Medusa

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medusa 

 

Medusa
Classical Greek depiction of Medusa from the fourth century BC
Personal information
Parents	Phorcys and Ceto
Siblings	The Hesperides, Sthenno, Euryale, The Graea, Thoosa, Scylla, and Ladon
Children	Pegasus and Chrysaor

In Greek mythology, Medusa (/mɪˈdjuːzə, -sə/; Μέδουσα "guardian, protectress") also called Gorgo, was one of the three monstrous Gorgons, generally described as winged human females with living venomous snakes in place of hair. It is in the Roman poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses that her story is most deeply elaborated. She was lovely, according to the poem—until she was raped in Athena’s temple by Poseidon. Athena then punished her for this violation, by turning her into the monstrous, stony-glanced creature that we know. Thus those who gazed into her eyes would turn to stone. Most sources describe her as the daughter of Phorcys and Ceto, although the author Hyginus makes her the daughter of Gorgon and Ceto. According to Hesiod and Aeschylus, she lived and died on an island named Sarpedon, somewhere near Cisthene. The 2nd-century BC novelist Dionysios Skytobrachion puts her somewhere in Libya, where Herodotus had said the Berbers originated her myth, as part of their religion. She remained a priestess to Athena after her death and was risen with fresh hair.

Medusa was raped by Poseidon then beheaded by the hero Perseus, who thereafter used her head, which retained its ability to turn onlookers to stone, as a weapon until he gave it to the goddess Athena to place on her shield. In classical antiquity the image of the head of Medusa appeared in the evil-averting device known as the Gorgoneion.

Classical mythology

An archaic Medusa wearing the belt of the intertwined snakes, a fertility symbol, as depicted on the west pediment of the Temple of Artemis

The three Gorgon sisters—Medusa, Stheno, and Euryale—were all children of the ancient marine deities Phorcys (or "Phorkys") and his sister Ceto (or "Keto"), chthonic monsters from an archaic world. Their genealogy is shared with other sisters, the Graeae, as in Aeschylus's Prometheus Bound, which places both trinities of sisters far off "on Kisthene's dreadful plain":

Near them their sisters three, the Gorgons, winged
With snakes for hair—hatred of mortal man—

A medieval Byzantine depiction of Medusa from the Basilica Cistern.

While ancient Greek vase-painters and relief carvers imagined Medusa and her sisters as having monstrous form, sculptors and vase-painters of the fifth century began to envisage her as being beautiful as well as terrifying. In an ode written in 490 BC Pindar already speaks of "fair-cheeked Medusa".

In a late version of the Medusa myth, related by the Roman poet Ovid (Metamorphoses 4.770), Medusa was originally a ravishingly beautiful maiden, "the jealous aspiration of many suitors," but because Poseidon raped Medusa in Athena's temple, Athena transformed Medusa's beautiful hair to serpents and made her face so terrible to behold that the mere sight of it would turn onlookers to stone. In Ovid's telling, Perseus describes Medusa's punishment by Minerva (Athena) as just and well earned.

Coins of the reign of Seleucus I Nicator of Syria (312–280 BC)

In most versions of the story, she was beheaded by the hero Perseus, who was sent to fetch her head by King Polydectes of Seriphus because Polydectes wanted to marry Perseus's mother. The gods were well aware of this, and Perseus received help. He received a mirrored shield from Athena, gold, winged sandals from Hermes, a sword from Hephaestus and Hades's helm of invisibility. Since Medusa was the only one of the three Gorgons who was mortal, Perseus was able to slay her while looking at the reflection from the mirrored shield he received from Athena. During that time, Medusa was pregnant by Poseidon. When Perseus beheaded her, Pegasus, a winged horse, and Chrysaor, a giant wielding a golden sword, sprang from her body.

Jane Ellen Harrison argues that "her potency only begins when her head is severed, and that potency resides in the head; she is in a word a mask with a body later appended... the basis of the Gorgoneion is a cultus object, a ritual mask misunderstood."

In the Odyssey xi, Homer does not specifically mention the Gorgon Medusa:

Lest for my daring Persephone the dread,
From Hades should send up an awful monster's grisly head.

The Medusa's head central to a mosaic floor in a tepidarium of the Roman era. Museum of Sousse, Tunisia

Harrison's translation states "the Gorgon was made out of the terror, not the terror out of the Gorgon."

According to Ovid, in northwest Africa, Perseus flew past the Titan Atlas, who stood holding the sky aloft, and transformed him into stone when he tried to attack him. In a similar manner, the corals of the Red Sea were said to have been formed of Medusa's blood spilled onto seaweed when Perseus laid down the petrifying head beside the shore during his short stay in Ethiopia where he saved and wed his future wife, the lovely princess Andromeda who was the most beautiful woman in the world at that time. Furthermore, the poisonous vipers of the Sahara, in the Argonautica 4.1515, Ovid's Metamorphoses 4.770 and Lucan's Pharsalia 9.820, were said to have grown from spilt drops of her blood. The blood of Medusa also spawned the Amphisbaena (a horned dragon-like creature with a snake-headed tail).

Perseus then flew to Seriphos, where his mother was being forced into marriage with the king, Polydectes, who was turned into stone by the head. Then Perseus gave the Gorgon's head to Athena, who placed it on her shield, the Aegis.

Some classical references refer to three Gorgons; Harrison considered that the tripling of Medusa into a trio of sisters was a secondary feature in the myth:

The triple form is not primitive, it is merely an instance of a general tendency... which makes of each woman goddess a trinity, which has given us the Horae, the Charites, the Semnai, and a host of other triple groups. It is immediately obvious that the Gorgons are not really three but one + two. The two unslain sisters are mere appendages due to custom; the real Gorgon is Medusa.

Modern interpretations

A Roman cameo of the 2nd or 3rd century

Historical

A number of early classics scholars interpreted the myth of Medusa as a quasi-historical – "based on or reconstructed from an event, custom, style, etc., in the past", or "sublimated" memory of an actual invasion.

