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The image of the kneeling slave, designed for the seal of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade, then widely distributed as a cameo manufactured and distributed by Josiah Wedgwood became a powerful abolitionist icon. The image has been seen as both one of victimization and one that acknowledges the agency of the slave. While the former interpretation is understandable given the re-configurations of the image within the polemics of the Abolitionist campaign of the nineteenth century, the original image needs to be examined within the context of its construction. For this, it is necessary to explore the classical nature of the figure, particularly the representations and mythic significance of Hercules. These associations are combined with references to supplication as depicted in earlier token books, religious iconography, contemporary treatises on acting, eighteenth century treatises on gesture and rhetoric, and eighteenth century treatises on phrenology, physiognomy and ethnology. It is the complexity derived from such blending that became simplified and limited in later re-presentations where the image is used in conjunction with sentimental appeals to the benevolence of the viewer. As the classical resonances gave way to sentimental imperatives, the changing array of discourses changed not only the context which gave the image meaning, but reshaped the very image of the kneeling slave in subtle, but significant ways. The result provides us with a complex study of the dynamics of visual rhetoric. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article continues the analyses in Medical History 52 (2008), 73-90, 365-86 of William Harvey's self-understanding as the philosopher and discoverer of the blood's circulation. Harvey brilliantly and subversively assumed the persona of the mythological Hercules to embody his own anatomical labour in De motu cordis et sanguinis (1628). He reprised the role in self-defence against accusations in the College of Physicians, London, of his breach of faith with medical tradition. Harvey sought to usurp the medical epithet 'a second Hercules' by reforming humanist dependence on ancient texts as authoritative medicine. A knowledge of the theory and practice of Renaissance humanism discloses his identification with the Herculean labour of cleansing the Augean stable. He employed anatomical demonstration against Galen's porous cardiac septum, which admitted blood across the ventricles. Harvey's oath mehercule swore against Galen's Dia to assert the necessity of opening an alternate route for the blood flow. His Herculean labour was to dam the cardiac septum and divert the blood flow into a continuous channel through the arteries and veins. His circulation of the blood also imitated Hercules' successful dependence on the force of the water flow to flush the Augean stable. Harvey's copia did not denote a quantitative amount but a powerful supply. Harvey aspired to be, like Hercules, immortal, a term which the College belatedly acknowledged. This cultural analysis exposes Harvey's professional issues and personal ambitions, so to promote a fuller understanding of his historic role in medical discovery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interprets the role of women at the Ara Maxima cult in the fourth century A.D. citing the earliest myths of pre-Romulean Roman history. Ritual exclusion of women in the worship of Hercules at the Ara Maxima; Roman culture and history; Elegaic aetiology of the cult's practices.

The article focuses on the questions or topics included in an article written by B. O. Malatire that was featured in the classical department of the "Journal of Education" on March 15, 1888. It includes a question about the birth of Roman god Hercules. It proposes a question such as the year of the birth of poet Horace.