Final Draft - Preview Matter - Florida State University
Final Draft - Preview Matter - Florida State University
Final Draft - Preview Matter - Florida State University
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study, for not enough evidence survives to support even these three basic ideas for each god or<br />
goddess. The use of animal iconography in the representation of a deity is not enough to label an<br />
animal a totem for a particular people or tribe; in the context of ancient Italy, the iconographic<br />
choice to represent a deity in full or hybrid animal form does not appear to be based on ethnicity.<br />
This forms the sum total of information concerning the appearance of Picus in worship<br />
and cult; our knowledge of this god is scanty at best. 576 He also does not often appear in mythic<br />
narrative beyond his initial metamorphosis from man to bird. We have already mentioned this<br />
god in connection to an episode in Ovid’s Fasti in which Numa captures Picus and Faunus in an<br />
attempt to learn how to expiate a thunderbolt. 577 In addition to a lack of mythic narrative, visual<br />
representations of this god are also quite rare. 578 One possible representation of Picus takes the<br />
form of a small, black gloss amphora (Fig. VI.3). 579 This vessel in the shape of a bird most<br />
closely resembles the green woodpecker (Picus viridis) due to its small, conical beak and<br />
protruding eyes, but also exhibits some human features. 580 Ears jut from the sides of the bird’s<br />
head, arms reach out from beneath the bird’s wings to wrap around the belly of the vessel, and<br />
legs are bent between the bottom of the wings and the base of the amphora. This piece may be<br />
intended to represent a stage of the metamorphosis of Picus from man into bird. If so, the artist<br />
has chosen a dramatic moment in the adventures of this man turned god.<br />
Picus is not the only theriomorphic or therianthropic bird divinity found in Etruscan and<br />
Roman myth, but he is the only one we can identify with any degree of certainty. Furthermore,<br />
bird-man hybrids are so poorly understood that it is not always clear from which species of bird<br />
the hybrids are formed. Three other examples of bird-man hybrids appear in Etruscan and<br />
Roman art, and the context in which these figures are found varies. Another problem that<br />
plagues our understanding of the following bird-men is that surviving examples of these hybrids<br />
are quite limited and thus there is little material on which to base conclusions.<br />
576<br />
Rosivach 1980, 145. Halliday (1922, 111) also notes that Picus belongs more to the realm of myth and folklore<br />
than cult.<br />
577<br />
Ov. Fast. 3.291-326.<br />
578<br />
There is no LIMC entry for the god Picus.<br />
579<br />
Capanna (2000,225) this piece, acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art from a private collection in<br />
Lugnano, may be meant to represent the climax in the story of Picus, the moment of his transformation from man to<br />
woodpecker. Given the unknown provenance of this piece, and its presence in a private collection, it is difficult to<br />
determine whether it is of Roman or Etruscan make. The Etruscans seem to have been interested in Circe’s<br />
handiwork, and scenes depicting the transformation of Odysseus’ men into animals appear on Etruscan cinerary urns<br />
as well as other objects. If we are able to identify this figure as the transformed Roman king Picus, then this is the<br />
only visual representation of the narrative of Picus of which I am aware.<br />
580<br />
Capanna 2000, 225.<br />
117