Laocoon's Influence on Renaissance Artists

A distinguished military veteran and dedicated historian, Pliny the Elder’s work provides us with aspects of everyday life in Ancient Rome, and is a valuable source for knowledge on the state of science in that time. Gaius Plinius Secundus, better known as Pliny the Elder to distinguish himself from his nephew, Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus, wrote as a naturalist, biographer, and historian. Around 79 A.D, Pliny died during the eruption of Vesuvius which decimated Pompeii and Herculaneum, his nephew wrote of these events in his letters to Tacitus . Throughout his lifetime, Pliny obtained many military positions in the government, including administrator of Equestrian Rank and Procurator of Africa.

But in 1905 the archeologist, Ludwig Pollack, discovered the original right arm of Laocoön and it was reconstructed in 1957-60 (“The Vatican” 185). The style of this sculpture is immediately classified as Hellenistic, because of the motion on the bodies of Laocoön and his sons. The agony on their faces portrays the anguish they were feeling at the time of their death, and the bulging muscles, and veins stick out as they try to free themselves of the snakes. The legend says that Laocoön was a Trojan priest of Apollo. The Greeks who had been trying to sack the city of Troy for years were unsuccessful, and devised a new plan. They created the Trojan horse to offer the city of Troy as a promise to stop the fighting. Laocoön saw that this was a trap and tried to warn his fellow Trojans of the danger. When he approached the alter of Poseidon to pray, the Gods Athena and Poseidon depending on which version you read, favored the Greeks and decided to punish Laocoön for his treachery by sending two giant snakes to kill him and his sons. However, there was one Trojan who heeded the warning, his name was Aeneas. Aeneas, fled Troy and this eventually led to the founding of Rome (“Musei Vaticani – sito ufficiale”). There are a lot of different theories just on this one story. I have seen that the snakes were sent by Athena, Poseidon, and even Apollo. There is also debate on whether the Trojan horse was a gift to the city of Troy or an offering to the gods.

At the beginning of Book 2 of The Aeneid, Aeneas tells his story about the fall of Troy. The Greeks constructed a massive wooden horse to which the Trojans believed was an offering goddess Minerva. They then sent one of their youths, Sinon, to give the offering to the Trojans. The Trojans brought the wooden horse into to please the goddess but, the wooden horse was actually a structure to house some Greek soldiers to infiltrate Troy as well as execute a sneak attack when the city was asleep. Similar to guerrilla soldiers, the Greeks exit the wooden horse to begin their attack on the Trojan city. When Aeneas sees the city in flames, he gathers his men to attempt to save Troy. Aeneas attempts to kill as many Greeks as he can, but forced to retreat.

In one of his temper tantrums, Poseidon realized he was not happy with his ocean domain, and wanted to try and overthrow his brother, Zeus, and become king of the gods himself. Poseidon asked for help from Apollo, the god of light and music. Together, they bound Zeus with chains. Zeus had too much strength and power and freed himself very quickly. Zeus was furious with Apollo and Poseidon. As punishment, he sent them to work as laborers for Laomedon, the king of Troy, a city in what is now considered Turkey. Laomedon promised a very big reward if they could build a wall around the city of Troy. However, after they built the wall, Laomedon refused to honor his agreement and did not pay them for their work. In turn, Poseidon and Apollo sent a plague and a sea monster to destroy the city of Troy. (Gall.)

I went to the Cantor Center for Visual Arts on Stanford Campus on 2/28/13. I saw a lot of sculptures and vases there. They are very beautiful and interested. The most interested one I think was Kleophon Painter, “Volute Krater”, ca. 430 BCE, Greece, red-figure terra cotta vase, size 26’ ¾” * 19’ *19’. Hazel D. Hansen Fund, 12, 1972 Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University. This vase is located in the Iris & B Gerald Cantor Center from the classical period between 479-323 BCE in Greece. The Kleophon Painter is an anonymous Athenian vase painter in red figure style. The name he is named because of a youth named “Kleophon”. He is also good at Achilles Painter; a number of “black figure” works in the mid-to-late 5th

Prior to the Trojan War, Helen, the Queen of Sparta, was abducted by the Prince of Troy. Bound by honour, Odysseus led a fleet of twelve ships to Troy and battled for Helen for a decade. The war finally ended when Odysseus outwitted the enemy by feigning retreat and leaving a giant wooden horse behind, called the “Trojan Horse”. The Greeks hid in the horse which the Trojans took in. After the Trojans celebrated their false victory and went to sleep, the Greeks snuck out of the wooden horse and wreaked havoc within the city. Odysseus’ sharp

here is where the cunning of Odysseus shone through. Odysseus had the Greek army built what came to be known as the Trojan horse,a giant hollow wooden horse to give the Trojans as an offering of peace. within the body of the horse, some of the best Greek warriors hid. this was remembered to be referred to, as ''beware Greeks bearing

