In the Greek Mythology, Ganymède (in Greek old Γανυμήδης / Ganymếdês ) is the lover of Zeus and the wine waiter of the gods.

Myth

It is a Trojan prince , wire of Tros (king founder of Troy) and nymph Callirrhoé, great-grandson of Dardanos and thus descendant of Zeus. According to the Iliade , it is the famous most beautiful being of the teenagers.

Whereas it makes feed its herd on the mount Ida de Troade, Zeus sees it and, transforming itself into eagle, removes it to make his/her lover of it, and the wine waiter of the gods. In compensation, his/her father receives from Zeus four horses which it held of Poséidon, which appears then in the myth of Héraclès: Laomédon (father of Ganymède according to other versions) promises them to the demigod if it saves his daughter Hésione. Other traditions speak rather about a gold cut, work of Héphaïstos. Héra, jealous not only of this new lover but as of his function of wine waiter as Zeus had removed with Hébé, his daughter, forces her husband to return Ganymède in the mortals. Zeus the pupil then rather with the sky in the form of the constellation of Aquarius.

It should be noted that Homère ( Iliade , XX, 232-233), mentions to him only that it is removed by “gods”, without speaking about eagle. Lastly, according to a later version, it is Éos (Dawn) which removes Ganymède and Tithon. Zeus, seeing Ganymède, claims it with the goddess, and obtains it provided that it exauce a wish.

Ganymède gave its name to the Constellation Verseau.

It is difficult to identify what returns to the history and what returns to the myth in connection with Ganymède. “Zeus and Ganymède” being the couple pederastic archetypal and divine from traditional Greece, it gave place to innumerable works, as well by the poets of antiquity as by the artists since the Rebirth.

In arts

Antiquity

It is not vain to make a distinction in arts between antiquity and all the posterior period. Indeed, after the end of paganism, the representations of Ganymède refer only to the myth, whereas before it had an incidence in the daily life, justifying votive or funerary objects.

In sculpture, one of the most famous representations of Ganymède is the group carved by Léocharès at fourth century BC, admired by Pline Old the: “Léocharès carried out an eagle conscious of what it removes in Ganymède and for which: it saves the child by planting his greenhouses in its clothing. ” This delicacy of the eagle is often rented thereafter: Straton de Sardes evokes it in one of its epigram S ( Greek Anthologie , XII, 221), just as Martial (I, 7). The legend of Ganymède also inspired a group out of terra cotta, probably of Corinthian origin , preserved at the archaeological Museum of Olympie (fig. 2): it is one of the rare examples of great sculpture out of terra cotta.

In ceramic, the topic of Ganymède is frequently taken again, generally on craters, these vases in which one mixed water and the wine at the time of the banquets (Symposium S), held between men, during which the guests competed of imagination to celebrate the merits of their respective eromene S. Among most famous appear the crater in red figures of the Painter of Berlin (fig.  1): on a side, Zeus is illustrated in full continuation; other, russet-red Ganymède, plays with a hoop, symbol of its youth. It also holds a cock, present pederastic traditional. The reason for the cock is taken again on the tondo of famous a kylix of the Painter of Penthésilée, preserved at the national archaeological Museum of Ferrare: Ganymède, fleeing, is turned over towards Zeus which has been just seized of him.

Modern time

The Renaissance saw re-appearing of innumerable representations of this myth (Michel-Angel, Benvenuto Cellini), but also the Néoclassicisme of the 19th century (Thorvaldsen), including a representation Art nouveau with Washington, extremely far from the culture of origin, with the Library of the Congress, in 1883.

Generally, any representation of an eagle removing an young man, as one sees some on many ceilings painted with in the private residences, must a priori be paid to the representation of this myth.

2007 - work of Pierre and Gilles (triptych)

Astronomy

Ganymède is also the moon of Jupiter (see Ganymède). Indeed, Galileo, thanks to his famous glasses, was the first to observe the four larger Jupiter satellites. It called them “the moons médicéennes”, in homage to the Médicis. Its rival Simon Marius, in 1614, rather proposed to give to each one the name of an adventure in love with Zeus.

Sources

  • (, 12,2),
  • : (, 115).
  • Aristophane, Peace (v.  724).
  • Ibycos de Rhégion (france 289).
  • (v.  820-838).
  • (, 265-270; , 219-240),
  • : ( with Aphrodite , 201-218).
  • ( Olympic , 40-45; Thousand-year-old Ve front J. - C., 105).
  • (, 636 Cd),
  • : (255 c).
  • Théognis de Mégare, elegiac Poems (v.  1345).

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