Why centaurs were created

He was the son of Philyra and the Titan god, Cronus and he married the nymph Chariklo. Chiron resided in the forests of Mt. Chiron was responsible for Achilles adolescent education, and Achilles was gifted a formidable Pelian ash spear from his tutor which he used during the Trojan war. Chiron was known for not indulging in drinking, having superior knowledge to his brethren and having a different lineage than the other centaurs. Centaurs permeate Greek myths and can be found throughout epic sagas and Greek stories.

In one instance a tribe dwelling in the western Peloponnese came into conflict with the hero Hercules; where the centaur Pholos hosted Hercules while he was hunting for the giant boar, one of his required labours. Attracted by the smell of the wine Pholos and Hercules were drinking, other centaurs interrupted the festivities and eventually, spurred on by intoxication attacked Hercules.

In the mayhem, Hercules accidentally poisoned Chiron with a poisoned arrow and Pholos was killed after accidentally dropping one on his foot. While immortal the poison caused Chiron terrible pain and when Hercules asked for the freedom of Prometheus from Zeus he had to make a trade.

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Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. Centaurs are not the only composite creatures in Greek art. Satyrs, Gorgons, Sphinxes, and so many more were too composite creatures; part human, part animal. Like almost every other civilization, the Greeks had their own mythology, which incorporated elements beyond the real world.

Through fantasy, the Greeks attempted to understand and explain the natural world by exploring and going beyond its limits. Before the Greek world had emerged, images of composite centaur-like creatures were already a thing.

There is at least one image of a centaur from Bronze Age Ugarit. However, the certainty that this was actually the image of a centaur has been debated. During the Greek Dark Ages , the period that followed the collapse of Bronze Age civilization, these composite creatures mysteriously disappeared until they returned during the Greek Geometric Period.

It is at that time half-man and half-horse creatures like the one in the image above made their appearance.

A shared attribute of all composite creatures in Greek art was that their images were under constant experimentation until approximately the 6 th century BCE. We can find centaurs with human legs, Gorgon centaurs, sphinxes with equestrian legs, and depictions of Typhon as a centaur during this period.

Although centaurs are a par excellence Greek inspiration, this does not mean that their iconography cannot be traced back to other mythologies and cultures. The Greeks were not isolated from the rest of the world.

Around Greece, there were mighty kingdoms with rich histories and mythologies. Egypt and the Kingdoms of the near and middle East influenced the Greeks in every aspect, from architecture and art to religion. It is no coincidence that Archaic Art includes an orientalizing period. By the time Homer had written his epics, the Aegean had already seen war, trade, and immigration to the point that the images and the stories of the east were accessible to the Greeks.

The Greeks, of course, were not passive receivers but active ones. Composite beasts like the sphinx or the chimera were lent from Eastern civilizations, sometimes with some small changes and other times with no changes at all.

Furthermore, Eastern beasts like the human-lion and the human-bull present many visual similarities with centaurs. In an Assyrian cylinder seal of the 13 th century BCE, we can clearly see a man with wings, the body of a horse, and the tail of a scorpion. This idiosyncratic winged horseman holds a bow. Another early depiction of a centaur in eastern art comes from another Assyrian cylinder seal also of the 13 th century BCE.

The figure was also holding a bow, an image that became a canon during the next centuries and was crystallized in the image of the Sagittarius. Except for these Assyrian seals, the roots of the centaur can be traced back to the Mesopotamian Urmahlullu, an idiosyncratic type of lion-centaur.

Of course, there are also other beings that have human and animal bodies but nothing like the centaur as it appeared in Greek Art and Mythology. Another very interesting comparison can be made with the Indian male spirits called Gandharva, which often take the form of creatures that have the head of a horse and the body of a man.

Could these beings be related to centaurs as part of a common Indo-European heritage? The most probable answer is no. It is very unlikely that there is a true connection with the Gandharva, even though the idea is very appealing.

A good case for supporting a Mycenean descendance of the centaur are two clay Mycenaean figurines found in Ugarit , although we cannot be certain that they truly were centaurs. Since Ugarit was a major trade hub in the area of Syria, it not weird that Mycenean objects were found there. Actually, the Myceneans were in constant communication through trade, war, and travel with the peoples around them.

Something similar happened when the Aztecs, who had never seen a horse before, saw Conquistadores riding for the first time. There, according to a story, they had picked up a fight with Hercules, who managed to repulse them with his bow and arrows. Other centaurs were also said to have resided in Crete and Cyprus. The most famous story involving centaurs in Greek Mythology is the famous Centauromachy , the battle between Centaurs and the Lapiths.

According to this story, Peirithous, the king of the Lapiths, invited the centaurs to his marriage with Hippodameia. The centaurs were known savages, but Peirithous invited them on the grounds of their common ancestry as both the Lapiths and the centaurs descended from Ixion.

Everything was going great and the centaurs appeared to be behaving, but then wine began being served. At that point, one of the centaurs named Eurytion got drank almost instantly and attempted to run away with the bride. The other centaurs, suddenly in a drunken frenzy, also attempted to force themselves on the female guests. The Lapiths could not sit in front of this violent outbreak and within moments were drawing their swords, spears, and fighting with everything they had.

The legendary hero Theseus who also happened to be invited to the wedding, played a major part in the battle, helping the Lapiths win and successfully repulse the centaurs who were thus driven off Thessaly. The frieze features a series of scenes from the battle between the Lapiths and the centaurs in striking poses.

Many have tried to explain why the Athenians of the 5 th century chose to depict this theme on the south metopes of the Parthenon frieze. However, scholars have seen further layers of meaning in these depictions. A common and widely accepted explanation is that the centauromachy symbolized the struggle of the city of Athens against the Persians. For the Greeks, the Persians were barbarians who did not control their impulses.

They were drawn to excessity just as the centaurs were barbaric savage creatures unable to control their worst impulses. Furthermore, the Persians had sacked Athens in BCE showing disrespect towards the city the same way that the centaurs had disrespected the wedding of Peirithous and Hippodameia. Nevertheless, the Centauromachy as a theme was extremely common. One could find a centauromachy at the temple of Zeus in Olympia , the temple of Apollo at Bassae , and the temple of Hephaestus in the Athenian Agora , amongst others.

Lucretius, the first-century Epicurean philosopher, wrote a poem arguing against the existence of centaurs. His main argument was that it would be paradoxical for a half man and half horse creature to exist.

Because humans and horses reach their prime at a different age. Horses reach their prime at the age of three, but humans are still infants at that age. That also means that when the horse part of the centaur is getting old and closer to dying, the human part is just beginning its journey in life. As such, Lucretius concludes that:. The Greek painter Zeuxis was famous for his life-like paintings. However, one of his most famous works was not praised for its technique but its theme.

That painting was called the Hippocentaur and it depicted a family of centaurs. This theme was so novel that everyone stood in awe in front of the painting, impressed by this depiction that did not present the centaurs as mere savages but humanized them for the first time. The Roman writer Lucian provided a detailed description of the painting. In the center stood a female centaur nursing a pair of infant centaurs, and in the background, a male centaur — the father held a lion in his right hand to terrify his children as a joke.

This centaur family with a compassionate mother, playful children, and a caring father was a radically new conceptualization for the time. Since then, women centaurs, called Centauridai, became commonplace in Greco-Roman art.