PirithousHippodamiaWedding1.0003_Michelangelo

PirithousHippodamiaWedding1.0003_Michelangelo

OGCMA s.v. "Pirithous, Wedding of P. and Hippodamia"
Google Arts & Culture
Ovid Met.12.393-430

Michelangelo buonarroti (1475-1564), "Battle of the Centaurs" (subject disputed; battle of Hercules and Centaurs,w with rape of Deianeira? or Battle of the Laptish and Centaurs?), marples relief, ca. 1492. Casa Buonarroti, Florence.

Ovid first drew attention from the hugger-mugger of the Lapitho-centauromachy — that battle between Lapiths and Centaurs that ensued at the wedding feast of Pirithous and Hippodamia — and directed attention to the tender love story of Hylonome and Cyllarus. This painting seems to be about the Lapithocentauromachy, except that the central focus is on the dying centaur front and center.

Within the epic chaos, Ovid pauses elegiacally to dwell upon the death of Cyllarus and Hylonome’s tender grief.… Therefore so, too, does Piero.

A marble relief sculpture depicting numerous nude figures in a chaotic battle or struggle, carved in a classical style

Other artists to pay attention to Hylonome include Francesco Bertos and David Backhouse. Aristide Maillol's treatment of the Lapithocentauromachy may bear some awareness of this approach to the myth.

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.