Icarus
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
| Revision as of 22:54, 12 December 2008 Jahsonic (Talk | contribs) ← Previous diff |
Revision as of 22:54, 12 December 2008 Jahsonic (Talk | contribs) Next diff → |
||
| Line 3: | Line 3: | ||
| '''Icarus''' is a character in [[Greek mythology]]. He is the son of [[Daedalus]] and is commonly known for his attempt to escape Crete by flight, which ended in a [[fall]] to his death. | '''Icarus''' is a character in [[Greek mythology]]. He is the son of [[Daedalus]] and is commonly known for his attempt to escape Crete by flight, which ended in a [[fall]] to his death. | ||
| - | Icarus' father, [[Daedalus]], a talented craftsman, attempted to escape from his exile in Crete, where he and his son were imprisoned at the hands of [[King Minos]], the king for whom he had built the [[Labyrinth]] to imprison the [[Minotaur]]. Daedalus, the master craftsman, was exiled because he gave Minos' daughter, Ariadne, a clew of string in order to help [[Theseus]] survive the Labyrinth. | + | Icarus' father, [[Daedalus]], a talented craftsman, attempted to escape from his exile in Crete, where he and his son were imprisoned at the hands of [[King Minos]], the king for whom he had built the [[Labyrinth]] to imprison the [[Minotaur]]. Daedalus, the master craftsman, was exiled because he gave Minos' daughter, [[Ariadne]], a clew of [[string]] in order to help [[Theseus]] survive the Labyrinth. |
| Daedalus fashioned a pair of wings of wax and feathers for himself and his son. Before they took off from the island, Daedalus warned his son not to fly too close to the sun, nor too close to the sea. Overcome by the giddiness that flying lent him, Icarus soared through the sky curiously, but in the process he came too close to the [[sun]], which melted the wax. Icarus kept flapping his wings but soon realized that he had no feathers left and that he was only flapping his bare arms. And so, Icarus fell into the sea in the area which bears his name, the Icarian Sea near [[Icaria]], an island southwest of [[Samos Island|Samos]]. | Daedalus fashioned a pair of wings of wax and feathers for himself and his son. Before they took off from the island, Daedalus warned his son not to fly too close to the sun, nor too close to the sea. Overcome by the giddiness that flying lent him, Icarus soared through the sky curiously, but in the process he came too close to the [[sun]], which melted the wax. Icarus kept flapping his wings but soon realized that he had no feathers left and that he was only flapping his bare arms. And so, Icarus fell into the sea in the area which bears his name, the Icarian Sea near [[Icaria]], an island southwest of [[Samos Island|Samos]]. | ||
Revision as of 22:54, 12 December 2008
|
Related e |
|
Featured: |
Icarus is a character in Greek mythology. He is the son of Daedalus and is commonly known for his attempt to escape Crete by flight, which ended in a fall to his death.
Icarus' father, Daedalus, a talented craftsman, attempted to escape from his exile in Crete, where he and his son were imprisoned at the hands of King Minos, the king for whom he had built the Labyrinth to imprison the Minotaur. Daedalus, the master craftsman, was exiled because he gave Minos' daughter, Ariadne, a clew of string in order to help Theseus survive the Labyrinth.
Daedalus fashioned a pair of wings of wax and feathers for himself and his son. Before they took off from the island, Daedalus warned his son not to fly too close to the sun, nor too close to the sea. Overcome by the giddiness that flying lent him, Icarus soared through the sky curiously, but in the process he came too close to the sun, which melted the wax. Icarus kept flapping his wings but soon realized that he had no feathers left and that he was only flapping his bare arms. And so, Icarus fell into the sea in the area which bears his name, the Icarian Sea near Icaria, an island southwest of Samos.
Hellenistic writers who provided philosophical underpinnings to the myth also preferred more realistic variants, in which the escape from Crete was actually by boat, provided by Pasiphaë, for which Daedalus invented the first sails, to outstrip Minos' pursuing galleys, and that Icarus fell overboard en route to Sicily and drowned. Heracles erected a tomb for him.
Icarus in modern culture
Icarus is widely regarded as a metaphor for a social fall, and this is taken into its full extreme in Walter Tevis' novel The Man Who Fell to Earth. Both it, and the subsequent film reference Icarus, and the hero, a slowly corrupted and disillusioned extraterrestrial, has Brueghel's painting of the story on his wall.
Namesakes
I as in Icarus , French film