According to Joseph Campbell:

The legend of Perseus beheading Medusa means, specifically, that "the Hellenes overran the goddess's chief shrines" and "stripped her priestesses of their Gorgon masks", the latter being apotropaic faces worn to frighten away the profane. That is to say, there occurred in the early thirteenth century B.C. an actual historic rupture, a sort of sociological trauma, which has been registered in this myth, much as what Freud terms the latent content of a neurosis is registered in the manifest content of a dream: registered yet hidden, registered in the unconscious yet unknown or misconstrued by the conscious mind.

Psychoanalysis

Medusa by Arnold Böcklin, circa 1878

In 1940, Sigmund Freud's "Das Medusenhaupt (Medusa's Head)" was published posthumously. In Freud's interpretation: "To decapitate = to castrate. The terror of Medusa is thus a terror of castration that is linked to the sight of something. Numerous analyses have made us familiar with the occasion for this: it occurs when a boy, who has hitherto been unwilling to believe the threat of castration, catches sight of the female genitals, probably those of an adult, surrounded by hair, and essentially those of his mother." In this perspective the "ravishingly beautiful" Medusa (see above) is the mother remembered in innocence; before the mythic truth of castration dawns on the subject. Classic Medusa, in contrast, is an Oedipal/libidinous symptom. Looking at forbidden mother (in her hair-covered genitals, so to speak) stiffens the subject in illicit desire and freezes him in terror of the Father's retribution. There are no recorded instances of Medusa turning a woman to stone.

Archetypal literary criticism continues to find psychoanalysis useful. Beth Seelig analyzes Medusa's punishment from the aspect of the crime of having been raped rather than having willingly consented in Athena's temple as an outcome of the goddess' unresolved conflicts with her own father, Zeus.

Feminism

#Me(dusa)too, oil on canvas, Judy Takács, 2018

In the 20th century, feminists reassessed Medusa's appearances in literature and in modern culture, including the use of Medusa as a logo by fashion company Versace. The name "Medusa" itself is often used in ways not directly connected to the mythological figure but to suggest the gorgon's abilities or to connote malevolence; despite her origins as a beauty, the name in common usage "came to mean monster." The book Female Rage: Unlocking Its Secrets, Claiming Its Power by Mary Valentis and Anne Devane notes that "When we asked women what female rage looks like to them, it was always Medusa, the snaky-haired monster of myth, who came to mind ... In one interview after another we were told that Medusa is 'the most horrific woman in the world' ... [though] none of the women we interviewed could remember the details of the myth."

Medusa's visage has since been adopted by many women as a symbol of female rage; one of the first publications to express this idea was a feminist journal called Women: A Journal of Liberation in their issue one, volume six for 1978. The cover featured the image of the Gorgon Medusa by Froggi Lupton, which the editors on the inside cover explained "can be a map to guide us through our terrors, through the depths of our anger into the sources of our power as women."

In issue three, Fall 1986 for the magazine Woman of Power an article called Gorgons: A Face for Contemporary Women's Rage, appeared, written by Emily Erwin Culpepper, who wrote that "The Amazon Gorgon face is female fury personified. The Gorgon/Medusa image has been rapidly adopted by large numbers of feminists who recognize her as one face of our own rage." Griselda Pollock analyses the passage from horrorism to compassion in the figure of the Medusa through Adriana Cavarero's philosophy and Bracha Ettinger's art and Matrixial theory.

Elana Dykewomon's 1976 collection of lesbian stories and poems, They Will Know Me by My Teeth, features a drawing of a Gorgon on its cover. Its purpose was to act as a guardian for female power, keeping the book solely in the hands of women. Stephen Wilk, author of Medusa: Solving the Mystery of the Gorgon, questioned Medusa's enduring status among the feminist movement. He believes that one reason for her longevity may be her role as a protector, fearsome and enraged. "Only the Gorgon has the savage, threatening appearance to serve as an immediately recognized symbol of rage and a protector of women's secrets," wrote Wilk.

Even in contemporary pop culture, Medusa has become largely synonymous with feminine rage. Through many of her iterations, Medusa pushes back against a story that seeks to place the male, Perseus, at its center, blameless and heroic. Author Sibylle Baumbach described Medusa as a “multimodal image of intoxication, petrifaction, and luring attractiveness," citing her seductive contemporary representation, as well as her dimensionality, as the reason for her longevity. Elizabeth Johnston's November 2016 Atlantic essay called Medusa the original 'Nasty Woman.' Johnston goes on to say that as Medusa has been repeatedly compared to Clinton during the 2016 presidential election, she proves her merit as an icon, finding relevance even in modern politics. "Medusa has since haunted Western imagination, materializing whenever male authority feels threatened by female agency," writes Johnston. Beyond that, Medusa's story is, Johnston argues, a rape narrative. A story of victim blaming, one that she says sounds all too familiar in a current American context.

Medusa is widely known as a monstrous creature with snakes in her hair whose gaze turns men to stone. Through the lens of theology, film, art, and feminist literature, my students and I map how her meaning has shifted over time and across cultures. In so doing, we unravel a familiar narrative thread: In Western culture, strong women have historically been imagined as threats requiring male conquest and control, and Medusa herself has long been the go-to figure for those seeking to demonize female authority.

— Elizabeth Johnston, The Original ‘Nasty Woman’

The Medusa story has also been interpreted in contemporary art as a classic case of rape-victim blaming, by the Goddess Athena. Inspired by the #metoo movement, contemporary figurative artist Judy Takács returns Medusa's beauty along with a hashtag stigmata in her portrait, #Me(dusa)too.

