You’re a person, I’ll assume you’re broadly familiar with the fall of the Titans, but for a quick catch-up, let me bring you up to speed on “The Mutilation Of Uranus By Saturn,” a 16th-century painting by Giorgio Vasari. Uranus being the father of the Titans by way of Gaia, but also the father of the enormously-less popular Cyclopses and the hundred-handed Centimanes, whom he imprisoned in Tartarus shortly after their births by virtue of their being right disgusting.
FINE. Okay. This upsets Gaia, who demands that one of her Titan sons castrate his father with a flint sickle, and the only one to take her up on the offer is Cronus (of future baby-eating fame), and the rest of the siblings watch as he overthrows his father.
Which, so far, is pretty standard-issue messed up Greek mythology stuff. AND YET. Please pay careful attention to the ladies on the far right, watching their brother forcibly castrate their father with a sharp piece of stone.
One of them is rubbing her nipples. She is watching her brother castrate her father in front of the whole family, and her response is to rub her nipples.
Whichever one of you is the last to leave, please be sure to turn out the lights behind you.
Sincerely,
Mallory
Tags: artwork, mythology, religion
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She looks like she’s throwing gang signs using her boobs.
My gang has found that using signs that employ the breasts intimidates/confuses/lures our enemies into submission more often than not. I recommend it.
Are… those her hands though? They look big, and that would make her arms extra long… not impossible for Greek mythology, of course.
Her arms also apparently contain an extra elbow – the right one, at least. Again, though, not out of the realm of possibility for this bunch.
She also seems to have an extra pelvis between her regular one and her ribs.
I think those ARE her hands, though. Which makes me think “if your hands are the size of your face, you’ll get cancer!”
A friend of mine played that trick on me when I was a kid, and it gave me a nosebleed, and he felt awful, which pleased me greatly.
Either she’s rubbing her own nips, or one of those ladies decided the done thing to do at your father’s castration was sexually assault your sister.
That’s what I thought. Especially since you can see her upper arms behind, I think there’s a hidden dude under there banging her in some sort of weird half-sitting-half-standing reverse cowgirl while he grabs her boobs from behind.
Those are someone else’s hands.
They must be.
They’re not attached to her arms.
Now that has been pointed out I CAN’T STOP SEEING IT. I am on Team Not Her Hands, which I think only makes this painting weirder. Western Art History, What Is Wrong With You?
“Right, mom, so I’ll cut dad’s junk off. But where?”
“Well, he’s always napping in front of that giant Astrolabe.”
“Oh but that’s where Tethys likes to have her… er, private time. If you get what I mean.”
“Look, son, if you wait for the perfect time and circumstances to slice off your dad’s balls, it’s never gonna happen.”
“Fine.”
Stupid kids. Always procrastinating.
She’s clearly thinking “He had it coming.”
I was going to make a joke about having an inappropriate reaction when my father had to get circumcised when I was in high school, but NOPE, can’t bring myself to do it.
And all the dudes are like NOPE BYE
Handmaiden on the right clearly shares the “why is this happening, I am not paid enough to deal with this endless shitshow, please tell me she’s not going to command everyone to turn it into an orgy, maybe if I hold enough armor in front of me I’ll look busy or decorative or something,” opinion.
I need more armor to hold in front of me while lounging. I clearly do not look decorative or busy enough to save me from the things I get dragged into, either.
That looks like an incredibly bad tool for the job. And a pretty poor technique. Was he okay with castrating his father, but terrified of touching another man’s testicles?
I’m going to go ahead and guess it’s Rhea because she’s very protective of her nips, in general. Zeus ended up having to be suckled by his Cousin, The Goat, because Rhea didn’t want her breasticles being marred by some kid’s dumb mouth.
Oh man I just understood the source of several of Zeus’ problems.
I’ve wanted abroad movie about Vasari and Michelangelo doing research for “The Lives of the Artists” . If it could include a scheme where Vasari has to justify some choices in this painting that would be so great.
Conjunction: Ass and Astrolabe.
Just sayin’
Apparently, Rhea pulled this kind of shit all the time.
Or everything RIGHT in Greek mythology! Celebrate the unmanning of the the patriarchy*! Massage your nips! Take to the seaaaa!
*only in communities where the unmanning of the patriarchy is legally and morally correct, of course.
Speaking of boobs, I couldn’t help but envision “Two Monks Discuss Childbirth and Nursing” when I saw THIS: http://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/814/g… Obvs that was painted by someone who had never handled a boob or seen a woman nurse!
She apparently has a bottle coming out of her collarbone.
The Two Monks INVENTED childbirth and nursing! New mothers have one tiny boob on their shoulder, and that’s all!
the number of Madonna and Child paintings done by someone who has also apparently never seen a baby is worryingly high.
The dead give-away is the head-to-body proportion.
Tiny adult proportions: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6…
Actual child proportions: http://www.goodliferetreats.com/wp-content/upload…
That truly is a TINY boob! Also…. What in all hell happened to her stomach? I mean, i’ve seen stretchmarks, i’ve seen loose skin but this is just… wha?
I demand to read ‘Two Monks Discuss Childbirth and Nursing’ immediately. Get on it, Ortberg.
At first they were just itchy, but then it just felt right.
Uranus seems remarkably unperturbed about all this, like he can’t even wake up enough to react to his scrotal evisceration until he’s had at least two cups of coffee. “This is about me not mowing the lawn, isn’t it? Tell your mother I’ll get to it this afternoon.”
For my money, the nipple-rubbing isn’t nearly as alarming as the other side of the painting, where two incredibly old guys are doing a flying tackle at some nude preschooler or elf.
Well, they weren’t wearing pearls, they have to grab SOMETHING in feminine disbelief!
for some reason the perspective makes me think that Saturn and Uranus are actually standing in front of a fresco. if you look under Saturn’s right arm, the woman behind him seems distinctly flat in comparison. so they actually just chose to do their neutering in a festive room maybe?
The sister? in the back looks so goddamned bored. “Oh, Dad’s getting castrated. Must be Tuesday.”
I like the old dude leap-frogging away, while other people on the left have their hands out as if catching one of the testicles wins you a prize. Is it like the inverse of the wedding bouquet? If you catch it, you get to live in glorious undisturbed misandry forever?
Is that a Buffy reference? Bliss! (And also, EW for the rest of your comment. I would also be leap-frogging away. :P)
Isn’t this really everything wrong with sixteenth century Italian painters? I don’t think you can pin this one on the Greeks.
Stupid kids. Always procrastinating.
I need more armor to hold in front of me while lounging. I clearly do not look decorative or busy enough to save me from the things I get dragged into, either.
Those are someone else's hands.
They must be.
They're not attached to her arms.
Also, on the left, there is what appears to be a …brother? touching her sister's boob with the back of his hand.
A friend of mine played that trick on me when I was a kid, and it gave me a nosebleed, and he felt awful, which pleased me greatly.
It gets better: Cronos threw the severed bits of his father into the sea, which began to foam, and from the foam was born (or just emerged) Aphrodite.
Thanks for sharing, hope that it can be a goodness for us all. be a modest muslimah , Keep istiqomah. ^^
Right.