology in art
Kravchenko, Anastasiia. Mythological subjects in Francisco Goya's work. 2019Book for teaching mythology in art.
Mythology
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narra ...
Art history
Classical antiquity in modern art and culture
Classical mythology in art
Classical mythology in popular culture