Feminist theorist Hélène Cixous famously tackled the myth in her essay "The Laugh of the Medusa." She argues that men's retelling of the narrative turned Medusa into a monster because they feared female desire. "The Laugh of the Medusa" is largely a call to arms, urging women to reclaim their identity through writing as she rejects the patriarchal society of Western culture. Cixous calls writing "an act which will not only 'realize' the decensored relation of woman to her sexuality, to her womanly being, giving her access to her native strength; it will give her back her goods, her pleasures, her organs, her immense bodily territories which have been kept under seal." She claims "we must kill the false woman who is preventing the live one from breathing. Inscribe the breath of the whole woman." Cixous wants to destroy the phallogocentric system, and to empower women's bodies and language. "You only have to look at the Medusa straight on to see her," writes Cixous. "And she's not deadly. She's beautiful and she's laughing."

Nihilism

An embossed plaque in the Art Nouveau style from 1911

Medusa has sometimes appeared as representing notions of scientific determinism and nihilism, especially in contrast with romantic idealism. In this interpretation of Medusa, attempts to avoid looking into her eyes represent avoiding the ostensibly depressing reality that the universe is meaningless. Jack London uses Medusa in this way in his novel The Mutiny of the Elsinore:

I cannot help remembering a remark of De Casseres. It was over the wine in Mouquin's. Said he: "The profoundest instinct in man is to war against the truth; that is, against the Real. He shuns facts from his infancy. His life is a perpetual evasion. Miracle, chimera and to-morrow keep him alive. He lives on fiction and myth. It is the Lie that makes him free. Animals alone are given the privilege of lifting the veil of Isis; men dare not. The animal, awake, has no fictional escape from the Real because he has no imagination. Man, awake, is compelled to seek a perpetual escape into Hope, Belief, Fable, Art, God, Socialism, Immortality, Alcohol, Love. From Medusa-Truth he makes an appeal to Maya-Lie."

— Jack London, The Mutiny of the Elsinore

Art

Perseus with the head of Medusa, Benvenuto Cellini (1554)

 

Medusa, by Caravaggio (1595)

Medusa has been depicted in several works of art, including:

• Perseus beheading the sleeping Medusa, obverse of a terracotta pelike (jar) attributed to Polygnotos (vase painter) (c. 450 - 440 BC), collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
• Medusa on the breastplate of Alexander the Great, as depicted in the Alexander Mosaic from Pompeii's House of the Faun (c. 200 BC)
• Medusa column bases of Basilica Cistern in Constantinople.
• The "Rondanini Medusa", a Roman copy of the Gorgoneion on the aegis of Athena; later used as a model for the Gorgon's head in Antonio Canova's marble Perseus with the Head of Medusa (1798–1801)
• Medusa (oil on canvas) by Leonardo da Vinci
• Perseus with the Head of Medusa (bronze sculpture) by Benvenuto Cellini (1554)
• Perseus and Medusa – bronze statue by Hubert Gerhard (c. 1590)
• Medusa (oil on canvas) by Caravaggio (1597)
• Head of Medusa, by Peter Paul Rubens (1618)
• Medusa (marble bust) by Gianlorenzo Bernini (1630s)
• Medusa is played by a countertenor in Jean-Baptiste Lully and Philippe Quinault's opera, Persée (1682). She sings the aria "J'ay perdu la beauté qui me rendit si vaine" ("I have lost the beauty that made me so vain").
• Perseus Turning Phineus and his Followers to Stone (oil on canvas) by Luca Giordano (early 1680s).
• Perseus with the Head of Medusa (marble sculpture) by Antonio Canova (1801)
• Medusa (1854), marble sculpture by Harriet Hosmer, collection of the Detroit Institute of Art
• Medusa (oil on canvas) by Arnold Böcklin (c. 1878)
• Perseus (bronze sculpture) by Salvador Dalí
• Medusa sculpture by Luciano Garbati, which portrays her clutching the severed head of Perseus (2008) 

Medusa remained a common theme in art in the nineteenth century, when her myth was retold in Thomas Bulfinch's Mythology. Edward Burne-Jones' Perseus Cycle of paintings and a drawing by Aubrey Beardsley gave way to the twentieth century works of Paul Klee, John Singer Sargent, Pablo Picasso, Pierre et Gilles, and Auguste Rodin's bronze sculpture The Gates of Hell.

Film

The most influential depiction of Medusa in film is arguably the stop motion animation created by Ray Harryhausen for Clash of the Titans (1981). As well has having snakes for hair, she was given a serpent-like body and rattlesnake-like tail. The model was one Harryhausen’s most complex and in 2020 it was voted third favourite among his many creations.

Flags and emblems

The head of Medusa is featured on some regional symbols. One example is that of the flag and emblem of Sicily, together with the three legged trinacria. The inclusion of Medusa in the center implies the protection of the goddess Athena, who wore the Gorgon's likeness on her aegis, as said above. Another example is the coat of arms of Dohalice village in the Czech Republic.

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  Municipal coat of arms of Dohalice village, Hradec Králové District, Czech Republic

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  Flag of Sicily

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  Ceremonial French military uniform belt of World War I

Arachne

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arachne 

 

Minerva and Arachne, René-Antoine Houasse, 1706

Arachne (/əˈrækniː/; from Ancient Greek: ᾰ̓ρᾰ́χνη, romanized: arákhnē, lit. 'spider', cognate with Latin araneus) is the protagonist of a tale in Roman mythology known primarily from the version told by the Roman poet Ovid (43 BCE–17 CE), which is the earliest extant source for the story. In Book Six of his epic poem Metamorphoses, Ovid recounts how the talented mortal Arachne, daughter of Idmon, challenged Athena, goddess of wisdom and crafts, to a weaving contest. When Athena could find no flaws in the tapestry Arachne had woven for the contest, the goddess became enraged and beat the girl with her shuttle. After Arachne hanged herself out of shame, she was transformed into a spider. The myth both provides an aetiology of spiders' web-spinning abilities and is a cautionary tale warning mortals not to place themselves on an equal level with the gods.

Biography

According to the myth as recounted by Ovid, Arachne was a Lydian maiden who was the daughter of Idmon of Colophon, who was a famous dyer in purple. She was credited to have invented linen cloth and nets while her son Closter introduced the use of spindle in the manufacture of wool. She was said to have been a native of Hypæpæ, near Colophon in Asia Minor.

