Tanato

Tanato (nome sdrucciolo: Tànato) o Thánatos (dal greco θάνατος, "Morte"), è, nella mitologia greca, la personificazione della morte. È figlio della Notte (o di Astrea) per partenogenesi (o da Erebo), nonché fratello gemello di Ipno, il dio del sonno (Ὕπνος, il Sonno).
È citato anche come "Colui che governa la morte" e "Legione Suprema". Nonostante l'importante funzione nella mitologia greca, è raramente rappresentato come persona.

Nel mito e nella poesia

Esiodo, nella sua Teogonia (vv.211-212) fa nascere Tanato dalla Nyx (Nύξ, Notte), assieme al fratello gemello Hypnos (Ὕπνος, il Dio Del Sonno). Altri fratelli erano Moros (Μόρος, il Destino inevitabile), Ker (Κήρ, la Morte violenta), gli Oneiroi (Ὄνειροι, la Stirpe dei Sogni) e con le Moire, delle quali fu spesso associato alla figura di Atropo, dea della morte lei stessa.
Sempre Esiodo descrive l'insensibilità di Tanato alle implorazioni degli umani:

«Hanno le case qui della torbida Notte i figliuoli
la Morte e il Sonno Numi terribili; e mai non li mira
lo scintillante Sole coi raggi né quando egli ascende
il ciel né quando giú dal cielo discende. Di questi
sopra la terra l'uno sul dorso infinito del mare
mite sorvola ha cuore di miele per gli nomini tutti:
di ferro ha l'altra il cuore di bronzo implacabile in petto
l'alma gli siede; e quando ghermito ha una volta un mortale
più non lo lascia; e lei detestano sin gl'Immortali.»

(Esiodo, Teogonia, vv. 758-766)

Omero, nell'Iliade, definisce Ipno e Tanato come gemelli (da qui la celebre locuzione latina consanguineus lethi sopor) e descrive come furono mandati da Zeus su richiesta di Apollo, per recuperare il corpo di Sarpedonte, ucciso da Patroclo, per portarlo in Licia per ricevere gli onori funebri.

«Dall’alma il corpo, al dolce Sonno imponi
Ed alla Morte, che alla licia gente
Il portino. I fratelli ivi e gli amici
L’onoreranno di funereo rito
E di tomba e di cippo, alle defunte
Anime forti onor supremo e caro.
[...]
D’immortal veste avvolgi: indi alla Morte
Ed al Sonno gemelli fa precetto
Che all’opime di Licia alme contrade»

(Omero, Iliade vv. 453-458 e 681-683)

Il carattere di Tanato è arrogante e impulsivo, amante del sangue e della violenza, quale potenza inevitabile e inflessibile. Nemico implacabile del genere umano, odioso anche agli immortali, ha fissato il suo soggiorno nel Tartaro o dinanzi alla porta dell'"Elisio" e degli "Inferi". Tanato ha un cuore di ferro, venne a meno in un mito popolare già citato da Omero e sviluppato nel dramma satiresco Sisifo fuggitivo di Eschilo (Σίσυφος Πετροκυλιστής, Sisýphos drapétes, V sec a.C.), dove Zeus per punire Sisifo, re di Corinto, mandò Tanato per rinchiuderlo nel Tartaro. Ma quando Tanato giunse a casa di Sisifo, questi lo fece ubriacare e lo legò con catene, imprigionandolo. Con Tanato incatenato, la morte scomparve dal mondo. Il dio Ares, quando si accorse che durante le battaglie non moriva più nessuno e che quindi non avevano più senso, si mosse per liberare Tanato e prendere Sisifo.
Sisifo riuscì una seconda volta a sfuggire alla morte convincendo Persefone di farlo tornare per un giorno da sua moglie sostenendo che lei non era mai riuscita a dargli un funerale appropriato (in realtà aveva imposto alla moglie Merope di non seppellire il suo corpo). Questa seconda volta Sisifo fu trascinato nell'oltretomba, fino nel Tartaro, da Hermes, quando rifiutò di accettare la propria morte; in più fu condannato per l'eternità a trascinare, in cima a una collina, un macigno che poi sarebbe rotolato giù.
Sisifo viene anche ripreso da Alceo di Mitilene. In un frammento di una sua lirica è riportato:

«Il re Sisifo, il più astuto dei re, supponeva di poter controllare la morte; però, nonostante i suoi inganni, attraversò due volte l'Akeron al comando del fato.»

(Alceo, Frammento 38a)

Se Sisifo fu l'unico che poté sfuggire all'inesorabile Tanato grazie all'inganno, Eracle fu l'unico che poté sfuggire grazie alla sua forza, come inscenò Euripide nella tragedia Alcesti.

