To what extent can Daedalus be seen as analogous with Ovid? A study on how and why the poet poetologically presents the craftsman at Crete Reuben Riepma (s)2299704
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[email protected] Supervisor: Prof. dr. A.B. Wessels Second Reader: Dr. S.T.M. de Beer 15 August 2019 Master Thesis Classics and Ancient Civilizations Faculty of Humanities, Leiden University 1 Reuben Riepma s2299704 1) Introduction 2) Status Quaestionis 3) Parallels: The artists are innovative; Hated exile; Oppression by Authority; They advise their ‘children’; They grieve and repudiate their arts; ‘Consolation’ of celebrity 4) Why? 5) Conclusion 6) Bibliography Introduction Daedalus, one of the most famous figures of mythology, is known today perhaps primarily for his flight, the fall of his son Icarus and more generally as an archetypal artist. In antiquity he was also widely renowned as a master craftsman and is noted by Homer, the Athenian dramatists, Plato, Pliny the Elder and Pausanias, as almost an equal to Hephaestus.1 Yet Daedalus was also a “chameleon- like figure” who was adapted and changed by cultural context: was he to be an artistic maverick, hero of ingenuity, or on the other hand a negative archetype of hubris?2 The Roman poet Ovid shares some of these general contrasting characteristics: at times being recognised by commentators for literary skill, at other times censured for going too far.3 It may therefore be read as highly suggestive that Ovid’s poems include many references and treatments of Daedalus: this study shall focus on the Metamorphoses (mainly 8.183-235) and his exilic oeuvre (a selection), due to their contextual chronological proximity/overlap with exile.4 In the former, that is in the context of Daedalus’ Cretan exile, first making the labyrinth for the Minotaur, and then producing wings to escape; the exile poems also contain allusions to Daedalus, which though more fragmented are pertinent to presentation of the banished artist.