Mythology

Athena and Arachne (Antonio Tempesta)

In Metamorphoses the Roman poet Ovid writes that Arachne was a shepherd's daughter who began weaving at an early age. She became a great weaver, boasted that her skill was greater than Athena's, and refused to acknowledge that her skill came, at least in part, from the goddess. Athena took offense and set up a contest between them. Presenting herself as an old lady, she approached the boasting girl and warned: "You can never compare to any of the gods. Plead for forgiveness and Athena might spare your soul."

"Ha! I only speak the truth and if Athena thinks otherwise then let her come down and challenge me herself," Arachne replied. Athena removed her disguise and appeared in shimmering glory, clad in a sparkling white chiton. The two began weaving straight away. Athena's weaving represented four separate contests between mortals and the gods in which the gods punished mortals for setting themselves as equals of the gods. Arachne's weaving depicted ways that the gods, particularly Zeus, had misled and abused mortals, tricking and seducing many women. When Athena saw that Arachne had not only insulted the gods but done so with a work far more beautiful than Athena's own, she was enraged. She ripped Arachne's work to shreds and hit her on the head three times. Terrified and ashamed, Arachne hanged herself. Then Athena said, "Live on then, and yet hang, condemned one, but, lest you are careless in the future, this same condition is declared, in punishment, against your descendants, to the last generation!" After saying this she sprinkled her with the juice of Hecate's herb, and immediately at the touch of this dark poison, Arachne's hair fell out. With it went her nose and ears, her head shrank to the smallest size, and her whole body became tiny. Her slender fingers stuck to her sides as legs, the rest is belly, from which she still spins a thread, and, as a spider, weaves her ancient web."

The myth of Arachne can also be seen as an attempt to show relation between art and tyrannical power in Ovid's time. He wrote under the emperor Augustus and was exiled by him. At the time weaving was a common metaphor for poetry, therefore Arachne's artistry and Athena's censorship to it may offer a provocative allegory of the writer's role under an autocratic regime.

Influence

The Spinners, or, The Fable of Arachne (1644–48) by Velázquez

The taxonomical class name Arachnida and the name for spiders in many romance languages are both derived from arachne.

The metamorphosis of Arachne in Ovid's telling furnished material for an episode in Edmund Spenser's mock-heroic Muiopotmos, 257–352. Spenser's adaptation, which "rereads an Ovidian story in terms of the Elizabethan world" is designed to provide a rationale for the hatred of Arachne's descendant Aragnoll for the butterfly-hero Clarion.

Dante Alighieri uses Arachne in Canto XVII of Inferno, the first part of The Divine Comedy, to describe the horrible monster Geryon. "His back and all his belly and both flanks were painted arabesques and curlicues: the Turks and Tartars never made a fabric with richer colors intricately woven, nor were such complex webs spun by Arachne."

The tale of Arachne inspired one of Velázquez' most factual paintings: Las Hilanderas ("The Spinners, or The fable of Arachne", in the Prado), in which the painter represents the two important moments of the myth. In the front, the contest of Arachne and the goddess (the young and the old weaver), in the back, an Abduction of Europa that is a copy of Titian's version (or maybe of Rubens' copy of Titian). In front of it appears Minerva (Athena) at the moment she punishes Arachne. It transforms the myth into a reflection about creation and imitation, god and man, master and pupil (and therefore about the nature of art).

It has also been suggested that Jeremias Gotthelf's nineteenth century novella, The Black Spider, was heavily influenced by the Arachne story from Ovid's Metamorphoses. In the novella, a woman is turned into a venomous spider having reneged on a deal with the devil.

In popular culture

Pendule with Arachne and Athena in Meissen porcelain, attributed to Johann Gottlieb Kirchner and George Fritzsche (1727)

 

Arachne, Predator and Prey, oil on canvas, Judy Takacs, 2019

Arachne has had a considerable degree of influence on modern popular culture. She frequently appears in modern fantasy books, movies, and television series in the form of a monstrous spider. In Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, she is pictured as a grotesque, half-woman, half-spider monster who nests on people to produce killer spiders. She is the central character in the 2011 novel The Spider Goddess by Tara Moss. In Class of the Titans, Arachne is changed into a giant spider and makes a deal with Cronus to become human again. Cronus does not hold up the end of his bargain though and betrays her after getting her to trap the heroes for him. After being berated by Atlanta, Athena turns Arachne back into a human, and she is allowed to live at the Olympus High School, weaving for the gods.

In the 13th episode from season 6 of Supernatural, "Unforgiven", the monster of the week is an Arachne, depicted as a humanoid monster with spider-like attributes and abilities, including the ability to weave strong webs and a venomous bite that can turn other humans into Arachnes. They can be killed only by decapitation and, before one appeared in Bristol, Rhode Island, hadn't been seen in two thousand years. While soulless, Sam Winchester hunted one, but was unaware that it had turned its victims into Arachnes as well. One of the turned victims comes back for revenge and Sam is forced to kill him.

Arachne is also featured in the Percy Jackson and Heroes of Olympus series. All of Athena's children, including Annabeth Chase, are arachnophobic because of Arachne's dispute with Athena. Arachne appears towards the end of The Mark of Athena as a large spider while still maintaining human features. She is defeated by Annabeth because of her pride and eventually they are both sent falling into Tartarus, where Percy Jackson kills Arachne.

In the novel The Last Unicorn written by Peter S. Beagle, a plain brown spider is bewitched into believing she is Arachne until the witch who enchanted her is killed. She is mentioned to be one of the creatures in Mommy Fortuna's Midnight Carnival. The book describes Arachne as "the greatest weaver in the world—her fate's the proof of it. She had the bad luck to defeat the goddess Athena in a weaving contest. Athena was a sore loser, and Arachne is now a spider, creating only for Mommy Fortuna's Midnight Carnival, by special arrangement. Warp of snow and woof of flame, and never any two the same. Arachne."