Altri miti

In qualità di divinità psicopompa, a volte la sua figura si confonde con quella di Hermes, in particolare nel periodo più antico. Spesso fu associato, oltre i suoi fratelli, anche ad altre personificazioni negative come Geras (la Vecchiaia), Oizys (la Sofferenza), Apate (l'Inganno), Eris (la Discordia). Occasionalmente è visto come la Morte in pace, in contrapposizione a sua sorella Ker, la Morte violenta.
Il suo nome è traslitterato in latino come Thanatus, e veniva corrisposto a "Mors" o, più raramente, a Orco.

Rappresentazioni

Durante il periodo tardo Imperiale, quando la transizione dalla vita ai Campi Elisi veniva intesa come una fine più accettabile, Tantato cominciò ad essere visto come un meraviglioso efebo e divenne associato più al gentile trapasso che ad una terribile minaccia. Molti sacofaghi romani lo ritraggono come un fanciullo alato al pari di Cupido: come osservò Arthur Bernard Cook, "Eros con le gambe incrociate e la torcia rovesciata divenne il più comune simbolo della Morte".
Sovente era rapprenentato con la Torcia girata quale simbolo della vita che si estingue, o con una farfalla in mano (ψυχή [psiche], oltre a farfalla, può significare anche anima, vita) oppure con un fiore di papavero sonnifero, simbolo che condivideva col fratello Hypnos, col quale spesso era in compagnia.
Se rappresentato come adulto, sempre alato, spesso è armato di Spada, come nell'Alcesti di Euripide, il quale lo descrive anche vestito di nero. La lettera a lui associata è la Theta, la sua iniziale in greco, nonché il simbolo Theta nigrum.

Thanatos come un giovane alato armato di spada. Scultura sul timpano di una colonna del Tempio di Artemide a Efeso, circa 325–300 a.C.

sconosciuto - Marie-Lan Nguyen (User:Jastrow), 2007

Winged youth with a sword, probably Thanatos, personification of death. Detail of a sculptured marble column drum from the Temple of Artemis at Ephesos, ca. 325-300 BC. Found at the south-west corner of the temple.

Mors

Nella mitologia e nella letteratura dell'antica Roma, Mors (noto anche come Letus ) è la personificazione della morte ed equivale al greco Tanato. Il sostantivo latino "mors", genitivo "mortis", è di genere femminile, ma generalmente nelle rappresentazioni artistiche dell'antica Roma la morte non è mai stata rappresentata come donna; i poeti latini erano invece vincolati dal genere grammaticale della parola e si riferivano generalmente a Mors come fosse di genere femminile.

Mors Principium Est by The-Golden-God

Thanatos

In Greek mythology, Thanatos (/ˈθænətɒs/; Greek: Θάνατος, pronounced in Ancient Greek: [tʰánatos] "Death", from θνῄσκω thnēskō "to die, be dying") was the personification of death. He was a minor figure in Greek mythology, often referred to but rarely appearing in person.
His name is transliterated in Latin as Thanatus, but his equivalent in Roman mythology is Mors or Letum.^{[citation needed]} Mors is sometimes erroneously identified with Orcus, whose Greek equivalent was Horkos, God of the Oath.^{[citation needed]}

In myth and poetry

The Greek poet Hesiod established in his Theogony that Thánatos is a son of Nyx (Night) and Erebos (Darkness) and twin of Hypnos (Sleep).
Homer also confirmed Hypnos and Thanatos as twin brothers in his epic poem, the Iliad, where they were charged by Zeus via Apollo with the swift delivery of the slain hero Sarpedon to his homeland of Lycia.

"Then (Apollon) gave him [Sarpedon] into the charge of swift messengers to carry him, of Hypnos and Thanatos, who are twin brothers, and these two presently laid him down within the rich countryside of broad Lycia."

Counted among Thanatos' siblings were other negative personifications such as Geras (Old Age), Oizys (Suffering), Moros (Doom), Apate (Deception), Momus (Blame), Eris (Strife), Nemesis (Retribution) and even the Acherousian/Stygian boatman Charon. Thanatos was loosely associated with the three Moirai (for Hesiod, also daughters of Night), particularly Atropos, who was a goddess of death in her own right. He is also occasionally specified as being exclusive to peaceful death, while the bloodthirsty Keres embodied violent death. His duties as a Guide of the Dead were sometimes superseded by Hermes Psychopompos. Conversely, Thanatos may have originated as a mere aspect of Hermes before later becoming distinct from him.^{[citation needed]}
The god's character is established by Hesiod in the following passage of the Theogony:

And there the children of dark Night have their dwellings, Sleep and Death, awful gods. The glowing Sun never looks upon them with his beams, neither as he goes up into heaven, nor as he comes down from heaven. And the former of them roams peacefully over the earth and the sea's broad back and is kindly to men; but the other has a heart of iron, and his spirit within him is pitiless as bronze: whomsoever of men he has once seized he holds fast: and he is hateful even to the deathless gods.

