Hercules - Waddesdon Manor, Buckinghamshire, UK
Posted by: Dragontree
N 51° 50.581 W 000° 56.544
30U E 641741 N 5745580
This mid-18th century statue of Hercules appears in the grounds of Waddesdon Manor. This valuable and important collection is attributed to Ferdinand de Rothschild and is maintained by The National Trust with the Rothschild Charity today.
Waymark Code: WMA2Y6
Location: South East England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 11/08/2010
Views: 3
Grade II Listed on 29th January 1985 this statue is of carved marble and is made by Laurent Delvaux in about 1725. The statue was probably made for Wanstead House in Essex with another statue of Omphale, Queen of Lydia. Hercules holds a distaff which symbolises his three year humiliation when he was a slave to Omphale; he was being punished for murder. He also holds a tambourine and stands on a 19th century pedestal.
Wikipedia describes Hercules:
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'Hercules is the Roman name for the Greek demigod Heracles, son of Jupiter (the Roman equivalent of Zeus), and the mortal Alcmena. Early Roman sources suggest that the imported Greek hero supplanted a mythic Italic shepherd called "Recaranus" or "Garanus", famous for his strength, who dedicated the Ara Maxima that became associated with the earliest Roman cult of Hercules. While adopting much of the Greek Heracles' iconography and mythology as his own, Hercules adopted a number of myths and characteristics that were distinctly Roman. With the spread of Roman hegemony, Hercules was worshiped locally from Hispania through Gaul.'