In Marvel Comics, Arachne is the name used by the second Spider-Woman (Julia Carpenter, currently the new Madame Web) to distinguish herself from Jessica Drew, the original Spider-Woman. In Volume 3 of Monster Musume, an Arachne (a human female from the hips upward and the body/legs of a spider) named Rachnera Arachnera is introduced; she goes on to become a member of the "Monster Girl" household in Volume 4. Arachne Gorgon is a powerful witch and one of the main antagonists of Soul Eater. She was responsible for crafting the first demon weapons, an act that Death fiercely opposed, forcing her to bide her time and remain in hiding for 800 years. She returns to lead the risen Arachnaphobia, her personal army against Death.

The story of Arachne has also been adapted for many plays. She is the inspiration for a character featured in the Broadway musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. Arachne: Spider Girl! is a play for children based on the myth by Ursula Dubosarsky, first published in the NSW School Magazine.

Gustave Doré's illustration of Arachne's punishment in Purgatory for Dante's Purgatorio has had a surprising number of pop culture appearances. It is one of the many recurring images used by the rock band, The Mars Volta; it has been used in the cover of their Live EP, as a backdrop for their live shows, and a favorite accessory for guitarist and composer Omar Rodríguez-López in the form of a belt buckle. Eminem's 2013 music video for the song "Rap God" features imagery from Dante's Purgatorio, including the illustration of Arachne. (This is most likely a metaphor for the rappers who try to compete with the self-proclaimed "Rap God").

On Episode 245 of the Comedy Bang! Bang! Podcast, Comedian Neil Campbell references Arachne and Athena's rivalry during a freestyle rap battle. In the popular MOBA game, Smite, Arachne is listed as a playable deity in the Greek pantheon.

In a short story "More Spinned Against" John Wyndham tells of how Arachne finds herself in the clutches of a spider-obsessed collector and of the deal she makes with the collector's wife Lydia.

The story of Arachne has been revisited in contemporary art by figurative artist, Judy Takács. Takács views the story and reimagines the characters through a feminist lens, with her triptych, Arachne, Predator and Prey.

New7Wonders of the World

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New7Wonders_of_the_World 

From left to right, top to bottom: Chichen Itza, Christ the Redeemer, Great Wall of China, Machu Picchu, Petra, Taj Mahal, and Colosseum

New7Wonders of the World was a campaign started in 2000 to choose Wonders of the World from a selection of 200 existing monuments. The popularity poll via free Web-based voting and small amounts of telephone voting was led by Canadian-Swiss Bernard Weber and organized by the New7Wonders Foundation (N7W) based in Zurich, Switzerland, with winners announced on 7 July 2007 in Lisbon, at Estádio da Luz. The poll was considered unscientific partly because it was possible for people to cast multiple votes. According to John Zogby, founder and current President/CEO of the Utica, New York-based polling organization Zogby International, New7Wonders Foundation drove "the largest poll on record".

The program drew a wide range of official reactions. Some countries touted their finalist and tried to get more votes cast for it, while others downplayed or criticized the contest.^[4][6] After supporting the New7Wonders Foundation at the beginning of the campaign by providing advice on nominee selection, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), by its bylaws having to record all and give equal status to world heritage sites, distanced itself from the undertaking in 2001 and again in 2007.

The seven winners were chosen from 21 candidates, which had been whittled down from 77 choices by a panel in 2006.

The New7Wonders Foundation, established in 2001, relied on private donations and the sale of broadcast rights and received no public funding. After the final announcement, New7Wonders said it didn't earn anything from the exercise and barely recovered its investment.

Although N7W describes itself as a not-for-profit organization, the company behind it—the New Open World Corporation (NOWC)—is a commercial business. All licensing and sponsorship money is paid to NOWC.

The foundation ran two subsequent programs: New7Wonders of Nature, the subject of voting until 2011, and New7Wonders Cities, which ended in 2014.

Winners

Location of the New7Wonders winners

The Great Pyramid of Giza, largest and oldest of the three pyramids at the Giza Necropolis in Egypt and the only surviving of the original Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, was granted honorary status.

Wonder	Location	Image	Year
Great Pyramid of Giza (honorary status)	Giza Necropolis, Egypt		2560 BC
Great Wall of China	China		700 BC
Petra	Ma'an, Jordan		312 BC
Colosseum	Rome, Italy		80 AD
Chichen Itza	Yucatán, Mexico		600 AD
Machu Picchu	Cuzco Region, Peru		1450 AD
Taj Mahal	Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India		1643 AD
Christ the Redeemer	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil		1931 AD

Reactions

United Nations

In 2007, the New7Wonders Foundation contracted a partnership with the United Nations in recognition of the efforts to promote the UN's Millennium Development Goals".

However, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in a press release on June 20, 2007, reaffirmed that it has no link with the initiative. The press release concluded:

There is no comparison between Mr. Weber's mediatised campaign and the scientific and educational work resulting from the inscription of sites on UNESCO's World Heritage List. The list of the 8 New Wonders of the World will be the result of a private undertaking, reflecting only the opinions of those with access to the Internet and not the entire world. This initiative cannot, in any significant and sustainable manner, contribute to the preservation of sites elected by this public.

— UNESCO

Brazil

In Brazil there was a campaign Vote no Cristo (Vote for the Christ) which had the support of private companies, namely telecommunications operators that stopped charging voters to make telephone calls and SMS messages to vote. Additionally, leading corporate sponsors including Banco Bradesco and Rede Globo spent millions of reals in the effort to have the statue voted into the top seven. Newsweek reports the campaign was so pervasive that:

One morning in June, Rio de Janeiro residents awoke to a beeping text message on their cell phones: "Press 4916 and vote for Christ. It's free!" The same pitch had been popping up all over the city since late January—flashing across an electronic screen every time city-dwellers swiped their transit cards on city buses and echoing on TV infomercials that featured a reality-show celebrity posing next to the city's trademark Christ the Redeemer statue.

