Hercule file aux pieds d’Iole · Centre for Early Modern Visual Culture

Title: Hercule file aux pieds d’Iole
Period: 1400-1450;
Geographic: Aetolia
Description: When King Eurytus of Aetolia broke his promise to Hercules that he could marry his daughter, Hercules took revenge and killed him. He married Iole, but Iole wanted to avenge her father’s death. To do so, she turned Hercules from being a strong, abrasive, masculine man, to a feminine, soft, gentle man. She knew that if she could change the man he was, she would truly avenge her father’s murder. In the image, Hercules wears a yellow cloak and is using instruments for weaving – something Iole taught him to do. He sits in a feminine position and looks weak and old, rather than powerful and strong. Iole and another young woman sit across from him, Iole wearing the blue gown.
Image Creator: Master of the Cleres Femmes of the Duke of Berry (Illuminator)
Type: Text; Illumination
Identifier: mta:19830
Language: fre
Source Name: Livre des Femmes Nobles et Renommées
Parent Collection: 1403 Paris; 1403 Paris
Image: mta_19830_OBJ.png
Collection: Early Modern Women
Subject: Murder; Femininity; Masculinity; Gender; Hercules