Post by brobear on May 19, 2024 5:42:52 GMT -5
Continued....
The case of King Arthur, whose name is directly related to the word for bear and who will be considered later, is different. He is not a divinity but a monarch, the most famous in medieval literature. His story is partly connected to an ancient ursine myth, various traces of which are found in several Celtic legends. The figure of the king is associated with the figure of the bear, because for the Celts - as for the Germans, the Balts, and the Slavs - the bear is the king of all the animals, and hence the quintessential royal animal. He retained that status in a large part of Christian Europe throughout the High Middle Ages and even in the period immediately after the year 1000, until the Church, the sworn enemy of the bear, finally succeeded in installing on the throne another animal, the lion.
Continued....
Although they sometimes staged battles in the arena between bears and bulls ( the bears almost always won ), they especially liked to see wild animals brought from Africa or Asia fight one another or against men. Sometimes, however, curiosity made them wonder about the strength of a bear or a bull compared to that of an animal from afar, and so there were battles between bears and lions, bears and panthers, bulls and lions, bulls and an elephant, and even a bear and a rhinoceros. Although bulls, fighting alone or in a group, seem never to have been victorious, a bear always won in single combat against a lion or against several panthers.
Continued....
But that was not enough to make the bear the king of beasts in the eyes of the Romans. Like the Greeks - who had little fondness for animal combat - they preferred to install on the throne either lion or, perhaps more frequently, the elephant. There never seems to have been a battle between a bear and an elephant, but Martial recorded a combat in Rome late in the first century of our era between a bear and a rhinoceros: the latter won easily, piercing the bear's stomach with its horn, then lifting its wounded opponent from the ground with its snout and tossing it in the air several times. A cruel humiliation for the European champion.
*From 'THE BEAR - History of a Fallen King - by Michel Pastoureau' - a book every bear fan should own and read. The bear in the Aesop stories was probably replace (by the church) with the lion.
_______________________________
See Myth & Legend - Original King of Beasts.
The case of King Arthur, whose name is directly related to the word for bear and who will be considered later, is different. He is not a divinity but a monarch, the most famous in medieval literature. His story is partly connected to an ancient ursine myth, various traces of which are found in several Celtic legends. The figure of the king is associated with the figure of the bear, because for the Celts - as for the Germans, the Balts, and the Slavs - the bear is the king of all the animals, and hence the quintessential royal animal. He retained that status in a large part of Christian Europe throughout the High Middle Ages and even in the period immediately after the year 1000, until the Church, the sworn enemy of the bear, finally succeeded in installing on the throne another animal, the lion.
Continued....
Although they sometimes staged battles in the arena between bears and bulls ( the bears almost always won ), they especially liked to see wild animals brought from Africa or Asia fight one another or against men. Sometimes, however, curiosity made them wonder about the strength of a bear or a bull compared to that of an animal from afar, and so there were battles between bears and lions, bears and panthers, bulls and lions, bulls and an elephant, and even a bear and a rhinoceros. Although bulls, fighting alone or in a group, seem never to have been victorious, a bear always won in single combat against a lion or against several panthers.
Continued....
But that was not enough to make the bear the king of beasts in the eyes of the Romans. Like the Greeks - who had little fondness for animal combat - they preferred to install on the throne either lion or, perhaps more frequently, the elephant. There never seems to have been a battle between a bear and an elephant, but Martial recorded a combat in Rome late in the first century of our era between a bear and a rhinoceros: the latter won easily, piercing the bear's stomach with its horn, then lifting its wounded opponent from the ground with its snout and tossing it in the air several times. A cruel humiliation for the European champion.
*From 'THE BEAR - History of a Fallen King - by Michel Pastoureau' - a book every bear fan should own and read. The bear in the Aesop stories was probably replace (by the church) with the lion.
_______________________________
See Myth & Legend - Original King of Beasts.
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