Thanatos was thus regarded as merciless and indiscriminate, hated by – and hateful towards — mortals and gods alike. But in myths which feature him, Thanatos could occasionally be outwitted, a feat that the sly King Sisyphus of Korinth twice accomplished. When it came time for Sisyphus to die, Zeus ordered Thanatos to chain Sisyphus up in Tartarus. Sisyphus cheated death by tricking Thanatos into his own shackles, thereby prohibiting the demise of any mortal while Thanatos was so enchained.
Eventually Ares, the bloodthirsty god of war, grew frustrated with the battles he incited since neither side suffered any casualties. He released Thanatos and handed his captor over to the god. Sisyphus would evade Death a second time by convincing Persephone to allow him to return to his wife stating that she never gave him a proper funeral. This time, Sisyphus was forcefully dragged back to the Underworld by Hermes when Sisyphus refused to accept his death. Sisyphus was sentenced to an eternity of frustration in Tartarus where he rolled a boulder up a hill and it would roll back down when he got close to the top.^{[citation needed]}
A fragment of Alcaeus, a Greek lyric poet of the 6th century BC, refers to this episode:

"King Sisyphos, son of Aiolos, wisest of men, supposed that he was master of Thanatos; but despite his cunning he crossed eddying Akheron twice at fate's command."

Sisyphus, son of Aiolos was a more than mortal figure: for mortals Thanatos usually presents an inexorable fate, but he was only once successfully overpowered, by the mythical hero Heracles. Thanatos was consigned to take the soul of Alkestis, who had offered her life in exchange for the continued life of her husband, King Admetos of Pherai. Heracles was an honored guest in the House of Admetos at the time, and he offered to repay the king's hospitality by contending with Death itself for Alkestis' life. When Thanatos ascended from Hades to claim Alkestis, Heracles sprung upon the god and overpowered him, winning the right to have Alkestis revived. Thanatos fled, cheated of his quarry.
Euripides, in Alcestis:

"Thanatos: Much talk. Talking will win you nothing. All the same, the woman goes with me to Hades' house. I go to take her now, and dedicate her with my sword, for all whose hair is cut in consecration by this blade's edge are devoted to the gods below."

In art

An Orphic Hymn invoked Thanatos:

"To Thanatos, Fumigation from Manna.

Hear me, O Death, whose empire unconfin'd
extends to mortal tribes of ev'ry kind.
On thee, the portion of our time depends,
whose absence lengthens life, whose presence ends.

Thy sleep perpetual bursts the vivid folds
by which the soul, attracting body holds :
common to all, of ev'ry sex and age,
for nought escapes thy all-destructive rage.

Not youth itself thy clemency can gain,
vigorous and strong, by thee untimely slain.
In thee the end of nature’s works is known,
in thee all judgment is absolved alone.
No suppliant arts thy dreadful rage control,
no vows revoke the purpose of thy soul.
O blessed power, regard my ardent prayer,

and human life to age abundant spare.

In later eras, as the transition from life to death in Elysium became a more attractive option, Thanatos came to be seen as a beautiful Ephebe. He became associated more with a gentle passing than a woeful demise. Many Roman sarcophagi depict him as a winged boy, very much akin to Cupid: "Eros with crossed legs and torch reversed became the commonest of all symbols for Death", observes Arthur Bernard Cook.
Thanatos has also been portrayed as a slumbering infant in the arms of his mother Nyx, or as a youth carrying a butterfly (the ancient Greek word "ψυχή" can mean soul or butterfly, or life, amongst other things) or a wreath of poppies (poppies were associated with Hypnos and Thanatos because of their hypnogogic traits and the eventual death engendered by overexposure to them).
He is often shown carrying an inverted torch (holding it upside down in his hands), representing a life extinguished. He is usually described as winged and with a sword sheathed at his belt. In Euripides' Alcestis (438 BCE), he is depicted dressed in black and carrying a sword. Thanatos was rarely portrayed in art without his twin brother Hypnos.
Thanatos is also famously shown on the Euphronios Krator where he and his brother Hypnos are shown carrying the body of Sarpedon to his home for burial.

