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0I’m sure she’s got a great personality. That centaur is a really good judge of character.
Centaurs, despite having an incredible amount of competition, are clearly in the running for “stupidest man/creature hybrid” award, if not at the very top of the list. It’s tough to say, and I imagine it’s a very subjective thing. Maybe you really like horses. Maybe the idea of a half man, half horse is appealing to you? I can’t say for sure, all I know is that, to me, it seems absolutely ludicrous. How do these two disparate things come together to make one biological monstrosity? How, exactly, does it work?
I think this is the hardest part for my mind when it comes to mythology. Somewhere in my brain I just want things to work and the physiology of centaurs and other hybrid creatures just doesn’t fit. Does this thing eat grass? Does it eat food at all? It looks like it would have two stomachs. How many lungs does it have? What is its brain like?
Mythology doesn’t have a lot to say on the particulars of centaur organs and the like, belonging, as they do to antiquity, but I can’t help but wonder.
Centaurs and their female counterparts, the Centaurides, are creatures of Greek imagination that have stood the test of time, for one reason or another. Surprisingly, there is some interest in the symbolism and meaning of the centaur race as they are used in the mythology and literature of ancient Greece. Representing a physical duality, both man and horse, the Centaur also represents a spiritual and intellectual dualism: that of being trapped between the civilized and the barbaric. To the ancient Greeks (as well as the myriad civilizations that co opted the imagery in later years) they were seen as being untamed and wild, like the many horses that ran across Europe, yet there persisted an element of civilization, the human part of these man-horses, allowing them to be identified, and even sympathized with, by very human readers and storytellers. Centaurs could fashion weapons, and could make war, they could also speak and tell stories, love and lose. They, like some other hybrid creatures, made for interesting and moving figures in stories and art as well as enemies for heroes.
It’s not altogether surprising that hybrid creatures that lacked the upper body of humans were less inspiring and less identifiable to human readers in ancient Greece as in other lands. The minotaur, a tragic figure when one really considers it, is shown very little sympathy and not exactly painted in a positive light. Even the harpies, which classically are depicted as having only human heads, are not seen as worthy of human interest beyond the terror they induce.
If you plan to have some kind of human-animal hybrid baby, you’d best make sure you get the proper half of the body looking right.
Fortunately the Centaurs are constructed the right way up. Now we can relate to their problems, like accidentally checking out the wrong sort of butts.
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First time getting to know about the existence of Centaurs was when I watched Fantasia as an 8 year old.
The concept of half man/half horse was very hard for me to digest. But after rewatching it a few times, I somehow became some kind of a Centaur fanboy.
There was a Perry Bible Fellowship on the same theme, but the working the gag the other way around :
http://www.pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF059-Disgusting_Ted.jpg
Ah, good old PBF, I’m glad someone mentioned it
I got to know Centaurs when I was like 5-6 and used to read myths, and there were this Nessos guy, who indirectly killed Heracles. So the first centaur I got to remember was an ultimate eeeeviiil guy, not very different from Minotaur, and even worse than Hydra because he actually succeeded in defeating The Ultimate Hero.
And then there were also the story that Heracles killed all the centaurs with his arrows poisoned with Hydra’s venom because they wronged him in some way (I don’t remember what was it) and only one of them was a cool old guy and Heracles was really sad because of him, but only him.
Do you like horses? Nay.
So why the long face?
Quit horsing around!
Hero’s of Might and Magic 3~! Also, love the coloring detail in the last panel.
In hindsight that wasn’t a good idea. (oh gawd I have to STOP)
I am always a bit perplexed as to why it doesn’t seem untoward to mix and match disparate transliteration rules within the same document; the words “centaurs” and “kentaurides” are a perfect example of this (as you are well aware, I suppose, them being derived from the words “centaur” for “κένταυρος” and “κενταυρίδες” respectively)…
Anyway, I haven’t told you how much I love the blog so far, so, despite the pesky bitching on my part, you have my kudos for your great work!
