Centaur

Résumé (then Abstract)

Après l’évocation de quelques représentations d’époque romane directement inspirées d’œuvres antiques, il sera question des principaux médias – littéraires et artistiques – qui permirent à la figure du centaure de s’intégrer à l’imaginaire chrétien et de susciter des représentations à la fois originales et ancrées dans le passé. On notera à cet égard l’importance de l’illustration des traités d’astronomie et des Herbarii d’époque carolingienne comme images-relais. On verra aussi que, dissociées de leur contexte, les antiques images ont souvent poursuivi une carrière autonome. Il en est résulté des confusions d’attributs aberrantes en termes mythologiques, mais souvent décoratives. L’étude comprend en outre quatre études de cas : le centaure au lièvre ; le Sagittaire zodiacal comme centaure et hippopode ; Chiron médecin et les centaures au rameau, et le centaure au serpent.

Abstract

After first remarking on some representations from the Romanesque period directly inspired by antique works, we will treat the principal media – literary and artistic – which have allowed the figure of the centaur to integrate itself into the Christian imagination and to give rise to some representations at once novel and yet firmly anchored in the past. We will note in this regard the importance of the illustration of Carolingian astronomical treatises and herbals as fecundating images for medieval centaur iconography. We will also see that divorced from their cultural contexts these antique images have often taken on lives of their own. This often results in a certain confusion of attributes, aberrant in terms of « classical » mythology, but often quite decorative. The study comprises four specific examples of the centaur type : the centaur bearing a hare, the zodiacal Sagittarius as a centaur and hippopode, Chiron the physician and the centaurs with antlers, and finally the centaur bearing a serpent.

Jean Gebser's theory of consciousness suggests that we are experiencing a new era in the history of consciousness. Human consciousness moves like a pendulum. The current "Integral Structure of Consciousness" is not unprecedented, yet we are experiencing it in a multi-layered, deeper, and vaster way. Centaurs are imaginal creatures that first appeared within the "Mythical

As remnants of previous times, few Romanic capitals still exist within the Northern tower of the famous gothic cathedral of Chartres. Overshadowed by the splendor of gothic architecture and arts throughout the cathedral, they hardly receive the attention they merit by their sculptural quality. Three of them show intriguing figurative scenes of combat. The article looks into their possible interpretation: Do they reflect a definitive narrative, possibly from antique mythology? Or would they rather combine pictorial pattern of the time (ca. 1137-1140)? Ultimately, do they count among the many allusions of Romanic art as to the eternal combat between Good and Evil, for (and within) the human soul?

Résumé (then Abstract)

Hérités de la mythologie classique, sirènes, centaures et minotaures ornent les chapiteaux de nombreuses églises romanes d'Auvergne. La présence de ces animaux fantastiques dans l'iconographie régionale n'est pas issue d'une filiation directe mais s'explique de façon très différente selon les cas.

Abstract

Inherited from the Classical Mythology, the sirens, centaurs and minotaurs adorn the capitals of many Romanesque churches in Auvergne. The presence of these fantastic animals in the regional collection of illustrations does not come from a direct filiation : each case can be explained a very different way.

Otherwise Engaged is print only, which makes it desirable because you can hold it and have a good read. There is lots within of merit. You can actually buy a copy of this on Amazon when it is issued in July, but this also appeared online in Antipodean SF https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20191120174052/https://www.antisf.com.au/the-stories/black-hole-down

I don’t know how much mail you get from the south of you and whether you might be inclined to these researches such as they are of a dentist in Antarctica or even whether your advertisement is open to such foreigners, for I have not made your proper acquaintance, even if I hope to, at least in this formal submission of my Black Holes to this upcoming, and if not I sure had fun in writing it. So when the dogsleds pulled in and I read of this I thought to publish my discoveries here in, as it were, anagogical form, hence I address you from somewere out of McMurdo on the way to the Antarctic Mountains and Mt Erebus as long at least as the battery lasts,.  Yours truly, Rubino del Sur

Rubino del Sur Note, “Did you ever wander in the cold so long your brain freezes down to the point of bare survival, but then go to sleep and nothing  will suffice, but you wake to such clarity you think you’re in super brain? I don’t know how much mail you get from the south of you and whether you might be inclined to these researches such as they are of a dentist in Antarctica or even whether your advertisement for your issue 250 is open to such foreigners, for I have not made your proper acquaintance, even if I hope to, at least in this formal submission of my Black Hole Down to this upcoming, and if not I sure had fun in writing it.

Co-Authors: Mayke Wagner, Wang Bo, Pavel Tarasov, Sidsel Maria Westh-Hansen, Elisabeth Völling

Access to the accepted Manuscript: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-613962

Published Version: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/abs/ornamental-trousers-from-sampula-xinjiang-china-their-origins-and-biography/D313C3F0693E0FE56FE2D5519C551924


A decorated pair of trousers excavated from a well-preserved tomb in the Tarim Basin proved to have a highly informative life history, teased out by the authors – with archaeological, historical and art historical dexterity. Probably created under Greek influence in a Bactrian palace, the textile started life in the third/second century BC as an ornamental wall hanging, showing a centaur blowing a war-trumpet and a nearly life-size warrior of the steppe with his spear. The palace was raided by nomads, one of whom worked a piece of the tapestry into a pair of trousers. They brought no great luck to the wearer who ended his days in a massacre by the Xiongnu, probably in the first century BC. The biography of this garment gives a vivid glimpse of the dynamic life of Central Asia at the end of the first millennium.