Triton (mythology)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Triton carries Theseus ( Melean relief , 5th century BC)
Triton and Nereid (Naples)
Triton carries nymph (Berlin)

Triton ( ancient Greek Τρίτων Trítōn ) is a sea ​​god in Greek mythology , from whom the mythological genus of the tritons was later derived.

mythology

He was thought of as a hybrid being and was often viewed as the son of Poseidon and Amphitrite . His siblings were Rhode and Benthesikyme .

His golden palace stood near Lake Tritone (present-day Tunisia ). After the Argonauts legend , he pulled the ships of the seafarers stranded in the desert by a hurricane back into the sea. A widespread cult was dedicated to him in Hellenistic Greece. His main temple was in Aulis .

In mythology he is rarely mentioned, but in art it is often depicted blowing on his snail shell ( conch ) with which he can stir up the sea or calm it down again. Karl Kerényi calls him an ichthyokentaur , because his upper body is that of a human with the front legs of a horse, and his lower body resembles a dolphin. In another legend, Heracles had to fight him, after which he was shown the way to the garden of the Hesperides .

Tritons

There are eight tritons on the Kohlmarkt fountain in Braunschweig , which dates back to 1869 .
Triton Manueline gate sculpture as an allegory of creation - Palácio Nacional da Pena

The figure of a tritone or tritons has been depicted many times in art, especially as a sculpture (s) in so-called triton fountains or z. B. in the baroque era as a small figural ornament for fountains and ponds. In iconography, a tritone is a (mixed) creature, half consisting of a human upper body and a fish-like lower body with a caudal fin.

reception

In Georg Philipp Telemann's suite Hamburger Ebb 'und Fluth , one movement (Harlequinade) bears the programmatic title Der Schertzende Tritonus .

In the 1963 film Jason and the Argonauts , Triton appears in a strait to allow Jason's ship to pass through. Triton is portrayed here by an unknown actor who has been enlarged many times over by Ray Harryhausen's special effects and who also wears the classic lower body of a fish.

In the cartoon Ariel, the mermaid from Disney, Triton appears as the father of the mermaid Ariel.

In the animated series Spongebob SquarePants he plays the rebellious son Neptune, the god of the sea in the series.

The sculptor Richard Guhr created four groups of figures with tritons on the Carl-Zuckmayer-Bridge in Rudolph-Wilde-Park in Berlin-Schöneberg in 1908/1910, carrying nymphs on their backs from one bank to the other across the fen area that was once a chain of lakes ( Information board on site).

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Hesiod , Theogony 930-931; Hyginus , Fabulae : Introduction
  2. ^ Libraries of Apollodorus 1,4,6
  3. ↑ Hesiod, Theogony 933
  4. ↑ Herodotus 4,179
  5. ↑ Apollonios Rhodios , Argonautika 4,1537–1588

Web links

Commons : Triton  - collection of images, videos and audio files