— Elizabeth Dwoskin, Newsweek

According to an article in Newsweek, around 10 million Brazilians had voted in the contest by early July. This number is estimated as the New7Wonders Foundation never released such details about the campaign. An airplane message, with a huge inscription "4916 VOTE FOR CHRIST" flew in Rio de Janeiro for a month.

Peru

An intensive campaign led by the Peruvian Ministry of Commerce and Tourism in Peru had a great impact in the media and consequently Peruvian people voted massively for its national wonder. The announcement of the new World Wonders generated great expectation and the election of Machu Picchu was celebrated nationwide.

Chile

The Chilean representative for Easter Island's Moais, Alberto Hotus, said Weber gave him a letter saying that the Moais had finished eighth and were morally one of the New Seven Wonders. Hotus said he was the only participant to receive such an apology.

India

A campaign to publicize the Taj Mahal in India gathered speed and it reached a climax in July 2007 with news channels, radio stations, and many celebrities asking people to vote for the Taj Mahal.

Jordan

Queen Rania Al-Abdullah of Jordan joined the campaign to back Petra, Jordan's national treasure.

Mexico

There was a campaign on the news programs to encourage people to vote for Chichen Itzá.

Other finalists

The other 13 finalists, chronologically were:

Wonder	Location	Image	Year
Stonehenge	Amesbury, United Kingdom		2400 BCE
Acropolis of Athens	Athens, Greece		447 BCE
Hagia Sophia	İstanbul, Turkey		537
Angkor Wat	Angkor, Cambodia		1113
Moai	Easter Island, Chile		1250
Timbuktu	Timbuktu, Mali		1327
Alhambra	Granada, Spain		1333
Red Square	Moscow, Russia		1561
Kiyomizu-dera	Kyoto, Japan		1633
Neuschwanstein	Füssen, Germany		1869
Statue of Liberty	New York City, United States		1886
Eiffel Tower	Paris, France		1887
Sydney Opera House	Sydney, Australia		1959

 

Eighth Wonder of the World

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Wonder_of_the_World

Eighth Wonder of the World is an unofficial title sometimes given to new buildings, structures, projects, or even designs that are deemed to be comparable to the seven Wonders of the World.

Candidates for the Eighth Wonder of the World


Mitre Peak, in Milford Sound, New Zealand

Natural places

• Burney Falls in California, United States; called so by Theodore Roosevelt
• Deadvlei Clay Pan in Namibia
• Giant's Causeway in County Antrim, Northern Ireland
• Gros Morne National Park in Newfoundland, Canada
• Milford Sound in New Zealand; called so by Rudyard Kipling
• Natural Bridge (Virginia), United States, so dubbed by William Jennings Bryan
• Niagara Falls, between the province of Ontario and the state of New York, United States.
• Pink and White Terraces in New Zealand, prior to their wrongly assumed destruction in the 1886 eruption of Mount Tarawera. In 2017 researchers using a lost 1959 survey finally mapped the Pink and White terrace locations.
• Torres del Paine National Park, Chile.
• The great wildebeest migration in the Maasai Mara, Kenya and Serengeti, Tanzania

Pre-1900 creations


Sigiriya in Matale District, Sri Lanka
 

Angkor Wat in Angkor, Cambodia
 

The Citadelle Laferrière in Northern Haiti
 

Monolithic church of Ethiopia in Lalibela, Ethiopia
 
• Amber Room in the Catherine Palace near Saint Petersburg, Russia
• Angkor Wat, Cambodia
• Banaue Rice Terraces, Philippines
• Borobudur, in Magelang, Indonesia,
• The Citadelle Laferrière, Haiti
• The Eads Bridge, St. Louis, Missouri, United States
• Monastery of El Escorial, Spain.
• The Forth Railway Bridge in Scotland
• Great Wall of China, China
• The original 1882 Kinzua Viaduct (railway bridge) in Pennsylvania, United States.
• The Leaning Tower of Pisa, Italy
• Machu Picchu, Peru
• The moai statues of Easter Island, Chile
• The Obelisk of Axum, Ethiopia
• The Polhem dry dock, Karlskrona, Sweden
• The rock-hewn churches at Lalibela, Ethiopia (Church of Saint George, Lalibela)
• Royal Palace in Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Sigiriya, Sri Lanka
• Statue of Liberty, New York Harbor, United States
• Stonehenge, United Kingdom
• The Taj Mahal, India
• Chapel of the Rosario, Puebla City, Mexico
• The Terracotta Army, China
• The original rail-only Victoria Bridge (Montreal), Canada.

Post-1900 creations

• Aswan Dam in Egypt, called as such by Nikita Khrushchev
• Bahá'í terraces, on Mount Carmel, Haifa, Israel.
• Delta Works, the Dutch provinces of Zeeland and Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands. The Delta Works has been called one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World by Quest magazine and the American Society of Civil Engineers, and the "Eighth Wonder of the World" by several other sources.

Sydney Opera House, Sydney, Australia
• Empire State Building, New York City, United States.
• George Washington Bridge, New York City, United States
• Great Manmade River in Libya; given the title by Muammar Gaddafi.
• Hibernia Oil Platform, Newfoundland, Canada
• Houston Astrodome, Texas, United States
• Karakoram Highway in Pakistan, and China
• Palm Islands of Dubai
• Panama Canal, Panama
• Pikeville Cut-Through in Pikeville, Kentucky, United States; given the title by The New York Times.
• Queensway Tunnel, Liverpool, Merseyside, United Kingdom
• Rogers Centre, originally named SkyDome, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada
• Statue of Unity, Kevadiya, India, given the title by Shanghai Cooperation Organization.
• Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia; the story of its construction was recounted in the opera The Eighth Wonder
• Thames Barrier, London, United Kingdom.
• Three Gorges Dam in Hubei, China
• West Baden Springs Hotel in West Baden Springs, Orange County, Indiana, United States.
• West Edmonton Mall in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

People

• André the Giant, a French professional wrestler and actor in the 1970s and 1980s, who was billed as being 7 ft 4 in (2.24 m) and 500 lb (230 kg), was regularly referred to as the Eighth Wonder of the World by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF).

