Hermes1.0047_Spranger

Hermes1.0047_Spranger

Metzler on Spranger
ogcma s.v. "Hermes"
Classical Sources:

Bartholomäus Spranger, "Mercury and Minerva," ca. 1590-93, frescoed ceiling roundel, 9 ft. 3/8 in. (275 cm) in diameter, White Tower, Prague Castle.

The pairing of Hermes (Mercury) with Athena (Minerva) results in a graphic statement of the two-aspected divinity "Hermathena" represented often in the Renaissance. Cf. Federico Zuccaro (1540-1609), "Hermathena" (ca. 1566), at Villa Caprarola, which Metzler sees as an intertext to this image by Spranger.

The image at right was derived from the internet, cf. the cleaner image published in Metzler, p. 130. (vid. Bibliography)

Mythological painting of Mercury and Minerva with their attributes and roosters.

Spranger clothes Athena similarly in his famous allegory of "Minerva Vanquishing Ignorance" (1590-1593)) (Athena1.0051_Spranger).

Bibliography (on Athena1.0051_Spranger):

Metzler, Sally. 2014. Bartholomeus Spranger: splendor and eroticism in imperial Prague, the complete works. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York / Yale University Press. Cat. no. 67.

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.