In psychology and medicine

According to Sigmund Freud, humans have a life instinct—which he named "Eros"—and a death drive, which is commonly called (though not by Freud himself) "Thanatos". This postulated death drive allegedly compels humans to engage in risky and self-destructive acts that could lead to their own death. Behaviors such as thrill seeking and aggression are viewed as actions which stem from this Thanatos instinct.
However, some scientists argue that there is little evidence that most people have a specific drive toward self-destruction. According to them, the behaviors Freud studied can be explained by simpler, known processes, such as salience biases (e.g., a person abuses drugs because the promise of immediate pleasure is more compelling than the intellectual knowledge of harm sometime in the future) and risk calculations (e.g., a person drives recklessly or plays dangerous sports because the increases in status and reproductive success outweigh the risk of injury or death).
Thanatophobia is the fear of things associated with or reminiscent of death and mortality, such as corpses or graveyards. It is related to necrophobia, although the latter term typically refers to a specific fear of dead bodies rather than a fear of death in general.
Thanatology is the academic and scientific study of death among human beings. It investigates the circumstances surrounding a person's death, the grief experienced by the deceased's loved ones, and larger social attitudes towards death such as ritual and memorialization. It is primarily an interdisciplinary study, frequently undertaken by professionals in nursing, psychology, sociology, psychiatry, social work and veterinary science. It also describes bodily changes that accompany death and the after-death period.
Thanatophoric dysplasia, so named because of its lethality at birth, is the most common lethal congenital skeletal dysplasia with an estimated prevalence of one in 6,400 to one in 16,700 births. Its name Thanatophoros, means "death-bearing" in Greek.
Euthanasia, "good death" in Greek, is the act or practice of ending the life of an individual who would otherwise experience severe, incurable suffering or disability. It typically involves lethal injection or the suspension of extraordinary medical treatment. Doctor Jack Kevorkian named his euthanasia device the Thanatron.

Hypnos (left) and Thanatos (right) carrying dead Sarpedon, while Hermes watches. Inscriptions in ancient Greek read HVPNOS-HERMES-θΑΝΑΤΟS (here written vice versa). Attic red-figured calyx-krater, 515 BC.

Jaime Ardiles-Arce (photographer). Krater by Euphronios (painter) and Euxitheos (potter). - File:Euphronios krater - front.jpg

Sarpedon’s body carried by Hypnos and Thanatos (Sleep and Death), while Hermes watches. Side A of the so-called “Euphronios krater”, Attic red-figured calyx-krater signed by Euxitheos (potter) and Euphronios (painter), ca. 515 BC. H. 45.7 cm (18 in.); D. 55.1 cm (21 11/16 in.). Formerly in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (L.2006.10); Returned to Italy and exhibited in Rome as of January, 2008.

Mors

In ancient Roman myth and literature, Mors (also known as Letum) is the personification of death equivalent to the Greek Thánatos and the Mara (Hindu goddess). The Latin noun for "death", mors, genitive mortis, is of feminine gender, but surviving ancient Roman art is not known to depict Death as a woman. Latin poets, however, are bound by the grammatical gender of the word. Horace writes of pallida Mors, "pale Death," who kicks her way into the hovels of the poor and the towers of kings equally. Seneca, for whom Mors is also pale, describes her "eager teeth." Tibullus pictures Mors as black or dark.
Mors is often represented allegorically in later Western literature and art, particularly during the Middle Ages. Depictions of the Crucifixion of Christ sometimes show Mors standing at the foot of the cross. Mors' antithesis is personified as Vita, "Life."

Genealogy

Mors is the offspring of Nox (Night), and sibling to the personification of sleep, Somnus.^{[citation needed]}

Roman mythology

Mors is often connected to Mars, the Roman god of war; Pluto, the god of the underworld; and Orcus, god of death and punisher of perjurers. He also is not immune to being tricked or resisted.
In one story, Hercules fought Mors in order to save his friend's wife. In other stories, Mors is shown as a servant to Pluto, ending the life of a person after the thread of their life has been cut by the Parcae, and of Mercury, messenger to the gods, escorting the dead person`s soul, or shade, down to the underworld's gate.

MORS Roman mythology

Archaeological Museum, Athens - Thanatos

Copia romana di un originale della scuola di Pasitele (fine del secolo I a.C), esposta nella stanza 31 del Museo archeologico nazionale di Atene

Giovanni Dall'Orto - Opera propria

Morte di Sarpedonte Anfora Attica (500-490 a.C.), dall'Italia, Parigi, Musée du Louvre

Diosphos Painter - User:Bibi Saint-Pol, own work, 2007-06-15

Death of Sarpedon. Side A from an Attic black-figured neck-amphora, 500–490 BC. From Italy.

