Cupid and Psyche

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The abduction of the psyche . Painting by William Adolphe Bouguereau
Antonio Canova : Cupid and Psyche , Paris, Louvre (1793)
Auguste Rodin : Cupid and Psyche , 1885, Paris, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la ville de Paris
Cupid and Psyche as Children by William Adolphe Bouguereau , 1890
Sculpture by Reinhold Begas , postage stamp 1981

Cupid and Psyche is a very common subject in the fine arts of antiquity and modern times and a popular topic in fiction and music. Aspects of the mythical love relationship between the god Amor , also called Cupid, and the mortal king's daughter Psyche, who is finally accepted among the immortals, are shown. The modern artistic treatment of the material ties directly or indirectly to the narrative of Amor and Psyche, which is contained in the Metamorphoses of Apuleius from the 2nd century. In the fine arts of antiquity, the representation of Cupid (Eros) and Psyche was already popular in the epoch of Hellenism , long before the time of Apuleius.

Story by Apuleius

The narrative occupies a large space in the eleven book Metamorphoses : It makes up the end of the fourth book, the entire fifth book and most of the sixth book (4, 28–6, 24). The story of Amor and Psyche does not come from the Greek model of the Metamorphoses; apparently it is a creation of Apuleius. It is embedded in the portrayal of the fate of the girl Charite, who was kidnapped by a band of robbers. The old housekeeper of the robbers tells Charite, in order to distract her from her suffering, the story of the god Amor and the king's daughter Psyche, whose name is the Greek word for "soul".

Psyche is the youngest and most beautiful of the three beautiful daughters of a king. She is so beautiful that everyone stops worshiping Venus , the goddess of beauty and love. Annoyed, Venus calls her loyal son Cupid and orders him to make Psyche fall in love with a bad man. The father sends his daughter - as the oracle of the god Apollo ordered him - in a wedding dress to a lonely mountain peak, on which she is to marry a terrible demon . Instead of becoming the demon's wife, however, she is brought to a fairytale castle by Zephyr , the lord of the winds, on instructions from Cupid, who himself has succumbed to the unearthly beauty of Psyche .

Her current lover Amor visits this castle night after night, but during the day he disappears without her ever seeing him. Since Psyche feels lonely, he grants her a visit from her sisters. But Cupid warns her not to let the sisters mislead her into finding out who he is.

The sisters are initially happy to find Psyche safe, but soon consumed by envy . On another visit, they manage to convince the naive girl, who is now expecting a child, that Cupid is really a hideous snake, which is why he never faces her in daylight, and moreover intends to devour the pregnant woman.

Fearing for herself and her unborn child, she follows the advice of her sisters and waits for her husband at night with an oil lamp and a knife. When she illuminates her lover, however, she does not see a monster, but the beautiful body of the winged Cupid. Psyche is overwhelmed by love for her divine husband and therefore does not notice how a drop of hot oil falls on Cupid's shoulders. The god who disobeyed his mother feels betrayed, flies away and leaves Psyche inconsolable.

Venus is furious that her son disobeyed her commands and instead fathered a child, Psyche. Venus locates the girl and forces her to do various life-threatening tasks for the goddess. Thanks to the help of ants , talking reeds , towers, etc., she manages to solve them. On the last task, however, she lets herself be overwhelmed by the desire to win back her lover. So, in order to make herself beautiful for him, she opens a box that is said to contain a beauty ointment intended for Venus from Pluto's wife Proserpina , and falls into a death-like sleep, which is the only content of the container.

Cupid has now recovered from being burned with the hot oil and rushes to the rescue of Psyche. Since he still loves her, he uses his wings to chase the sleep of death back into the box. While Psyche delivers the box, Cupid flies to Jupiter and asks permission to marry Psyche. The supreme god (according to another story, the messenger of the gods Mercury) has forbearance, hands Psyche a mug with ambrosia and thereby makes her immortal, so that nothing stands in the way of a wedding among the gods.

Psyche gives birth to Cupid a beautiful daughter who receives the name Voluptas (lust).

Artistic representations

The story of Cupid and Psyche has had a diverse impact in literature and music, but above all in the fine arts. Many paintings and sculptures deal with the couple. Among the best known are the sculptures by Antonio Canova in the Villa Carlotta on Lake Como and Auguste Rodin in the Louvre and in the Hermitage , the sculpture group by Reinhold Begas in the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin and the etchings by Max Klinger . The painter Moritz von Schwind decorated the owner's Schwind pavilion with numerous frescoes in the manor in Rüdigsdorf ( Kohren-Sahlis ) in Saxony . Many psychedelic representations also come from Bertel Thorwaldsen and several of his students and successors, including Wolf von Hoyer and Ferdinand Schlöth .

In music , among others, César Franck wrote a three-part symphonic poem Psyché for choir and orchestra , as did Richard Franck a tone poem for large orchestra Liebesidyll “Amor und Psyche” (op. 40). With Till we have Faces (you are the answer), CS Lewis has given a modern interpretation of this story.

For narrative research , Amor und Psyche is the oldest written version of the fairy tale animal bridegroom .

In the novel Das Parfum by Patrick Süskind and its film adaptation , a perfume with the name Amor and Psyche plays an important role.

The Paris cameo diadem , once supposedly a gift from Napoleon Bonaparte to his first wife, Empress Joséphine , and now part of the Swedish crown treasure , is also decorated with a depiction of Cupid and Psyche.

See also

Text editions and translations

literature

comment

  • Maaike Zimmerman among others: Apuleius Madaurensis: Metamorphoses. Books IV 28-35, V and VI 1-24: The Tale of Cupid and Psyche . Egbert Forsten, Groningen 2004, ISBN 90-6980-146-9 (in detail)

reception

  • Sonia Cavicchioli : The Tale of Cupid and Psyche. An Illustrated History. New York 2002
  • A look at Amor and Psyche around 1800. Exhibition catalog Musée de Carouge and Kunsthaus Zürich. Zurich 1994
  • Christel Steinmetz: Cupid and Psyche. Studies on the conception of myth in the visual arts around 1800. Dissertation Cologne 1989
  • Carina Bauriegel, Agneta Jilek, Sebastian Jung: Opus V, Amor and Psyche , 1880 in: Frank Zöllner (Ed.): Griffelkunst. Myth, dream and love in Max Klinger's graphic. Plöttner Verlag, Leipzig 2007, ISBN 978-3-938442-31-9
  • Jörn Steigerwald: Psyche. In: Maria Moog-Grünewald (Ed.): Mythenrezeption. The ancient mythology in literature, music and art from the beginnings to the present (= Der Neue Pauly . Supplements. Volume 5). Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2008, ISBN 978-3-476-02032-1 , pp. 622-630.

Audio books

Web links

Commons : Cupid and Psyche  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Stefan Hess / Tomas Lochman (eds.), Classical beauty and patriotic heroism. The Basel sculptor Ferdinand Schlöth (1818–1891). Basel 2004.
  2. ↑ Type 425 according to Aarne and Thompson . See Das singende, jumping Löweneckerchen , Grimms Märchen Nr. 88.