HeraclesOmphale1.0054

HeraclesOmphale1.0054_LeMoyne

OGCMA, s.v. "Heracles and Omphale"
Louvre site

François Le Moyne, "Hercules and Omphale," 1724, Louvre, Paris, inv. M.I. 1086

A copy is in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts; a variant is known in a private collection in New York (according to Reid).

The queen of Lydia, Omphale, has purchased Heracles, whose thralldom to her will expiate his murder of Iole's brother Iphitus.

Omphale holds a position of superior authority over the once-great hero. She brandishes her club, and the distaff in his left hand is really in her control, too. He is left holding a little shuttle, an emasculated implement that allows him to engage in an entirely domestic task of weaving.

OGCMA slides are designed by Roger T. Macfarlane for use in Classical Civilization 241 courses at Brigham Young University.
The present resource contains information assembled for The Oxford Guide to Classical Mythology in the Arts, 1300 - 1990's, edited by J. Davidson Reid (Oxford 1994), and it is used with express permission from Oxford University press.
Address concerns or inquiries to macfarlane@byu.edu.