Antaeus

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Character in Greek and Berber mythology

title: "Antaeus" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["greek-giants", "children-of-poseidon", "children-of-gaia", "fictional-half-giants", "libyan-characters-in-greek-mythology", "mythology-of-heracles", "berber-mythology", "kings-in-berber-mythology"] description: "Character in Greek and Berber mythology" topic_path: "general/greek-giants" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antaeus" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Character in Greek and Berber mythology ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox deity"]

FieldValue
typeGreek
nameAntaeus
abodeLibya
parentsPoseidon and Gaea
childrenAlceis or Barce,Iphinoe
deity_ofGiant King of Libya
member_ofthe Libyan Royal Family
consortTinjis
other_namesAnti
imageHerakles Antaios Louvre G103.jpg
captionHeracles and Antaeus, red-figured krater by Euphronios, 515–510 BC, Louvre (G 103)
::

| type = Greek | name = Antaeus | abode = Libya | parents = Poseidon and Gaea | children = Alceis or Barce,Iphinoe | mount = | deity_of = Giant King of Libya | member_of = the Libyan Royal Family | consort = Tinjis | other_names = Anti | image = Herakles Antaios Louvre G103.jpg | caption = Heracles and Antaeus, red-figured krater by Euphronios, 515–510 BC, Louvre (G 103)

Antaeus (; , derived from ), known to the Berbers as Anti, was a figure in Berber and Greek mythology. He was famed for his defeat by Heracles as part of the Labours of Hercules.

Family

In Greek sources, he was the son of Poseidon and Gaia, who lived in the interior desert of Libya. His wife was the goddess Tinge, for whom it was claimed that the city of Tangier in Morocco was named (though it could be the other way around), and he had a daughter named Alceis or Barce. Another daughter, Iphinoe, consorted with Heracles.

Mythology

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Hércules_luchando_con_Anteo,_por_Zurbarán.jpg" caption="Antaeus fighting [[Heracles]], in a 1634 painting by [[Francisco de Zurbarán"] ::

Antaeus would challenge all passers-by to wrestling matches and remained invincible as long as he remained in contact with his mother, the earth. As Greek wrestling, like its modern equivalent, typically attempted to force opponents to the ground, he always won, killing his opponents. He built a temple to his father using their skulls. Antaeus fought Heracles as he was on his way to the Garden of Hesperides as his 11th Labour. Heracles realized that he could not beat Antaeus by throwing or pinning him. Instead, he held him aloft and then crushed him to death in a bear hug.

The contest between Heracles and Antaeus was a favored subject in ancient and Renaissance sculpture.

Location in Africa

Antaeus is placed in the interior desert of Libya. He was probably incorporated into Greek mythology after the Greek colonization of Cyrenaica in the mid-seventh century BC.

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Msoura.jpg" caption="Msoura in 1830"] ::

A location for Antaeus somewhere far within the Berber world might be quite flexible in longitude: when the Roman commander Quintus Sertorius crossed from Hispania to North Africa, he was told by the residents of Tingis (Tangier), far to the west of Libya, that the gigantic remains of Antaeus would be found within a certain tumulus; digging it open, his men found giant bones; closing the site, Sertorius made propitiatory offerings and "helped to magnify the tomb's reputation". It is proposed that this monument is the Msoura stone circle, 50 km from Tangier. In Book IV of Marcus Annaeus Lucanus' epic poem Pharsalia (c. AD 65-61), the story of Heracles' victory over Antaeus is told to the Roman Curio by an unnamed Libyan citizen. The learned client king Juba II (died 23 BC), husband of the daughter of Antony and Cleopatra, claimed his descent from a liaison of Heracles with Tinga, the consort of Antaeus. In his Life of Sertorius cited above, Plutarch recounts what he says to be a local myth, according to which Heracles consorted with Tinge after the death of Antaeus and had by her a son, Sophax, who named the city of Tingis after his mother. Sophax in his turn was father of Diodorus, who conquered many Libyan peoples with his army of Olbians and Mycenaeans brought to Libya by Heracles. Moreover, some related that Heracles had a son, Palaemon, by Iphinoe, the daughter of Antaeus and (presumably) Tinge.

