In art, Asclepius is represented as a bearded man of ripe years, with singularly noble features, from which the kindly benevolence of a benefactor of mankind looks forth. He is generally accompanied by a serpent, as a symbol of self-renovating vital power, which he is feeding and caressing, or which is more commonly represented as creeping up his staff. Such is the conception in the engraving (Fig. 32), which is after a statue preserved at Berlin. As the god of healing, he has also other attributes—a bowl containing the healing draught, a bunch of herbs, a pine-apple, or a dog; the latter being a symbol of the vigilance with which the physician watches disease.
There are numerous extant statues of the god, although the great statue in gold and ivory of the temple at Epidaurus has been entirely lost. A fine head of colossal proportions was discovered on the Isle of Melos, and is now an ornament of the British Museum (Fig. 33). There is, on the other hand, a very fine statue without a head in existence at Athens, near the temple of Zeus. There are, moreover, celebrated statues in Florence, Paris, and Rome (Vatican); in the last case, of a beardless Æsculapius.
2. Inferior Deities of Birth and Healing.—The Greeks also honoured Ilithyia as a goddess of birth. This appears to have been originally a surname of Hera, as a deity who succoured women in childbirth. Hygiea was looked on as a goddess of health, and was described as a daughter of Asclepius.
The Romans had no need of a special goddess presiding over birth, although they honoured a deity often identified with Hygiea, whom they called Strenia, or Salus. As guardian of the chamber of birth, they honoured Carna, or Cardea, who was supposed to drive away the evil Striges (screech owls) that came at night to suck the blood of the new-born child. Carna was further regarded as the protectress of physical health. Another of these inferior deities, of whom men sought long life and continued health, bore the name of Anna Perenna (the circling year).
Fig. 34.—Night and the Fates. From Carstens.
4. Deities of Fate.
1. Mœræ (Parcæ).—The Mœræ, better known by the Latin name of Parcæ, really denote that portion of a man’s life and fortune which is determined from his birth; so that, in this sense, there are as many Mœræ as individuals. The Greeks, however, who were wont to revere all such indefinite numbers under the sacred number three, generally recognised three. These they regarded as the dark and inexplicable powers of fate, daughters of the night. Their names were Clotho (spinner), Lachesis (allotter), and Atropos (inevitable).
Only two Parcæ were originally known to the Romans, but a third was afterwards added to make their own mythology harmonise with that of the Greeks.
The popular conception of the Parcæ as grave hoary women was not followed in art, where they always appear as young. In the first instance, their attributes were all alike, separate functions not yet having been allotted to them. But at a subsequent period it was Clotho who spun, Lachesis who held, and Atropos who cut the thread of life. This arrangement was first adopted by later artists, who generally give Clotho a spindle, Lachesis a roll of parchment, and Atropos a balance, or let the last point to the hour of death on a dial. Such is the case in a talented creation of Carstens, in which the conception of modern times is brought into harmony with the ideal of antiquity (Fig. 34).