Ganymede. A beautiful youth, son of the legendary Trojans Tros and Callirhoë, Ganymede was taken to Olympus to be the cupbearer of Zeus (Jupiter), replacing Hebe. Ancient sources differ on the specifics of the story: Homer in the Iliad relates that Ganymede was given to Zeus in exchange for a breed of horses or a golden vine, while in the first Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite it was the wind that carried him off; Virgil, that he was abducted by Jupiter's bird, the eagle; and Ovid, that the eagle was Jupiter himself in disguise. In some accounts, a homosexual relationship between Zeus and Ganymede is suggested; this theme became popular during the medieval period and persisted through the Renaissance. In the fourteenth-century Ovide moralisé, Ganymede is seen as prefiguring John the Evangelist. To some Renaissance authors Ganymede personified the soul aspiring to God. A popular theme for artists, Ganymede is most commonly depicted flying off in the grasp of the eagle of Zeus, or pouring wine for the Olympians.

Further References:
G. Kempter (1980), Ganymed: Studien zur Typologie, Ikonographie und Ikonologie (Cologne and Vienna: Böhlau); J.M. Saslow (1986), Ganymede in the Renaissance: homosexuality and art and society (New Haven: Yale UP); P. Mayo (1967), Amor spiritualis et carnalis: aspects of the myth of Ganymede in art (Ann Arbor: University Microfilms).