Scholiasts on Pindar's Pythian Ode 9 also recorded a story which made Antaeus king of the Libyan city of Irassa, and the father of a daughter named either Alceis or Barce. Antaeus promised her hand to a race winner just as Danaus had done to find husbands for his daughters. Alexidamus emerged victorious and married the daughter. Three versions of this story with minor variations were collected by the scholiasts; one made Antaeus, king of Irassa, a figure distinct from the Antaeus killed by Heracles; another suggested that both were one and the same.

The ancient city of Barca, possibly located at Marj, Libya, was also called Antapolis after Antaeus.{{cite book |page=182 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LnxTDwAAQBAJ&q=antaeus+ant%C3%A1bulus&pg=PA182|title=The Works of Ibn Wāḍiḥ al-Yaʿqūbī (Volume 1): An English Translation |editor1=Matthew S. Gordon |editor2= Chase F. Robinson |editor3=Everett K. Rowson |editor4= Michael Fishbein |isbn= 9789004364141 |publisher=Brill |date = 2017

Notes

References

References

  1. (30 March 2014). "A Travel Guide to Homer: On the Trail of Odysseus Through Turkey and the Mediterranean, by John Freely, page 151". Bloomsbury Academic.
  2. [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)
  3. [[Gaius Julius Hyginus. Hyginus]], ''Fabulae'' [https://topostext.org/work/206#31 31] & [https://topostext.org/work/206#157 157]
  4. [[Statius]], ''[[Thebaid (Latin poem). Thebaid]]'' 6.893 ff.
  5. [[Lucan]], ''[[Pharsalia]]'' 4.588-655
  6. Ahmed Toufiq. (2019). "في تاريخ المغرب".
  7. [[Scholia]]sts on [[Pindar]], ''Pythian Ode'' 9
  8. [[Plato]], ''Laws'' 7.796a
  9. [[Pausanias (geographer). Pausanias]], 9.11.6
  10. [[Quintus Smyrnaeus]], 6.285 ff.
  11. Tzetzes, ''Chiliades'' 2.363 ff.
  12. [[Diodorus Siculus]], 4.17.4
  13. [[Philostratus of Lemnos]], ''[[Imagines (work by Philostratus). Eikones]]'' 2.21.3 & 2.22.1
  14. [[Pindar]], ''Isthmian Odes'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Pind.+I.+4&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0162:boo=0:chapter=0&highlight=Antaeus 1.4.52 ff.]
  15. [[Josephus. Flavius Josephus]], ''Antiquities of the Jews''
  16. [[Gaius Julius Hyginus. Hyginus]], ''Fabulae'' [https://topostext.org/work/206#31 31]
  17. Apollodorus, 2.5
  18. Diodorus Siculus, 4.18.1 & 4.27.3
  19. Kleiner, Fred S.. (2008-02-01). "Gardner's Art Through the Ages: V. 2: A Global History". Cengage Learning EMEA.
  20. I. Malkin, ''Myth and Territory in the Spartan Mediterranean'', 1994:181-87, giving sources, noted in Robin Lane Fox, ''Travelling Heroes in the Epic Age of Homer'', 2008:182 and note 51.
  21. Fox 2008:182, noting [[Plutarch]], ''Sertorius'' 9.3–4.Fox 2008:182
  22. [http://www.minculture.gov.ma/fr/Tertre%20de%20Mzora.htm Tertre de M'zora] {{Webarchive. link. (2004-06-24 {{in lang). fr
  23. [[Strabo]], 17.3.8 noted in D.W. Roller, ''The World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene'', 2003:54 and 154, and by Fox 2008:182.
  24. [[Pliny the Elder]], ''[[Natural History (Pliny). Naturalis Historia]]'' 5.2–3
  25. [[Plutarch]], ''Life of Sertorius'' [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Sert.+9.4&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0062:boo=0:chapter=0&highlight=Antaeus 9.4]
  26. [[Tzetzes]] on [[Lycophron]], 663
  27. [[Scholia]] on Pindar, ''[[Pindar's First Pythian Ode. Pythian Odes]]'' 9, 185, referring to [[Pherecydes of Athens. Pherecydes]], [[Pisander of Camirus]] and other unspecified writers

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greek-giantschildren-of-poseidonchildren-of-gaiafictional-half-giantslibyan-characters-in-greek-mythologymythology-of-heraclesberber-mythologykings-in-berber-mythology