Honestly, I had not even realized I’d done this hahaha I was semi delirious when I wrote the post last night, being unable to sleep thanks to the swarm of bugs inhabiting my room! I fixed it, as it is something that bothers me as well.
I can’t believe I did that. I am literally facepalming at myself now.
I had this one book when I was a kid that contained an illustration of the Minotaur – except it was drawn with a bull’s body and a man’s head. We called it “the Manotaur”. It was seriously one of the most terrifying things I have ever seen.
I was just thinking about reverse centaurs. Human legs and torso with this awkward horse body coming off of the shoulders. I don’t know where I get these ideas.
http://happletea.tumblr.com/post/7816135458/this-is-the-best-thing-ive-ever-drawn
Meh, If it was female I’d still hit it.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Ki5GKMJVK4M/TDwJVpUY76I/AAAAAAAAAaw/KgXGlJ1bAWw/s1600/misc+fakku.jpg
I know that guy! hahaha
In hindsight I feel really bad for the Minotaur. He was born out of a dickish revenge plot from the gods, bummer :/ . Then again he did eat people.
I would eat people too if I were trapped in a maze forever, born into a life I didn’t choose!
Or if I were hungry…
*licks lips*
I always just wonder if the man parts are in between his front or rear legs, when I see a centaur.
I’ve seen photos of some really old Greek statues of centaurs. The man part was in the front. I’ve also seen pictures of some frescoes where the man part wasn’t shown in the front. Maybe they weren’t sure either.
I am sorry, but I think you are mistaken: no early Greek statue, insofar as I know, has ever had the human genitals in display; the genitals are placed equine-specifically, between the hindlegs.
For some reason, I suspect there has been confusion with Roman and later Greek statues (yet debatable); can we get pictures or references, please?
This is the one I’m referring to.
http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/17.190.2072
Statuette of a man and centaur, ca. 750 B.C.; Late Geometric
Greek
Bronze
Source: Statuette of a man and centaur [Greek] (17.190.2072) | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Ah, yes, now I understand what you meant when you said “really old.” My mind somehow did not register that as the Archaic period, bur the Classical period instead of the Hellenistic… My bad!
Yes, back then, it was common for centaurs to be presented as such (it is a rather much more chimeric design). In later days, centaurs were given quite a fixup, as the male human torso is much more “fused” with the equine body, lending much more to verisimilitude, and the genitals are decidedly equine and placed between the hindlegs.
You should read John Varley’s Gaïa trilogy, he’s got a nice take on this matter
On the note of the Minotaur, Tom Siddell would have agreed and changed the life of the creature in his comic, somewhat.
http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=21
If you haven’t already looked into his comic, then maybe you should. After all, it is good. (Though, it is not quite as funny as yours, in my opinion.)
fun fact: there is a an ancient Grecian statue (or idol perhaps, it wasn’t a huge piece and I can’t remember the exact terminology) of a man and a centaur conversing that to me is striking for one very specific reason, which is that the centaur has his genitals on display between his forelegs. I stared at the photo for ages and scanned it out of my art history textbook, I was that amazed by it. This will forever be in mind whenever the topic of centaurs comes up.
Most Greek artefacts have no problem displaying the genitalia as considered “realistic” within the mythological trend; all centaurs have the testes and penile sheath of a horse, not to mention the various heroic junk on display or the odd (more or less) satyre’s thingamagog, somewhere between a human’s and a ram’s (art and biology student, amongst other fields). XD
We actually talked about Crete, Minos and the Minotaur in a history class yesterday, as a starting point for what we can find out about the actual culture and their reverence for bulls. I was kind of surprised to hear that the bulls they bred for their bull leaping games stood 6 feet high at the shoulder, since they were auroch cross-breeds.
I also blurted out “Bronze Age Beastiality!” when I heard about how the Minotaur was created, using that weird contraption Daedalus built.
By the way, it would be nice if this blog had an email notification for comments made in reply to the comment a person posts.
c s lewis said in the silver chair that centaurs had 2 stomachs and that they ate grass and other stuff too
i loved the strip your work is amazing
Best of lucks
S