Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Figures
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Spelling and Orthography
- 1 Introduction: Encountering the Sphinx
- 2 ‘Welcome to Athens’: Theories of Hybridity
- 3 Hybrids around the Corrupting Sea
- 4 Hybrids, Contact Zones and Margins
- 5 Heads or Tails: Gorgons, Satyrs and Other Composites
- 6 Centaurs and Other Horses
- 7 Snakes and the Perils of Autochthony
- 8 Hermaphrodites and Other Bodies
- 9 Adynata, Ethnography and Paradox
- 10 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Index
6 - Centaurs and Other Horses
Published online by Cambridge University Press: aN Invalid Date NaN
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Figures
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Spelling and Orthography
- 1 Introduction: Encountering the Sphinx
- 2 ‘Welcome to Athens’: Theories of Hybridity
- 3 Hybrids around the Corrupting Sea
- 4 Hybrids, Contact Zones and Margins
- 5 Heads or Tails: Gorgons, Satyrs and Other Composites
- 6 Centaurs and Other Horses
- 7 Snakes and the Perils of Autochthony
- 8 Hermaphrodites and Other Bodies
- 9 Adynata, Ethnography and Paradox
- 10 Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Horse hybrids reveal a wide range of meanings. Since riding requires control of an animal much more powerful than the rider, it was a psychologically charged experience that found expression in hybrid figures of riders fused to their horses. Pegasos, the horse with wings, is the hero Bellerophon’s companion and makes it possible for him to slay another hybrid, Chimaira. The best-known horse hybrid is the centaur, but centaurs come in different varieties. Some are human to their toes, with a horse’s rear end jutting out of the middle of the creature’s human back. Others exhibit a human head and torso rising from the horse’s withers. Since the centaur is frequently used as a symbol of unrestrained lust, the change in form forces the viewer to consider uncomfortable questions regarding sexuality and animality. Yet centaurs are more than the embodiment of rampant sex drives, since the opposite of licentious behaviour is embodied by another centaur: Cheiron, the tutor of heroes. The centaur expresses the kaleidoscopic nature of being and identity in the Archaic Greek world.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Centaurs and Snake-KingsHybrids and the Greek Imagination, pp. 171 - 201Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024