In fiction

• King Kong, a fictional giant movie monster resembling a colossal gorilla, that has appeared in several movies since 1933. His captor promotes public exhibitions of the caged Kong with the tagline: "Eighth Wonder of the World".
• Similarly, Gorgo, a fictional 65-foot tall dinosaur-like creature captured off the coast of the fictitious Irish isle of Nara Island from the British kaiju film of the same name is promoted as the "8th Wonder of the World" while on display at a circus in London.

Seven Social Sins

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Social_Sins 

Seven Social Sins is a list that was first uttered in a sermon delivered in Westminster Abbey on March 20, 1925 by an Anglican priest named Frederick Lewis Donaldson. He originally referred to it as the "7 Deadly Social Evils".

It is a common misconception that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was the originator of this list as he published the same list in his weekly newspaper Young India on October 22, 1925. Later he gave this same list to his grandson, Arun Gandhi, written on a piece of paper on their final day together shortly before his assassination.

The Seven Sins

1. Wealth without work.
2. Pleasure without conscience.
3. Knowledge without character.
4. Commerce without morality.
5. Science without humanity.
6. Religion without sacrifice.
7. Politics without principle.

History and influence

Before Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi published the list in his weekly newspaper Young India on October 22, 1925, an almost identical list had been published six months earlier in England in a sermon at Westminster Abbey by Fredrick Lewis Donaldson. Gandhi wrote that a correspondent whom he called a "fair friend" had sent the list: "The... fair friend wants readers of Young India to know, if they do not already, the following seven social sins," (the list was then provided). After the list, Gandhi wrote that "Naturally, the friend does not want the readers to know these things merely through the intellect but to know them through the heart so as to avoid them." This was the entirety of Gandhi's commentary on the list when he first published it.

In the decades since its first publication, the list has been widely cited and discussed. Some books have also focused on the seven sins or been structured around them:

• Eknath Easwaran (1989). The Compassionate Universe: The Power of the Individual to Heal the Environment (listed, discussed, and served as chapter structure for book)

• Stephen Covey(1989). Principle-Centered Leadership ( Chapter 7: Seven Deadly Sins (p. 87 to 93).

• Frank Woolever (2011) Gandhi List of Social Sins: Lessons in Truth

Many books have discussed the sins more briefly:

• Peter J. Gomes (2007). The scandalous gospel of Jesus: What's so good about the good news? Page 122 states "Years ago, I was much encouraged when I discovered that Gandhi had a list of seven social sins that, if not resisted, could destroy both persons and countries. .... We live in a world in which these social sins flourish as much today as they did in Gandhi's time; surely the battle against them is still worth waging."

• Adam Taylor (2010). Mobilizing hope: Faith-inspired activism for a post-civil rights generation Page  155 mentions two of the social sins, stating "The recent economic collapse (now referred to as the Great Recession) reminds me of two social sins from Gandhi's famous list of seven deadly social sins. Gandhi warned about the dangers of wealth without work and commerce without morality...."

• Thomas Weber (2011). "Gandhi's Moral Economics: the Sins of Wealth Without Work and Commerce Without Morality." Page 141 lists the sins and their date of publication, stating that "These and many of Gandhi's own writings make it quite clear that the Mahatma did not compartmentalize his life. For him, economics together with politics, morality and religion formed an indivisible whole."

• Rana P. B. Singh (2006). "Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi."  Page  107 lists the sins and gives a 2 or 3 sentence explanation of each, stating "these are ideals, but they are more relevant in the present era of desperation and could easily be accepted."

They have also been anthologized:

• Anil Dutt Misra (2008). Inspiring Thoughts Of Mahatma Gandhi 

Politics without principle

Regarding "politics without principle", Gandhi said having politics without truth(s) to justly dictate the action creates chaos, which ultimately leads to violence. Gandhi called these missteps "passive violence", ‘which fuels the active violence of crime, rebellion, and war.’ He said, "We could work 'til doomsday to achieve peace and would get nowhere as long as we ignore passive violence in our world."

Politics is literally defined as, "The struggle in any group for power that will give one or more persons the ability to make decisions for the larger group."

Mohandas Gandhi defined principle as, "the expression of perfection, and as imperfect beings like us cannot practice perfection, we devise every moment limits of its compromise in practice." 

There are many different types of regimes in the world whose politics differ. Based on Gandhi’s Blunder Politics without Principle, a regime type might be more of a root of violence than another because one regime has more principle than the other. Regimes have different types of fighting and aggression tactics, each desiring different outcomes.

This difference affects the actions taken by political heads in countries across the globe. Gandhi wrote, "An unjust law is itself a species of violence." The aggression of one country on another may be rooted in the government's creation of an unjust law. For example, a war of irredentism fought for one state to reclaim territory that was lost due to a law promoting ethnic cleansing.

Principle in one country could easily be a crime in another. This difference leads one to believe that the root of violence is inevitably present somewhere in the world. “Politics without Principle” will inevitably take place throughout time.

"I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent."

This list grew from Gandhi's search for the roots of violence. He called these "acts of passive violence". Preventing these is the best way to prevent oneself or one's society from reaching a point of violence, according to Gandhi.

To this list, Arun Gandhi added an eighth blunder, "rights without responsibilities". According to Arun Gandhi, the idea behind the first blunder originates from the feudal practice of Zamindari. He also suggests that the first and the second blunders are interrelated.

Arun Gandhi description as "Seven Blunders"

Arun Gandhi, who was personally given the list by his grandfather, Mohandas Gandhi, has described it as a list of "Seven Blunders of the World" that lead to violence.