The ionic frieze of the Parthenon was considered by the Italian traveler and antiquarian Cyriac of Ancona as one of the “noblest images” of the Parthenon. The ionic frieze measures some 160-meters, or 524 feet, and is visible along the upper walls of the cella in addition to across the two porches. Cyriac was one of the first individuals to have sketched the figures on the frieze. The subject of the ionic frieze according to Cyriac was “the victories of the Athenians”. The Doric frieze of the Parthenon in the past presented 92 polychromatic carvings.

Due to Alexander’s great conquests into Egypt and Asia, money was plentiful for the Greeks and new cities had to be built and beautified. This is where we first see new cities being laid out on grids which were introduced by Hippodumus of Miletus in fifth century B.C. However this is just one accomplishment in architecture during the Hellenistic Age. One place we see a change from Classical Greece to Hellenistic is how architects began to move away from the balanced tension and idealism that we saw in the fifth century B.C. With this, they moved toward the sentimental, emotional and realistic mode of the fourth century B.C. One place where we see this is in the marble statue called the Laocoon (see pg. 89) which was carved in Rhodes in the second century B.C. and then later taken to

One last lesson Odysseus and I have both learned is how tricks can sometimes be successful, yet sometimes they can fail. When sly, cunning Odysseus built the wooden horse to send to Troy as a “surrendering” gift, the Greek who said it was an offering to Troy was convincing enough to bribe the soldiers into bringing the horse inside the walls of Troy. Then, Odysseus and his men snuck out of the horse in the night, defeated the Trojan army, and were finally

He makes it seem like his uncle did completely to help the people. He does not mention much about his uncle and his encyclopedia or that he was a naturalist. Pliny the Younger does say in the beginning of the second paragraph, “My uncle was stationed at Misenum , in active command of the fleet.”. That is how he starts the second paragraph. He makes sure you know that he is on a fleet and makes that first thing you read in the paragraph.

The Renaissance time period was home to many new ideas in art. This includes new artists bringing forth ideas that had yet to be discovered and made popular. New themes and types of art were also being brought forward during this period.

The fall of Troy was brought about because the god Minerva helped to fool the Trojans into accepting the wooden horse. Sinon tells the Greeks, "if your hands should harm Minerva's gift, / then vast destruction...would fall on Priam?s kingdom and the Phrygians; / but if it climbed by your hands into Troy, then Asia would repel the Greeks" (II.268-273). Minerva sends a strange sign to confirm this story: two giant serpents rise up from the sea, devour a priest and his two sons, and then slither up to the shrine of Minerva. The Trojans took this as a sign that they must appease the goddess, and so they wheeled the horse into the city of Troy. Throughout the book Aeneas is convinced that the gods are out to get him: "Had the outcome not / been fated by the gods...Troy, you would be standing yet" (II.75-79); "But oh, it is

One of the pieces defining characteristics, what makes it such a marvel, is how the physique is anatomically perfect. This speaks of a highly developed culture, with an intricate understanding of anatomy and physiology. But, also of a culture that privileges physical strength and beauty. The Greeks of the time were either artists or warriors, or often both, so strength and beauty were central in their world. Laocoon and His Sons is a much more naturalistic piece than earlier Greek works; in which the figures were often idolized; lacking luster, life, emotion, humanity. Cleobis and Biton, a set of sculptures from the Archaic Period, exemplify this quite well; posing, rigid, golem like figures; lacking the humanity they are supposed to represent. The Hellenistic baroque style of Laocoon and His Sons gives us a much more true-to-life representation in comparison to earlier works. This work has inspired artists and regular humans alike down through the centuries, one of whom it is particularly well known to have influenced greatly was Michelangelo; as can be seen in some of his pieces; e.g: The rebellious Slave.

When the new upper class movement, Renaissance, occurred in Italy around the 14th century, a revival of the classical forms originally developed by the ancient Greeks and Romans, an intensified concern with secular life, and interest in humanism and assertion of the importance of the individual began. Thus, artists such as Mosaccio and Giotto depicted art that unlike the Middle Ages, showed emotions, feelings, and bright colors, thus demonstrating the deep concern for naturalism in the society. Other artists during the Italian Renaissance period such as Giovanni Bellini began to express their art through secular and religious themes and ideas that were exhibited through landscapes and portraits. As new styles of