Hypnos and Thanatos carrying the body of Sarpedon from the battlefield of Troy; detail from an Attic white-ground lekythos, ca. 440 BC.

Thanatos Painter (eponymous vase) - The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202. Permission: . Image renamed from Image:Thanatos-Maler 001.jpg

Hypnos and Thanatos carrying the body of Sarpedon from the battlefield of Troy. Detail from an Attic white-ground lekythos, ca. 440 BC

Eros Thanatos alato con torcia capovolta e gambe incrociante, (III sec a. C.), Stoà di Attalo, Atene

Giovanni Dall'Orto. - Opera propria

Figurina di Eros in terracotta, del secolo III d.C. Il fatto che il dio si appoggi ad una torcia capovolta (e quindi in via di spegniomento) fa pensare che si tratti del suo opposto, Anteros. Esposto nel Museo dell'antica agorà ad Atene, alloggiato nello Stoà di Attalo. Foto di Giovanni Dall'Orto, 9 novembre 2009.

Depiction of Thanatos by Mexican artist Mauricio García Vega

Mauricio García Vega - Painting and photograph of Mauricio García Vega

1 Painting Tanatos (Thanatos) by Mauricio García Vega

Sonno e suo fratello Morte figli della Notte, di Evelyn De Morgan (1883)

Hypnos and Thanatos: Sleep and His Half-Brother Death, by John William Waterhouse, 1874.

Kupferstich (1795) von Tommaso Piroli (1752 – 1824) nach einer Zeichnung (1793) von John Flaxman (1755 – 1826).

H.-P.Haack - Antiquariat Dr. Haack Leipzig

thanatos

Malczewski Thanatos

Jacek Malczewski - www.pinakoteka.zascianek.pl

tra il 1898 e il 1899

AlcestisHerculesLeighton

Frederic Leighton

1869-71

Thanatos: The Greek God Of Death - (Greek Mythology Explained) - YouTube

YouTube

Thanatos: The Greek God Of Death - (Greek Mythology Explained)

Eros y Thanatos

Nath Planas from asuncion, paraguay

2011

Thanatos

Jacek Malczewski - Moje życie, prawa część tryptyku 1911

thanatos

Jacek Maleczewski-Thanatos II-1899

Jacek Malczewski - Scanned from book "Akt Polski" by Maria Poprzęcka, Edipresse Polska, 2006, ISBN 83-7477-066-X, page 36

Thanatos

Johann Heinrich Füssli

1803

Thanatos - relief by Johann Gottfried Schadow for a side panel on the tomb of Count Alexander von der Mark.

James Steakley - Opera propria

tra il 1788 e il 1789

Gravestone showing Thanatos - greek god of death (Old Cemetery - Siedlce, Poland )

Polinka198 - Opera propria

Thanatos (Earth-616)

Sculpture "Thanatos draagt zijn tweelingbroer Hypnos" (Thanatos carries his twin brother Hypnos) by Jack Poell in 1986. Placed at the Sint Pieterstraat in front of the Molenhof in 2008. Used to be at the Ankerkade.

Brbbl - Opera propria

Greek Mythology: Story of Thanatos - YouTube

YouTube

Greek Mythology: Story of Thanatos

Der Tod als Jüngling mit gesenkter Fackel (Bernhard Rode).file:

James Steakley; artwork: Bernhard Rode - Das Jahrhundert der Freundschaft. Johann Wilhelm Ludwig Gleim und seine Zeitgenossen, ed. Ute Pott (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2004), p. 39.

Greek Primordial Thanatos God of Death! by AnarchyTwisted500

Hardt-Anlagen, Wuppertal. Denkmal für Johann Anton Stephan Diemel (Wuppertaler Wundarzt, 1763-1821). Die Figur ist ein Thanatos

Atamari

thanatos

Thanatos from Olbia. First c. AD Odessa Archeological Museum

Venzz - Opera propria

Recovery of the corpse of Memnon, red-figure kylix (drinking cup)

Roscher, Wilhelm Heinrich, 1845-1923, aus Overbeck, Gatt. her. Bildw. Taf. XXII, 14 - Ausführliches Lexikon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie (1894) Volume: 2:2 on archive.org (S. 2677, Abb. 4) Original: British Museum 834 (veröffentlicht von Sam. Birch, Archaeologia 29 pl. 16 d. 139ff.