More recently Mohandas Gandhi's list of negative qualities has also been described by his grandson as "Seven Blunders of the World". Examples of description under this heading include:

• Brad Knickerbocker (February 1, 1995). "Gandhi grandson pursues peace main sidebar". Christian Science Monitor. p. 14. ISSN 0882-7729. External link in |title= (help) (profile of Arun Gandhi that gives a list entitled "Mohandas Gandhi's 'Seven Blunders of the World,'" and states that "The last time Arun saw his grandfather, the old man slipped the boy a piece of paper with a list of what have come to be known as Gandhi's 'Seven Blunders of the World' that lead to violence." It also states that Arun Gandhi "would make 'Rights without responsibilities' No. 8 on his grandfather's list of 'blunders.'")

• Steven W. Gilbert (1996). "Making the most of a slow revolution". Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning. Taylor & Francis. 28 (2): 10–23. doi:10.1080/00091383.1996.9937745. ISSN 0009-1383. JSTOR 40177995. OCLC 10647084. (p. 15, gives the list entitled "Gandhi's 'Seven Blunders of the World' that Lead to Violence," plus "8. Rights without responsibilities" credited to Arun Gandhi.)
• Angeles Arrien (2001). "Introduction." In: Arrien, Angeles (2001). Working together : Diversity as opportunity. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. pp. 1–11. ISBN 1576751562. Seven Blunders of the world. (the list was entitled "Seven Blunders of the World" and described as having been given to Arun Gandhi by his grandfather)

The Seven Deadly Sins of Modern Times

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Seven_Deadly_Sins_of_Modern_Times 

The Seven Deadly Sins of Modern Times
Artist	Susan Dorothea White
Year	1993

The Seven Deadly Sins of Modern Times (1993) is an acrylic painting on a wooden table by the contemporary Australian artist Susan Dorothea White.

Inspired by the composition and design of The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things by Hieronymus Bosch, White has instead depicted the inverse virtues taken to extremes – for example, gluttony is supplanted by "dieting", and "sucking up" stands in for envy.

In the depiction of each of these deadly sins is an animal or plant which has been introduced to Australia to ill effect, as the cockroach represents squandering and a feral water buffalo demonstrates indifference. Instead of the eye of God which Bosch placed in the center of his design, White has incorporated an enlargement of the iris of her pet cat, which represents Gaia, with the rubric "The Eye of Gaia Sees All". The artist has also produced a woodcut of the same title and similar composition and another large acrylic painting on a wooden table The Seven Deadly Isms - the latter has been described as a "Boschian extravaganza ... depicting such contemporary obsessions as Materialism and Workaholism in intricate figurative tableaux".

To view the Seven Deadly Sins of Modern Times properly requires that you walk around it and view each of the sections, which are artfully integrated. The center is a nocturnal eye with the inscriptions "The Seven Deadly Sins" on one side, and "The Eye of Gaia Sees All" on the other. The sections are described below after a short, general definition from Princeton's WordNet.

Self effacement

Self-effacement is defined as withdrawing into the background, making yourself inconspicuous.

The section shows three activities in one room:

• a person with their face in a newspaper clipped to a line with many other newspapers after it. One hand is on the paper and the other is throwing the previous one away.
• a person on their knees reading by candle light a book resting on a toilet, wiping tears from their eyes. The toilet paper is unfurled onto the floor where a violin rests and its bow
• a person on their knees working on a wig made of thorns on the floor, where their old hair lies in their hands as they stare intently at it and play with it

Celibacy

Celibacy is defined as either abstaining from sexual relations (as because of religious vows) or being in an unmarried status.

It shows a naked couple. The woman's hand gestures "stop", and she is looking away from him. A cactus grows around her feet. Above the bed is a picture of a saint, and above that a cross. He holds a sex toy and has an erection. Because they each have one foot on the rug, it is a sign that they are married.

Workaholism

Workaholism is defined as compulsiveness about working.

It shows a person in bad ergonomics bent over a small computer screen typing on the keyboard. Another person stares intently into the dark pit of a cylindrical blue object on the floor while standing under a ledge making that special section of flooring like a desk for them. There are stacks of books and papers on the floor and a shelf with more of the same. It is after midnight. A furnace with irons in the fire cooks a steaming pot, and more tools are on the ground.

Dieting

Dieting is defined as the act of restricting your food intake or your intake of particular foods.

It shows an anorexic person with both hands gesturing "stop", sitting at a table with all kinds of food, healthy and unhealthy. They're pushing away a turkey with their foot. A rat with his tail on the cheese nibbles at the cupcakes. They are looking at an apple lying on the floor near a menu on a chalk board. A skeleton in a "slimming contest" dances on a stage; two large menus are prominent and contain telling descriptions of the meals and specials.

Squandering

Squandering is defined as spending resources lavishly and wastefully.

It shows a person pouring water into a sink. The water is a shower head. In the sink is a person killing "the goose that laid the golden eggs", and a person walking into a casino, money falling out of their pocket. A hand is throwing money into the sink. Roaches crawl on a gambling form.

Sucking up

To suck up is defined as either to try to gain favor by cringing or flattering, or to ingratiate oneself to another, often with insincere behavior.

It shows the managing director of an office heading upstairs while another is holding their pant leg and licking the behind. A person sits at a table sucking up a toad held by a utensil, with more on the plate. A large toad with a pink bow on its head is leaving the office.

Indifference

Indifferences is defined variously as the trait of lacking enthusiasm for or interest in things generally; the trait of remaining calm and seeming not to care, a casual lack of concern; apathy demonstrated by an absence of emotional reactions; and unbiased impartial unconcern.

It shows a building labeled "Charity" with wide inviting steps leading to an entrance with no door on it. Two artworks adorn its side: on the right an aging cucumber, on the left a biological human heart. On the sidewalk are three images: on the left is an Asiatic buffalo wading in water up to its neck; on the right is a calculator; front and center is a pedestal the height of the steps with a person standing on it, icicles dripping from their suit of cloths and from their head. Their arms are folded and their weight shifted to their right leg. Their image is the foreground of the door, and they are looking rightward toward the heart.